I just finished reading Dating Dead Men by Harley Jane Kozak. (It was pretty darn good, very romancey.) Harley Jane is an actress. You may remember her as the wife in Arachnophobia. I remember her as Mary from Santa Barbara. She was a former nun and she fell for bad, bad boy Mason.

They were the best. Couple. Ever. He loved her so much! Then she was crushed by the letter C when the sign from the hotel blew over. Still. Best. Couple. Ever. Then he fell in love with Julia and that was pretty awesome, too, but Mary had softened him up.


Now, I grew up watching soaps in the time of the Super Couple. Luke and Laura. Bo and Hope. Patch and Kayla. I was invested. I think long term conflict helped the viewer become invested.

So, some couples who fought long and hard and deserved a HEA:

Pacey and Joey from Dawson's Creek. Yes, I know she's now a freak, but man, Pacey loved her.



Mulder and Scully.



Sydney and Vaughn, the early years.



Angel and Buffy. Say all you want about Spike, but I'm an Angel girl.



Kate and Sawyer (hey, maybe I should have a separate list for best triangles.)



Darcy and Elizabeth. MY Darcy.



D'Lynn and the captain from Battlestar Galactica - always reminded me of Claire and Jamie, the way they were equals.

Ross and Rachel. Yes, he's whiny, but so is she.



Niles and Daphne from Frasier. I stopped watching after she went to the Fat Farm, though.



Leo and Greenleigh from All My Children. They were both bad, but together they were so good!



Wolverine and Rogue - is that gross?



Aragorn and Arwen.



Belle and the Beast.



Jo and Laurie from Little Women.

Jack and Lucy from While You Were Sleeping.



Jack and Annie from Speed.



Lucy and George from Two Weeks Notice. (to complete my Sandra Bullock obsession) There's that whole scene where she has to GO and they're stuck in traffic, and that is so something that would happen to me!



Evie and O'Connell from The Mummy.



Han Solo and Leia.



Indiana Jones and Marian.



Forney and Novalee in Where the Heart Is. How stunned was I to find out he was British??



Will and Kate (the blacksmith girl) from A Knight's Tale.

Shrek and Fiona



Alex and Isabel from Fools Rush In. Man, that boy messed things up good, didn't he?



Cher and Josh from Clueless. I love that movie, and he's so patient with her!



Maria and Captain von Trapp from The Sound of Music - the first time they danced - SIGH!!!



Bruce Wayne and Vickie Vale from the first Batman movie. I know, she screamed, she got in trouble a lot, but there was chemistry!



Jason and Marie in The Bourne Identity.



Jared and Sam from Into the Blue, which we saw last night and it wasn't terrible. They were very much equals.



Who are yours?

Go crazy?

Don't mind if I do!

Okay, way too much Simpsons in this house, I know. I haven't had Internet since about 6:30 last night. Ahhh! But I do have a new washer. Yay! And I slept till ten today. Weird.

I've been watching a lot of TV on my sabbatical. My friend Cindi and I love commercials. Here are some of our favorites.

Favorite commercials:

Formula 409 – because the world’s not ready for Formula 410

Pace – because the sauce made in New York City is so wimpy you have to ride a bull with an airbag

Nextel – the guys dancing to Salt N Pepa in the office. I don’t know why it cracks me up. Lack of expression juxtaposed with with the dancing?

Kia – Save the Greenbacks – LOLOLOL

Cingular commercial where the guy is waiting for his great date to call him

Pentium – the Intel chip will be set free and live inside a Mac (you have to be a Mac person to appreciate)

WalMart – the commercial with the smiles in the shadows and shapes of every day things.

Citi cards – the older couple playing the autoharp and ukulele (?) and she chides him for forgetting the second verse.

NASCAR – where the cars are racing over the landmarks like the St. Louis Arch.

American Express – with the little kid who’s a pinch penny, who decides to splurge on a medium popcorn when he finds out his AmEx card has a saving account.

I'm a Chevrolet Corvette!

You're a classic - powerful, athletic, and competitive. You're all about winning the race and getting the job done. While you have a practical everyday side, you get wild when anyone pushes your pedal. You hate to lose, but you hardly ever do.

Take the Which Sports Car Are You? quiz.

