Inappropriate public behavior...again

I try very hard to conduct myself in a respectable fashion when representing my employer in public. Most of the time, I’m successful. There are even people who believe I’m a mature professional.

But then the risqué romance author inside me can’t help herself. It happened a few times during the two-day conference I attended last week.

The first sign of trouble occurred during a raffle preceding the keynote speaker. As audience members whipped out their tickets and waited for the numbers to be read, the guy behind me began cheering quietly for himself.

“Come on, me!”

Only he didn’t really pause for the comma. I laughed so hard I dropped my raffle ticket in my tea. A colleague watched as I fished it out and licked it.

“What?” I asked. “I have to see if I win.”

She shook her head. “You’re a winner, all right.”

I managed to stay on my good behavior the rest of the day, and was actually feeling pretty proud of myself when I got to the evening cocktail party at a nearby restaurant. There was a lovely buffet table adorned with gourds and other autumn produce, and I wanted to know if it was real. I was stroking an especially large squash when I noticed the guy next to me wearing an odd expression.

“Sorry,” I said, drawing my hand back. “I shouldn’t fondle phallic-looking vegetables in public.”

The guy looked startled. “I wasn't thinking that at all.”

But since I'd introduced the idea and he was obviously thinking it now, it seemed wise for me to step away from the squash, polish off my drink, and make my escape with only one person believing I'm a raging pervert.

The following morning, I attended a presentation on search engine optimization. The room was packed, and everyone scribbled notes as the instructor paced the front of the room.

“For ten dollars,” he said as he held up a bill, “can anyone tell me the number one keyword people search online?”

I shot out of my chair. “Porn!”

Everyone turned and stared. I sat back down, feeling fifty pairs of eyes on me as all my colleagues speculated how I happened to be allowed out in public.

The instructor laughed. “Um, no. Good guess though.”

By the time afternoon rolled around, fatigue started to set in. The advantage of being able to fall asleep anytime, anywhere is that you seldom grapple with insomnia.

The disadvantage is that you end up doing the Jello-neck head bob whenever you find yourself in a warm room with the drone of someone’s voice lulling you to dreamland. When I snapped awake at one point and discovered a puddle of drool on my lap, it seemed like a good time to excuse myself.

My brain needed fuel and my iPhone needed a charge, so I meandered to a nearby restaurant where a good friend was waiting tables. She set me up at the bar with a steaming plate of flatbread and a good glass of wine and plugged in my iPhone charger behind the counter.

I had to eat fast since another presentation was starting soon, so I gobbled the food, paid the bill, and looked around for someone to retrieve my phone.

No one was in sight.

I could see where the cord snaked to the other side of the counter, so I hitched up my dress and boosted myself onto the bar. I was just yanking the plug out of the outlet when my friend and the bartender reappeared.

I slid back across the bar and planted my butt on my stool, trying to look innocent. The bartender’s expression suggested I may have just flashed my underwear at the cluster of unsuspecting businessmen enjoying happy hour behind me. My friend smiled at him.

“It’s OK, she’s a friend of mine,” she offered.

I tugged down the hem of my dress and shoved my iPhone back in my purse. “There are moments you probably don’t want to advertise that.”

Have you done anything to embarrass yourself or your employer in the last week? Please share so I’m not alone.

Oh, and in case you’re still wondering about the top searched keyword, it’s “quote.” As in “insurance quote,” not “porn quote,” though clearly we can all agree the latter would be more interesting.

What dumb things have you done lately?

I would like to hire someone to reside under my bathroom vanity and punch me hard in the face every time I think it’s a good idea to wax my own eyebrows.

No matter how many times I end up looking like a badly groomed hedgehog with mange, I never seem to learn my lesson.

Besides having no brow waxing skills, I have no common sense when it comes to the timing of things. The fact that I have a big book signing coming up at 7 p.m. Friday at Powell’s on Cedar Hills Crossing in Portland should have deterred me from taking major cosmetic risks at this point, but it’s actually what convinced me the grooming effort would be a good idea.

So now I have mismatched eyebrows with random patchy chunks missing. I’m also waiting to see if I end up with a black eye from stepping on a rake in my garage the other day. I’ve seen the rake sitting there for weeks, and it crossed my mind more than once that I should turn it around so I wouldn’t end up smashing myself in the face with it.

But the face smashing occurred, and my cheekbone still aches. I don’t see any noticeable marks so far, but I’m half expecting to wake up with some sort of delayed-onset black eye.

It can happen. Well, if it can happen, it will certainly happen to me.

Then there’s the sunburn I got yesterday by forgetting to ask someone to put sunscreen on my back until after I’d been out on the lake for more than three hours. Fortunately, that shouldn’t be too noticeable at the book signing unless I decide to take my shirt off. Given my questionable judgment recently, I wouldn’t rule out the possibility.

Make me feel better here – what dumb things have you done lately? Please share, I need to know I'm not alone in this.

Oh, and if you happen to live near Portland and are planning to attend the Powell’s event on Friday, can you let me know in the comments? They’re trying to get a ballpark head count so they know which room to put is in.

I’m thinking the one with the padded walls would do nicely.

My high-class evening with the literary crowd

I am capable of behaving in a civilized fashion when the occasion calls for it. Saturday night, the occasion called for it.

Unfortunately, I did not rise to it.

I was lucky enough to get my hands on tickets to a fancy dinner for The Nature of Words, Central Oregon’s premier literacy event. Nature of Words is a multi-day smorgasbord of workshops and readings from renowned authors, culminating in a dinner that included actor Sam Waterston as the keynote speaker.

My not-so-fabulous photo of Sam Waterston.

I was a Literature major in college, and a big fan of many of the authors attending. Anne Lamot, Barry Lopez, David Whyte – I was delighted to rub shoulders with them all. I wore a lovely dress and red lipstick and looked as classy as I’m capable of looking.

That’s pretty much where the class ended.

Pythagoras and I were joined by a male friend, and there was some initial trouble getting all three of us seated together.

“If it helps,” I joked to the hostess, “I’m happy to sit on Sam Waterston’s lap.”

She smiled. “He’s my uncle.”

I slunk away to drink wine. Once we were seated and the event got underway, I was spellbound – and respectfully silent – as Michael Dickman read his poem “My Autopsy.”

