I have been meaning to post about the redesigned Desire Authors website ever since the relaunch last week. Finally I have remembered (and may I blame the heat for this memory lapse?) One of the new features is a blog, with a different author in the spotlight each week. Guess who's "it" this week??? Please visit and check out the classy new design, and do read last week's blog entries by the brilliant, talented, insightful (and funny) Roxanne St Claire.

There is this giant spider in the bathroom.
I swear, it is at least twice as big as this picture.

Where are my menfolk when I need them?

No, I do not have a new car. The new toy to which I refer is an MP3-player gadget, a Christmas present from one of my sons. Up until now I've not had a chance to do much except listen to some music said son uploaded for me--my one attempt to do the same failed and I haven't yet read the instruction book (see my 7 for 7 list of things I cannot do.) The reason behind this particular present? My son believes I should exercise more. He is right, but don't tell him I said so. I bought this ergonomic trainer thingy before Christmas but it wasn't being used enough. Because it has this back-and-forth arm action, I can't read on it (I can, but it's awkward and difficult and sucks all the joy out of reading.)

But I can listen to music OR--and this is the good part--listen to an audio book...which is what I've finally worked out this week.

I joined audible.com, which I'd heard all about at the Reno conference last year as they'd just taken Harlequin books on board. For an annual fee of $9.95 I received a credit for my first book download. I chose Susan Elizabeth Phillips' MATCH ME IF YOU CAN, which I'd not read yet as I was hanging out for the paperback edition. Hardcovers are ridiculously expensive in Australia. The download to my computer and upload to my device went smoothly--I didn't even have to resort to reading the instruction book!--and I have just finished listening to the whole book. No, I didn't exercise for the eleven-plus hours of the reading (unabridged). I listened while exercising the last three days, while driving, while walking, while cooking dinner, while ironing and doing assorted housework chores, and while lying in bed last night because I couldn't put it down!

At first I was slightly bothered by the voices the reader adopted. I'm still hating the cutesy three-year-old voice she put on and the purportedly big-tough-guy voice she adopted for Bodie's point of view. But I did get used to the rest and it stopped bothering me so much once I got into the story. And being by Susan Elizabeth Phillips, that didn't take long. I'm about to go make another selection. I'm trying to decide if I should select another from my favorite authors list or to take the plunge and go for a new author or even a new genre. There are a lot of titles listed so choosing won't be easy.

Anyone else listen to audiobooks? And have you had any experiences where you couldn't stand listening to the reader's voice?

Now there's something I never expected to say in this lifetime! But the truth is, there is shopping I love and shopping I loathe and there are times when I'd rather just stay home and read a book. This weekend is one of those times. It is pretty darn scorching where I live (today's forecast is 110, I think I heard son #1 mutter as he went off to work) but we need a new car. And by new, I don't necessarily mean brand-spanking showroom new. Our choice may well be a low-mileage pre-owned beauty. Our current model is mumble-mumble years old and has mumble-mumble miles on the clock. It's had a good life and has served us well, but its time is nigh.

But, here's the thing: I have no idea what kind of car I want. (Well, I do, but that's way outside our price range!) I've bought the magazines and checked out all the best-rated models in our size and price bracket. None of them appealed. Sigh. I decided it might be because the pictures are one-dimensional. They might look better in the metal, right? So I decided to go see...and discovered that car dealerships aren't open on a Saturday afternoon (who knew? I though that'd be prime car-viewing time.) But I got to see several from my list sitting in the car yards and I'm still not impressed.

Maybe it's the heat. Maybe it's the fact that I'd rather be home reading a book. Or maybe it's because the car I would really covet (if I would allow myself to covet it!) is not on my list. I really do not want to shop for a car. Sigh.

So, do you like to shop? Is there shopping you love and shopping you'd choose a root canal over? (At least then you can read your book in the waiting room.) And is there a car you covet, even thought it's hugely impractical and well into the you're-dreaming price range?

Finishing a book feels much the same as end-of-semester at school. I feel like tossing all my books in the air, letting out a loud Wahoooo, and enjoying some playtime. If it's been a particularly harrowing press to make deadline, I may also feel like sleeping for a week...but that's another story for another time.

This afternoon I am indulging my need for playtime by making some changes to my blog template.

I finally decided on a name (see top of page) which, for the benefit of non-Australians, is a reference to the famed Dorothea McKellar poem which we all learned to recite in primary school, My Country. It's a poem of many verses but the one we all remember--and which never fails to stir patriotic goosebumpy emotions in me--goes something like this:

I love a sunburnt country, a land of sweeping plains,
of ragged mountain ranges, of droughts and flooding rains.
I love her far horizons, I love her jewel-seas,
Her beauty and her splendour--the wide brown land for me!

