What can I say about the RT convention that hasn’t already been said elsewhere? Probably not a lot. Yes, the hotel was a rundown dump. Yes, some of the “models” (I put models in quotes because to call the troublemakers models is an insult to the true cover models in attendance) took bad behavior to a new, disgusting and disturbing level. But still, even in the midst of plaster dust, missing towel racks and the lingering odors of mold, mildew and must, I still had fun visiting with friends and meeting new ones.

Some of the highlights from my week:

–I won a Sony Ebook reader at Wednesday night’s ebook expo. You can see a photo of me (with friends Beth Williamson and Cindy Szolyga) and my new ereader over on the Beyond Her Book Publishers Weekly blog written by Barbara Vey (who is an absolute sweetheart and was a pleasure to see as she ran all over the convention, catching all the goings on). I’ve been eying the Sony Reader for awhile, and now I have one. I love my new toy! Not only did I get the Reader, it also came with a fun and funky purple and black skin and a Dooney & Bourke Reader cover and keychain. Click the link to see a photo of the one I got. Unfortunately, my keychain has gone missing. I’ve searched all my luggage and bags and it’s disappeared. I do have to dedicate this win to Marty Mathews, Samhain’s author liaison and all-around awesome person. Without her, I never would’ve won. She brought me the ticket when I was busy working and couldn’t get away to grab one myself. And she nudged me to pay attention when they called out the winning numbers. I even told her afterward that she should’ve won, rather than me, and she shrugged it off and told me I deserved it. Have I mentioned lately how much I adore Marty?

–Staying up until 3 am my first night at RT with my bud Heather Osborn, editor for TOR. Heather and I have been friends for-evah–forever being around 13 years–but I haven’t seen her in a few years. We spent half the night laughing our asses off. It was the perfect way to start my RT week.

–Going on a Pittsburgh adventure with Shiloh Walker and her hubby. Shiloh and I discovered we have something in common–wherever we go, whenever we travel, we collect books on local ghost stories. So on Friday we decided to get some fresh air and find a bookstore. We hit up Pittsburgh’s public transportation–the T–and with the help of some locals, we made our way to the mall, about 40 stops away on the opposite end of the line. We found a bunch of ghost story books, and then had lunch in a fun little cafe with to-die-for chocolate fondue for dessert, before racing back to the hotel so I could do my hour in Club RT.

–Throwing an impromptu party in my hotel room on Friday night. The hotel, as some sort of compensation for the awful, awful living conditions, gave everyone vouchers for food and alcohol. Shiloh, her hubby and I pooled our vouchers together, bought a bunch of appetizers, and invited pretty much whoever we ran across to join us up in the room. I was one of the lucky few with a fridge, stocked with alcohol thanks to my editor Angie. So the drinks flowed, the appetizers disappeared, and we laughed and gabbed for half the night. Plus I got to meet Smart Bitch Sarah–which is how she was introduced to me. She was a hoot! I think the most amusing part of that evening was watching JC Wilder roll around on the bed laughing, her head landing in the remnants of frosting from the cake Shiloh Walker provided. So if you kissed JC on top of the head later in the week and thought she tasted sweet, you got a taste of our party too!

–Meeting Laura Bradford, who is one hell of an awesome literary agent who represents some of my best writing buds, Lauren Dane and Anya Bast. I had a great time talking about the industry with her during one of the parties as we huddled in a corner because the room was so crowded. Ms. Bradford is one classy lady–now I know why her clients love her so much!

Honestly, it’s impossible to sum up the RT experience in just a single blog post. I’ve been home for almost two days, but I still feel like I could sleep for a week. But you know what? I’m already thinking about next year and what it might bring, who I might see, and the experiences I’ll have. I hope to see some of you next year in Orlando!

Today we’re blogging over at It Takes Two. If you can call it blogging. Apparently sometime in the last week Lisa and I lost our shared brain, and we need help getting our mojo back! If you have time, come on by and offer some suggestions to kick our brain into gear again.

Today we’re blogging over at the It Takes Two blog, talking about making time for friendship as well as writing. Come on by and say hi.

We’re blogging over at It Takes Two today, the new blog focusing on author teams/writing partnerships. Lisa and I talked about some of the silliest typos and mistakes we’ve made over the years. Hope you’ll come by and check it out.

