Don’t tell anyone, but today I spent my first day in Seattle holed up in my hotel room with room service, watching a good portion of the first seas of Chuck.

I will be leaving my room in a few hours, as I’m meeting with a local chapter (which is why I’m here early), but in the meantime, it’s been kind of nice loafing about. I even used my flight time for work (reading submissions) so I feel a little naughty taking a partial day to do not much of anything. I should have at least gone out to see the sites…a mall…something. But actually, I’m okay with this. Me and Chuck. He’s kind of cute. Don’t tell my husband. Plus, Adam Baldwin as the cold-blooded agent? Hello! I swear they typecast him from his Firefly days. It’s perfect!

So, yeah, traveling. Now you know.

In case you haven’t noticed, the time before I travel gets a little crazy for me, and I neglect my blog. I also had a really active (totally fabulous) weekend, so wasn’t online much. The past two days have been spent getting things done since I’m leaving town tomorrow at the crack of dawn. I’m headed to Seattle for the Emerald City conference this weekend, but first am meeting with a local (to Seattle) RWA chapter on Thursday, to share all my great wisdom with them. Heh.

As we all know, I don’t do so well at blogging while on the road, so no promises. Go read some good (Samhain) books to keep yourself busy while I’m gone. And register to vote if you haven’t already.

ToysRUs has them in stock online right now. Don’t say I never gave you anything

Link

Mad props to my mom friend Nicole, who posted this on our board. I know some of you out there reading have been on the hunt!

The other day I stumbled across this blog/website and I ended up following one post to another and to another and…well it was all such interesting, fun and useful information, that I wanted to share it all here. But instead, I’ll tell you about my meandering around and let you head over and do the same!

It started with an article on washing/chopping herbs

which led me to this article on making homemade produce wash

but also led me to how to make a one-pot indoor herb garden as well as make ahead fresh herbs and butter as well as never pay for onions again

I moved on from there to 15 helpful household lemon aids, which opened up a wide variety of topics for me including homemade citrus vinegar cleaner, microwave cleaning tips, and uses for citrus peels plus candied lemon peel. Of course from that one page I ended up on pages for making homemade flavored lemon sugars (and then on to vanilla sugars) and then, from that same lemon aids article, I ended up on how to make waterproof matches and firestarters.

From there it was an article on 20 things you can use twice where I then learned the idea of using ketchup bottles as pancake dispensers.

And then…well, you get the idea. I haven’t even begun exploring. I dare you to go to tipnut.com and not end up doing the same thing as I did, opening tab after tab and trying to remember as many neat tips as possible! I know I’ve added this one to my RSS feed.

James was the bus driver on our wine tour in San Francisco. I told James, when I took his picture, that I was going to blog about him. See how happy he looks? Ha.

The tour left from the pier in San Francisco in the morning. As we drove through San Francisco on our way out of town, James gave us some history of the city and famous landmarks that we passed. About 15 minutes into the tour, he told us about the richest part of town and the mansions there, and one house in particular.

“The largest mansion belongs to an author—and I use the term loosely—Danielle Steel.”

Yes, he “used the term loosely”. I guess all those books she wrote don’t qualify her as an author. All those books that earned her that money that bought that mansion.

This is a great contest, really fabulous idea and way to find new authors and series. Check it out:

What do Sharon Cullen, Misty Evans, Carolan Ivey, Kate Johnson, Melissa Lopez, TJ Michaels, Michelle Pillow, Moira Rogers, Renee Wildes and Linda Winfree have in common? They’re all authors with Samhain Publishing, and they all want to hook you on a new series!

Below you’ll find covers for eleven books, each the first installment in a series. You can click on the covers to view information about each book. Some have been out for years, and some are brand-new. They range from paranormal romance to romantic suspense, and are sure to entertain you. If you’d like a chance to win one, fill out the form below and you’ll be entered in the Get Hooked On a Series drawing. Eleven lucky winners will discover a new series! Winners will be announced on October 20th, in honor of the three authors who have October 21st release dates.

Visit Moira Rogers’ website to enter.

I’ve missed posting some of these due to travels, but this week’s Samhain freebie for the Kindle is Perfecting Amanda by Bonnie Dee.

I’ve been going through my pictures from my travels of the past few months. I’m going to be posting my family reunion pictures on Brianna’s blog, and my work photos here. San Francisco (RWA Nationals is first). I got there early since I was coming direct from my family reunion, and one of the first things we did was take a bus tour of wine country. We visited three wineries, but my favorite bottle of wine (which I’m now extremely ticked I didn’t buy) was one that I saw in a store after we stopped in Sedona for lunch. Seven Deadly Zins by Michael David Winery totally caught my eye because of the name, and when I turned it over and read the back label, I was completely enchanted. I can’t even remember now why I didn’t buy it.

 Schulenburg’s vines, grubby with GREED,
Embrace Lodi’s soil, to drink and to feed.
Oh Lord, forgive me my zin.
Secure in it’s strength, weathered with PRIDE,
Standing like soldiers, the forest of Snyde.
Oh Lord, forgive me my zin.
Hearts filled with LUST, ole Maley’s trees.
Court Lodi’s sun, and flirt with it’s breeze.
Oh Lord, forgive me my zin.
Good Bishofberger did raise some GLUTTONOUS beast,
Vines fattened like turkeys before Thanksgiving feast.
Oh Lord, forgive me my zin.
With the tilt of the glass, I commit seven zins,
Oh Lord, with your help… I’ll do it again.
Indulge!