So, that's my newly (and belatedly) christened blog.

My other addition is a tagboard, which you will in the sidebar over to the right. I'd love for a few of you to try it out so I can see what it looks like with more than my one lame "testing" line. Yes, I could make up some names and add lots of entries myself but I'm not going to. Maybe.

And after I finish with this playing, I may go and watch something from my boxed set of LOST DVD's. Or perhaps read a book. Whatever, I promise to enjoy my playtime!

I have been tagged three times with this meme over the last few weeks and finally I have time to come out to play! So, here are my lists of seven, courtesy of Gail Dayton and Carol Stephenson and Nalini Singh. Aside: is it just me or has the word "seven" never been the same since THAT movie? Shudder.

7 things to do before I die:

1. Submit one (just one!) book earlier than the last minute of the last deadline day
2. Rent a fabulously inspiring place (a Tuscan villa, a mountain cabin, a 5-star hotel penthouse) for a couple of months and write a complete book while there
3. See an opera
4. Fly first class
5. Play blackjack in Monte Carlo
6. Spoil my grandkids (but, hopefully, not for quite a few years yet!)
7. Read all the books in my TBR pile.

7 things I cannot do:

1. Stick to a chocolate-free diet
2. Waterski
3. Make a sponge cake
4. Ignore a good sale
5. Touch a snake or a spider or a mouse or anything that slithers or skitters or has too many legs!
6. Kill anything (except mosquitos)
7. Read the instruction manual before trying out a new gadget.

7 things that attract me to men:

1. Biceps
2. Hands
3. Ab's
4. The way they move, sit, lounge
5. Their cute cluelessness when it comes to stuff like the importance of chocolate and why LOST is not about the plot and deciding which shirt to wear with which trousers
6. Their ability to singlemindedly go after what's important
7. How they don't panic in an emergency.

7 things I say most often:
1. (insert middle child's name), what are you doing in my office? You know you're not allowed to touch that computer.
2. (insert middle child's name), are you in my office again?
3. (insert middle child's name), please don't do that!
4. (insert middle child's name), did you leave the gate open?
5. (insert middle child's name), did you let all the horses out?
6. (insert middle child's name), please don't let the dog lick your ice-cream!
7. (insert middle child's name), love you, buddy.

7 Books or Series I love:: (I already have my favourite books listed on my website so I'm going for 7 series I love)

1. Suzanne Brockmann: Tall Dark and Dangerous SEALs
2. Ruth Wind: The Last Roundup
3. Susan Elizabeth Phillips: Chicago Stars
4. Anne McAllister: Code of the West
5. Catherine Coulter: the Sherbrooke siblings
6. Nora Roberts: the McKade brothers
7. Nora Roberts: Chesapeake Bay.

7 movies I can watch over and over:
1. Pretty Woman
2. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
3. The Big Easy
4. Christmas Vacation
5. Pride and Prejudice
6. Shrek 2
7. Clueless

7 people I want to join in (tag, you're it):

1. Jennie Adams
2. Charlene Sands
3. Janice Lynn
4. Heather, Word Trix
5. Fiona Lowe
6. Ally Blake
7. Tanya Michaels

The Cataromance website is conducting a reader poll of the best category/series romance books of 2005. The voting form includes all the Harlequin/Silhouette romance lines and a space for you to nominate your favorite in each. It's not necessary to nominate a book in every field (although, if you read every series then I think YOU deserve the award!) and there is a one vote per reader rule. In other words, you need to decide on your one favorite from each series, which I am finding VERY tough in a couple of categories. Here's a link to the voting form. The winners will be announced on Valentine's Day.

Thanks to everyone who participated in my giveaway contest by posting their Best of 2005 comment. I know, for some of you, registering and logging in was a frustration and I thank you for your patience and persistence. I hope you'll all come back and visit regularly. Meantime we have a winner, drawn randomly from the comments. Congratulations Pat (#16). Email me (see button top right of page) with your address and I will send out your copy of The Rich Stranger. Normal blogging will resume tomorrow.

I had hoped to be back posting regularly before now but life has been, and continues to be, crazy. :( Maybe next week....

In the meantime, I have received author copies of my February release in Australia/New Zealand. The Rich Stranger is paired with Trust Me, the first book in Caroline Cross's exciting new trilogy. For a chance to win a copy, let me know one of the best things you did in 2005 in the comment section of my previous post (Best of 2005.) I will be back to choose a winner next weekend. Until then, happy reading!