My drive from San Antonio to Houston went well today — until I got to Houston. First, the ramp I was supposed to take onto a toll road was closed. But never fear, I was able to pull out my atlas and find another exit and a back way to get to the needed tollway. So I was trucking along just find, thanks, until I got to the exit my directions from Mapquest said I was supposed to take. One problem — the exit off the toll road was only for EZTag holders since it wasn’t a manned or pay toll station. I don’t live here, so I don’t have an EZTag. So I had to drive through the grass to get to another road I could take. So then I didn’t know where I was, where my hotel was — ugh! I ended up driving around the airport with nowhere to pull over to ask for directions until I finally found a Marriott on the airport property. The kind banquet server inside pointed me in the right direction. Unfortunately, I’d eaten up so much time that I didn’t have any extra to work on revisions this afternoon before RWA board stuff began. That’s why I’m working on them now at 11 p.m. when I have a meeting at 7:30 in the morning. Oh well, at least I’m here safely and without having an accident in all the traffic on unfamiliar roads.

In much better news, Golden Heart pal Elisabeth Naughton made her first book sale this week! In fact, she sold three romantic adventure stories to Dorchester. Yeah, Elisabeth

Fellow writer Maureen McGowan has posted an interview with me on her blog as we close in on the final days of voting in the final round of the American Title contest. You can read the interview here. Don’t forget — the last day to vote is Sunday.

Oh, and the presidential election “fix” she’s referring to in the entry is actually referring to a funny video she posted on her blog just prior to the interview with me. It’s from the Onion News Network, and it’s funny that she posted that because I saw it on TiVo while here at Mary’s house

Revisions update — I finished up Ch. 4 this morning, and I’m working on Ch. 5 this afternoon. I’m going to have to really kick it when I get back home next week. Looking forward to going out to dinner with Mary and another fellow Noodler, Stephanie Feagan, tonight.

Had a fun day today. Mary and I went to the Guenther House for breakfast — home of the yummiest biscuits in the world, though I tried their pancakes this time (also yummy). Then we toured the historic Steves Homestead and walked through part of the historic King William district, which is full of gorgeous old refurbished homes. We topped off the day by an afternoon at the zoo and dinner at Pei Wei.

Tomorrow, Mary has to go back to work, and I’m going to be here trying to convince her cats to do my revisions for me.

Day 2 of my road trip is in the books and I’m happy to be visiting my friend Mary. I’m in the land of yummy Mexican food (LOVE Mexican food) and ate at a place called Taco Garage tonight. I plan to have some Taco Cabana this week too. Maybe it’ll fuel some fast and furious revision on Thursday while Mary is at work.

Sorry to be late with the announcement of last week’s books winner, but I’m happy to announce that Fedora is the big winner of the following books:

Cover of Night by Linda Howard
Behind the Mask by Metsy Hingle
Silent Warning by Kathleen Long

Fedora, if you’ll e-mail me your mailing address through the Contact page on this site, I’ll get your books out to you next week when I return home.

This week’s giveaway includes the following books:

Deborah Simmons’ Maiden Bride
Karen Whiddon’s One Eye Open
Lisa Gardner’s The Killing Hour

After a wonderful weekend at my RWA chapter retreat, I’m currently on the road and at a hotel with less-than-stellar Internet connection. Thus the lack of posts and why I haven’t drawn for the winner for last week’s books yet. I’ll post more when I get to some better Internet at Mary’s house. I’m loving Texas again because it’s already so much warmer here this evening than it was when I left home this morning.

More revisions today, which will be the name of the game until March 15. I think my nose is getting sore where it’s been applied to the grindstone.

I’m off to my RWA chapter’s writing retreat this weekend. I hope to get lots of — you guessed it — revisions done while also having some time to hang out with the gals.

Don’t forget — if you comment on the blog anytime this week, you’re in the running to win the three free books. And if you haven’t had a chance to go over to the Romantic Times site and vote for your favorite romantic scene, I’d love it if you could take a moment and do so.

I’m a recent convert to Project Runway — recent as in the last 2 to 3 episodes. Yes, I’m late to the party. I admire the participants because they do something for which I have absolutely no talent. My sewing talent is limited to putting on buttons and counted cross-stitch. The personalities are funny too. I don’t know much about the people who got booted before the final five (Sweet P, Jillian, Chris, Christian and Rami). I’m anxious to find out who will win the battle between Chris and Rami for the prize of being able to show at Fashion Week. I like them both.

So, any Project Runway fans out there? Who do you hope wins?

Short post today — busy, busy, busy.

I’m thrilled to announce that I’ve made the Final 2 in the American Title contest sponsored by Romantic Times magazine and Dorchester Publishing. So now it’s time to rally the troops!

Voting starts today at http://www.romantictimes.com/news_amtitle3.php and I would really appreciate your vote for OUT OF SIGHT. (Be warned, this final round is romantic scenes.) I loved writing this book, and I’ll do a serious happy dance if it wins and I get to share it with all of you — it and hopefully a sequel.

The number of votes is more important than ever, so I’ll need not only your votes but the votes of anyone you know with an e-mail address. Just like in a presidential election, don’t think that one vote doesn’t count. It does, especially when that “one vote” is multiplied by many people.

Thanks for all of your support and votes in the previous rounds. I truly appreciate it.

I’m blogging today on two of the group blogs of which I’m a part. Over at Title Magic, I’m talking about how I pretty much ignore negative reviews, whether they be for books or movies. And at the Wet Noodle Posse blog, I’ve posted about using TV and movies as inspiration for your own writing.

The Random Number Generator has done it’s work for the week, and the winner of this week’s books is Rebekah Elrod. Congratulations, Rebekah! Just e-mail your mailing address through the Contact page on this site, and I’ll get your books out to you.

The books in the giveaway for this upcoming week are:

Cover of Night by Linda Howard
Behind the Mask by Metsy Hingle
Silent Warning by Kathleen Long

Busy day today — I judged three contest entries and am working on an article for the Romance Writers Report. Unfortunately, while judging one of the contest entries, I had to give some low scores. I don’t like doing this. I always try to give some constructive and hopeful comments to lessen the sting of the scores, but I don’t want to give a person a false sense of how good their work is when it really needs a good bit of revision to make it submittable. It’s a delicate balance as a judge.

During my lunch break, I watched last night’s episode of Supernatural. Wow, what a combination of hilarity (Dean dancing to Asia’s “Heat of the Moment”) and poignancy (poor Sam having to relive watching Dean die in different ways over and over and over again). My two truly laugh-out-loud moments were Dean’s “Heat of the Moment” dancing and when Sam told Dean that he peed himself when he got hit by a car. I was here alone in my house and I was laughing myself silly.