I was not so quiet when the emcee declared how glad she was that we could all “come together.”

Pythagoras and our friend weren't much better when she announced, “let me tell you about the lay of the night.”

We eventually got control of ourselves and stopped snickering for the author readings. This was right about the time the woman seated beside me introduced herself.

At least I think she introduced herself. She was slurring her words so much it’s possible she was challenging me to a cage fight in the parking lot.

Within the first five minutes of our introduction, she complimented my hair, shared details of her sexual exploits with several men in the room, and offered me a discounted facial.

Her husband looked bemused.

Mine looked curious. “Is she groping your knee under the table?”

“Maybe she thinks it’s yours?”

When it came time to go, I noticed one bottle of particularly good wine remained nearly untouched on our table. Everyone else began to clear out, leaving it behind.

"Good wine should never go to waste," I insisted.

I rolled up a cocktail napkin to make a makeshift cork and then I hustled over to the coat check to stash the bottle under my jacket.

“Classy,” Pythagoras said as he held the door open for me.

“Shut up and drive the getaway car.”

So that’s how my fancy evening unfolded at a fancy literary affair. Hey, it could have been worse. At least I didn’t dance on the table.

What did you do this weekend to embarrass yourself? Please share.

I would offer to share my wine in return, but I’m not that nice. You'll have to steal your own.

My crush on the guy with the big probe

Thanks to everyone who participated in my “favorite place to be kissed” poll the last two days. Want to know what that was all about? You’ll have to stop by The Debutante Ball and read this week’s post.

Now that we got that out of the way, I have some exciting news – I get to go to the dentist this morning.

This fills my heart with joy like composite resin in a decaying tooth. I’ve been going to the same dentist for about nine years, and I’m not ashamed to admit I have a small crush on him.

OK, maybe I’m a little ashamed to admit it. It’ll be just my luck he’ll visit my blog today and will promptly transfer my records to one of the other dentists.

Honestly, it’s a harmless thing. He’s happily married, I’m happily married, and our contact is limited to him shoving his gloved hands in my mouth once every six months. Hardly the basis for a romantic tryst.

I will confess right now that the second romance novel I ever wrote had a hero who bore a striking resemblance to my dentist. The story is one of my abysmal early attempts, so there’s little risk it will ever find its way to the bookstore shelves where my dentist – who, naturally, would be browsing the romance aisle – would stumble upon it and bellow, “wait a minute, that’s me!”

That’s true for pretty much any character I write. People often ask me if I base characters on real people. The short answer is, “of course!”

The long answer is that my characters – especially the male love interests – are almost always an amalgam of many different people. I’ll borrow eyes from a guy I pass on the street, arms from some sexy stud I spot on the internet, a smile from my high school boyfriend. I’ve told my husband before that he’s the inspiration for every hero I’ll ever write, and while that’s true, I mean it more in a big picture “you’re the reason I believe in true love” sort of way.

But I’d be lying if I pretended little parts (and not-so-little parts) of other men don’t help form those characters.

Especially my dentist.

When I had a cavity filled several years ago, he dosed me liberally with laughing gas (knowing my crippling needle phobia and the likelihood I’d punch anyone who came near me with the Novocain.)

The whole thing is a blur to me, except the faint memory that I was very, very happy for the duration of the procedure.

I walked home afterward, and was still a little loopy when I strolled through the front door with a big, drooly smile on my face.

“You’re baked out of your gourd, aren’t you?” Pythagoras asked.

I grinned. “Uh-huh. Nitrous Oxide. Good stuff.”

“Please tell me you didn’t hit on the dentist.”

Truly, I have no idea. That’s probably best.

Have you ever developed a harmless crush on your doctor, dentist, or the clerk at the adult video store? Do any traces of these people appear in your novels? Please share.

I have to go primp for the dentist.

Getting lipstick on another man's shirt

I had lunch yesterday with a former co-worker I’ve been friendly with for maybe six years.

This is a male friend – someone I’m delighted to catch up with over lunch a couple times a year, but not someone I go out with for girls’ night and spend the evening swapping fashion tips and ass pats.

We met at the door and exchanged the customary hug. One problem – the angle was off. You know those hugs where things don’t line up quite right and you end up with your faced squashed against someone’s shoulder?

Not usually a big deal. Unfortunately, I’d just applied a fresh coat of lipstick and my lunch companion was wearing a light colored dress shirt. As we headed off toward a table, all I could think was, “crap, did I just get lipstick on his shirt?”

By then, he was off and running with the conversation, so I settled for discretely trying to get a look at his right shoulder. Just my luck, he sat down at an angle that made it impossible to inspect him for makeup damage.

At this point, I probably should have said something, right? “Dude, I think I just smeared Créme Sable on you, here’s a Tide Stain Stick.”

But the moment never seemed to present itself. And I wasn’t really sure about the lipstick. Maybe I really didn't get it on him at all. If I could just get a look at—

“So the writing career is going well?”

“Oh, yes,” I replied, tearing my eyes off his shirt. “Very well. Just ten months until the release date. Um, look—”

“Would you excuse me a second?” he asked as he frowned down at his phone. “I have to take this call.”

I tried to get a look at his shirt as he stood up, but no luck. I was staring at my own phone when he returned, so I missed my chance then. We went back to chatting about his kids’ activities, and I was just working up the nerve to say something when I heard a commotion behind me.

I turned in my seat to look. “What is it?”

“Must be a kitchen fire,” he said. And since he’s technically the guy in charge of such incidents, he got up to deal with it.

By the end of lunch, I was exhausted from my covert efforts to look for lipstick, my thwarted efforts to address the issue head-on, and my fretting about the scene that could await him at home later.

“What did you do today, dear?” his wife might ask.

“Oh, I had lunch with an old friend.”

“I see,” she’ll say, folding her arms over her chest and narrowing her eyes at his shirt. “Was this a female friend?”

Sadly, I’ll never know. And since he was hopping on a plane last night for two weeks of travel– followed by the inevitable six-month gap that always occurs between our lunch dates – the odds are slim I’ll ever find out.

Have you ever been in a situation like that? You want to say something, but you’re not sure you should, and then when the opportunity presents itself things don’t quite work out? Feel free to share. Or feel free to tell me what I should have done differently. There’s always that.

