Yep, I’m late again posting last week’s book winner, which was…Monica McCabe!

Up for grabs this week:

Prince Charming in Dress Blues by Maureen Child
Her Galahad by Melissa James
Mistress by Amanda Quick

I’m also blogging over at Romance Bandits today about what I’d do if I were suddenly and fabulously wealthy. Come by and join the fun!

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!

I saw an article online today listing the TV series that have been canceled for next year. I have an abysmal record of liking shows that end up getting canceled, so it wasn’t a surprise that I watched nine shows on the list:

Moonlight (the one I’m mourning the most)
Men in Trees (I’m just going to firmly believe that Patrick and Annie would have gotten back together.)
Jericho
Back to You (I thought Kelsey Grammar and Patricia Heaton were funny, but I guess not enough other people did.)
K-Ville  (no more Cole Hauser, sniff)
New Amsterdam
Life is Wild
Bionic Woman (Poor Will Yun Lee keeps getting cast in shows I like but which are canceled; he was in Witchblade too.)
Journeyman

This list didn’t even include Blood Ties (which I’m also mourning; come on, leave me ONE vampire show), which had been previously canceled.

I wonder which new shows in the fall I’ll like and thus be the kiss of death for.

As this year’s shows wind down with finales, my TiVo’s to-do list was getting pretty short. (I think the only things still on it are LOST, Battlestar Galactica, Deadliest Catch and The Alaska Experiment.) So I went through today and scheduled some movies I hadn’t seen. Maybe I’ll have time to watch them after I meet my YA outline deadline the first week of June. I still haven’t gone to see Prince Caspian either. Maybe I’ll do that on my birthday or as a treat after I meet my deadline.

Luckily my choice in friends is more successful than my choice in shows, including the fabulous Beth Pattillo. She’s guesting over at the Romance Bandits today in celebration of the release of her new book, The Sweetgum Knit Lit Society, this week. Swing by and say, “Hi.” She’s giving away a copy of the book to one lucky person.

Today was the Heart of Dixie Readers’ Luncheon in Huntsville, Alabama. I was attending for the first time, and as a guest author. I’m sure I was grinning like an idiot the entire time. I’ll admit to being a bit nervous. After all, I was low on the author totem pole since I don’t have a book out yet. I had visions of no one sitting with me or being forced to sit at the “loser table” when the big authors’ tables filled up. I didn’t have anything to really give the ladies sitting at my table other than my new bookmarks. I was lamenting this last night, when my faboo roomie for the event, author Janice Lynn, mentioned that some authors in the past had bought the people at their table raffle tickets for the big baskets of books that are raffled off. Great idea!

Well, like most things I worried about, I shouldn’t have. A lovely lady named Susan came up and said she had been looking for me because she wanted to sit at my table. Color me shocked! And thankful. We started talking about my books and where we were from, and then something amazing happened. More people sat at my table! I ended up with the most wonderful group of ladies, and we had a great time talking. That’s them below. Susan is on the far right. (Sorry I can’t get the picture to post any bigger. It’s being contrary.)

Lady Luck seemed to be with our table too. Of the eight people at the table, five won raffle baskets. Three of them won two baskets each, including the biggest basket donated by the published authors of the Heart of Dixie chapter of Romance Writers of America. Dorothy, Susan’s mother-in-law, won the huge basket of goodies. And here’s the funny part. Even though she’d bought several raffle tickets, the one I’d given her was the winner of the big basket. How cool is that!? Here’s Dorothy looking very happy with her large, very cool basket.

The keynote speaker today was Roxanne St. Claire, who was just lovely and entertaining. She was so popular that she ran out of books at the book signing. Here I am with Roxanne. We evidently got the subliminal memo to wear black and white, as did many of the other attendees.

The authors in attendance also gave away special baskets. Again, since I didn’t have any books yet, I put together a basket from my Romance Bandits gals. Here is the lovely Ann Linker, who won the basket. See, she got the black-and-white memo too.

