Martin and I will be reporting from the New Yorker Festival throughout the weekend, so look for our frequent reports! In the meantime, there are a few other people we’d like you to meet. —E.G.

Toby Gardner: With the New Yorker Festival upon us and so many events scattered across the city, the Emdashes Powers That Be (EPTB) saw the need for a new strategy: the Pepper Mill, whereby several correspondents are sprinkled throughout the proceedings like so many flavor-enhancing spices. And I am one of their new recruits. I hope I get called up for tonight’s chat between Miranda July and A.M. Homes on Deviants. There’s also a Town Hall meeting about the war in Iraq, but how relevant is that, really?

Although EPTB offered to pay off my student loans in exchange for my services, I said that really wouldn’t be necessary. [While we’re at it, we really should pay off ours, too. —Ed.] The honor to help cover this exciting festival is payment enough. So if you see a bald guy with a Mac G4 and a winning attitude, say hello. I’ll be working hard to make ensure that Operation Pepper Mill is a success.

Quin Browne will be covering a couple of events for Emdashes this weekend. She was born in New Orleans under one name, and writes in New York under this one. Blatherings about this and that can be found at www.fmdn.blogspot.com; actual shorts are located under her name at www.sixsentences.blogspot.com.

Tiffany De Vos’s name and musical tastes owe much to the ’80s. She is a poet, pet chinchilla enthusiast, and teacher. Her stories and poems have appeared in Pedestal, The Saint Ann’s Review, Washington Square, Small Spiral Notebook, and the Global City Review. Her hair often falls over her right eye, but she is by no means a hipster.