my bad…

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I know, I fell of the National Conference Blogging Bandwagon. Totally sorry.

Thursday started off with an early morning meeting with my wonderful agent, Deidre Knight. I love this woman. We plotted out my career goals for the next year and chatted a lot…while I ate a big ass plate of pancakes and a pound of bacon. Not that I was hungover or anything. Just wobbly.

Thursday was a quiet day spent meeting and greeting old friends and getting ready for The Literacy Signing and the RWA Online Chapter party.

Here are a few pics from Wednesday and Thursday. More to come soon. Sorry Killer and Fishdog, no boob shots today.

Chris the Wonder Waiter


Jenna Mayson, Adrian Wood, Kate Pearce, Nic Montreuil

Before Drag Queen Karaoke

During Drag Queen Karaoke

On the ride home from Drag Queen Karaoke

not time for details yet…

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Good morning, peeps.

It’s too early to give the details from last night, however there is one thing I will tell you.

None of those tits belonged to Gena Showalter or Jill Monroe because they totally dissed us and did not show up last night.

I think you should all comment on their blogs and let them know how disappointed you are….

Seriously.

Do it.

wine with barbara samuel

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A group of us met up with Barbara Samuel in the bar today. (I know you’re noticing a theme in each post, but honestly, what can I do?)

Barbara is so gracious and kind and such a good spirit. I’ve decided I’m going to follow her around and try to bottle her aura so I can sell it on eBay absorb it and make myself a better person.

I had a glass of wine and chatted with everyone and then met ArkansasCyndi who will become one of my BFFs after I move home to Arkansas. She’s awesome in every way that I think is cool.

Here’s a group photo. I am the one not pictured because I am the photog. Try not to be disappointed. I promise I’ll be in more pics later. Especially if we make it to Drag Queen Karoke…Oh yeah, we’re so going.Here are a few more pics, just cuz I’m feel generous.

more, more, more…

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First of all, I promise more cleavage in the future posts. Thanks to Fishdog and Killer for the requests.

Secondly, no the piercing really didn’t hurt. It was over Quick, Fast, and In-A-Hurry. Timmy the wonder Piercer said, “Close your eyes.” and I did. And then he poked me. I held my breath and my right eye watered, but honestly, it felt sharp, like when you have an under the skin zit that you just won’t let go. The guys at Taboo Tattoo were fantastic. They were friendly and gracious and now I have a little crush on Tim. I can see how people can get addicted to this. There is a definite rush. I felt the same after I had my navel done. But I didn’t find myself crushing on my navel guy. LOL

That’s my guy in the center. Timmy, we love you. You were great. By the way, I love my piercing. It looks like it has always been there and I had a couple of people comment yesterday that for some reason they thought I’d always had it. Awesome.
This is the group of Divas who kidnapped me and forced me to puncture my nose. What a great group of ladies!

Now on to the conference.

Last night was a blast. A group of us did more liver training in the bar. We had great service (well, it was mediocre service but great compared to what others were getting) our waiter Chris was way busy and trying so hard, but he did manage to pay us a lot of attention. I have a feeling it had a lot to do with the abundance of cleavage in our area…

Not mine….but still, great cleavage.

Of course, it might not be the cleavage, Chris could’ve just been coming by for the show:
okay, so I’m off to the gym. More pics and stories to come!

uh oh…what’s the girl gone and done now…

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What happens when you do liver training with a bunch of Romance Divas?Before the Romance Divas…

They plan your next day all for you….

After Romance Divas… pic 1

pic 2

pic 3

pic 4

final pic

close up….

What do you guys think?

the big "d" day one…

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I arrived in Dallas after a turbulent flight from Little Rock. The airplane ride was like a tame version of the Tower of Terror. I never felt like we were gonna free fall, but I certainly never felt 100% safe either.

For the first time ever, my bags were the first to be unloaded off the plane. That was kinda awesome. I loved the looks of envy from the other passengers as I skipped over and plucked my red suitcase and the ugly brown JORDACHE hanging bag (circa 1988) from the conveyor belt. This was a good sign.

Um. sorta.

I found the shuttle. We waited for a few mins, nobody else came so we were off–to the next terminal. We picked up a lovely lady and commenced to drive around the airport some more. We hit each terminal at the airport, then came back to where he picked me up and told us we had to switch shuttle buses. While we’re waiting to board the other passenger and I introduce ourselves. Imagine my shock and awe when I discover I’ve been sharing a shuttle with THE Eloisa James. How fantastic! Especially since Maria is her Kathy Bates, I mean, biggest fan.

We proceed to find a seat on the shuttle and I meet another passenger, author Kalen Hughes. As we continue our tour of the airport, the three of us commence in a lively discussion of books, kids, camps, Italy, jet lag, beer…until we stop at another terminal and pick up…my CP Louisa Edwards! Finally we left the airport and headed toward the hotel.

After Louisa and I check in, we rush upstairs to freshen up…I swear Airplane smell absorbs into the skin… we call our friends to discover they were waiting downstairs for us to check in! Somehow we missed each other.

We go downstairs, find our way to a bar (I know, big surprise) meet up with Maria, Pam, Nic, Kalen joins us with Dorchester author, Sandy Shaw. We enjoy a couple of drinks and some nachos then split up to get ready for dinner.