Since I was a kid, my mom has made a special Halloween dinner. This year, the festivities are at my house, with the entire extended family coming over for dinner and Trick or Treat goodness. Together, my mom and I will be making the same dinner I’ve had every Halloween since I was a little girl in costume.

Halloween Beef Pies

1 1/2 pounds ground beef

1 medium onion, chopped

1 tablespoon chili powder

1 teaspoon cumin (optional)

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon garlic powder

1 (15 1/2-ounce) can tomato sauce

1 cup shredded carrot

1 (4 1/2-ounce) can chopped ripe olives

1 (10-ounce) can refrigerated biscuits

10 slices American cheese

Brown ground beef and onion in large skillet. Pour off drippings. Sprinkle chili powder, cumin, salt and garlic powder over meat mixture. Stir in tomato sauce, carrot and olives. Cover and cook slowly 20 minutes, stirring occasionally. Roll each biscuit on lightly floured board to make a 4-inch circle. Press each over the bottom of greased muffin cup to fit snugly. Bake at 400 degrees 10 minutes, or until lightly browned. Remove biscuit cups from pan immediately. Place on baking sheet. Cut 3-inch circles from each cheese slice and cut each with a sharp knife to make a pumpkin face. (Note from Jen: My son, niece and nephew are in charge of making the jack-o-lantern cheese faces. They love it!) Chop cheese scraps and stir into meat mixture until partially melted. Place an equal amount of meat mixture in each biscuit cup. Top each cup with cheese face. Return to oven just until cheese begins to melt, about 3 minutes. Makes 10 pies.

For the last several months, Lisa and I have been revisiting 2003. That year was wild, crazy and wonderful for us as we became published authors for the first time with the release of our first four titles: Acting on Impulse, Lover’s Talisman, “Magic in the Works” in the Mesmerized anthology (now out of print) and Angel in Moonlight.

2007 has felt like the rebirth of Ashleigh Raine. After no releases for a couple years, we came back to publishing with the release of Driven to Distraction, the sequel to our very first release, Acting on Impulse, and new contracts for the Talisman Bay series. Lisa and I have spent a lot of time talking about how we feel like we’re reliving 2003, but with an additional four years of knowledge of the publishing industry, the entertainment industry, writing and life under our belts. We’ve spent the last couple months revising and rewriting Lover’s Talisman, and we’re currently working on doing the same to Forsaken Talisman, both titles which are being re-released from Samhain Publishing in 2008.

But there are certain experiences from 2003 we would have rather not relived. Southern California on fire.

Four years ago almost to the day–and now–Southern California burned. Lisa wrote up her 2003 fire experience–including her evacuation and her adoration of firemen–on the Havoc(2) Tale from Hollywood.

The fire still rages outside, but so far Lisa hasn’t had to evacuate this time, and we’re praying she doesn’t have to. But both of us–living 90 miles apart–are experiencing the smoke, the fire and the flames, the difficult-to-breathe air, from different fires. Below are some photos we took of what we see when we look outside.

Here’s the view from Lisa’s house yesterday afternoon right after a new fire started:

 Here’s a photo her husband took of the sun on Sunday afternoon:

 Another view of the valley from Lisa’s house, this photo taken Sunday:

Lisa’s backyard, Sunday afternoon:

Now on to Jen’s house. Here’s the view from my front yard from a few hours ago. That’s smoke, not clouds:

 Here’s the view down the street:

And this is my horizon from a couple hours ago:

I need to go out and take more photos because it’s gotten much, much worse. The sky is gray, red and orange, with no hint of the blue sky you could see in the photos from a couple hours ago. I tried to take photos last night of the hillside burning. It’s the strangest sight to stare out the window and watch the fire move down the mountain, a red glow in the blackness.

Our thoughts and prayers go out to all those fighting the fires and those who no longer have homes to go back to. Sadly enough, it’s nowhere near over. So we sit back and watch and wait and hope that it ends soon.

I completely forgot to post on Wednesday. I came to the site to write up my post, saw that Lisa had posted her Tales from Hollywood about her recent experiences on the movie G-Force and CSI: Miami, read them instead of writing my post, then promptly forgot all about the original reason I came to the site. Yes, my brain is on overload this week. Then yesterday I was so busy I didn’t have time to write up anything, so now I hope to make up for it.

