I had a great trip to San Francisco, but it is good to be home. Yesterday was a bit of a wild day. The train was running four hours late, so those of us who were to make the connection to the train headed south were taken off the train headed to Chicago at Galesburg, Illinois, then bussed to Champaign, Illinois, so we could catch The City of New Orleans en route. It was late getting into Champaign, so we didn’t board until 11:15 p.m. — 15 minutes after the cafe car closed on the train. So none of us got a meal last night. My dinner was a bag of Cheez-Its. You can imagine how hungry I was driving home this morning after I was dropped off at my end station at 5:10 a.m. My car and the McDonald’s sign up the interstate never looked so good.

I promised photos when I got back, so I’ll be posting some over the next few days. Here goes…

This is me beside the California Zephyr, which I took from Chicago to San Francisco and back to Galesburg.

On the way west, we started seeing flood water from the recent Mississippi River flooding several miles before we reached the river. Farmhouses were still surrounded, roads covered, and things such as furniture and outdoor playsets (the wooden ones with slides, swings, etc.) were floating in the water.

The guided tour I mentioned in San Francisco included a very windy ferry ride from San Fran’s Ferry Building to Saulsalito. My agent’s air is a testament to the windy ride. You can see the Golden Gate Bridge over my right shoulder, and Saulsalito over her left shoulder.

We also passed by Alcatraz.

Jennifer Yates, a devoted reader of the Romance Bandits blog, was on the same tour and brought along a mini Golden Rooster (in joke for readers of the RB blog). So of course I had to pose with the Golden Rooster at the Golden Gate.

More photos tomorrow, along with the announcement of three weeks worth of book winners.

Fabulous pal Terry McLaughlin took me touring through some gorgeous parts of California today. We drove out of San Francisco and headed for Napa Valley and the rest of the wine country. It’s a very pretty area, and we stopped and walked around Rubicon, a lovely winery in Napa Valley owned by movie director Francis Ford Coppolla. We also drove through the pretty little towns of St. Helena and Yountville before heading toward the coast and Muir Woods National Monument, where I saw my first redwood trees. Very pretty park, and I loved the woodsy, cool, verdant smell, which reminded me of parts of the Smoky Mountains. After taking a walk through the woods and a detour through the gift shop, we headed for Muir Beach and the Muir Beach Overlook, both part of Golden Gate National Recreation Area. The view form the overlook was gorgeous. I could see lots of the rocky coast and the really odd view of the fog settled over the ocean out in the distance rolling toward shore. It looked like clouds sitting on top of the water.

My train leaves in the morning, so I better turn in. I’ll check back in later in the week, when I’ll start sharing some of the more than 150 photos I’ve taken on my trip.

No, I haven’t fallen into the San Francisco Bay. Just been busy, busy, busy since leaving home last week. Because I’m sure all of you have been waiting anxiously to hear my travel tidbits here’s a rundown.

Last Wednesday — Drove the 3.5 hours to the train station.

Thursday — Rode train to Chicago, boarded second train for California; too tired to work on manuscript, so read Simone Elkeles’ Leaving Paradise (up for a YA RITA this year), watched Penelope on my laptop, and read stuff for the board meeting. Traveled through Illinois, Iowa and Nebraska.

Friday –  Traveled through Colorado and Utah. One of the prettiest part of the trip, the winding along the Colorado river in western Colorado. As usual, there were tons of rafters, several of whom mooned the train (also common). I think the most beautiful stretch of this day is Ruby Canyon on the Colorado-Utah border.

Friday — Traveled across Utah and into Nevada.

Saturday — Crossed Nevada and California. The Sierra Nevada portion was lovely as always, and I actually like the run across the desolate desert of Nevada because it has a stark, remote beauty of its own. When we went across the salt flats, it’s so flat that you can see forever. Arrived in San Francisco and good friend Theresa Ragan picked me up and took me to the hotel. Thanks, Theresa! Since the rest of the board members had arrived earlier, they’d already eaten dinner so I got some Chinese takeout and fired up my laptop to find I’d received 400 e-mails in two days!

Sunday — RWA Board of Directors meeting, followed by more takeout with everyone.

Monday — Long day to finish board meeting at 9ish last night.

