Yesterday, since I didn’t post a blog title, it shows up in my little control panel thingy as “Post 299.” Which makes this 300!!!

WoooHoooo!!

Can you beleive that some of you have read 300 posts from a rambling me? I’m so not entertaining and half the time I don’t even say anything (like now). And those 300 posts aren’t even counting the Blogspot ones from before I went to Wordpress (I don’t think - they might be).

300 posts since June 2005. Wow.

I’ve made so many new friends and met so many people. Last summer I even got to meet a few in Reno! I’ve learned a lot from comments and even more from following other peoples blog links.

Sure, blogging is a great way to procrastinate (Wahoo!) but it really is also a great learning tool, way of networking, all sorts of good stuff wrapped up into one little web page.

So, tell me, what’s your favorite thing about the whole blog phenomenon? What are some blogs you never miss? Do you think you could quit blogging cold turkey right now? What does blogging mean in your life (ok, so that’s a lame question, but I’m trying)?

As you know I’ll be gone for the next four days, but I SHOULD have internet access and I hope to regale you with stories of Cleveland and/or more zoo pictures. Tomorrow = Pandas!!

Now, to celebrate 300, here are some more pictures from the zoo!

Why is it that the more stuff I have to do, and the less time I have to do it, the more I find ways to procrastinate?

I swear, this week when I cross one thing off the list I add two more. I don’t seem to be making any headway.

So, things to do today & tomorrow:
Finish edits on Hot Stuff (done, but I’d like one more read through)
Finish edits on Tempting Fate (about 1/2 way through)
Cover Request Form
Author Form
Come up with 2 interesting blogs for SEx and Torrid Temptations next week
Catch up on all emails (this is a big one - my inbox is very full)
Send emails to many people
Find and purchase ticket to Florida - WooHoo!! I’ll be spending 10 days in Florida the beginning of June!
Laundry (which has to be drip dried because we finally just taped up the dryer vent so birds don’t get in) - Though it’s still drying.
Pay Bills (yucky)
Wrap presents
Pack

And all of this stuff has to be done by tomorrow?!?!

And with that I think I have to be finished blogging for the day because obviously I’ve got too much stuff to do? What does your week hold for you?

Everybody should go wish Kendra a Happy Birthday!

Doesn’t this little guy look like he’s wishing on a star?

I awoke to a dark and dreary day.

Perfect for curling up under the covers with a good book, or maybe perfect for getting a whole lot of work done.

I’m afraid as good as option one sounds, I’m going to have to go for option two.

You see, I’ve only got a 3 day week this week. Why you ask? I leave on Thursday to head off to beautiful Cleveland, Ohio for my brother-in-laws wedding.

Now first of all, it entails going to Cleveland. Don’t anyone get down on me for not wanting to go to Cleveland. I lived there for 4 years and I am perfectly content with never returning (though the Hubster and I do intend to catch up on the old stomping grounds). But the simple fact that when I checked the weather yesterday, it was 20 degrees colder in Cleveland than it is here, is enough to make me not want to go.

And then there’s this. My deep dark secret. Yes, I know I’m a romance author, I loves me the Happily Ever After, but here’s the secret - I hate weddings.

All weddings. Can’t stand them. Didn’t really even like my own that much (although it was so damn simple there wasn’t much not to like).

And I’m not talking about the reception part of weddings (though I do have a profound hatred for the Hokey Pokey and Bunny Hoop), I hate the actual wedding part of weddings.

I just can’t take the stressing out and paying thousands of dollars for a dress you’re going to wear once. The stress for acheiving perfection in everything from flowers, to friends, to small children who don’t want to be dressed up, to archaic vows that don’t really even have meaning anymore.

I certainly don’t find them romantic in the least. I mean what’s romantic about standing in front of everyone you know, making promises that 50% of married couples don’t keep, while everyone whispers behind your back about how long it’s going to last and the rubbery chicken they’re going to have to force down at the reception.

Now, that said, on Thursday, I will put on my happy face. I will be happy for BIL and soon-to-be SIL. I will do the same in several months for the other BIL’s wedding.

But secretly inside, I will simply continue to hate weddings.

To end on a happier note, and since yesterday’s bunnies went over so well, I figured I’d share some pictures over the next few days. Have I mentioned how much I love my digital camera with super awesome zoom lens?

I took this at the National Zoo.

Jenna Howard writes for WCP Torrid and Liquid Silver Books. Her series Seasonal Changes is spanning all four of the Torrid Seasonal Anthologies. I for one, can’t wait to read the rest of them!