By the way, there’s still time to weigh in on the “favorite place to be kissed” poll at the top right of this page. I’m pulling it down at 7 p.m. PST Thursday evening, and yes, it will all make sense tomorrow. Sort of.

Also, I was thrilled recently to be interviewed by Gabriela Lessa as part of a series for Women’s Fiction Month. She kicked off her interview series chatting with Jodi Picoult and concluded with me, interviewing a lot of other fabulous authors in between. That probably makes me sound way cooler than I am. Never mind, no it doesn’t. You guys know better. Anyway, go check it out here.

Please don't let me pee myself at this conference

You know that irrational fear you might hurl yourself off a balcony or scream curse words in church?

I see a few of you nodding and the rest wondering if you should keep a closer eye on your friends in multi-story buildings and places of worship.

I feel this way as I prepare to attend my first writers’ conference this week. Not that I’m afraid I’ll leap from the 17th floor of the Seattle East Hilton Bellevue, though the cursing is always likely.

It’s more that I don’t know what to expect, and I realize there’s a strong possibility I’ll spit gristle in someone’s purse or spontaneously lift my dress over my head.

It’s the little things that worry me, really. I’ve studied the list of workshops available at the Emerald City Writers Conference, but I’m not savvy enough to know how many I get to attend or how I’ll find my way from point A to point B. I specified my preference for the smoked salmon ravioli, but worry I should stuff my purse with crackers and a 15-pound turkey to satisfy my constant need for snacking.

And what to wear? “Business casual” in Central Oregon means something very different than it does in Seattle, and I also fret that the current heat wave in the Pacific Northwest will prompt conference organizers to air condition the rooms to the approximate temperature of a meat locker.

At least I don’t have to roam the city looking for a good cardboard box to sleep in. A couple members of my RWA chapter in Portland very kindly offered me a spot in their room, but I’m not certain whether I’ll be sleeping in a bed or on the bathroom floor. I also have to confess that I’m not 100% sure I’ve met these kind souls in person. What can I say? I’m terrible with names and faces, and despite our friendly email banter about room rates and breakfasts, it still hasn’t completely clicked for me who these women are. If it turns out they’re zombies or serial killers, I hope the maid doesn’t have too much trouble scrubbing my blood from the carpet.

I know these are trivial things in the grand scheme of my writing career, and I’ll figure it all out once I get there. I’m attending this conference to learn and to make new friends, and I intend to do that even if I have to use my plastic pirate sword to take hostages in the lobby.

Have you been to a writers’ conference before? Do you have any tips for newbies like me? If you’ve never attended one, what’s holding you back?

Admit it – it’s the cursing thing, right?

Why I'm stroking my husband's...leg

Yesterday, my husband shaved his legs.

No, he didn’t follow up by donning my best negligee and asking me to call him Katie. Believe it or not, there’s a fairly manly reason for it.

If you’re new to this blog, you should know Pythagoras is obsessive about exercise. He starts to twitch if he doesn’t run every day. When he tells me he’s going for a “quick bike ride,” he means he’ll be riding 90 miles straight up the side of a mountain.

This is actually the reason for the leg shaving. It’s a trademark of competitive cyclists. Watch the Tour de France or any high-level cycling event and you won’t see a leg hair anywhere.

Reasons for this vary. Some say it’s for aerodynamics. Others claim it makes road rash easier to treat after crashes. Another theory is that it facilitates post-ride leg massage.

But let’s face it – if it were an issue of aerodynamics or wound cleaning, wouldn’t they shave their arms as well? And while Pythagoras might wish for daily post-ride leg massage, the odds I’ll be providing this are about the same as the odds he’ll learn to rub my shoulders without copping a feel.

Which leaves you with the real reason cyclists shave their legs – because cyclists shave their legs.

Simple enough.

Cyclists have always shaved their legs, so cyclists continue to shave their legs because that’s what they do. It’s how they pick each other out of a lineup.

I thought about this last week when I attended the monthly meeting of the Mid-Willamette Valley Romance Writers of America and realized I am largely ignorant about the habits of romance writers. I didn’t join the group until after I landed my book deal in February, and I’m still trying to learn the ropes.

Is there a secret handshake? A hairstyle I should adopt? A special way I’m supposed to pat my colleagues on the butt at the end of each meeting?

I’m only half joking here, because I really don’t know. While everything I’ve written over the last eight years has had elements of romance, it wasn’t until this book deal came along that I really thought of myself as a romance author. I’m still not sure what that means, so I mostly feel like the weird kid in the back of the room worrying someone will notice she’s not wearing the right socks.

If you’re a romance author, can you clue me in? Are there any habits I should be aware of or secrets I should know? If you don’t write romance, what are the trademarks of authors in your genre? Can I spot a paranormal author by the antennae sprouting from her forehead or a thriller writer by her muscle shirt and big tattoos? Please share in the comments.

I’ll be waiting with my razor at ready, just in case there’s a rule requiring me to shave my pinkie toes.

How not to be an email goober

I’ve been known to do stupid things with email.

Shocking, isn’t it?

My offenses have ranged from typos to a smart-ass rant about the boss sent to a coworker (and subsequently viewed by the boss, who happened to be standing behind my coworker when she opened it).

My most recent faux pas occurred last week, and fortunately, wasn’t too embarrassing. Well, not unless you consider it embarrassing to extend a dinner invitation to a gentleman you’ve never met living 2,500 miles away with a salutation that begins, “Hey, bitches – you owe me wine.”

That one was more amusing than mortifying, but when you’re querying agents or crafting other professional correspondence, it’s important to avoid looking like a dork.

Here are a couple tips I can share:

Don’t fill in the “to” field until you’re certain it’s perfect. I do this with important messages to avoid the embarrassment of accidentally hitting “send” before spellchecking, proofreading, or removing the note-to-self that reads add something smart here.

Ditch the emoticons and exclamations. Lord knows I love a good smiley from time to time, but when your email message looks like a minefield of exploding happy faces, you’ve gone too far. Ditto that for exclamation points or goofy abbreviations like LOL or BTW or WTSAGP (duh, that’s Want to Split a Grape Popsicle?)