Okay, the second half of the season has started....how are you liking the new shows? (SOME SPOILERS AHEAD, if you haven't watched the aired shows)

24 - I loved it last year, and this year is even better. I don't think I breathed during the second night, in the airport! Wow, Jack is back indeed! And he kicked some serious booty on Monday night, too. A good thing to look forward to on Mondays.

American Idol - I started watching a couple of years ago just to see the bad singers. Last year I got hooked by Bo. This year, I agree with what some others have said about them showing TOO many bad singers and not enough of the good singers. I wracked my brain last year trying to remember the auditions of some of the final Idols, but all I remembered was Constantine. How cute was it when Simon called to get that girl her job back after she quit to audition for American Idol? But Wednesday night he was in a mood. Randy's getting mean, too.

Lost - What was UP with Charlie? Dreaming? Visions? Weird. I didn't like that. And where is Sayid? Gotta love Sawyer the matchmaker.

Invasion - intriguing episode, but I figured out what I don't like. The problems are wrapped up at the end of every episode. I'm used to Lost and 24, where the problems are ongoing. These are resolved too fast. And I'm over my crush on Eddie.

I hate that they moved Bones opposite Lost, and I won't be seeing Las Vegas till reruns because Jack's back. I TOLD my dh I wanted a DVR, but "it was too expensive." Sigh.

So what are you watching? And how do you like it?

I was getting ready for class when my grandmother called me. My mom had been having pains in her stomach all morning and finally went to the hospital to have my brother, 3 weeks early.

I was in the student teaching program at the time, and attendance was mandatory even though we weren't in the classroom for another week or so. And I had a big project to turn in, due that day. I promised my grandmother I'd come get her as soon as I turned it in. I hung up and promptly lost my mind. I was so nervous - no telling how long I wasted running around like a chicken with my head cut off. I don't remember if my neighbor Erin heard me running up and down the stairs or what, but she came and brought me a handful of quarters so I could call people from the hospital. Then I went up to the school, which was thankfully not very far. My professor wasn't in, and no one believed me that I had to miss class because my mother was having a baby.

FINALLY I raced across town (rush hour had died down) and got my grandmother, then we raced to the hospital. It took us FOREVER to find the maternity ward, and when we did, Mom was still in the labor room. Her first words were, "Did you see him?" Now, I'm looking at my mother, whose stomach was just as big as it had been the last time I saw it, so I was confused. She'd had a c-section so she'd already delivered. I didn't know it was that fast. So my grandmother and I hurried to the nursery, where Michael was laying right in front of the window, naked to the world and NOT happy.

Glad to say things have changed. Last week we took him to the Rainforest Cafe to celebrate.

The birthday boy


My other brother, mom and stepdad


My boy

A scary word. You may have noticed I'm not really excited about my agent sending out my manuscript this week. Well, I just don't have a lot of hope. Yes, it helps that she's excited about it, that she believes in it, and it helps that it's changed a lot since she helped me revise it, but.....this book has been rejected.

A lot.

It's better than it was, but it's been rejected a lot. So I'm holding my hope in reserve.

Only yesterday I was listening to some of the Spotlights from RWA conference and I started thinking, "Well, you know, mayyyybe...." I started getting a little excited when I heard about Berkley and Bantam talking about offering two book contracts, and holding off books to publish them back to back to build authors and I thought, "Heyyyy, that could be......"

And I'm so afraid to think like that, to believe it could happen to me. You've seen the timeline. There are a lot of spaces in there I chose not to dwell on. A lot of rejections, a lot of dashed dreams. I could think I'm due and be wrong. I could think I'm good enough and be wrong. My agent (God bless her, she's so enthusiastic) could be wrong.

Hope. It's one scary word.

My motivation, that is. Only problem is, I'm having a touch of writer ADHD.

Here's the problem:

Vanished shouldn't be too hard to fix (the one I posted the sucknopsis to a few weeks ago). It needs higher stakes, like Toni said, but I can't think of how to ramp it up. I think if I gave them stronger internal conflicts, but I don't know. If I wasn't suffering from this ADHD, I would think of it, I'm sure, but there's the rub.....

Midnight Sun is the book I worked on with my critique group, so I have good characters, but I'm not sure where to start. I know if I started, I would be able to find it after a few false starts but then......