Onto Jenna’s interview:
I wanted the James Bond question though. I’m soo Anita Mahnnow. Curses!
If you were stuck in the dark with no flashlight( and couldn’t have sex) what would you do?
In the dark? With no flashlight? And no sex? Good grief. I’d probably have a good friggin’ cry! Unless I have my laptop along then I have light and could write about sex instead of having it. Or else I’ll sleep through the dark then have sex when it’s light. That’s not a part of the rules. Huzzah!

Stealing from James Lipton (Inside the Actors Studio), what’s your favorite word? Your least favorite?
Least favorite - bar none: the c-word. As Robin Williams said on Inside “It’s such an angry word.” I can’t even type it. I had a character say it once and I was traumatized for two days before I came to terms with it because, as my character rudely said “What am I going to call? Her honey pot?” Sometimes you just gotta listen to the characters, close your eyes and type even if you hate the word.

Favorite word? Holy dinah…I don’t know. Now if you asked most used word I’d say f*** but it’s not a favorite. Um…contract is pretty high up there. And ” ‘ntie” as I’m pretty sure that’s what my nephew said as he looked at me then pointed at the light switch, racing towards it a if I was the hero who would lift him up so he could play with it. I firmly maintain that he called me ” ‘Ntie” on Saturday. No one else believes me but that’s my belief. So yeah ‘ntie is pretty much rocking my world right now.

Do you play an instrument? Well? What and for how long?
The piano. I haven’t played in years. Well enough my parents didn’t threaten to chop up the piano but not well enough to get me to play comfortably before others. I can’t recall how long. A long time.

If you could win an Olympic medal what sport would it be in?
I don’t do sports. For the safety of those around me and myself, I do not do sports. Now if napping or procrastinating were a sport then I’m in. Although when I was little (and bendy) I dreamt of being an Olympic medalist in gymnastics.

If you were a tree, what kind would you be? What kind of flower?
Hm this was a tough one. I actually asked for some opinions. One was very clever of me being a rubber tree (curses, I hate clever men) but then my best friend said “No. You’re a knotty pine!” Soooo I’m a naughty pine. Most excellent. And flower? Holy Dinah…I couldn’t even come up with a tree! Oh something exotic and rare and expensive to buy. Daisy comes to mind, one with pink petals (I’m sure there’s a real name for that but I have no idea) because then I’d be juuuust a little different from the other daisies and pink is very fashionable.

C’ann Inman writes for WCP Torrid and well as writing for the WCP regular line under a different name. Let’s get onto her interview:

Do you believe in the paranormal? Have you ever had any first
hand experience?
Yes. I believe in the paranormal. I have feelings sometimes.
Never seen a spirit. Never communicated with one. But I believe in
several things that cannot be seen.

If you were a crayon, what color would you be?
I’d be the Mosaic. *grins*

What’s your favorite flavor of ice cream?
Buttered Pecan. Or Chocolate Almond. Mmmmmmmm. Nuts in my ice
cream.

If you could be any animal, what would it be?
Cat. I believe the feline is a superior creature. (Note to
Emma: My cat, Pumpkin, filled this one in for me. See how she is?)

If you were a super hero what would your power be? What would
you do with it?
I would be like Storm on X-Men. I would control the elements.
Or maybe like Poison Ivy (but good). Hmmmmm. Something to do with
wind, water, or plants. Maybe I could be a Wood Sprite. Fairy? I
would need to help people. But I’m not much for flying. Oh. And I
would need a whip like Catwoman. Why, you ask? No reason.
*grinning* Just because I need one.

Don’t forget to check out all the releases by these two great authors!

And I hope everyone is having a very Happy Easter. We discovered these little guys last night, living near the apartment building caddy-corner to ours.

My Mom’s coming to visit for the weekend so I’ll probably be a bit scarce. But I hope the Easter Bunny brings everyone lots of chocolate and jelly beans.

Now I’m going to blog about Deep Breath

I read this book as part of Alison’s viral marketing campaign, which I wish I could do, but don’t really think it’d pan out for me quite yet. I can’t quite afford to give away too many books yet.

Anyway, I’ve been putting off blogging about it because everyone else is, and I just feel like other people are better at reviewing than me. But I’m going to bit the bullet and do it!

I’ve read almost all of the SG-5 books now (except for Larger Than Life which I didn’t realize until recently was part of the series - talk about a huge change-up in terms of looks). I read them because once I started the series I didn’t want to stop, BUT I was never a big fan of the format. I could never quite classify them in my brain, they were trade paperback size, but really skinny and I just had trouble telling how long of a book this was supposed to be!

I read them and I liked them but they never really seemed like complete stories to me. I guess I would have either put them all together in an anthology or written longer to be ST. The format really didn’t appeal to me.

I LOVED that Deep Breath was a real, honest to goodness Single Title Book!