Today — My day off! Had a wonderful guided tour of the city. Took a ferry over to Sausalito, a cute seaside village, where I had lunch with my agent. Then we boarded a shuttle to ride back across the Golden Gate Bridge, which was so cool! It was the first time I’d seen the bridge. It was kind of seeing the Statue of Liberty in person for the first time. Saw Alcatraz and Angel Island (the West’s equivalent to Ellis Island) from the ferry. Visited the Palace of Fine Arts, the Japanese Tea Garden at Golden Gate Park, Lombard Street (curviest street in the country, maybe world), saw the Presidio as we drove by, and walked through China Town. Personally, I liked the Golden Gate Bridge and Sausalito the best. I wished I’d had more time to explore the little town, but after eating lunch it was time to meet the shuttle.

Tonight, I had dinner with the Romance Bandits, and a great time was had by all.

Tomorrow, the conference kicks off, and the schedule just gets busier and busier. But it’s great to see friends and soak up the great energizing vibe I always get from writing conferences.  More reports to come.

It seems that no matter how much I plan, how many lists I make, how many times I walk back through the house before I leave, I always forget something I meant to bring on a long trip. And I usually remember it two hours down the interstate. This time, it was the cord that connects my digital camera to my computer. I was going to try to blog from the RWA National Conference, complete with photos, but the photos will have to wait until I get back. I’ll still try to blog with some tidbit each day. We’ll see how well that works.

I’m blogging over at the Romance Bandits today about my adventures in traveling by car and train since I don’t like to fly. Come on over and join the fun!

As I’ve mentioned before, I love these “top whatever” lists that Yahoo does frequently. Today’s was “Tourist Traps You’ll Love.” Hey, that’s right up my alley because, hey, I’d be the person who’d want to see the World’s Biggest Ball of Twine or Carhenge.

Yahoo’s list offered up seven things to see, but I’ve only been to two — Dolly Parton’s Dixie Stampede in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee and Wall Drug Store in Wall, South Dakota. Have to say I liked Wall Drug more because it’s such an institution, has tons of things to meander through, and you see the eye-catching signs advertising it all the way across South Dakota. It has a very yesteryear feel to it. Not to mention it’s a good place to stop and eat if you’re driving across South Dakota.

Do you enjoy “tourist traps”? If so, which ones? Which ones didn’t live up to your expectations. For me, the latter includes Rock City near Chattanooga, Tennessee. I grew up seeing the “See Rock City” barns, so I guess my expectations were high. It has a decent view of several states from the top, but overall it’s pretty cheesy.
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In writing news, I got through the latest set of revisions on my YA manuscript today. I’m still typing them in and need to make sure I addressed all the points my editor listed in her letter, but I hope to finish that tomorrow.

Sorry I fell off the blog radar for a few days. The Internet connection was poo in my room at the RT conference hotel, and I spent yesterday driving home from Pittsburgh. But without further adieu, here’s a look at my week in pictures and a bit of commentary.

My hotel room overlooked the site of historic Fort Pitt (you can see the outlines of the original fort on the grass), and where the Monongahela and Allegheny rivers come together to form the Ohio River. It was cool to see the spot where the Ohio River begins since I grew up near the opposite end of the river. To the far right of the photo below, you can see a bit of Heinz Field, more commonly known as Three Rivers Stadium to Pittsburgh Steelers fans.

Since some of my Bandita pals were there, and I was an American Title finalist like one of them (KJ Howe) and several other writers in attendance. We had a group Bandita/AT dinner at a restaurant across the street from the hotel. Others took those pictures, so I don’t have those yet.

I’ve decided that at any future RT conferences I attend, I’m going to go the costume route at the evening parties. Lots of people went all out, including my pal Lindsey Brookes, and it was great to watch. Because these parties included dancing, I didn’t want to keep up with my camera. But if anyone sends me photos, I’ll be sure to post them.

On Friday was the awards luncheon where numerous authors were honored, and Helen Scott Taylor was announced as the winner of the American Title contest. I came in first runner-up. Huge congrats to Helen! That’s her below sitting between her beautiful daughter, Katherine, right, and the first AT winner, Janice Lynn.

Here are some more ATers: Holli Bertram, Evonne Wareham, former finalist Judi Fennel, last year’s winner, Jenny Gardiner, and (standing) Liz French, managing editor of Romantic Times BOOKreviews Magazine and our fabulous RT contact throughout the contest.

