Just Call Me Gennita-Dillow

I woke up from my creaky five-star Hyatt hotel bed.

Dammit, my back still hurts. And I actually stretched before I went to bed! But that's for later in the story.

Day Three--I've lost count--is Eat A Lot Day. Everyone is having some sort of a party. So I hid my preggo stomach behind a Big Flower Dress and started the day...at the bar, of course! Look who started earlier that me! Writers...such lushes!


C.J. Barry/Samantha James (you see? She was so drunk here, she couldn't remember her own name) wanted me to buy her more wine. She bribed me with food. Ha.

Cindy Gerard was grinning because she just signed a thousand-book contract. I was grinning because I just had another drink.

Then it was the first dose (ok, second) of calories at the ballroom. Service awards were given to those who had worked hard and untiringly to promote RWA through the years. One line stood out, causing me to spew my coffee:

"She has served in numerous positions on and off the board." I coughed so hard, Harold Lowry (aka Leigh Greenwood) had to pound me on the back. Sorry. Kayla Perrin's snorts didn't help either.

Lisa Kleypas was the keynote speaker and she spouted much wisdom about armadillos.

Now why would anyone want to talk about roadkill during lunch, you ask, but hey, did you really think that rubber chicken you were chewing was really chicken? Bwahahaha.

But I digress. The armadillo-as-totem speech was fabulous and is right now being talked about by all the writers. Armadillos, according to Lisa, are hard to kill. She had them in her yard, so she should know.

They avoid poison; they throw mothballs back at you. They laugh at traps. And bullets bounce off their armor. So the only way to kill them is with a car, but Lisa says she hasn't allowed her husband to chase them down in her lawn yet.

So, as an author, we all have to take care of our inner armadillo, hide ourselves in someone's lawn, and throw mothballs at our critics. Works for me. So Gennitarmadillow. A mouthful, but your condescending sneers are bouncing off my hard shell, bitches.

After lunch, I gave away some books and for some reason, had a few more drinks and then it was time for more calorie dosage!

Publisher's dinner--everyone was dressed to the eights and nines (tens is for tomorrow night, silly). Here is me, with my tummy sucked in:

Please ignore the dirty sock on the floor. I don't have time to crop that out this morning ;-).

The MIRA dinner was at a swanky place in town called Iron Cactus. The food. Oh. My. God. I ate so much, Gayle Wilson tapped my leg to check whether it was wooden ;-). I ate so much my editor asked me whether I was pregnant. I ate so much we had to call a wheelbarrow to get me down to the cab.

But did that stop me? Of course not. It's calories day! So after a ten course buffet dinner, it's off to the Kiss of Death Chapter's DEATH BY CHOCOLATE party, where the winner of the prestigious Daphne du Maurier award was announced.

I rolled in with Gayle Wilson. I was so big at this point, my whole body obscured Gayle's in this pic:

Look at the SPREAD:

Even the coffee table was decadent, with whipped cream and your choice of additives:

There was this hot melted chocolate cake dish that was soooo gooood, I ate about 10,000 calories. Gayle Wilson tapped on my other leg.

You noticed there are no photos of authors. I'm so sorry. It's hard to take photos when your fingers are sticky with food.

I want to congratulate my friends Cindy Gerard, Ann Voss Petersen, Gayle Wilson, Pamela Clare, Marjorie Liu, Liz Maverick, Robin Perini, and Jennifer St. Giles, as well as all other finalists who made it to the top five of their categories. The Daphne is one of the best writing contests, with really outstanding competition each year. It's tough to final!

Finally, Death By Chocolate overdosed this armadillo. I was so full I couldn't follow Kayla Perrin who was going to some place to ride a mechanical bull. I know, I know. But my inner armadillo was insisting on morphing into my inner snake. I needed to sleep off these calories.

However, when I got back to my room, the inner snake had decided to be super-hyper because of all that chocolate in me! Do you know what I did? I...ahem...went to the gym. I went cycling 100 miles and used up a miserable 125 calories, according to the meter. How pathetic, huh? I could have been riding a mechanical bull but instead rode a dumb mechanical bike at MIDNIGHT.

Then, as I was jogging back to my room from the third floor, the alarm went off and a loudspeaker was ordering everyone out of their rooms! There was this horrible acrid smell in the air, like someone farted a dollop of very bad chocolate in the hallway. It wasn't me, I swear.

I wish I had my camera with me, dudes. I saw MANY half-dressed authors standing in the hallway that would have made me a fortune on Youtube. Duckie pajama bottoms. Lacey tops with quite a bit of the, ahem, armadillos showing. Bed hair. Smeared eyeshadow. Damn, damn, damn.

Angela Knight was on my floor and she was NOT a happy camper. Especially since it was a false emergency. Some stupid ass had pulled the smoke alarm, hence that smell. There were flashing lights on every floor, so it looked like everyone was on a dance floor, except they were all yawning and bleary-eyed.

I jogged back to my room. Gathered my sweet inner armadillo and kissed her goodnight before I tunnelled into sweet creaky sleep. The shell, by the way, does not protect from backaches caused by creaky five star sofabeds.

So this morning, the stoopy Gennitarmadillow is off to some booksignings.

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