It was a great mix of action, suspense and a bit of a love story. The love scenes were hot, but I don’t think I’d consider it an erotic romance. I’d give it - Sexy Romantic Adventure maybe? There’s not a ton of suspense, and actually the big “problem” of the book is solved almost laughingly easily.

The main characters were fun and enjoyable and even though I disagreed with what the heroine was doing at times, I understood her motivation which makes all the difference. The secondary characters I think could have easily overshadowed the main characters at times, but they were rained in quite nicely. And I’m thrilled to know that eventually we will be seeing Finn’s story!

Without giving anything away, I have to say that I was very pleased with the ending, with neither character having to give up too much to stay together. Something that I alway have doubts about when one character has a secret job and the other one doesn’t.

So from me, all in all, 2 thumbs up for Deep Breath! If you like a quick by long, action adventure story with some romance thrown in for good measure and some hot lovin’ click on the picture below to buy Deep Breath.

The birds are still trying to nest in my dryer vent. Some maintenance guy came and looked at it, assured that they couldn’t get in the house (not that I was worried about that, but now I am) and said he’d be back…eventually.

But the birds are still there, and now our dryer doesn’t actually dry stuff.

Oh, and the Hubster instituted his brilliant solution for everything - spray Clorox at the dryer vent. *shakingheadmublingdumbassmubling*

Anyway, now that the birds are out of the way - metaphorically anyway, I watched Brokeback Mountain last night.

Obviously people that liked the movie must have watched a different version than I.

After I watched the movie I watched the special features and they were saying “oh people call it the gay cowboy movie but really it’s so much more than that,” but really, I think something called “the gay cowboy movie” would be a hell of a lot better.

They say that it’s this epic doomed love story. Uh, I missed it. I mean it is epic, and it is doomed, but I missed the love story part.

These two dudes kept getting back together but I never once saw that they were actually in love with one another. Was the sex that good? I dunno, but I never saw that they were in love.

Like I almost felt like the filmmakers were like “we’re stepping outside the bounds, making a gay love story, but lets not actually alienate people by showing the characters, you know, in love.”

And totally, if this movie were a romance novel, the characters would have been TSTL.

And while I knew I wasn’t going to get a happy ending, I expected at last something semi uplifting. But no. Two years from now, someone is going to find Ennis’s rotting corpse alone in his trailer after his liver explodes.

And Jack Twist is just a man ho! Where’s the romance in that? And did I really need to see Princess Mia’s boobs? I don’t think so!

The only good parts (and no, I’m not a perv) were the love scenes between Jack and Ennis. I could really feel the “I do, but I don’t” feelings there. But the rest just kind of fell flat.

So, I know I’m way late on seeing this flick, but I’m dying to know what other people thought!

My apartment looks like a hurricaine has swept throught it. And my mom is coming to visit this weekend. The next two days are goiong to be cleaning days.

***
I can share now, since I have the signed contracts ready to go in the mail sitting right next to me, I sold Double Jeopardy (formerly known as “the book that will kill me”) to Venus Press! I’m so excited that all that work wasn’t for nothing, but I’m kind of bummed about having to revisit it for edits.

***
I went to my super RWA chapter meeting last night featuring our own Kathy Love. She talked about characters, but the really fun part was when she played various songs and we wrote characters based on the song. It was quite fun.

So I think the current WIP that’s not going anywhere needs a soundtrack. Especially since the new car has a CD player and I can listen to it there.

What? Procrastination? Me? Never!

***
I got Secrets in the Marraige Bed yesterday, and devoured it last night. It’s a fabulous book, by my fabulous birthday buddy Nalini Singh. But it’s quite different from things I normally read, and I think quite different for her.

It might need it’s own post. Or just go here and read what Meljean said. I think the same thing.

***
And lastly, check out my beautiful new cover. It’s for Tempting Fate (duh) coming soon from Liquid Silver Books and done by the wonderful April Martinez.

OK, I just made my list of things I have to do this week and well, that means I have to blog cheat today. Stolen from Shannon again.

1. Go to Wikipedia.
2. In the Search box, type your birth month and day (but not year).
3. List three events that happened on your birthday.
4. List two important birthdays and one interesting death.
5. Post this in your journal.

Three Events:

1251 BC - A solar eclipse on this date might mark the birth of legendary Heracles at Thebes, Greece. It’s the might I like in this answer.

1927 - The first fully electronic television system is achieved by Philo Taylor Farnsworth. I’ve really just always loved the name Philo Farnsworth

1969 - Monty Python’s Flying Circus airs first episode.

Two Important Birthdays:
There’s a depressing lack of non-interesting people born on my birthday.