On Saturday was the big group book signing. I knew lots of the authors signing. Here are just a handful of them.

Colleen Gleason

Anna DeStefano

Jessica Andersen

Natale Stenzel

Here I am being a total fangirl with J.R. Ward, who is not only talented but gracious, friendly and hysterical too.

Oh, and here my fabu agent, Michelle Grajkowski, and I decided to have a picture taken together to see how much our printed shirts would mess with people’s eyeballs.

Okay, here’s what you all have been waiting for — cover models! Not only were this year’s contestants in the Mr. Romance contest there, but since it was the 25th anniversary of RT, there were also famous cover models in the building. Yes, Fabio was in the house. In fact, I nearly plowed into him when I was exiting the ladies room. I also spied special guest Adrian Paul of Highlander fame looking verra nice in a purple suit. Sorry, didn’t have my camera with me. Next time, I think I’ll just have my camera attached to my hand at all times. If you’ve been reading romance novels for awhile, you’ll also recognize the name John DeSalvo. And guess what! Yes, I do have a photo of him.

The Mr. Romance competition brought out the flashing cameras. Here’s a peek at the reason why.

And here’s me with the very nice and charming James Gaskin, who was the second runner-up. One night, he talked to Michelle and me for several minutes after one of the parties. We chatted a bit about him studying physics in college and how my hubby was a physics major for a couple of years before changing to economics.

And the winner was…Chris Winters. Oh, and in case you’re wondering, he’s the one showing off his pecs in the photo above. Hey, if you’ve got it, flaunt it.

I didn’t meet Chris, but from all accounts he’s a nice guy too. I don’t know what I was expecting, but the guys I met and heard about were all very nice and down to earth, several of them college students. Other than James, I only talked to Chris Howell and a bit with Luke Walsh. I think I felt kind of funny just striking up conversations with them because it seemed like they were constantly being pulled one way or another. I figured they had to be totally exhausted by the end of the week.

So, have I convinced any of you to attend RT next year in Orlando?

I made it home this afternoon, thank goodness. After driving through rainstorms, dodging tornadoes and temperatures in the 70s yesterday, today I drove through snow, sleet and temps in the upper 30s and low 40s. Brrr!

Seen on a sign in front of a small convenience store in rural Mississippi:

Cold Beer
Hot Food
Tropical Fish

Hmm, which doesn’t belong? I just hope the tropical fish weren’t the Hot Food.

I got a few more stamps in my National Parks Passport today: Tupelo National Battlefield, Brices Crossroads National Battlefield, Natchez Trace Parkway, Natchez Trace Parkway National Scenic Trail, Corinth Civil War Interpretive Center, Shiloh National Military Park and Trail of Tears National Historic Trail. All of these sites are fairly close together. I’d been to Shiloh and the Natchez Trace before, but it was before I bought my passport last summer while visiting Mammoth Cave National Park.

I need to figure out what new counties I traveled through on my trip (as well as when I went to San Francisco last November) to add to my county count since I’m a member of the Extra Miler Club.

Now that I’m home, I will be attached to my computer doing revisions that are due March 15. Not much else will get done between now and then except a daily blog post and a quick trip to the grocery.

When I left Houston this morning, it was 70 degrees and windy. Felt wonderful to me. After consulting The Weather Channel before I left, I decided to take a different, morn southern route, home. As I drove northeast toward Shreveport, I watched the temperature drop 16 degrees. When I turned east and started across Louisiana, however, the temp started going back up again. I’d gotten out ahead of the weather front, and it chased me all day. I drove through rain almost all day, and when I got to Jackson, Mississippi, and headed north, I was outrunning tornado warnings a county or two behind me. Eek! I was very glad to find a hotel room and settle in for the night.

I’ve mentioned here before that I’m a big fan of the national parks. I bought my niece a National Parks Passport, a booklet in which you can stamp cancellation ink stamps from each national park unit you visit. I thought it was so cool that I got one for myself. Even though I’d visited Vicksburg National Military Park before, I zipped by there today and stamped my passport. Dummy me didn’t take it with me when Mary and I went into San Antonio the other day. I would have gotten my stamp from San Antonio Missions National Historical Park.

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