My TiVo is getting nice and full of all the new shows. I haven’t been able to watch as much as I’d like (see previous paragraph about overloaded brain and being too busy to breathe) but they’re waiting there for my next free moment. I love TiVo.

I have had a chance to watch a few things. I saw Cold Case. It was okay. I’d probably rate it a C. Not a memorable episode. I’d rate this season’s first episodes of Heroes and How I Met Your Mother with a B/B-. They were satisfactory episodes, but again, nothing overly memorable in either of them. I enjoyed seeing Hiro in feudal Japan, and the mention of slapcountdown.com in HIMYM, which leads me to believe there are better storylines to come this season from both of these shows. This week’s episode of The Unit I’d have to give a C- too. I was bored. I’m ready for this storyline to wrap up so the Unit can get back to saving the world, rather than all this “who’s betraying whom” crud they have going on now. Law & Order: SVU came back with a bang. I’d easily rate this as one of my favorite episodes from the last couple years. Maybe it’s my lifelong fascination with Dissociative Identity Disorder, but this episode kept me glued to my seat and got an A rating from me. Plus, Cynthia Nixon was amazing as the SGS of the week. A stellar return for L&O: SVU.

My biggest surprise of the week was Bionic Woman. I originally didn’t plan to watch this show. I saw the original pilot at Comic Con and was overall unimpressed. But my hubby wanted to watch it, so I kept him company. The version that aired this week was surprisingly better than the pilot I saw at Comic Con. I was up-in-arms when I learned they recast and re-imagined the role of Jaime Sommers’ sister. I like the actress who portrayed her in the pilot–in fact that was one of my favorite things about the pilot, which was why I didn’t plan on watching the new version. But the new sister isn’t half bad. I still have some concerns about the show. I feel zero chemistry between Jaime Sommers and her doctor love interest on the show. Watching scenes between them borders on painful for me. I actually fast forwarded through the love scene in the episode–and me, FF through a love scene, that never happens. It doesn’t help that the background music during their scenes–a low, solo saxophone–screamed bad B movie to me. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good saxophone, but “good” this was not. Honestly, Katee Sackhoff and Michelle Ryan have better chemistry. They sizzle on screen together. I’d give Bionic Woman a solid B- and I’ll be checking in again next week to see if the problems I had with the first episode improve.

Oh, on Monday I mentioned the TV show Life, which I got the advance preview of on DVD through Blockbuster. This is another show that just didn’t work for me. I love the main actor–Damian Lewis–and thought he was especially great in Band of Brothers, so I was interested to see how he’d bring this tortured character to life. The show is just a bit too…odd for me. Or maybe it’s the main character. Or maybe it’s the premise. Or maybe it’s the interactions between the characters. I can’t quite define what didn’t work for me, I just know I had no interest in continuing to watch it. Now, my husband enjoyed it more than I did–he watched the entire first episode whereas I bailed out after only seeing the first half. But even he’s not convinced he’ll tune in for the second episode.

Tonight I’ll be tuning in for Moonlight, even though, I hate to admit it, the teasers I’ve seen for the show have felt stale. I’m keeping up hope it was just bad choice on the marketing department and the show itself has more life than the promos make it appear. I also love Jason Dohring, formerly of Veronica Mars fame–another show I miss dearly–so I’ll tune in just to see how he plays a vampire.

So that’s it for me. What did everyone else like and dislike about this week in TV?

My week is already out of sync. I didn’t get to watch my Monday night shows yet! I wasn’t feeling well last night and ended up falling asleep early. My hubby and I made a pact that we’d watch How I Met Your Mother and Heroes together this evening–so I’m doing my best to avoid any and all spoilers. It’s not easy! I do know a character was murdered on Heroes–but I’ve managed to avoid learning which one. My hubby better get home from work early today.

Tonight’s a full night of premieres, although most of them are old favorites, with only one new show in the mix. Reaper. It looks like a fun, irreverent show, and since Kevin Smith directed the first episode, I’d be checking it out even if it didn’t look so good. I mean, c’mon, a show about a slacker whose parents sold his soul to the devil before he was even born, and now he has to retrieve souls who’ve escaped from hell, using a special hand vac as a retrieval device? LOL!

