Monday, August 11, 2008
Down Under Desirabelles
I've taken a short intermission in my lessons-learned-from-conference series (a weekend away, which did nothing to help me recover from post-conference lurgy!) but I will resume in a day or two. Recently I've posted about audiobooks at 2BRead and more on conference at the shiny new Down Under Desirabelles blog.  Labels: Down Under Desirabelles, other blogs
Friday, August 08, 2008
Lesson 3: I Still Love San Francisco...
...although I didn't see as much as I'd intended, thanks to the specialness and so-much-to-do conference and a hotel that didn't drive me out the door in search of air and space and solitude as often happens. In fact I didn't even scout the shops around Union Square or the big Westfield Mall in the next block to the hotel or Macys or Bloomingdales or Borders (shocking, I know!) The great thing: thinking about this on the trip home and now as I'm writing this post, I have no regrets. I did what I felt like doing, went to the workshops I felt like attending, kicked back with a coffee or a drink and a chat with friends when I wanted, and didn't succumb to the pressure of being here, there and everywhere that has exhausted me at previous conferences. This all sounds as though I didn't make it out of the hotel which is so not the case. Day 1 we found Mel's Diner for breakfast and returned again for a post-literacy signing hamburger and root-beer float (the addiction, I tell you, had to have). Then there were the daily Walgreen visits for the staples: bottled water and bandaids and breakfast snacks. How does anyone make it to the conference breakfast, I ask, when I'm lucky to stagger into an 8.30 workshop with coffee in hand and eyes barely open? A lunch at Annabelle's, the PASIC reception at Neiman Marcus, the Harlequin party at the Four Seasons, were all further excuses for a short, manageable even in heels, walk. On Saturday afternoon we had a couple of hours, a window of opportunity that beckoned, and of course we found ourselves drawn to the bay. Along with every tourist west of the Rockies. We'd thought about doing one of the short cruises that take you under the bridge and around Alcatraz, mainly because getting out on the bay gives another perspective. Due to the crowds, we didn't and so glad.  We stood on the now-uncrowded pier and watched the packed ferry rock by and decided that being by the water was enough, that leaning on the rail and looking back at the hillsides was enough, that the whip of the breeze and the bark of the sea lions and the stretch of choppy blue-grey water at our backs was enough. My favourite cities are all built on harbours or bays or by the ocean. It's not as though I was born near water or feel compelled to live by water. I'm not a water sign. I don't have a pool. But by the water I feel a drawing power and an elemental response that is both calming and stimulating. Paradoxical, I know, but that's how it is.
Down by the bay with fellow Aussie authors Fiona McArthur (Hq Medicals) and Barbara Hannay (Hq Romance.)Labels: Conference, RWAmerica, San Francisco
Thursday, August 07, 2008
What I Learned At RWA 2008, Lessons 1 & 2
It's been a while--far too long!--since I blogged here. One of the main reasons was my preparations and the work I needed done before leaving for the Romance Writers of America national conference, held last week. I had intended blogging before I left and possibly even from San Francisco but where did the time go? Adopting the tenet of better late than never, over the next week I'll be tapping into my memory bank for a series of posts. The theme: lessons learned (because, after all, isn't a conference trip always a learning adventure?)  Lesson 1: shortening the length of travel into doable chunks and arriving at conference fresh and relaxed and not shattered with exhaustion is a very, veRY, VERY good idea. Kind of makes me wonder: why didn't I think of this before? Duh. Travelling with a group of friends and hanging out a couple of days and nights in Hawaii (that's our hotel centre back of the picture) = the perfect place to break the Pacific crossing and the perfect start to a conference trip. Which segues rather nicely into...  Lesson 2: select your travel companions and room-mates well (See picture, with fellow Harlequin authors Alison Roberts, Kelly Hunter, Trish Morey and Fiona McArthur.) Medical authors, for example, are fabulous travel companions. As well as a (sometimes black) sense of humour, they know important stuff such as the importance of aspirin and support socks when flying long haul AND how to travel in style. Most important is choosing friends you can relax with, be yourself with, laugh with, shop with, gossip with, and brainstorm with. This is all particularly important when your plane is delayed and you have four hours to fill in at airport.  Sure there is a serenity garden at Honolulu airport, which we really did appreciate, despite the serenity being slightly bruised by the scent of aviation fuel and the persistent screech of jet engines. Other top Hawaii moments: Watching the sea turtles from our balcony. Swimming by moonlight. Shopping, day and night (gotta love 11pm closing.) Mai tais, pina coladas, daiquaris and my first root-beer float. The Waikele Outlet Mall. And the fire-knife dancer. Labels: Conference, RWAmerica, travelling
Sunday, July 13, 2008
Photos and Memories
Our middle son turns 21 in a couple of months. I gather that this isn't such a big deal in America -- correct me if I'm wrong -- but here in Australia it is the landmark birthday that traditionally signifies the step into adulthood and independence. There is often a party, large or small. In the case of our James we opted for small, mostly family, but then we don't exactly have a small family. The list passed small several pages ago.