Seven of Lodi’s best growers gave their souls and the first fruits of each of their old vine vineyards to contribute to the layered complexity of this fanciful blend. Soft, supple pepper and licorice-clove notes merge into a sinful marriage of deep, brambly blackberries and lustful cherries. The finish is clean on the palate with hints of rich vanilla, cocoa, and mild tannins.

Isn’t that fun? Visit their website to check out some of their other uniquely named wines, including 7 Heavenly Chards, 6th Sense Syrah, and Icognito Pink. I would totally order some if the freaking state of Maryland would allow alcohol to be shipped in. Bastards.

Or even if you are registered to vote, do you want to double check to make sure you’re all set to vote (some states have recently had thousands of people declared ineligible to vote, so you might want to double check, just to be sure).

Whether you’re a Republican, a Democrat or an Independent, please visit this site and take a few minutes to get your voter registration in place. Exercise the amazing privilege we’ve been given in this country to vote and help determine the future of our country, the future of our children!

This is a site launched by Barack Obama’s campaign, but using it doesn’t mean you’re voting for him or have to vote for him! This is just an opportunity for everyone to check their voter registration or register to vote, or get an absentee ballot.

Hey,

The Obama campaign just launched a new one-stop voter registration website called Vote for Change:

http://my.barackobama.com/vfc

You can check your registration status, register to vote, look up early-vote information for your state, apply to vote absentee, or even find your polling place.

It’s the easiest and most important thing you can do to bring the change we need. Make sure your voice is heard:

http://my.barackobama.com/vfc

Thanks — see you at the polls.

This is my brain on politics. I know you guys are used to some radio silence from me, but I’ve been having a hard time coming up with blog topics that aren’t politically related. For real, I’m consumed by this election, reading political blogs, Twittering politics and generally driving my husband insane with the latest “you know what happened today in the campaign?” every night when he comes home. Possibly he might want to start working weekends so he doesn’t have to hear me talk about politics all weekend.

Anyway, if you had any inkling of following me on Twitter, or are following me on Twitter, please be aware that I’m pretty open about my political views there. Twitter is the one place that’s not really remotely work-related. I talk so little about editing or work, you might as well not even follow me if you’re hoping for some juicy editing gossip or tidbit from me there. Occasionally, while I’m editing, I might make an off-the-cuff remark, but I’ll bet I’ve made less than five of those (of my 1100 updates). On the other hand, I’ll bet a good third to half of my Twitters have been politically inclined. So for real, especially if you’re a Republican, don’t follow me on Twitter unless you’re just that interested in what I’m having for lunch or other totally random and boring facts. For that reason, I’ve also made my Twitters private, so you have to be following me to read them. Because I wasn’t comfortable not knowing given how mouthy I am. It’s the one problem of being in a position where I can’t always say what I want. But I can assure you, I will NEVER use Twitter to spout off about inappropriate things having to do with my job. I am, after all, still capable of discretion.

Two things I’ve been thinking about this week are apologies and admitting when you’re wrong, or when the other person is right. Since Josh is a Republican, and I’m a Democrat, when we watched the debate together last night (or have watched interviews with candidates) we’re even more careful than normal, I think, to listen as objectively as possible, and give the other candidate props when it’s warranted or agree when our respective candidate has flubbed in some way.

I appreciate that about him, and I hope he does about me, the ability to apologize, admit when you’re wrong or when we’ve messed up, and move on. I also appreciate when he concedes I have a valid point in an argument, and I know he appreciates it when I do the same. It’s frustrating to debate someone or disagree with someone, have them never be able to say “you’re right” or “you make a good point”. I think it takes a balanced person to be able to do that. And if you watched the debate last night, you’ll know why that was on my mind.

But it also related to something else I was thinking on this week, about apologizing or admitting a wrong. I cannot tell you how much I appreciate the people in my life who are able to say “I messed up, I shouldn’t have done that, I own that action/mistake/etc and I’ll work hard to be sure it doesn’t happen again.” Not only do I appreciate those people, but I find I admire them. It’s so hard to admit you were wrong or that you messed something up. It’s much easier to offer an excuse. But I also think the excuses can trip you up. I know for me, it’s often tempting to say “Oh, such and such happened and that’s why things got messed up”, shifting the blame to something or someone else (and there have been times I’ve done that, no matter how hard I try not to).

And okay, sometimes it IS necessary to offer that information, so the person understands where things went wrong so you can then say “this is what I’ve done to fix it, and what I’ve put in place to make sure it doesn’t happen again.” But for the most part, I think it’s okay, and best, to just say “I’m sorry, I messed this up.” No “but…it really wasn’t my fault, I didn’t meant to, if such-and-such hadn’t happened this wouldn’t have happened.” Just “I’m sorry, I messed up.” Try it, it’s both nerve wracking and freeing. Anyway, I was thinking about that this week, and no it’s not a pointed commentary at anything, so if you think you know exactly who/what/where I’m talking about, you’re wrong :P