Whoops, It's Tuesday and I'm Late

Though I try to do my posts ahead of time, I did forget today. Really, I do have a good excuse.

Last Thursday hubby and I left at 3:30 a.m. to fly to Phoenix and from there to St. Louis, MO. We then rented a car and drove to a little town called Taylorville, IL. (2 hour drive.) Thank goodness I brought along our portable Magellan as when we follow maps or something like Mapquest Directions, for some reason hubby tends to do the opposite of what I tell him. When the lady on Magellan warns him that the next turn will be to the right, he does what she says.

Taylorville has two motels, both rather mediocre. However, the one we stayed in was clean. We did have to ask for a hair dryer and more toilet paper and we got both. The bathroom light burned out, but it was fixed immediately.

Though the town is small, the streets are strange, going in all kinds of weird directions and changing names in the middle--so we continued to use the Magellan and still managed to get lost a couple of times.

There were two purposes for our visit. First, I was giving two presentations at the Prose in the Park writers' conference and second, to sign a publishing contract. The publisher of my Rocky Bluff P.D. series quit the business so I had to find another publisher and fortunately did.

The conference was small, but the attendees attentive and friendly. Another presenter was J.D. Webb who I'd met at Love is Murder in Chicago. He did a great job and it was fun to see him again.

We left Taylorville on Sunday and headed home. Flying today is grueling. Though I've done it often enough I know to take off my shoes and jacket, put anything that squeezes and squirts and can't be over 3 oz. in a quart size zip lock bag which must be tossed into a plastic box to be x-rayed, it's still a pain. Now the airlines don't feed you or give you anything to drink unless you pay for it, so we've learned to buy what we need after the screening process and take it on the plane.

When we landed in Phoenix we had about 10 minutes to get to our next plane which was in a different concourse and way at the end. Fortunately, one of those electric carts was there and we were offered a ride. Saved the day, otherwise we wouldn't have made it. From Phoenix to Bakersfield we fly in one of those small commuter planes and we've decided we like them best. There's actually more leg room and the stewardesses or whatever the politically correct name is today are more friendly.

On land, we still had an hour and a half drive ahead of us.

And as usual, we came home to piles of mail that had to be tended to, plus email that I couldn't take care of via my Blackberry.

Phew! Anyway, that's my excuse for being late and I'm sticking to it. Next up is a family reunion in Barstow.

Marilyn