Reno - The End

So now it's Saturday. I'm hung over from the Harlequin party last night, even though I swear I never felt like I had my drunk on the whole time. Gena Showalter and PC Cast made the event, putting on their own dance show that had me questioning if Gena's hips were double jointed. (As an aside - check out the pictures on PC's website - hahahaha. TOTALLY had me snickering.) I went with my critique partner and fantastic friend, Jennifer Skully, who came in exhausted from eating seven courses at the HQN dinner before hand.

During the day, my goal was basically to snarf more free books so I can run a contest for my newsletter folks when I get home. I'm giving away a whole bag of them - check it out on my site! I ran into Jaci Burton and her fabu husband Charlie snarfing books of their own. We found Sage Grayson and decided to take a break and gossip viciously about Tara Taylor Quinn, the RWA president who has caused a fervor the likes of which haven't been seen in the organization for at least four years. Hahahaha.

Anywho, then I went to the Red Sage spotlight, then got ready for the dinner and Rita awards, which I already blogged about here. I won't bore you with more of it.

Sunday, I spent 10 hours flying home. I almost missed my connect since we landed late, having circled the Atlanta airport for several hours (I'm not joking). When I got off the airplane, I saw that I hadn't been assigned another route home, even though my other flight had officially departed 3 minutes before. I pull an OJ Simpson - dashing through the airport, past 8 million people in line to reschedule their flights, down the stairs to the tram. I showed up just as the doors shut and it took off. Heaving like a 10 pack a day smoker (I'm carrying 30 pounds of books and a laptop on my back), I turn without pausing and sprint down the moving sidewalks to the next terminal, back up the stairs, and ALL THE WAY TO THE VERY LAST FREAKING GATE!! How's that for luck? I thrust my boarding pass at the desk guy, my hands shaking so badly he had to grasp for it twice, not that it stopped him from chatting with his friend. I stagger to the LAST seat (literally) in the plane, drop down and try to cram everything under the seat in front of me, since there is, of course, no bin space left. I'm heaving for air, sweating out all the alcohol I've been drinking all week and so thirsty, I could die (they ended up not serving beverages on the flight, by the way - too much turbulence). The stewardess gets on the intercom and, instead of starting the preflight instruction on how to buckle your seat belt, announces that it will be another thirty minutes until we leave because the pilot of this plane hasn't landed yet from his last flight. He's still circling above us. I just ran 7 miles with a total of 40 pounds on my back for absolutely no reason.

I'm telling you, I have the worst freaking luck when it comes to air travel.

All I can say is thank God I'm home. I don't want to have this much fun again for another year.