Watch the formatting. Back when I was querying agents, it seemed like a good time-saver to copy/paste a query I’d sent to one agent and use that as a starting block to personalize a query for another. Um, no. I couldn’t see it on my end, but that’s a good way to introduce all sorts of weird formatting. I discovered this when I looked in my “sent” folder and realized it looked as though I’d tried to demonstrate my creativity by inserting random paragraph returns in the middle of words.

Sleep on it. I know what it’s like to reach a point that you just want to SEND THE @#$% MESSAGE ALREADY. But when you’ve been staring at the words all day, you’re less apt to notice that you’ve misspelled an agent’s name or extolled the virtues of your extensive background in “pubic relations.” Come back later when you have fresh eyes.

Obviously this isn’t a comprehensive list, but these are a few ways I’ve found to minimize the number of times I look like a goober in a given week.

How about you? Got any embarrassing email mistakes you can share, or tips to help the rest of us avoid those mistakes? Please post in the comments!

I need all the help I can get.

The monkey business of social media

Social media is a serious networking tool for serious writing professionals. It allows you to build a readership, discuss craft and technique with fellow writers, and establish your brand identity as an author.

It also allows you to discuss feet.

This is what author/blogger Sierra Godfrey and I bonded over the other day when we realized we both have bizarrely agile toes.

Since it is obviously crucial to our writing careers that we explore this issue in depth, we began swapping stories of what we can do with our toes.

Check out her blog to find out what she's capable of, but here’s my list:

• Pick up a dropped razor in the shower. No need to bend over!
• Make my bed. I tried this when I was 10 to ensure I was prepared in case I ever lost both arms in a freak badminton accident.
• Write my name with a pen. I’m considering doing this at future book signings.
• Pull my husband’s leg hair. This is probably why he started shaving it.
• Type poignant love scenes in my manuscript. Don’t believe me? Here’s what I wrote yesterday:

Jmnglkiffooljyjyoinh grtrflrfol.rfrrejirooror

It’s clearly a very tender and moving scene, though Pythagoras was not particularly moved to find me with my feet on the keyboard.



Being serious writers who always strive to grow and improve, Sierra and I challenged each other to broaden our skills. Since she has a degree in art, I wanted to see if she could use her toes to edit a picture in Photoshop.You can see how she fared over on her blog.

Meanwhile, Sierra challenged me to embrace the spirit of the Monkey Toes Club by peeling a banana. Here’s how it unfolded.

Grasping the banana caused toe cramps at first, but I persevered.

Once I got it started, the peeling itself was fairly easy.

After peeling and devouring the banana, I went outside to swing in the trees.

So as you can see, social media is an important way for authors to forge valuable connections with fellow professionals.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to call my agent to let her know I’ll be writing my next book entirely with my feet. Pretty sure I can dial the iPhone with my toes.

How I hurked in my underwear

A couple weeks ago, I made a passing blog reference to the day I threw up in my underwear.

Ever the astute reader, my agent was on it immediately. “Is that true?” she tweeted. “Sounds like a story.”

It is indeed, one I’m pleased to share for no other reason than it’s a drizzly Wednesday and I feel like laughing and I’m generally the easiest target for my own mirth.

During my middle-school years, the confluence of wonky hormones in my system made me prone to crippling migraines that hit at the most inopportune times.

The most inopportune time of all was the last day of 8th grade. I was dressed up for the occasion in a stretchy lavender miniskirt and matching top with my bangs teased to terrifying heights.

I looked hot. Well, as hot as an awkward adolescent with braces and bad hair can look.

I made it halfway through the school day before disaster struck. My first clue a migraine was coming was the fact that my classmates were all missing their heads. I tried to pretend it wasn’t pre-migraine blurred vision, but was soon forced to accept the fact that decapitation wasn’t a class prank.

I hustled to the restroom thinking green linoleum and a quick pee might somehow prove to be the migraine cure my doctor hadn’t discovered.

There I sat with my knees tethered together by my underwear when the first wave of nausea hit.

It wasn’t unusual for a migraine to make me nauseous, but it was unusual for it to happen without warning – and to do so when I was seated upon the only appropriate vomit receptacle in the vicinity.

I hurled. Not just a little ladylike “urp,” either, but the product of a hearty school lunch.

And then I sat there in horror at what I had just done.

I had a few options available to me. Drowning myself in the toilet seemed most appealing, but the thought of my parents claiming my body in a school restroom was not the tender scene I’d envisioned.

Hitching up the puke-filled panties and pretending everything was normal was also not an option, or at least not one I wanted to consider.

Discarding the evidence seemed most logical, but then what? I was a 13-year-old self-conscious adolescent, so the thought of parading around the school in a thin miniskirt sans underwear didn’t hold the same appeal it would if I’d been a drunk pop singer.

But it had to be done. Thoroughly disgraced, I mopped up the mess, wrapped everything in toilet paper, and carried it to the trashcan by the door where I buried it deep beneath a mound of wet paper towels stained with Wet-N-Wild lip-gloss.

Then I trudged to the office to phone my mother for what would prove to be the first in a series of awkward calls she received during my school years. Though admitting I’d puked in my underwear was more mortifying than later admitting I’d lit my hand on fire, I was at least able to provide a more satisfying answer when asked if I’d done so intentionally.

Finally, I did the walk of shame out to the curb, careful not to sit down or stand in any direct sunlight.

And though I missed the ceremony, I feel confident I have a more interesting graduation story to tell than any of my classmates.

So that’s how it all happened. Aren’t you glad to share in my humiliation? If you feel like offering your own embarrassing story in the comments, please do so.

No sense in me being the only one to bare all, right?

Stick that thing in me and I guarantee I'll scream

A lot of authors talk about fear. Fear of failure, fear of rejection, even fear of success.

I don’t get the last one, and to be honest, the first two aren’t a problem, either. Rejection sucks, no doubt, but it proves you’re trying. Ditto that for failure, which gives you the added bonus of never being the jerk at a writers’ conference who gets lynched in the bathroom for describing the book deal that fell effortlessly into his lap.

I can relate to fear though. And I will confess right now that I am utterly, freakishly, terrified of needles.

This is where you say, “but they don't hurt,” and I explain that the phobia isn’t about pain. I once had a cavity drilled without Novocain just to avoid the needle.

