I needed a break Wednesday, so Mom, BB and I went to breakfast. When we got to the restaurant, BB mistakenly thought it said it opened at 8:30 (it opened at 7) so we went down to see the new part of the Riverwalk.

After that, we ate and went to the Japanese Tea Gardens, which was pretty and had kittehs. I left them there.

Then we went to a cool library that used to be someone's house. She dedicated it and the grounds to the city. It's not huge, but is gorgeous.

Then we wanted a snack so stopped at a bakery and had cookies and sticky buns. Yes, about an hour after breakfast. We're running out of time and we're having to double up on restaurants ;)

Then we went to JoAnn's and none of us bought anything.

Then we went to a place called Bubble Tea. Have you ever had bubble tea? It's tea with tapioca pearls in it. The tea was good. The pearls were odd.

Felt better after, and came home to a GOOD nap.

Pictures are out of order. Sorry!

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I have a new love...ebooks. I know, I know, I publish them but reading them was always a pain because I’d read them on my computer, which was too much like work. You know, I’d find myself editing or whatever.

But now with the iPhone, I have Stanza and Kindle for iPhone (which I haven’t registered for yet because I’m scared I’ll go insane with the downloading.) I had some books already on the laptop that I loaded onto the phone, and I have to say, it’s really cool. It’s well-lit and you can adjust the font, which is the best. Yes, I have to "turn" pages faster, esp. because of the small screen, but that doesn't bother me---yet.

There are a few issues, though. The books from TWRP didn’t translate well from the computer to the iPhone and instead of listing the author, it lists the editor, I think. Also, the formatting is gone, so there are no paragraphs. Everything just runs together. All but one are novellas, though, so I can deal. Still, frustrating a little.

And while Samhain books are cheap on Kindle. other books aren’t. Some of the books on my wish list are as cheap in ebook as mass market. And you can’t put ebooks on the wish list.

I’ve not tried HQ books from the website, or Fictionwise (because they take a HUGE chunk of my royalties. Do I want to give them more money?) or My Bookstore and More.

Where do you get your ebooks, especially if you use Stanza? What format do you get them in?

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This week has been rough. So I needed to do another favorite things post. My laptop is down AGAIN, and I just got word processing software on it. This time it seems to be the display, which is what happened with the LAST laptop. I was happily making ringtones for my iPhone and--bam.

And between the iPhones and the computer for the boy and college tuition coming due....so I needed a favorite things post.

Funny thing---Trish just started a healthy writer blog and I'm talking about FOOD!

I bought this cereal MONTHS ago. April, I think. I don't like cereal as a rule because I don't like milk. So I get granola, but it wasn't until the cupboard was bare and I was hungry for something chocolate that I broke into it.

IS GOOD. 245 calories, filling, and lots of bits of chocolate.



Then the dh and I were in the grocery store the other day and saw these ice creams on sale for a dollar each. When I was a kid, my grandmother in CA worked at a dairy and she had a freezer full of ice cream. The one I remember most clearly was coconut flavored. They were called snow balls or something, and they were GOOOOD. Well, this ice cream tastes just the same.



Then I found this V. easy recipe. YUM!

Peach Crisp

1 pouch (1 lb 1.5 oz) Betty Crocker® oatmeal cookie mix
1/2 cup cold butter
5 cups frozen sliced peaches, thawed and drained, or 1 can (29 oz) sliced peaches, drained

1. Heat oven to 375°F. In large bowl, place cookie mix. Cut in butter, using pastry blender or fork, until mixture looks like coarse crumbs.
2. In ungreased 8-inch square baking dish or 2-quart round casserole, place peaches. Sprinkle cookie mixture over peaches.
3. Bake 25 to 30 minutes or until topping is golden brown. Serve warm or cool.

THE BIG BANG THEORY



I absolutely love the geekiness of this show. My dh says he'd KILL Sheldon, but I LOVE Sheldon's character.

What are some of your favorite things this summer?

You know, it's good that I buy my books on Amazon because the website tells me which books I've bought. If I saw these books at the book store, I wouldn't know which I'd bought and which I hadn't. Stephanie's books are from Dell and Cindy's are from St. Martin's Press.















This, and titles that are too similar in series always confuse me. I never know which ones I have or not.

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This last week was hell with all the computer problems. I've finally got a word processor on my laptop, but not sure I like it.

Gabe is up for Best Hero at The Romance Studio. If he wins I get free advertising or something.

finish edits on BD
start revisions on paranormal
10000 words on RS (providing I work out my issues) If not, I'm setting it aside to write the road trip story.
paint bedroom
send out newsletter
send stuff to LASR
Samhellion blog/Romance Studio blog/I Read Romance blog
judge Melody of Love entries
breakfast with Mom and BB
sew 2 skirts and cut out dress
Read Burn by Linda Howard (due next Monday and not started)
go see HP and The Ugly Truth
call Cindi, who I haven't seen all summer
exercise/keep up house
grocery store/library

Another busy one!

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I have discovered the problem with my RS. See, it's a bodyguard story, and I'm thinking, if these guys are so big and bad and trying to get to my heroine, how is a bodyguard really going to stop them? I mean, shoot him in the head and take her, right?

