Last night was conference awards night and this year's version was pared down to the basics--recognition of nominees, awards given, (short) acceptance speeches--broken up with several vignettes of clips from movies/TV. The theme, I think, was Fact vs Fiction and the clips showed various fictional representations of writers and the publishing industry (think Misery, think the Friends episode were Rachel started writing a romance, think Romancing the Stone, As Good As It Gets, etc, etc.) Funny, entertaining, pertinent, and the perfect length.

The awards themselves: no gold statue for me but I was thrilled and applauded wildly the wins of fellow Aussies, Christine Diehm in the Golden Heart for Best Short Historical and Marion Lennox for Best Traditional Romance (her second RITA!!) I felt hugely proud and honored to see my books up on the big screen and to be part of the exciting buzz of the big night. The wonderful Liz Fielding won my category (Best Short Contemporary Romance) for The Marriage Miracle. Congratulations, Liz!!!

Today I say farewell to Atlanta and commence the long journey home. I am really looking forward to being home and to clearing the travel fog from my mind. I will have pictures to share (although I just realized that I didn't take nearly as many photos as I would have liked, especially of last night) and more details and impressions then.

Friday is publisher party night at conference, a chance for each publishing house to acknowledge staff and thank authors and generally for everyone to have a good time away from the conference venue. The Harlequin party is acknowledged as the best of those good times and every year it seems to become bigger and squishier, especially on the dance floor. This year's party was held at the Ritz-Carlton. The theme: Puttin' on the Ritz. We were told to wear our best and the authors took that to heart. You should have seen the dresses. Yiyiyiyiyi.

After pink drinks, a dessert table (I think, didn't check it out), the dance floor hopped from 9pm to 1pm. No stops, no breaks, plenty of sweat. From my point of view, this was just as well. This southern food is doing a job on my pre-conference svelteness (don't laugh, I DID lose weight, I swear!) and the dancing had to be some help, right? RIGHT? (Otherwise I'm in big trouble when I go to put on the RITA outfit later.)

Speaking of southern food: before the party, a group of us went to Aunt PittyPat's Porch, a local institution and you can probably tell by the name that the food and ambinece was pure south (oh, and the staff were charming.) Started with a frozen strawberry daiquiri (Scarlett's Passion) and had the Blackened fish. Yum.

I am now off to rehearsal for the awards night. Until now it's all been fun and--as Julie Cohen would say--zen-like clam. I suspect the nerves are about to set in, unfortunately. The big night starts in approx. 4.5 hours. Wish me luck!

Yesterday I saw more of Atlanta than anticipated, courtesy of a cab driver who didn't know as much of Atlanta as anticipated. The eHarlequin luncheon was held at a fine restaurant--whose name, forgive me, escapes my conference-fogged brain--in the Buckhead area. 3 cabs left the hotel on the 20 minute trip; only 2 arrived. The third--ours--went...how should I say this...elsewhere. Apparently the loonnnngggg road in the restaurant's address is crossed/divided into several segments by freeways. Our driver chose the wrong option.

On the one hand, it took him ten minutes to recognize he wasn't finding the right number and a further twenty minutes backtracking to find the right number. On the other hand, we saw some of Atlanta's poshest addresses on our side trip, glorious southern-style mansions in huge manicured and thickly treed gardens, which we would otherwise not have seen.

Lunch--shrimp gumbo on a bed of cheese grits--and a desserts tray I cannot find words to describe (photos were taken) made the looonnnngggg trip worthwhile.

Spent Day 1 in Atlanta building on those blisters. It's all part of the conference package, it seems, when one's feet stay swollen and all one's shoes no longer fit. Even the flip flops (NB: changed that from the Aussie "thongs".)

Best thing about the hotel: view from my 35th floor room
Worst thing about the hotel: the open-view elevator to my 35th floor room

Spent a session as volunteer doing conference registration, which is a great way to start conference. Best thing about this: the shrieks of recognition and "Bron!!!" from old friends. Worst thing about this: trying to lean over a 3 foot ledge to hug these old friends.

Last night went to my very first ever baseball game, Braves vs Marlins. Best thing about the baseball: definitely the chants and the tomahawk chop-chop thing...although the frozen margaritas finish a close second and a couple of awesome catches by the Braves center field a close third. Worst thing: it was Mullet Mania night, a promotion which saw some of the worst mullets EVAH in the crowd and photo-shopped onto the player mug-shots projected onto the big screen. Amusing but ugly.

This morning, a trip to the Atlanta Aquarium. Best thing: the soothing ambience of water and gliding fish. Perfect. Worst thing: the walk there and back (see aforementioned blisters.)