I had this dream the other night. It was SO good, and was completely plotted out and is really different from anything I've done. It's a pregnant heroine with a five year old, and it's got a beta hero (well, on the surface, he's a spy) but he's all stiff upper lip and that and her name is Emily and she's got a bad boy ex-husband (the father of her baby) and I want to TALK about it (you know that feeling, right, where you know you shouldn't talk about it, that it will kill the magic) and I think it could be really good but there are these other ones that I've already done work on and I know it's just new book euphoria, but I know mostly all the parts and there's a lot of good relationship stuff and.....

Yeah, I see it, too. I have to do it, don't I?

What would you do?

Oh, and how weird of names can you forgive? Graeme? Can you live with that name? Because when I saw it, I thought it had to be his name.

Here's some Gerry. Now help me ;)

Brianna’s Mommy issued this TBR challenge.

Title: One Way Out

Author: Michele Albert

Year published: 2005

Why did you get this book? It was about paleontologists.

Do you like the cover? Not really.

Did you enjoy the book? Yes.

Was the author new to you and would you read something by this author again? No, I’ve read all her books but Off Limits, which is in my TBR.

Are you keeping it or passing it on? Passing it on – the heroine was a little abrasive for my taste.

Anything else? Her books are just about as sexy as I can handle.

Simple enough, right?

And the breakdown for this year's challenges, unless anyone has any subsitutions they'd like to make:

January: Contemporary Romance
February: A book by a new-to-you author
March: Historical Romance
April: A book that's been on your TBR pile longer than 6 months
May: In honor of Memorial Day; War, law enforcement, military type or something similar (even loosely related counts)
June: A book that was recommended by someone you "know" (another blogger, author, friend, family member) or got a lot of buzz and that's why you bought it but it's still on your TBR pile
July: Romantic Suspense
August: A non-romance book, fiction or non-fiction
September: Category Romance
October: Paranormal Romance or Fantasy
November: A book originally published as an e-book (even if you have it in print now)
December: A book published prior to 2006

Gotta take my mommy to school today so my brother can have the car, and am staying late for science night. Sigh. I'd almost wanted to take a mental health day.

Candice was talking about turning points in her writing career, which of course got me thinking.

Okay, before I start, don't freak out at the time line. I lived it, and I'm not freaking out.

1989 - started writing on one of those computers where you could type in the page, then hit print. The pages were never center, and if you made a mistake you'd have to print all over again.

1994 - finished my first book on an old XT computer with a dot matrix printer.

1995 - Second book was requested by MIRA. It was only 600 pages.

1996 - took a community ed class on writing romance with Miriam Minger, who took us to a SARA meeting.

1997 - was rejected by MIRA

1998 - finalled in my first contest, "He Said, She Said."

2001 - went to my first National conference, embarrassed myself in front of Joan Marlow Golan when I knocked over the chair when I stood up from our appointment.

2002 - won my first contest, Where the Magic Begins, had my first full ms requested

2003 - finalled in the GH, got my first revision letter. Pretty much got everything I queried requested. Finalled in 6 contests with 4 books.

2004 - finalled in the GH, had high interest from an editor, who would call and talk for an hour about the book

2005 - got rejected, finalled in 9 contests with 4 books, GOT AN AGENT (I can't believe I left that out! I was thinking it was the most important!)

What will 2006 bring? At least I've grown.

(Psst, JoAnn, what year did we go to the Merritt when I cried because the editor said no at the pitch?)

As you can see by the page count meter in the sidebar, I've been having trouble getting motivated. Hot Shot is finally going out, and I know my agent wants changes on Don't Look Back. I have Surface sitting on my hard drive waiting for her to look at. So I'm not feeling much urgency to work on Vanished, or anything else. I know I'm going to regret my laziness down the road, but I can't get going.

Maybe it's the book, maybe I should try working on something else. I did pick up the latest Newsweek about the bad boy skier, with my Midnight Sun hero in mind. I watched Dante's Peak and Magma with a niggling of a new idea. Maybe I should move forward instead. But I know when those revisions come, I'll be yanked out of the new story and I hate that.

So anyway, today I'm going to clean a bit, then park my butt in the chair with the printed Vanished, with a notebook and a pen, and see where inspiration takes me.