This weekend I'm working on invitations. I chose a template from an on-line site. The design includes a series of photos from then and now, which means I've spent hours and hours poring through photos choosing which seven to include. Have also sorted out the best to use in his memory book, which is the next big (fun) task.
While sorting through photos and photo albums I found all kinds of stray and miscellaneous snaps. This one is stray because it's a panorama print: long and skinny and not fitting it any albums. In fact it's so long and skinny that it didn't fit in my scanner and so you're seeing just a portion of the literacy autographing at the New Orleans RWA Conference in 2001. My first conference, my first book, my first signing. I couldn't believe the size of it and it's only gotten bigger since.
 This year will be my fifth RWA conference and my fifth signing. Here is the list of participating authors. All 520 of them. If anyone can fit THAT in a photo, I would love to see it! Labels: Australian life, Conference, RWAmerica
Monday, July 07, 2008
In Three Weeks Time...
 ...I will be on a beach like this. Well, perhaps not *exactly* like this. Chances are there will be a lot more people. And waves. I won't be sitting on the beach playing kissyface either, I will be standing with my camera recording the efforts of certain intrepid authors on surfboards. It has been pointed out that money could be made keeping those pictures private but that would be blackmail, right? One of my least favourite ploys.  The beach, BTW, is the cover of Quade: The Irresistible One in Lithuania. For the second time. Here is the first cover as a single ===>>>; this latest one is a duet with Amy Fetzer's Taming The Beast. Seemed strange to get two translations in the one country relatively close together so I double-checked and it's the same title, Zavusis Kveidas, and the same blurb. It's a pretty cover and it could be Chantal and Quade. On their honeymoon. I think they'd have chosen an isolated island beach somewhere. How about you? Where did you spend your honeymoon? I have your choice from my available back titles as a giveaway. (Prize drawn July 15.) Labels: foreign translations, Quade: The Irresistible One
Friday, July 04, 2008
I Helped A Bitch Out...
...a month or three back at Smart Bitches which led to my coronation. Yes, I am an official dubbed-and-everything member of the Smart Bitches Peerage. All because I happened to remember the Mills & Boon trilogy by Sally Wentworth titled by the characters' names. Calum, Chris and Francesca. Also the vineyard scene made an impression. I suspect this may have been the first family trilogy I ever read -- another reason for memorable -- and I still love and adore the family trilogy. Have been meaning to update my sidebar and I will do that (one day) but in the meantime here is me, the aristocracy, as it should be.  Labels: fun stuff, Mills and Boon, trilogies
Monday, June 30, 2008
Get Smart, The Movie
 I resisted the urge to title this post, "Missed it by *that* much." Mostly because I reckon the movie adaptation of Get Smart didn't miss by much at all. In fact, I laughed, I grinned, I left the theatre in a damn fine mood...and isn't that what entertainment is all about? To be honest, I went to see Get Smart with low expectations. I loved the TV series and I couldn't envisage anyone else in the roles of Max and 99. I didn't want to see pale imitations, I didn't want the screwball original humour messed with, or to be drubbed over the head with the lines owned by Don Adams and Barbara Feldon. And you know what? They weren't, it wasn't, they didn't. This was an homage to the TV series, set in the present and with the original characters translated into the present. Steve Carell and Anne Hathaway were brilliant casting choices. Instead of a bumbling agent, this Smart was a skilled analyst but with no field experience. And 99 was a kickass agent who hated being teamed with the klutz. They had a real buddy chemistry and watching the movie I got the impression everyone was having a ball. Most of the humour -- or the stuff I found funniest -- was in the dialogue rather than the slapstick. Loved James Caan as the president and The Rock (forget his actual acting name) was excellent as SuperAgent 23. I've not enjoyed many of the recent spate of adaptations of TV series. Can't think of one off hand that I've enjoyed as much as Get Smart, and it put me in a warm 'n' fuzzy reminiscence about the TV series. I almost went to check the cable programs to see if it's currently showing, but I didn't. I think, along with Hogan's Heroes and F Troop, it's the kind of comedy best left in the past. I don't want to dim the memory of how uproariously funny I found them then. I suspect none might have aged well unlike, for example, MASH which has so much poignant human emotion underlying the humour. I'm the same with some of the romance in my keeper collection. I have a whole stack of Johanna Lindsey and M&B's from the 70s and 80s that I kept because of my unabashed love for them at the time. I want to maintain those feelings and so I won't pull them out for rereads, nor will I get rid of them. They're my touchstone to that time and to my introduction to romance. Oh, and in case you're wondering... Yes, the cone of silence and the shoe-phone do make an appearance. How could they not? Labels: movies
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