Pain is not a problem.

I’ve tried hypnosis, sessions with a shrink, and a staggering array of anti-anxiety meds. I can occasionally handle an injection, but an IV? I just gagged when I typed those letters.

So when my doctor ordered an exploratory surgery that required an IV two years ago, I explained my phobia. More accurately, I described the degree to which I was likely to FREAK THE F**K OUT if they tried to stick me while conscious.

“No problem,” he said reassuringly, and sent me home with a prescription for a drug labeled for management of severe anxiety and sedation of aggressive patients.

That sounded about right.

I was instructed to take one pill an hour before the procedure, and the second if I was still feeling anxious when we left for the hospital. The third?

“At your size, you won’t be upright after the second,” the doctor assured me. “The third is just for emergencies. We’ll decide when you get here, but that dosage could fell a horse.”

The first pill made me slightly dizzy. The second was tough to swallow because I was hyperventilating. I gulped the third in the car on the way there. By the time Pythagoras steered me into the lobby – trying hard to pretend I was a homeless person he’d found on the street – I was a sobbing, shrieking, shaking, slobbering mess.

“What happened to her?” the receptionist asked.

Pythagoras looked at me. “She’s actually doing pretty well.”

They marched me into a little room where the doctor took one look at me and determined there was no way anyone was touching me – much less trying to stick me with a needle.

That’s about when the hallucinogenic properties of the drug started to kick in.

“Look!” I slurred to Pythagoras as I crawled on the floor. “The shapes are moving. Pretty!”

“Please don’t lick the linoleum,” he urged. “Come on – get up. You don’t know who’s peed on that floor.”

“But it’s fluffy.”

“It sure is.”

Things got a little hazy after that. I remember being dragged into a room and taking a half-hearted swing at a nurse before passing out.

When I came to, Pythagoras was there. “Good news,” he said.

“I’m healthy?”

“Oh, they don’t know yet – but if they ever do this again, they’re just going to gas you.”

Alas, that’s not a viable solution for dealing with the daily fears of most authors, but it’s still a great source of comfort to me.

So what are your fears? Do they pertain to writing, or are they ridiculous like mine? Do share in the comments. Just know that if you use those two letters, I'll throw up a little in my mouth.

My one-hour Mother's Day cabbage pregnancy

Yesterday, we went for a ride on the tandem bike.

On our way home, Pythagoras spotted a sporting goods store and couldn’t resist the urge to stare at $5000 time-trial bikes.

Since I’d rather cut off my pinkie toes and soak my feet in grapefruit juice, I walked across the street to a small produce stand. Once there, I decided to make German red cabbage for dinner.

I selected a small purple cabbage and a Granny Smith apple and approached the cash register. “Excuse me,” I said to the clerk as I lifted my sweatshirt and turned to reveal the pockets on the back of my cycling jersey. “Do you think these would fit?”

He looked at me, looked at the cabbage, looked at the pockets. “Um, I guess I could try.”

“No, no – I don’t need you to put it in for me. Just wondering if it would fit?”

We weighed the cabbage, considered its dimensions, inspected my pockets, and eventually determined it was too large. “That’s OK,” I said finally. “The apple can go in the pocket, and if I cinch up the bottom of my sweatshirt, I can stick the cabbage in the front.”

I tried it out just to make sure it would work. Then I paid the clerk and walked across the street to find my husband.

When he saw me, he stared.

“How do I look?” I asked.

“Like a pregnant woman with a bobtail.”

“Excellent. Ready?”

So off we went on the tandem bike, earning a few strange looks from bystanders, and one shouted wish for me to have a happy Mother’s Day.

Then Pythagoras spotted another sporting goods store. We parked the bike and headed inside, Pythagoras studying me as he held the door open.

“Maybe you should take the produce out of your clothes,” he suggested.

“Wouldn’t it be weirder to walk around a sporting goods store carrying a cabbage and an apple?”

“I’m honestly not sure which is weirder.”

Once we were inside, Pythagoras became less interested with weirdness and more interested in overpriced bikes. I wandered around honking horns on the tricycles. That amused me for about five minutes. Then I was bored and ready to leave. I walked to the back of the shop where Pythagoras was talking to the clerk.

“We should go now,” I said, rubbing my cabbage belly through my sweatshirt. “It’s starting to kick.”

Pythagoras looked at me. “Want me to kick it back?”

The clerk was clearly horrified until I lifted my shirt and revealed the cabbage.

Then he just looked confused.

“It’s what all the cool cyclists are doing these days,” I informed him. “Cabbage in the front, apple in the back.”

“OK,” the clerk said, suddenly very interested in helping a customer at the other end of the store.

We eventually made it back on our bike and back home, with several fellow cyclists yielding the right-of-way upon seeing my delicate condition.

“I should ride like this all the time,” I told Pythagoras.

“No,” he said. “You really shouldn’t.”

“You’d better be nice or I won’t give you any cabbage.”

“Why does that sound dirty when you say it?”

My vacuum bag drug deal: why writers shouldn't go out in public

So apparently, vacuum cleaners require bags. Who knew?

Probably anyone who does more vacuuming than me, which is…well, most people.

Given my husband’s obsession with the Shop-vac, I don’t do a lot of vacuuming on my own. But recently, Pythagoras pointed out that (a) our Kirby vacuum cleaner has a bag, and (b) said bag was so full it resembled a misshapen piñata (though I was sad to discover it did not contain Tootsie rolls).

I went out to purchase new bags, only to learn that no one in our town of 85,000 has the same vacuum we do. Undeterred, I hopped online and found an eBay vendor who not only carried the bags, but lived right in our town.

What are the odds?

I fired off an email and received a response from a guy named Gary who said he didn’t have a storefront, but would be willing to meet me at the Moose Lodge.

Moose Lodge? I had never heard of it, but my friend Larie had. “Isn’t it that dark-looking building hidden behind the bushes down that narrow road past the Goodwill thrift store? It looks a little shady.”

Shady indeed. I showed up fifteen minutes before my scheduled meeting with Gary, pretty sure I was about to be kidnapped. I called Larie from my cell.

“I think it’s a setup,” I whispered.

“Cool. Can I have your peridot earrings if you die?”

I hung up and assessed my surroundings, looking for an escape route. Was that a mobster dressed in all black at the front of the building?

