anything goes

Editor's note: we would like to apologize for a typo in last night's post. The name of Mario Batali's Michelin-starred restaurant is "Del Posto", not "Del Postoperative". Our phone's autocorrect has a sense of humor. We now return you to your regularly scheduled daily drivel.

I had a totally lovely day at the romance conference; it feels like I've been here forever, even though it hasn't even officially started yet. I managed to wake up shortly after seven, shower, and make it down to the lobby in time to do some work before the event I was attending this morning (although work was slowed down by running into people, which was v. nice). The event was also excellent -- it was a retreat from 9:30am to around 3:00pm, featuring a couple of interesting agent/editor panels and plenty of time to mingle with a lot of people I know. Sadly, lunch featured little tea sandwiches, and each of the three sandwiches featured an ingredient that I despise (salmon with horseradish, ham with asparagus, and cucumber with dill). I actually don't despise horseradish, but I don't love it; asparagus makes me want to vomit; and dill causes post-traumatic stress flashbacks of my first six weeks in Ukraine when I was twelve and dill was in season. It's quite rare for me to run into so many things I hate, since those are basically the only three foods I refuse to eat (I guess I also refuse to eat tripe, but that's not something you run into often), so I was undernourished all day.

But, the panels were good, although one of the agents was a huge bigshot in the publishing world who, in my mind, completely undermined his expertise and arguments by repeatedly saying that people still 'buy movies on CD-ROM'. For one, no one says CD-ROM anymore, let alone buys them. For another, movies don't come on CDs. And for a third, no one buys movies on DVD either. Needless to say, I was unimpressed with someone who should have wowed me, although I thought a lot of people on the panel were quite savvy and are obviously thinking hard about the future of the business.

After the retreat, I came up to my room to kick off my totally fabulous ruby heels and trade them for some almost-as-fabulous blinged-out sandals. Then, I had drinks with the other finalists in my category, which was lovely even though I'm pretty convinced that I'm not going to win and the competitive part of me is trying to claw its way out of the box in which I've locked it so that it can destroy them all, so the stress of keeping my inner competitive demon tranquilized was tiring. So, I recovered from that + a large martini by taking a nap. I should clarify that the group really is wonderful, and I enjoyed spending time with them, and I will leave it at that before my gushing starts to sound insincere (which it is not).

After my nap, I met up with the '09 finalists (the Ruby Slippered Sisters) in the lobby, and we had a two-hour dinner at an Italian restaurant called Becco, which is conveniently a couple of blocks away from the hotel. It was wonderful to see them, and I sat at a table with a lot of women I adore, so I had a great time. We followed it up with drinks in someone's room, and now I'm probably keeping my roommate awake by typing, so I should go to sleep. The conference starts in earnest tomorrow, and I have no idea what workshops I'm attending, so I should probably figure that out in the morning. Goodnight!