Dinner was a great little Mediterranean Restaurant named Sambuca. They had a live jazz duo and we had a cute little waiter named John who was trying a little too hard but that was okay. Oh, and we had a cute little cab driver named Abu who was our chauffeur to and from the restaurant.

After our fun dinner, we came back to the hotel bar where we proceed to train our livers for conference week. Kalen, Doreen, Anne, Emma Peterson, Eden Bradley, and Lillian Feisty joined the party. We had a great time and I stayed up a little later than usual…but it was totally worth it.

This morning Louisa, Maria and I hit the gym for an hour long workout and now Louisa is headed for a mani-pedi and Maria and I are heading downstairs to work registration.

Pictures will come soon. If things go as planned, I’ll have something cool to report this evening…anyone care to guess what that might be?

i’m on my way…

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I’ll be heading to the airport in a couple of hours. My flight is at 12:15 and I land in Dallas at 1:30. I’ll be meeting my friends there today and tonight we’re all going to dinner together. I can’t wait to see everyone!

I promise to blog while at the conference…I can’t guarantee they’ll be coherent blog, but I can guarantee they will be somewhat entertaining.

packing…

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I loathe packing. I loathe unpacking even more. Usually, Fishdog packs /unpacks for me (cuz I’m a spoiled little princess diva…but at least I know that about myself and am totally okay with it. And c’mon, you’re only calling me names because you’re envious. It’s okay. I totally understand. You can’t help it that you’re a hater.) Anyway, since I’m going to RWA’s conference next week without the Fishdog, I’m packing solo. It sux. So I thought I’d procrastinate take a break from packing to blog about packing.

People tend to get a little knotted up about what to wear to these conferences. We’re all writers. Many of us roll out of bed and into the chair only changing clothes when we have to leave the house. So it cracks me up when I hear the “this is a professional conference so you must dress as a professional writer would” argument. Um. You know I write in my underwear, right? does that make me less professional because I sit at the computer wearing my Hanes Her Way? Frankly, I’m thinking that you guys want me to wear more than that when I’m at the conference. I could be wrong. I suppose we’ll see next week…

Professionalism is in the eye of the beholder. It’s in how you carry yourself. It’s not in what you wear. I promise. If you’re confident and happy, you’ll present yourself as such, even if you’re wearing a potato sack. If you’re a dried up negative bitty who can’t bother with a sincere smile but you’re wearing couture, the only thing people will notice is your grim attitude and then comment on what a shame it is to waste such nice clothing on such a rotten egg.

This year I’m packing a few dresses and skirts because those are the clothes that fit me. (did I meantion I’m a size smaller this year?) The last two years I wore jeans and capri pants and nice shirts. (usually low cut shirts because that’s how I roll. When you have tits like mine, it’s best to show them off–you know what I’m sayin’? And I’m not the only one, as witnessed from last year’s conference… Don’t hate us cuz we have great cleavage.) So I’ve packed my nice clothes in my hang-up bag and now I’m working on the suitcase. Did I mention how much I hate packing?

Okay, I’m done. I’ve procrastinated put off packing long enough. I’m totally looking forward to the conference but I’m not looking forward to the rest of the night filling my suitcase.

what’s going on?

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How was your 4th? Mine was fun, but fairly uneventful. We went to the movies and to a pool party.

I’ve seen two movies this week. Both were fun, action packed summer flicks, but I have to say, Live Free or Die Hard kicked Transformers‘ butt.

*there are some spoilers below…so if you don’t wanna know, go here.

First of all, I’m a huge Die Hard fan so I was skeptical about the fourth movie. Even with the ridiculous stunts (fighter jet anyone?) it was a fun, totally fast paced flick. John McClane is an awesome character and this time he had an awesome geeky side-kick played by Justin Long (you know “Hi, I’m a Mac.”) I’ve always had a wee crush on Justin but now it’s full blown. They worked well together and the dialogue was never stilted. I could (and probably will) go see that movie again in the theater.

Now, Transformers was another movie filled with action. But it also had so many more eye-rolling moments for me than Die Hard. The graphics were absolutely phenomenal and worth seeing the movie for. It also had a great cast. The Whitwicky parents were perfect and so was Sam. Sector 7 (the government agency that didn’t exist) was fun and very Area 51. But for me, the movie ranked a B…maybe even a B-.

First of all, there was this ridiculous comic-relief evil robot that I called the Jar-Jar-Binks-Bot. I wanted to stick a fork in my eye every time that metallic bug came on the screen. And as amazing as the graphics were, there are only so many times you can watch the cars transform. It was phenomenal–the first 6 times. But after that, it got to be a little redundant. Oh, and can anyone tell me why Optimus Prime always transformed from Rig to Robot and landed in the Ninja stance? Totally corny.

The dialogue was sometimes so cheesy it had me craving crackers. Now I’m a huge fan of the cartoon…I loved watching the original Transformers and I loved watching the newer shows when my boys were young. And I know that sometimes the cartoon dialogue is so cheesy and preachy and over the top…But they really didn’t have to go there with the movie. Many eye-rolling moments during some of the big speeches.

This movie coulda been an A if they would’ve cut it by about 30 mins. They could’ve easily done that. Hell, they coulda just cut 10 mins from one of the last fight scenes and I would’ve been happy.

Oh, and if there had been more Josh Duhamel, then it would’ve been an A+.

You guys see any movies this summer that you’ve loved, hated or could care less about?