Other shows my TiVo will be recording tonight: Bones (can’t watch this one when eating–some of the scenes make me squeamish, but I love the characters and well, who doesn’t love David Boreanaz?), The Unit (I love Scott Foley, which was the reason I first started watching this show, but then I got hooked on all the characters and the story–and the eye candy. *g*), Boston Legal (I can’t help it, I don’t want to be, but I keep tuning in. It’s off the wall, zany, and I shouldn’t like it, but I do.), Law & Order: SVU (would Benson and Stabler just sleep together already?). I’m going to have to catch repeats of House.

What is everyone else tuning in to watch tonight?

I’m a TV junkie and proud of it!

Okay, no surprise that.

This week marks the start of the 2007-2008 television season. Well, a handful of shows premiered last week, but the majority of shows kick into gear this week…and I’m excited. I love this time of year, reading up on all the upcoming shows to decide which ones I want to try watching, and anticipating the return of all my favorites.

Tonight marks the return of two of my favorite shows. Heroes and How I Met Your Mother. HIMYM is, hands-down, the funniest show on television. I watch a couple other comedies, but this one makes me laugh more than any other show. I do my best to get everyone I know hooked on it too. Last time Lisa came over I played her about half of the first season on DVD. And she loved it. So, see, it’s a good show. Try it out! A couple episodes from last season remained on my TiVo for months for re-watching pleasure. “Robin Sparkles/Slap Bet” and “Showdown”. All I have to do is mention the name Robin Sparkles and my husband starts laughing. We watched it so much this summer my seven year old, hubby and I can all sing the lyrics to “Let’s Go to the Mall…Today”.  You really have to watch it to understand, but suffice it to say that episode is probably the hardest I’ve laughed at television…ever. I’ve been waiting more than four months for a new episode, and will be glued to my TV tonight watching it, and laughing. That’s a guarantee.

I love paranormal shows, and generally give every one a try. Heroes was my favorite new show of last season. I love the mythology, the characters and the story. I love how Heroes isn’t just a TV show–it’s interactive. I really feel like Tim Kring, the creator of Heroes, is taking television to a new level, and I applaud his ideas and dedication to making Heroes a unique and original experience.

The new show premiering tonight I’m most excited about is Chuck. I rented a copy of the premiere episode from Blockbuster (included on the same DVD were the premiere episodes to Journeyman, which I’ll talk about next, and Life, which I’ll talk about on Wednesday.) The first episode of Chuck is awesome. The tagline of the show says it all: Computer geek by day. Government operative by night. I love stories that feature underdogs, and Chuck is that. Chuck is a member of the Nerd Herd (think Best Buy’s Geek Squad). He’s awkward around women, he’s got a supremely nerdy best friend, and his favorite past time is playing computer games–so much so his fingers are often in bandages. His whole life changes when his former college roommate sends him an encoded email transmission that downloads government secrets into his brain. The first episode has all the things that draw me in to a show. Fast, witty dialogue, fun characters, a great premise, action, adventure and lots of humor. Adam Baldwin, a favorite actor of mine–oh Firefly, how I miss you–brings his trademark over-the-top alpha obnoxiousness coupled with snide humor that I adore. Chuck is my top pick for brand-new shows premiering tonight.

As for Journeyman, I had high hopes for the show, based on the little I knew about it. I love time travel stories and thought the premise could be interesting. Unfortunately, I didn’t make it past the first fifteen minutes of the show. I need to be grabbed in the first few minutes–give me the hook, show me interesting characters I want to care about, make me laugh with fun dialogue, give me a reason to stay tuned in…this show had none of that going for it. The opening was bland, the characters unappealing, the dialogue trite and lacking any originality. My husband and I stared blankly at the TV for ten minutes, waiting for something to happen–and when the man first traveled through time, I couldn’t care less. It makes me sad when a show with a great premise doesn’t work for me…and maybe it’ll get better. But for now, I’m not sold on it and won’t be tuning in tonight. I’ll wait for the reviews of the next few episodes and maybe…maybe I’ll give it a second chance.

So now that you know what I’m dying to watch, what is everyone else looking forward to watching tonight?

A cool thing indeed for my Monday morning. Ashleigh Raine was chosen to be featured in an author spotlight on the following sites:

http://darkicegoddessmusings.blogspot.com/

http://selenaillyriasthoughts.blogspot.com/

http://selenaillyria.pinkchairdiaries.com/blog

Fun stuff!