My chapter's contest went electronic this year. We'd heard that did well for other contests, plus the no-going-to-the-post-office bit and saving a ton on postage.

We had a deplorable number of entries! One category didn't even make it! We got less entries than last year when it was a paper contest! Why do you suppose this is? Are contest entries down across the board? Are people afraid to try the e-entry and paypal? I think part of the problem is that there was very little promotion, even on our own chapter loops. We got reminders to sign up as judges, but no information about the contest itself. When I was coordinator a few years ago I posted monthly on every loop I was on, as well as eHQ. We had a large number of entries - I wish I'd kept the info so I'd know exactly how many, but I know in ST we had around 50 entries alone. This year we have 70 entries total.

The surprise? The biggest category was paranormal. Smallest that made it was RS.

I'm blogging today at Wet Noodle Posse today as soon as I can figure out what to blog about.

And some exciting news - my agent believes Hot Shot is ready for the real world! I've forgotten what it's like to have The Possibility of a Sale out there!

I don't WANNA go to school today!

First of all, it's group picture day. Which means that even though it's FRIDAY, I can't wear jeans. And no matter WHAT I wear, I'll look fat.

Second of all, Cindi and I were invited to the Sweet 16 birthday party of a former student. Now, we love this student, or what we're doing would never be considered. We're going to STAY at school till 6, then go to the party because it's literally right around the corner. I mean, why drive home 30 minutes in Friday traffic only to have to come back an hour and a half later. The good thing is we'll be together, and we'll have the copier to ourselves. I'm also taking my notebook so I can play with a new scene for Vanished. I haven't written in two weeks.

This weekend I have to get a new washer. This one is not only leaking water, but throwing it up on the walls when it spins! The dh wants to get it fixed rather than buy a new one (mainly because we don't have a truck to haul it in) but I'm thinking it's not worth it. Sigh.

AND tomorrow's my day to blog on the WNP site and I have NO idea.

EDITED TO ADD: I should be ashamed of myself. I have beautiful clothes, and "When you look good, you feel good." (Imagine Billy Crystal's version of Fernando Lamas) One of my students told me Wednesday she wouldn't be able to come to school on Thursday because she didn't have any shirts clean. The counselor and I worked together to get her a couple of extra shirts (he'd taken her shopping the week before because she qualified for some program or other) so she could bring her laundry and we could get it washed. Her mom has a three week old baby, no car and no washer. And I'm complaining?? Then Hector, the boy who fell off the monkey bars, couldn't go in an ambulance because his dad (a single father) has no insurance.

I am ashamed of myself.

Does this make up for the whining?

A Perfect Valentine's Day Gift! Make your own Romance Novel Cover!

My covers:

I didn't go to my chapter meeting last night and I feel guilty because I'm the librarian. But I was sooooo tired. I need to hand off the job, because it's too much like, well, a job. I want to WANT to go to my chapter meetings, not have to go.

I have duty this morning - switched with another teacher - so I had better run. At least the kids are testing this morning. That's a break for me.

Wow, I haven't slept this late on a school day in ages! Went to Rainforest Cafe last night with the family, drank 3 Diet Cokes and didn't think I'd go to sleep, so I took two Tylenol PMs. Wouldn't go to school today except I have a teacher coming to observe me. Thank goodness I traded duty days with another teacher!

So here's a cheat:

Dear Cats,

When I say to move, it means go someplace else, not switch positions with each other so there are still two cats in the way.

The dishes with the paw print are yours and contain your food. The other dishes are mine and contain my food. Please note, placing a paw print in the middle of my plate and food does not stake a claim for it becoming your food and dish, nor do I find that aesthetically pleasing in the slightest.

The stairway was not designed by Nascar and is not a racetrack. Beating me to the bottom is not the object.Tripping me doesn't help, because I fall faster than you can run.

I cannot buy anything bigger than a king-size bed. I am very sorry about this. Do not think I will continue to sleep on the couch to ensure your comfort.

Look at videos of cats sleeping, they can actually curl up in a ball. It is not necessary to sleep perpendicular to each other stretched out to the fullest extent possible. I also know that sticking tails straight out and having tongues hanging out the other end to maximize space used is nothing but catty sarcasm.