I squinted at him. OK, so he was about 75 and was moving with the aid of a walker, but still. That bulge under his shirt could be a pistol and not a colostomy bag.

I looked at the opposite end of the parking lot. Did that car just flash its headlights to signal the guy standing by the dumpster?

A man exited the building and aimed something at the car. I started to duck.

Then I realized it was a keyfob. The headlights flashed once more as the guy disarmed his alarm.

I looked back at the dumpster guy just in time to see him empty the trash.

By the time Gary showed up, I was on high alert. As his car glided to a halt beside mine, I fumbled for something I could use as a weapon. Carefully, I stepped out of the car and stood to face him.

“Are you Gary?”

He nodded, his gray beard brushing the collar of his golf shirt. “What’s the plastic fork for?”

“Protection.”

“OK.”

He reached inside his coat and pulled out…vacuum cleaner bags.

What a letdown.

“That’ll be 20 bucks,” he said.

I pulled out a $20 bill and handed it to him. I reached for the vacuum bags, braced for him to grab my wrist and whip out a switchblade.

But he just gave them to me. I couldn’t believe it.

“This feels sort of like a drug deal,” I said, looking around the parking lot.

Gary stared at me. “Huh?”

“Nothing, I just – I’m a writer. Overactive imagination.”

“Right,” he said, taking a few steps back. “Well, I’m going to play Bingo now. If you need more vacuum bags, give me a call.”

I watched him retreat, wondering if “vacuum bags” was a code word for something. I looked down at the package in my hands.

Vacuum bags.

What a bummer.

Inviting public mockery, one blog post at a time

There’s been a lot of buzz in the writing community this week about a situation that turned ugly in a very public fashion.

I’m staying out of the fight mostly because authors like Myra McEntire and Kirsten Hubbard already said it better than I could.

For those of you outside the writing community (or those who missed the showdown because you were doing something productive like laundering your belly-button lint) here’s the quick rundown:

Agent receives query, responds with professional rejection, author responds in an ass-hat manner, agent posts author’s ass-hat rant on blog with author’s full name, author responds with further ass-hat comments, agent holds Twitter contest inviting participants to publicly mock author.

I’m not going to jump on my soapbox and say who behaved more stupidly – I’ll let you draw your own conclusions.

Suffice it to say, we all do dumb things. What alarms me is the fact that nearly every stupid act you might commit these days has strong potential to become horribly, painfully public.

It wasn’t so long ago you could perform a bonehead maneuver and truly believe only your closest friends would know.

When I was in high school, I used to do a trick that involved smearing my hand with rubber cement and lighting it on fire.

It seemed like a good idea at the time.

Since I’d done it dozens of times without incident, I was honestly surprised one day when I couldn’t get the flames out. I ended up in the hospital with second and third degree burns.

Sympathy was in short supply – I had, after all, deliberately set myself on fire.

To top it off, I had the pleasure of learning that I’m violently allergic to codeine – a discovery made when my parents found me running around the living room throwing up and kicking walls while hallucinating I was in a house of mirrors.

A proud moment all around.

I had no problem then or now admitting that I had done something stupid. At the same time, I had the comfort of knowing my college application packets wouldn’t include a write-up of the event. My future job interviews did not have screenings of the video footage, and I was not forced to add it to my agent queries.

I also have the benefit of being a humor writer. As such, one of my favorite targets for mockery is myself. I’ll gladly blog about getting caught having fake car sex or dropping gristle in a stranger’s purse. I’m happy to tweet about the dog licking my armpit or hitting myself in the head with the car door.

I don’t mind you laughing at me. I encourage it.

But that’s the difference. I ask for it. I’m choosing to post my embarrassing moments for everyone with an internet connection to enjoy.

Not everyone asks for it.

Just something to think about before you hit the “post” button on that video of your co-worker break-dancing topless to Neil Diamond at the company Christmas party.

If you are what you wear, I'm in big trouble

Tomorrow I’m traveling to Portland for my first meeting with my new RWA chapter, the Rose City Romance Writers.

Can I confess I’m a little nervous?

Oh, it’s not that I’m afraid of dropping gristle in someone’s purse or shoving a half-cup of butter in my mouth.

They aren’t serving food, which cuts back significantly on my ability to embarrass myself.

I am, however, faced with the age old question that has plagued women since the first cavewoman studied her reflection in a pond trying to decide if the mastodon pelt or the T-rex hide was more flattering to her skin tone:

What do I wear?

In most parts of Oregon, “dressing up” means putting on a clean fleece hoodie. However, having a good friend in the fashion industry has made me dimly aware that there are fashion rules I should attempt to comply with.

Rules that aren’t carved in stone.

Several years ago I worked for a large corporation with a dress code that hadn’t been revised since the Nixon administration. A handful of female employees dared to question the company’s pantyhose requirement, and were quickly slapped down by a posse of matronly executives who considered bare legs just slightly below murder on the scale of mortal sins.

After several attempts to make my point through professional channels, I decided to challenge the hosiery policy by complying with it in theory, but looking as ridiculous as possible in reality.

One day I wore a forest green skirt with neon pink fishnets. Another day I showed up in a pink silk skirt and rainbow striped toe socks.

I looked horrendous. I was so proud. Certainly, I’d proved my point.

Then a co-worker returned from a meeting looking bemused. “I was just talking with one of the executives,” she said, naming the grandfatherly director of one of the company’s most influential departments. “He thought you looked nice today. Said you really brightened things up.”

I stared at her. “He was being funny, right?”

She shook her head. “You know him. He isn’t funny.”

As it turned out, the guy was dead serious. He thought I looked wonderful – bright and cheery, and as far as he was concerned, perfectly fashionable.

Eventually, the hosiery policy was changed – not before I trotted out a few more ridiculous outfits and withstood the threat of firing.

But the lesson I took with me is that fashion is sometimes in the eye of the beholder. What’s ridiculous to one person might be the height of haute couture to another.

If writing is the most subjective business on the planet, fashion must run a not-so-distant second.

On that note, I have to go figure out what to wear tomorrow. Parachute pants, perhaps?

Successful public speaking 101: flash your underwear

Since the announcement of my three-book deal, I’ve had a number of writing groups ask me to come speak to them.