I got to meet the wonderful Pamela Bolton-Holifield (who comments as “doglady” on the Romance Bandits, Wet Noodle Posse and many other blogs). She was sporting her shiny new gold heart bin for being a Golden Heart finalist. Here’s Pam with me and then with my roomie Janice. Pam comments frequently on the Writers at Play blog, where Janice is a member.

Finally, here I am with fellow RWA board member and shoe shopper extraordinaire Linda Howard. (I think she got the memo too.)

Thanks to the ladies of Heart of Dixie. I had a wonderful time and hope I can come back next year. Hint, hint. And I’ll even have books to sign by then!

I’m blogging over at the Romance Bandits about brushes with fame. Come read the fun stories, and share your own!

Thanks for all the lovely comments about my cover!

May is the one-year anniversary for the Romance Bandits, and we are celebrating big time. In addition to our normal fun posts, we’ve got a lot of great guests coming throughout the month beginning with New York Times best-selling author Eloisa James tomorrow.

We’re also having lots of drawings for prizes ranging from bookstore gift cards to signed books to critiques of first chapters. Be sure to visit every day and comment to be in the running for the prize drawings.

First off, my pal Mary’s book Hot Shot is out from Samhain Publishing today! In celebration, she’s guesting with us over at the Romance Bandits blog. Swing by if you have the chance.

In my writing news, I’m working on my AAs (author alterations) on my first book, A Firefighter in the Family. This is the last time I’ll get to look at it before it goes to press (squee!) and thankfully I’m not finding many edits. I think that’ll make my editor happy. And I like to keep my editor happy. I’m also working on ideas for my option book (what will hopefully be the first book of the next contract). I want to get that partial written before I head off to the Romantic Times conference later in the month.

For some reason, our Internet service has been intermittently wonky lately. I REALLY don’t want to change service providers because I’ve got screaming-fast cable Internet, so I hope the wonkiness doesn’t continue. For when it goes on the wonk, I’m glad there’s a Panera Bread with WiFi nearby. I spent 3 hours there yesterday! And since the hubby was out of town, I grabbed my dinner from there on the way out. According to him and his brother, Panera is “chick food.” 

The big upheaval of the last week, however, has been a surprise room re-do. We have a large-ish house, especially for two people, so in the winter we close off the back part so we don’t go broke with heating bills. Natural gas = not cheap. So we don’t go back there much in the winter and keep the temperature at about 55 so the pipes don’t bust. But the other day when hubby came home from a business trip, he zipped in the back door to use the back bathroom. This bathroom happens to be where the hot water heater resides. You see where this is going, don’t you?

Imagine the hubby’s surprise when he opens the door to find the room soaking wet and, I kid you not, mold growing up the walls. He says, “What happened back here?” I, clueless, wander back to see what he’s talking about. My mouth falls open. The water heater evidently had a leak but not so much that we didn’t still have hot water. The room was dripping from the ceiling, the border was peeling off, the mirror had come loose from the water, fallen and broken all over the sink and floor. The sink cabinet was ruined. In a word, it was DIS-GUST-ING!

The next day, I called contractors and got bids. Thankfully, one was able to start work last Friday. Since the room had to be gutted anyway, we decided to convert it to a laundry room. Looks like it’ll be done today, so tomorrow I’ll post some before and after shots for your viewing pleasure.

My fellow Romance Bandit Cindy (aka Loucinda McGary) compiled a Books By Romance Bandits Listmania list over on Amazon. Check it out and if you want to order the books, you can do so by clicking on any of the book covers in the posts on our blog. We’re an Amazon Affiliate, so we get some spare change each time a purchase through an Amazon click-through from our blog. And that’s not just purchases of our books; it’s for anything and everything you buy through Amazon. We use that spare change to keep all the Bandita fun up and running for our loyal blog readers.

I’m blogging with my pals over at the Romance Bandits blog today. Come on by and see what I’m yapping about.