Conference will officially start in one hour with the Literacy Autographing so I'm off to get ready. Later...

I'm here in Atlanta, site of the RWA National conference. To get here, first I needed to leave LA so let's backtrack briefly...

Where are all the cabs in LA? It's a big place, yes? There should be heaps, yes? Yet I waited fifteen minutes at the airport on arrival without one cruising by. I noticed I was the only person waiting for a cab, which I found slightly odd. Does everyone arriving in LA have a pickup or a rental car? Odd.

Leaving, again, not a cab to be found for over 15 minutes. I need not have worried since the cabbie that did arrive made up the slack by driving like a freaking maniac all the way to the airport. So, when I say I amde it to Atlanta safely, just know that I am truly grateful to the Lord and St Jude and whoever else made that possible.

The cab ride was fast, the check-in not so much. Short queue, not a crowd, and yet it took over an hour to crrp through check-in and security. Which was okay, except that ate up all the time allocated for brunch and the airline only served snacks (and by snacks, I really do mean snacks) despite it being a 4.5 hr flight. Anyhoo, by the time I arrived at my Atlanta hotel at 10.30pm (I left my LA hotel at 11am) I was regretting my no-breakfast, brunch-at-airport decision.

In brief:

* hotel had no standard rooms left so had to upgrade me to club level. Nice.

* there was a girl on my flight with a dog in her handbag. I didn't know you could take your dog flying with you. Interesting.

* my dh told me that Atlanta airport was the world's busiest. He didn't tell me it was the longest.

* when faced with the choice: train or walk to terminal, I should not have thought: a walk would be nice after so much sitting around.

* bleeding blisters are not the best way to start conference.

Here I am in Hollywood, surprisingly chipper, all things considered. When I say "all things" I'm referring to the flight-sleep-time difference combo. Here's how it works: I get on the plane 11am Sunday, my time. Due to the sterling efforts of the Qantas crew, we arrive early a bit under 13 hrs later. That would be midnight Sunday my time, so the inclination is to watch movies, read books, chat to neighbours. BUT the time I arrive in L.A. time is 7am Sunday, so if I didn't sleep I'd arrive in LA and have a whole day to kick around like a zombie wishing I was in bed...and that isn't possibly because no hotel will give you a room at 8-9am in the morning. Not when you've booked through a discount website anyway.

Not wanting to arrive at conference reading to collapse from fatigue, I took a sleeping tablet. I forced myself to doze on and off for about 2 hrs. Then I was wide awake again. It's not 4pm in the afternoon and I'm still wide awake. Hopefully I'll sleep well tonight without emdication because I don't like to make a habit of those things.

So, the flight was pretty okay. I had a nice window seat with exactly the kind of neighbors I like: unobtrusive, happy to chat for a while but not wanting to yabber on all night, happy to get up and stretch their legs so I could too. Nice peoples. I didn't fly Qantas last trip so I really noticed the changes this time. Back-of-seat entertainment system, choice of movies which play over the whole trip, games, and also menu changes. We won't discuss the meals. I mean, what meal prepared in advance and reheated in those little plasticy thingimmys is going to taste good? But, hey, I gotta love an airline that does the hot-towel thing and gives out ice-creams for dessert and hot chocolate at midnight and a snack pack of neat chocolate/nut/fruit mix choices.

The movie selection, however, was meh. I watched Failure To Launch (Matthew McConaughey and Sarah Jessica Whatsername) which was more entertaining than I'd anticipated. If I'd paid to see it at a theater then I might gripe a little about over the top comedic reactions and characters drawn with thick lines and no light and shadow and out-of-character behavior played in the name of cheap laughs. But I didn't pay, so I'll just say it was okay and any chance to listen to the MM drawl (especially while he takes his shirt off) is a chance well spent.

Also I listened to an audiobook, an amusing British chick-lit tome in which the first-person heroine meandered along having a rollicking good whinge about her life and family and kids and such...the kind of such one can empathise with! Luckily it was this kind of book because at the 3/4 point I discovered that the download had malfunctioned and a great chunk was missing. I rewound and checked several times, just in case I'D wandered off for a few chapters. I mean, how did our intrepidid heroine suddenly arrive at the bright idea that her husband was having an affair??? But, no. Chunk (which, hopefully, contained motivation) missing. I didn't care over much and moved on to a romantic suspense paperback.

So. Arrived at LAX and, as luck would have it, we were the only international flight arriving in that window so immigration and customs went amazingly quickly and I was in a taxi heading for the hotel (if not the room) one hour after landing. The last time I flew through LAX, that was more like 4 hours. Good start to the day and things got even better when I arrived at hotel in time to take a tour that I'd considered impossible to make before I left home.

