RWA 2013: Hitting The Ground Running

I landed in steamy Atlanta in the early evening, and somehow managed to beat KristieJ (my roommate) here.  She arrived shortly thereafter however, and after a brief settling in that including hugs and much squee'ing - we hit the bar to hook up with Rosie and World Famous Author, L.B. Gregg.

Talk was talked, drinks were consumed, and I ate dinner at an unreasonable hour.  Then it was back to the room where at 1:00AM, and still on Pacific Standard Time and I thought to myself, "Gee, I need to get up to get ready for Librarians Day at 6:30AM.  I might, oh, want to try to force myself to go to sleep."

So yeah, I started RWA off right by not getting enough sleep!  A growing trend sure to last the rest of the week.

Librarians Day was a big success.  There were several good panels and Jennifer Lohmann (another World Famous Author AND a librarian!) and myself got a lot of nice compliments from attendees about our panel on romance-related programming for libraries.  Jill Shalvis was a really good luncheon speaker, and I was able to track down author Vivien Arend thanks to her omnipresent cowboy hat.

The Librarian Goodie Room was, once again, off the chain.  I had a full bag of books, and that was me holding back.  Oh silly Wendy.  It's really time to consider decluttering the ol' TBR pile.  I still have books lying around on my desk from, oh, last year's RWA.  Sigh.

Then it was off to the Literacy Signing where I stood in line with Rosie and Kristie.  I told both of them that I probably wasn't going to buy much, and $136 later we know Wendy is a big fat liar.  Here's the thing though, I bought a hard cover book for a coworker, and ended up with three trade paperbacks - so there you have it.  Hey, it's only money - and it went to charity - so it's all good.  Here are some photos that I snapped from last night:

Giant lumbering Wendy (who lumbers over everybody) next to JUDE MOTHER-EFFIN' DEVERAUX!  I only babbled like a moron a little bit.

Carrie Lofty (whose historicals I lover) signing copies of her new Lindsey Piper paranormals for me.

Bronwyn Parry who came all the way from Australia (well via the UK) signing a copy of her latest (and RITA nominated) Romantic Suspense title for me.  

Jennifer Lohmann, my copresenter at Librarians Day and author for Harlequin SuperRomance.

After the Literacy Signing I decided to skip the Smart Bitches party - mostly because I had been going non-stop since 7AM and boy howdy my feet were shot!  Rosie, LB Gregg and I hit the bar, met up with Ally Blue and Jet Mykles and grabbed some food.  Then, naturally, has can happen at RWA - when I was all set to head back to my room I ran into friends (online friends I've known longer than I've been blogging!) in the bar.  I chatted with Sandi and Mo - and then I really, really had to get back to the room where, of course, I found KristieJ and of course we had to share our bounty from the Literacy Signing.

And you know, I went to bed at 1AM.

Go Team Wendy.