1944 - Sam Sloan, chess journalist Okay, raist your hand if you knew chess journalist was even a profession

1976 - Stevie Case (Killcreek), American video game celebrity Another one - what the hell is a video game celebrity?

And it’s not on Wikipedia, but I do happen to share my birthday (year and all) with Nalini Singh (and yes, I tell people that regularly)!

One Interesting Death:

2003 - The Great Antonio, Canadian strongman and eccentric (b. 1925) This one was the most fun. Actors, Singers, Statesmen, Strongman. Which one would you pick?

Isn’t it pretty?

It’s a Toyota Matrix. We haven’t come up with a name for him/her/it yet, but everytime I get in, I look at the Hubster and say “I know kung fu!” (Get it, from The Matrix).

The Hubster took it for a really long test drive. When we first got in it had 21 miles on it! When we got ready to take it home, it had 32 miles on it.

This is us going home! Note the cool moon roof! Unfortunatly we couldn’t have it open that day ’cause it was raining. Plus, it’s kind of chilly.

So, what did you do this weekend?

Today’s interviewees are Karen Mandeville and Anna J Evans! Welcome Ladies!

Karen writes kinda scary, REALLY sexy books for Triskellion and Whiskey Creek Press. Karen is one of the authors in all 4 seasonal anthologies.

If you were a pie, what kind of pie would you be?
hmm - I’d be a cheesecake. So fluffy and yummy but a tougher, still delicious exterior. Love cheesecake. Can’t have much of it lately - my fav is white chocolate and raspberry cheesecake! it’s evil! you can’t just have a piece - it has to be a slab!

If you were to choose a vegetable most resembling your personality, what veggie would you pick and why? (Note: Tomato is a fruit).
haha - what a question! My favourite vegetable is a sweet potato or a yam you American’s call it. I was never really a fan but this year - they have taken over. I have got a sweet and caring nature but some people think I’m odd (like the shape) with the things that I come out with. But I’ll do just about anything for anyone which makes sense with the sweet part.

What thought first crosses your mind when you hear, “Once upon a time…”?
Reminds me of when I was a kid and I used to listen to the records/tapes with the book that went along with it - and the ‘BRRRRING’ noise to turn the page. I loved fairy tales and disney books. But now, when I hear ‘Once upon a time …’ I start to think of my own stories - which are usually haunted tales.

Which Disney character are you most like, and why?
Snow White - she was the only brunette! But then again, Cinderella got the shoes … hm - I’d actually prefer the Brothers Grimm version of fairy tales - they have that whole era of those tales. They were the first scary tale and continue to be to this day. Love them!

What is the most attractive trait you could hope for in the opposite sex?
Someone with a personality! Nothing worse than a yes man or someone you can’t hold a conversation with. Personality is everything. If you don’t have that - you’ve got nothing!

Anna:

Anna writes super hot books for Ellora’s Cave, Chippewa and, of course, Whiskey Creek Press. Anna actually has 2 Torrid books out this month with the Spring Fling anthology and Torrid Teasers volume 4!

If you were a super hero what would your power be? What would you do with it?
My super skill would be the power of super-deadly, yet silent, farts. Whenever I spotted jerkiness at work, I would bombard the evil-doer with my death stench until he/she mended their evil ways.

Choose a word to describe a sunset. Why did you pick that word?
Heaven. I think a sunset is a perfect ending to something wonderful.

If someone were to make a movie of your life, who would you want to play you?
Penelope Ann Miller…from the “Kindergarten Cop” and “Gun in Betty Lou’s Handbag” years.

What’s your most embarrassing moment?
I went to Christmas breakfast at a fancy resort in fleece footie pajamas. I looked like a giant baby and thought that would be fun and festive, since the whole family had decided to wear P.J.’s anyway. Unfortunately, the old school snobby types were not amused and shunned me quite viciously.

Is there a skill that you don’t have but wish you did?
Yes, I would love to be able to paint really well. My ex husband was an artist, but refused to paint me in the nude. I don’t know why, but I’ve always wanted to be painted in the nude. I figure, if I could paint, at least I could do a self-portrait.

If you had to choose from eternal youth, endless wealthy and a year’s supply of dog food, which one would you pick.
Endlessly wealthy. Because I can’t stand dogs (think they should be released into the wild and hunted for sport), and wouldn’t want to live forever. I love life and my youth, which is officially coming to a close now that I’m at the end of my twenties, has been wonderful, but the whole business is a little too exhausting to want to mess with ‘eternally’. I like to think I’m the type of girl who knows when to leave the party ;).

If you haven’t checked out the Spring Fling anthology yet, you can do so here. And don’t forget to check out other releases from these 2 fabulous authors!