Most are calling dibs for the months surrounding my book release, which is funny – the idea that not only am I a desirable public speaker, but that booking me requires a 16-month advance notice and anything beyond the promise of free cookies.

Though I’m an introvert who’d be happy to live in a cave eating roots most days, I actually don’t mind public speaking. This is a contrast to Pythagoras, who if given the choice between speaking at a funeral or being the guy in the casket, would gladly climb in and pull the lid closed.

In the spirit of full-disclosure, I’ve warned these groups not to expect a stand-up comedienne. Blog-funny and book-funny don’t necessarily translate to in-person-funny.

I tried to explain this to my mom last night, but she disagreed. “You’ve always been a funny public performer. Remember the Christmas dolls?”

Ah, yes. My first foray into the world of professional presentations.

I was maybe four at the time, and all the girls in my Sunday school class were outfitted with obnoxious dolly costumes, herded onto a stage, and forced to bleat out a song that went, “We are pretty Christmas dolls, Christmas dolls, Christmas dolls…”

Not being a particularly gifted singer or an especially cute child, I wasn’t singled out for any special position in the chorus.

But during our first live show, it was clear to me someone needed to step up to the plate. The other girls seemed content to shyly murmur the words with downcast eyes and voices that couldn’t be heard over the piano.

This would never do.

Boldly, I stepped up and began to scream – yes, scream – the chorus.

“We are pretty Christmas dolls, Christmas dolls, Christmas dolls…”

Since the director hadn’t provided any choreography, I took it upon myself to dance along the top riser, lifting my dress up and down over my head in time to the music.

It’s possible I knocked another performer off the risers, though my mother assures me there were no lawsuits.

By the time the performance was over, several girls had fled the stage in terror, and at least one audience member had fallen off his seat laughing.

I wasn’t trying to be funny, but apparently I accomplished it. That’s often how it works for me.

So if you’re thinking of asking me to come speak at your writers’ group – hey, I’m flattered. If you have cookies, I’m in.

But I make no guarantees I’ll be funny. Not intentionally, anyway. And if you want me to lift my dress over my head, that requires an extra cookie.

Why you shouldn’t request phalluses from strangers

The other day I blogged about people who lack social filters, and how those awkward conversations are a goldmine for authors.

Now I must confess that I’ve been known to make the occasional joke that turns out to be mildly inappropriate.

Shocking, isn’t it?

The problem when you write humor is that there’s sometimes a fine line between “funny” and “what the hell?”

Case in point, my debut novel MAKING WAVES has a scene in which the hero and heroine are on the balcony of a hotel overhearing the world’s most awkward tryst on the beach below. I was going for a combination of humor and “this shouldn’t be a turn-on but kinda is.”

It was apparent from my agent’s reaction that I’d missed my mark.

“I don’t even know what this phrase is supposed to mean,” she emailed.

“That’s the point – it’s funny, you know?”

Um, no. Apparently it was funny for a few lines. Not for a few pages. The scene got trimmed, and rightfully so.

I’d like to say I only do this in writing and would never have my humor fall flat in real life, but then I’d be both a liar and a pervert.

About a month ago, I was at a friend’s party with several strangers. A gentleman struck up a conversation with me about his friend who makes beautiful, hand-carved wine bottle stoppers, and asked what shape I thought would be most marketable.

“A penis,” I told him for reasons I can no longer recall that probably seemed funny at the time.

There was some discussion about length and girth, and at one point the party’s hostess joined in and we all had a good laugh about it.

A few weeks later, the hostess called. “Remember that guy who was talking to us about the wine bottle stoppers?”

“Um, vaguely.”

“I have something for you.”

Yes indeed, this stranger took it upon himself to go to his artist friend and request a hand-carved wooden phallus for my wine bottles. And the artist didn’t stop at merely carving. As you can see, he hand-stitched this lovely leather scrotum, complete with two disturbingly lifelike testicles.

The creator was very proud of his work, and though I hadn’t actually planned to purchase such fine custom artwork in the immediate future, I was compelled to cough up the cash and admit that my joke had fallen a bit flat.

So now I have a wine stopper that spends most of its time hidden in a drawer, and a more finely-tuned appreciation for my need to think twice when I think I’m being funny.

How about you? Ever made a joke that’s fallen flat? Or one that’s forced you to purchase a hand-carved wooden phallus? Please share in the comments.

Networking tales from the socially challenged

After I joined Romance Writers of America last week, author/blogger Jeffe Kennedy kindly educated me about the different branches of the organization. With one branch, she explained, I’d have access to special meetings and events.

“Meetings?” I asked weakly. “Like – in person?”

It’s not that I’m antisocial. Though I prefer my human interaction to be virtual, my career in marketing & corporate communications forced me to participate in plenty of in-person networking activities over the years.

I just wasn’t very good at it.

One group of local marketing professionals used to hold monthly luncheons. They were well attended, and always provided an excellent opportunity for networking and education.

They were also an excellent opportunity for me to demonstrate why I shouldn’t be allowed out of the house.

The first time I went, I moved through the buffet line chatting amicably with a colleague about a direct mail campaign. Spotting the brownies, I set one on the edge of my plate and reached for the spoon nestled in a giant bowl of whipped cream.

“So we’ll be using radio spots to get the buzz started before the piece drops,” I explained as I spooned a hefty scoop of whipped cream onto my brownie.

The brief look of horror that crossed her face probably should have alerted me to impending danger, but it didn’t. I assumed she was counting calories.

Smug in the knowledge of my remarkably high metabolism, I marched back to our table to continue the conversation.

“So what sort of ROI have you been seeing on your new campaign?” I said as I scooped the whipped cream off my brownie and spooned it in my mouth.

The moment my lips closed around it, I realized my mistake. I had just crammed a half-cup of butter in my pie-hole.

Butter that began melting before I had a chance to decide whether I really felt like swallowing a mouthful of salted fatty-acid emulsifiers. It was instantly liquefied, eliminating most of my options. Could I spit in my water glass?

I saw my colleague scoot back a few inches as she gamely tried to pretend nothing was wrong. “Our preliminary numbers look good,” she said, ignoring the gagging sounds I made. “We’ll be using focus groups next month to fine-tune the message, but we’re seeing a great response.”