That would make for a very short story.

Also, if the bad guys come after her in the capitol building in the first scene, how do I up the stakes from that, you know? Am very frustrated.

I hate setting it aside after my research trip last week, but I'm kinda stumped.

Also, all I want to do is read. I have about 50 pages to go in Black Hills, which is good, but kind of what opened my eyes to my problem (Stop taunting and just get her already!) And I have about 15 books on my iPhone. I could so easily be a convert here, and I have a TON of hard copies to read, plus the 1st Sookie Stackhouse and the new Suze Brockmann waiting for me at the library.

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We got our iPhones yesterday. I have everything I want on there, almost. Am trying to figure out how to move my TWRP ebooks onto it and actually be able to read it. I did get free books from Harlequin, though.

Still no WORD on my laptop. DH loaded the wrong version, then played with his iPhone all night.

Went to the Gristmill for lunch. Mom, BB and I all got the same thing, then went shopping (after we'd already gone to Wal-Mart.) Came home and slept until 5:30.

We saw 2 does and 2 fawns on our way there.

We saw a lot more things on our way back because we got lost.

I wrote/revised/sewed NOTHING yesterday. Shopped until 2, slept until dinner, iPhoned until bed. So I'd better go write!

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My laptop is up and running again! Whee! Problem--dh hasn't reinstalled Word, so I can't write on it yet. Not a problem when the dh is at work, I just write on his. But last night...my head was about to explode because I couldn't work. I felt like yesterday was less than productive, though I updated my website, wrote a newsletter (but I have the header wrong and don't know how to fix it), made a skirt, cleaned the rooms I wanted to clean and met my revision goal. The only think I DIDN'T do was my 2000 words. I'm behind where I want to be, and I have 3 weeks of summer left. I just don't think I can finish in that time.

The ds has been out LATE the past 2 nights and I'm not happy. I can't sleep when he's out, so I had maybe 4 hours last night. I'd go back to bed, but I'm heading out with Mom and BB in a bit. I hate being this tired, though.

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Yesterday morning I was on the phone with Trish (a miracle in itself). We talked about RWA as she was driving home across Tennessee. She was just about to hang up when an email popped up ----a contract offer from The Wild Rose Press for Don't Look Back!!!! So now all my GH finalists have been contracted. Not sure when this one is coming out, but I'm so relieved they decided to take it. It's been through 3 editors now at TWRP and finally settled in their Crimson Rose (the romantic suspense) line.

Now, to get my hard drive reformatted so I have my own computer again. I swear, we never can have 3 computers working at a time!

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I did my research trip to Austin yesterday. We left here around 11 so got up there around noon. We parked and went up the main walk and into the building, which is the only capitol building larger than the national capitol.



I’ve been before, a couple of times, once with the dh and once in 8th grade or something. A tour was going on, but it sounded like Texas history instead of what I needed, so I moved around it to go down another hall, where I found the offices of some of the representatives. Cool. The doors are recessed, which was information I needed, the stairs have rubber treads, there are large columns in the hall. But then I realized that these offices were all for representatives who were the chairs for different committees.



I don’t think my heroine is that. She’s pretty new. So after running up and down the stairs looking for places for her to hide, I discovered a set of stairs under the stairs.



The dh did NOT want me to go down these stairs. But I wanted to know what was down there. When I finally saw people coming up, I said, “I’m going.” He said he and the ds would wait so they could bail me out of jail, but then they went down with me. Guess what? More offices, much smaller, some with 3 representatives in an office. We couldn’t actually see the offices, but upstairs the offices had 2 doors, in the basement, they had one. And low ceilings. And a copy room.

Guess where my heroine’s office is going to be? Because if she’d down in the basement, it’s easy for her to be trapped. I have to rewrite the first scene, but am very excited. Alas, my battery ran out on the camera at this point. I did get this shot of where her window would be.



Then we drove down San Jacinto to the Four Seasons, where my heroine will be living while she’s being protected by the hero. It’s right on Lady Bird Lake, which I thought used to be called Town Lake. Anyone remember if that’s right? I can google it. (Okay, yes, it was renamed. Locals would still call it Town Lake, though, I think.) I want her and the hero to run along the jogging path there in the next scene that I’m writing (after I rewrite the first scene.)

After that, we drove back up Congress because my heroine has a caffeine addiction and I saw 2 Starbucks, which wasn’t exactly what I wanted but will do. At least I know they aren’t drive-thrus, which is what I’d thought about doing.

The ds wanted to go to Waterloo Records, so we did, and then we went to the bookstore across the street, which was very cute but had a pitiful romance section.

We went to eat at Sandy’s on Barton Springs Rd., a drive thru/walk up place with great burgers but no place to eat but outside at picnic tables. Let me tell you, eating a big burger in 100 degree heat…not so good. While we were there, we were approached by 2 different panhandlers (and one at Waterloo, too.)

And as much as I love my strappy Crocs, they’re not for running up and down stairs in the Capitol building.

We headed home after that, and I was wiped. The dh went to the store for the Diet Cokes and some other stuff, and I just vegged on the laptop. But now I’m rarin’ to go.