For the last time, there is not a secret exit from the bathroom. If by some miracle I beat you there and manage to get the door shut, it is not necessary to scratch, meow or get your paw under the edge and try to pull the door open. I must exit through the same door I entered. In addition, I have been using bathrooms for years, feline attendance is not mandatory.

The proper order is lick my face, then go lick your butt. I cannot stress this enough. It would be such a simple change for you.

Gina did this awhile back. I’m not going to make you guess, though. I’m just going to share a few of my favorite first lines with you.

Okay, first of all, I have to say Nora is the master. I quit looking through her books after six. Er, seven. Remembered she’d signed The Villa for my grandmother. Third time I’d thought of my grandmother yesterday.

Anyway, I kind of cheated on Carnal Innocence and went to Chapter One instead of the prologue.

“Summer, that vicious green bitch, flexed her sweaty muscles and flattened Innocence, Mississippi.”

Montana Sky-

“Being dead didn’t make Jack Mercy less of a son of a bitch.”

Carolina Moon-

“She woke in the body of a dead friend.”

Midnight Bayou-

“Death, with all its cruel beauty, lived in the bayou.”

Three Fates-

“Happily unaware he’d be dead in twenty three minutes, Henry W. Wyley imagined pinching the nicely rounded rump of the young blonde who was directly in his line of sight.”

Remember When-

“A heroic belch of thunder followed the strange little man into the shop.”

Susan Elizabeth Phillips has a knack, too, but I didn’t dig back deep enough into my keeper shelf to find Phoebe’s book. My favorite is Kiss an Angel, anyway.

“Daisy Devreaux had forgotten her bridegroom’s name.”

Stephanie Feagan’s Show Her the Money gives the tone of the book right off the bat.

“Sitting in front of the senate finance committee was like sprinting down Dallas Central Expressway, naked.”

Cate Dermody, another Bombshell, has a great wry twist in the first line of The Cardinal Rule.

“The problem with being a spy was that when it was as breathlessly exciting as Jennifer Garner made it look, something had gone horribly wrong.”

Jennifer Crusie, is, of course, awesome. My favorite is Fast Women, but it must be buried somewhere. Welcome to Temptation is great, too.

“Sophie Dempsey didn’t like Temptation even before the Garveys smashed into her ’86 Civic, broke her sister’s sunglasses and confirmed her worst suspicions about people from small towns who drove beige Cadillacs.”

One of my all time favorite books. All together now……”JAMIE!” Sigh.

“It wasn’t a very likely place for disappearances, at least at first glance.”

My buddy Dorien Kelly won a lot of contests with The Last Bride in Ballymuir, which was put out by Pocket in 2003. Her latest is Hot Whispers of an Irishman and in my TBR stack. But this line probably got her a lot of those contest nods.

“As he looked about his sister’s house, it occurred to Michael Kilbride that he had traded up one prison for another.”

Another buddy, Kate Thomas, wrote for Duets. Wonder why? This is from Her Perfect Wife.

“As the two friends emerged from the chiffon and cummerbund gauntlet, their polite smiles faded like goodwill in the Middle East and they got down to business.”

Fellow Noodler Sandy Blair’s first book, A Man in a Kilt, garnered a Rita nomination last year. I bet this line helped.

“Since introducing himself to Miss Katherine Elizabeth Pudding, estate executor Tom Silverstein craved only one thing – whisky.”

The amazing Suzanne Brockmann (I listened to her “chat with” workshop over the weekend and was in tears) said she loved this hero best, and he’s my favorite, too. From Out of Control-

“At about 0530 that very morning, Ken ‘Wildcard’ Karmody became a terrorist.”

And I’ll leave you with two from my favorite cozy series, Southern Sisters mysteries by the late Anne George. My friend Elizabeth recommended them to me, and my grandmother enjoyed every one of them, over and over.

From Murder Shoots the Bull-

“The way my sister Mary Alice got us arrested was simple enough; she hit the president of the bank over the head with my umbrella.”

Consider these are women of advanced years and you’ll know why we got such a kick.

And finally, from Murder Runs in the Family-

“’Pukey Lukey is here,’ my sister Mary Alice murmured as she was ushered into the front pew beside me.”

Want to share some of your favorites?

300 Video Journals

A preview of Gerry's new movie!