I took a deep breath and swallowed the butter. “You don’t say?”

You would think I might have learned my lesson and avoided the luncheons altogether after that. If so, you would have sorely underestimated my desire to humiliate myself with food.

Several months later, I returned to the scene of the crime. This time they provided chicken and a guest speaker discussing the merits of qualitative research.

As I absorbed the presentation, I daintily cut a bite of chicken and began to chew.

And chew. And chew.

I soon realized the piece of gristle wasn’t going anywhere. Having learned from my butter experience that swallowing bad things wasn’t a networking requirement, I reached for my cloth napkin and quietly spit the gristle into the corner.

As the speaker continued, I forgot about the gristle. Several minutes later, I reached for my napkin again.

Everything happened in slow motion. The gristle rolled out of the napkin, tumbled off the table, and bounced into the gaping Coach handbag hanging on the chair of the stranger seated next to me.

I looked up to see if she’d noticed. She was smiling obliviously at the speaker, jotting notes about controlling consumer perception.

I looked back at her handbag. I couldn’t see the gristle anywhere. The bag was a huge tote, packed to overflowing with several electronic devices and something that looked like a pair of gym socks.

I stole another glance at the owner of the purse. She laughed, still focused on the presentation.

I started to reach for her purse.

Suddenly, the woman seated beside gristle-girl looked at me. I saw her eyes narrow as she spotted my hand creeping toward her friend’s purse.

I froze.

Had the speaker paused then, I might have offered an explanation. “I’m not a thief – just someone with abysmally bad table manners.”

Instead, I drew my hand back and pretended to dust some lint off the edge of my sleeve.

Satisfied I wasn’t planning to pilfer her friend’s wallet, the woman turned back to the speaker. I looked down at the handbag again. Was that the gristle stuck in the bristles on her hairbrush? Maybe if I knocked the purse to the ground, I could grab the gristle and run. Or maybe if I pulled the fire alarm –

“Thank you all for coming today,” announced the speaker. “Enjoy the rest of your afternoon.

I sat back in my chair, defeated.

I watched the woman and her friend gather their things and flounce out of the room. I tried not to picture the scene when she eventually discovered the gristle. Would she know what it was? Would she know to blame me?

I never got answers. I also never had those two women sit anywhere near me again.

So you see, I don’t have the world’s best track record when it comes to in-person networking. That doesn’t mean I’m dreading future RWA meetings. Just that I hope they don’t serve browies. Or chicken. Or—

Yes, I'm coveting your phone . . . and your ability to use it

Last night, I had a girls’ night out with a group of former colleagues. We shared drinks and laughs and spring rolls and had several meaningful conversations about shoes.

While admiring everyone’s accessories, I couldn’t help but notice that my friends all have much cooler cell phones than I do.

Their phones have keyboards and GPS and Internet and cool ring-tones.

Mine has 78 photos of the inside of my purse.

Not that I’d actually know what to do with a cool cell phone if I had one, but since I’ve managed to get the hang of tweeting and blogging over the past two weeks, I have high hopes that I will someday own and master such a device.

Then again, my history with text messaging suggests otherwise.

I received my very first text message about two years ago. I was so pleased with myself for being able to open it, and even more pleased that it required only a simple “yes” or “no” reply.

I fumbled with the buttons for the better part of the morning. Finally, I managed to reply with neither “yes” nor “no,” but “moss.”

Surprisingly, my friend did not find this helpful.

Several months later, I got my second text message. It was the same friend, and this time we were both celebrating the outcome of an election. I meant to type something clever and witty, like “f**k yeah” (which is considered very clever and witty after five glasses of wine).

The response I sent was “feed.”

Thoroughly annoyed with me, my friend took my phone away the next time we met and magically reprogrammed it so I could send text messages that actually made sense.

In theory, anyway.

A new problem has arisen now that I’ve managed to send more than a handful of text messages. My phone – helpful creature that it is – feels compelled to complete words for me based on similar words I’ve typed in the past.

Considering the words I’ve typed in the past, this isn’t a good thing. Recently, I tried to text a friend to let her know that I would see her the next night.

Naturally, my phone concluded that I was trying to tell my friend I would see her next nipple.

So I haven’t managed to master technology yet, but I’m trying. Who knows? Maybe amid all this blogging and texting and tweeting, I’ll even find time to write another book.

Writing makes me rip out my own hair . . . no, really

My mother hates that photo of me in the sidebar. She says my smile isn’t “natural.”

Normally I’d just write it off as Mom being . . . well, Mom. But a few friends voiced the same sentiment, and since the photo is two years old, it’s time for a new one.

Lucky for me, I’m friends with wildly talented photographer Claudine Birgy. She agreed to take some new pictures in the coming week, so yesterday seemed like a good idea to wax my own eyebrows.

This is like saying it seemed like a good idea to smear my hand with rubber cement and light it on fire. I’ve done both, often with dismal results. You’d think I’d learn my lesson, but clearly the dogged determination that has fueled my writing career has also given me a bizarre over-confidence in my ability to groom myself.

Case in point: a couple years ago, I accidentally waxed a half-inch bald patch right through the middle of my left eyebrow. After several vain attempts at an eyebrow “comb-over,” I decided to draw in the missing hair.

Admittedly I don’t wear much makeup, so I had limited tools at my disposal. I briefly considered a Sharpie marker before discovering a crusty eyeliner pencil in the back of a drawer. I quickly drew in the missing brow and hurried off to work.

Within minutes of my arrival in the office, it became clear that my artistry had somehow fallen short. A co-worker stopped me in the hall and studied my face with a frown. “Why is the middle of your eyebrow green?”

You’d think I’d have learned my lesson and just resigned myself to ponying up the $15 to have someone else groom what my mother lovingly calls my “Brooke Shields eyebrows,” but no. I’m nothing if not determined, and occasionally, I actually do a pretty good job.

Much to my surprise, yesterday was one of those occasions. OK, so the right one is a little crooked in the middle, and it’s possible the left one is a bit shorter, but I think I did OK overall.

So now I’m ready for my photo shoot. In the event that I’m fortunate enough to score a book deal in the coming year and the publisher wishes to use one of my new photos on the book jacket, my mother can rest assured that this is as “natural” as it gets.