So I've done the tour around the sights, seen the sign, cruised Rodeo Drive, read enough stars on Hollywood Boulevarde to make my eyes wee, well, stars! Lunched at Farmers Markets, pretended to enjoy our karaoke tour guide's rendition of Imagine, returned to hotel where my room was ready. Yay.

It's a nice room, if somewhat small. But since most of the space is taken up with a large and very comfy bed, it's looking good. Oh, and yeah, the air-con works a treat. The other thing I noticed about this hotel (which I was going to name, but then you all might prank-call me tonight, so I won't!) is the number of good-looking people walking around. Staff and guests. Is that a Hollywood thing? For a minute I was worried they would turn me away as not being high enough up the Beautiful People scale to check in. Luckily the light in the lobby was very low and they didn't realize exactly how haggard I'm looking with this chronic lack of sleep.

Tonight's dinner may be off. :-( In which case I'm wondering how dorky it would be to wander down to the Kodak Theater where there's a movie premiere happening, just in case I catch a glimpse of someone who looks like they might be a star... Or perhaps I could go shopping...

Today I leave for Atlanta, for the national conference of Romance Writers of America. I have been too busy for excitement this past month, with barely time to pack. I did however find time for the essentials: shopped a new outfit for the RITA Awards night, had the hair cut and colored (the deadline look is not good!), nails done. This is the my 4th RWAmerica conference and the first where I'm travelling solo. I'm slightly bummed that my mates can't go this time but looking forward to catching up with friends from all over America. On that note, I am catching up with fellow Desire author Laura Wright during my stopover in L.A. Haven't seen Laura since 2001 and we were critique partners for several years. Can't wait to see her. Much talking will be done. My airport shuttle will be happening along soon so I'm out of here. Hopefully I will have a chance to post during this next week, subject to internet availability and time. Otherwsie, lots of reports and photos when I return.

Have you noticed the new fun plaything in the sidebar (over yonder on the right?)

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It's called a Cluster Map and it shows where in the world my blog visitors hail from. It's still all new and shiny, so I'm checking it regularly and I admit to geeky excitement when I see a new spot in a previously uncharted part of the world. Wonder when my first visitor from Africa or South America will show up???

If you're interested in the teamwork required to get books from the writer to the reader, then check out agent Jennifer Jackson's Romancing The Blog column. I've been pretty embroiled in the football World Cup and so this pertinent reminder of the whole team effort, from management through support staff to on-field and bench players, struck a chord.

I interrupt my self-imposed blog celibacy to report on our trip this weekend to see Coldplay, a special treat to celebrate my husband's birthday (a Big 0 landmark one.) I chose a nice hotel which turned out to be an excellent choice, since they acknowledged the specialness of the occasion with complimentary champagne. Nice.

For those who don't know, we live on a farm some distance from any of the big cities. Sydney is slightly closer and when we head to the city that's where we usually head. This time the Melbourne concert dates suited better and we discovered that the drive is easy and hassle-free due to a (relatively) new freeway. At least it would have been hassle-free if not for a road closure and detour 3 blocks from our hotel. Three short blocks too, I kid you not! We'd just finished congratulating each other on not getting lost, on making such good time. I was dreaming of the champagne bar as a nice relaxing precursor to the concert. Ha. What I hadn't counted on was arriving in Melbourne as the crowd was exiting the Saturday afternoon football. Those last 3 blocks took almost an hour and soaked up all my champagne bar time.

Moving right along to the concert...

Coldplay is THE best rock band in the world, I won't even debate that with you. Their set on Saturday night included most of their biggest and most recognizable songs. Yellow was accompanied by the release of huge yellow balloons filled with confetti. Oh, and we had GREAT seats, which I have to mention because of the hassle in getting them. Well worth it.

Chris Martin owned the stage with his energetic and charismatic presence. He's like the energiser bunny unleashed--a long-limbed, enormously flexible bunny at that. He'd be a whiz at yoga. When he wasn't bounding around and contorting himself into impossible angles, he was hunched over the keyboards or tearing through the crowd to the top of the stadium.

I could go on...and on and on, but like holiday photos I think concert stories fall into the you-had-to-be-there basket. I *was* there and I'm sooooo glad I was. There's nothing quite like the rush of a live show or the whoomp-whoomp-whoomp of amplified bass thumping through your blood. Makes a tired old soul feel young and alive and energized...which is exactly what I needed, with only 3 weeks until I leave for Atlanta and a stack THIS high of work to do beforehand.

In the meantime, I'd love to hear about your favourite bands and/or live show experiences and/or what you've done lately that's excited or energized you. Anyone done anything/seen anything/read anything really fun lately?