Leap Soup - February 29

In The Soup This Week... Kit Rocha, Samhain, and bookish apps!

Soup Dish:  on my mind
✽Sad to hear that Samhain is closing. They played a huge role in breaking open erotic romance into the thriving genre it is now. I believe the announcement went out via email, but the email was posted online. Class act for sure. Be sure to check with your favorite Samhain authors over coming months for updates about their titles.

✽There's a bit of a buzz going on about Litsy, a new social/reading app for tracking and sharing books and reactions, or in their menu terms, Quotes, Blurbs, and Reviews. I recently switched from an iPhone to Android, so I won't be an early adopter. To paraphrase the zen parable, could be a good thing, could be a bad thing. It doesn't have a web client so it probably wouldn't get a lot of lift with me anyway. I love my mobile apps, but for lots of typing, I want my a real keyboard.

✽Speaking of apps, I was poking around book blogs, as one does, and stumbled over an amazing-looking plug-in for formatting book blog posts. Like everyone who's been on the Blogger platform for awhile, I thinking about migrating to WP every now and then.  This could be an incentive!

What I'm reading  --Kind of a light week.

✽I dived right into the latest Kit Rocha, but I resisted the impulse to speed through it.  It's really an amazing speculative world to visit, but it's the emotional wringer that forces me to set it down here and there, just to catch my breath. It's killer. When you get this far along in a series, sometimes things get to feeling a little stale but the Sectors just get better and better.

✽I dabbled around a little bit with some samples but I didn't find anything that hooked me. I did read a sort of hilarious erotic scene that was basically an X-rated version of "If You Give A Mouse A Cookie." I'll leave the details to your imagination.

✽Lastly, I had a 3rd-party review book that consumed a bit of my time.

Overall, not a bad week but didn't get through a whole lot of titles.
 

AJ Norris: Rust City Book Con Featured Author

 

HI THERE!
Conference Thursday is back, kicking off the third round in the Five Words Fiction game, and featuring another fabulous Rust City Book Con author.  Today, please welcome:
 

AJ NORRIS 

Hi AJ! Wanna tell us a little about your writing?

Hi Nicola! My romantic suspense, Healing Hearts, was released in January 2016. This is my debut novel and it's about two lovers with dark pasts trying to heal old wounds while her dangerous ex-boyfriend is on the loose. You can check out my website www.ajnorrisauthor.com for a detailed blurb and excerpt link.

I'm currently working on the second book of my paranormal romance series. The first book, Her Black Wings, Book One of the Dark Amulet Series, is due to be released on July 12, 2016.


A new series! That's such great news! And it will be out just in time for RustCity!  Are you ready for the RustCity questionnaire?

I was born ready!

1. Fill in the blank: "I used to be really good at enjoying my day job , but these days I'm pretty rusty." I definitely know those feels, my friend.

2. Eminem or Aretha? Explain.

Aretha! The queen of soul all the way, baby.

3. Choose One:
Vernors
Faygo
I'm confused. And not from around here.


4. What are you looking forward to most at the RustCity conference? I'm looking forward to meeting other authors, but most importantly, readers.

5. Which is NOT an actual community in Michigan? (no googling!)
Bad Axe
Mullet Lake
Alpha
Hero
Colon
Kalamazoo
(The correct answer is "Hero." I got very tickled at some of the names, especially when I saw that "Alpha" was one!)

6. Your latest work of fiction features a wealthy industrialist and an R&B singer. What's the first sentence? "Really?" Simone rolled her eyes, "and why would I believe you?"
OK, I'm intrigued.

What's it about? Struggling unsigned R & B singer, Simone, isn't looking for love, only a music contract. Mr. Calvin, a wealthy industrialist, wants to help her anyway he can after watching her perform. He claims he has connections in the music industry, but will he able to make her dreams come true or does he just want to steal her heart?
Hmmm. I think Mr. Calvin sounds like someone you get warned about. Risky!

7. And finally, would you like to participate in the Alpha Heroes Five Words Fiction Game?

Absolutely!  Bring on the paranormal, Alpha Heroes!

Excellent!  You'll be writing Part 3 of the ALCHEMY RUSTS story, and your challenge words are:  kaleidoscope, casserole, astrolabe, riot, susurration, and, per the delightful Ms. Usher, bonus points for using Belle Isle Aquarium-- which just so happens to have been a summer job for my own alpha hero, a/k/a, my husband.

ALCHEMY RUSTS

Part 1, by Laura Bickle

Part 2: by Calandra Usher

Mara slammed the Book of Spells shut. “Dammit. How in the hell am I supposed to get you off?” She stared at the dragon. It shook its whole body starting with the head and ending in a tail waggle. The sharp point on the end grazed the inside of her wrist. “Ow.” The little creature sat down, its bottom scorching her hand. She walked away from the stand where the Book lay.

Spike’s tiny silver talons held onto to the flesh of her palm like burnt leftovers stuck to the sides of a casserole dish. Maybe if she ran her hand under the faucet… The basin tap shuddered and dirty water sputtered out. Air bubbles caused the nasty mess to splatter the front of her clothing. Luckily, she wore her cloak today; a mainly black, full cape with a kaleidoscope of different color threads woven throughout the fabric. When the water ran clear, she stuck her hand into the stream.

The dragon beat its wings frantically but remained attached. Blood oozed from around the claw wounds and dripped into the sink. “Now what? Think, Mara.”

She pushed her cape behind her hip and shoved her empty hand into her jeans pocket for her cell phone. Unfortunately, the iPhone was on the opposite side and she had to reach across her body to get it out. “Really?” Why did that always seem to happen? Her phone was always in the wrong pocket. Mara set the phone down on the Book of Spells. She dialed the only person she could think of who could possibly help her. Izyk. He wasn’t really her friend, as alchemists and mythical creatures generally didn’t run in the same social circles. When she’d first met him while gathering special herbs, he’d been sleeping in his non-human looking form in the woods on Bell Isle. He worked at the Aquarium. Mara thought he was just one of those white deer found on the island. Okay…he had wings, but still… She thought about his mesmerizing ice-blue eyes for a moment as the phone rang.

“Hello,” his deep voice resonated in her ear. Her soul.

“Izyk, it’s me—”

He sighed and spoke under his breath. The susurration said her phone call wasn’t well received.

“Don’t hang up, I need your help.”

“What is it this time? I’m at work.”

“A dragon,” she squeaked.

Izyk sighed again. “…Don’t tell me, it’s silver and stuck to the palm of your hand.”

She squeezed her eyes closed and scrunched up her face. “What do you know about it?” His chuckle surprised her. Was he mocking her? “This isn’t funny.”

“Yeah, it is, you’re a riot.” He laughed into the phone.

“Stop laughing, this sooo isn’t funny. What do I do?”

A few minutes passed before he could say anything comprehensible. “Come to the Aquarium after dark and bring an astrolabe.”

“An astro-what?”

“Figure it out.” He ended the call before she had a chance to ask more questions.

“Dammit.” Mara had little choice but to do what he told her. She cursed the day she met him and rued the night she made love to him. Love…ha! A sliver of longing stabbed her heart…or actually more like an iron stake drilled her chest.

She raised her hand so she was eye level with Spike. His beady cobalt eyes locked onto hers. “You’re hurting my hand and still not half as annoying as Izyk.” Oh, God… Mara sighed; she missed her deer-man. There was no sense in denying she still had feelings for him.

Hmmm, a deer-man? Sounds like we've got a bit of a Cernunnos/horned-god thing going on, I like it!

You can find me on Twitter or visit my website.  I look forward to meeting everyone at Rust City Book Con in 2016.

Thanks so much for hanging out with us here, A.J.!  See you in August!

=====================================

 Registration is now open for #RustCity16!

Be sure to keep up with all things Rust City 2016, by following it via your own personal social media drug of choice: Facebook |Twitter | Google+ | Tumblr | Instagram | RSVP at the Facebook Event.

Monday Soup - February 22

In The Soup This Week... Lilith Saintcrow, Kris Kennedy, Book Riot, and bookcases...

Soup Dish:  on my mind -- the Soup's a little late this week, but hey, better late than never...
✽Bookcases! One of my favorite design/decor blogs is Emily Henderson's. She recently posted some tips on styling bookcases "for bookworms" and I just had to shake my head. Emily, you may know mid-century mod and you may know style, but you do not know bookworms.  Check out her post, with some very beautiful examples of styled shelves -- the bookworm example contains perhaps 25% more books than her normal styled/pretty/decorative options. It's adorable, there are at least 8 color-coordinated books on every shelf.  Go check it out.  Then come back here and I'll just leave you with this completely unstaged shot of my bookcases:

This represents perhaps 75% of my physical books. I have a full Ikea case in my bedroom, mostly double-stuffed, and a couple of other shelves here and there around the house. Now granted, I could probably do something about that top shelf. Over the years that was one of the few places I could stash something where my children could not get at it. For better or worse, those days are over... so I could tidy that up and make it prettier. Honestly though, if you look closely you'll see that the top of the shelf on the right has family photos, and almost HALF of one of the top shelves there has non-book items on it.  And also, I could have gone full height with those two on the end, but no, I got short ones and made space for Art. That is the height of my decorative restraint, my friends (literally, even).

✽Trope Anatomy 101 at The Book Smugglers - a new regular column by Carlie St. George. Her inaugural column is pretty hard on some beloved hero types. She definitely makes some good points, and I've often said that the line between alpha-hero and "alph-hole" is a little different for everyone -- hers is pretty restrictive, it seems.  It's always good to get different perspectives.

✽Brews and Books: Beer and Book Pairing Recommendations at Book Riot. Very clever and sounds delicious.  Book Riot is kind of my favorite bookish place on the net right now. For the record, I'm drinking Full Sail Amber right now  -- slightly hoppier than my norm but sufficiently balanced that I like it.

What I'm reading
Not too much, sadly...
✽I finished Lilith Saintcrow's Devil's Right Hand, the third in the Dante Valentine series. They are on sale now, all 5 books for I think $19.95? which is a good deal but I'm somehow finding resistible. I've been buying them individually because I want to kind of draw out the experience (also, I kind of hate how my kindle works with "boxed sets"). I bought the first one used for maybe a buck, so it pretty much balances out. Very happy with the series though. Liking it a lot.

✽I spotted a good deal on an anthology called, cheesily, Captured by a Celtic Warrior. SUPER-cheese! but the first story is by Kris Kennedy and I love her and I loved her short in the anthology. She has a way of drawing out those moments in her narrative, where the characters connect or an epiphany is realized... like the chime of a bell, she has a writes in these pauses, suspensions in time almost, stretching out a moment and letting it really resonate through the reader. Cannot get enough.

✽Just now I'm working on a third-party review read. And that's it!

MK Schiller: Rust City Book Con Featured Author

 

HI THERE!
Conference Thursday is back, kicking off the third round in the Five Words Fiction game, and featuring another fabulous Rust City Book Con author.  Today, please welcome

MK Schiller!

Hi all, I'm MK Schiller. I write contemporary romance - a hopeless romantic in a hopelessly pragmatic world. I have a full time life and two busy teenagers, but in the dark of night, I sit by the warm glow of my computer monitor, and attempt to conjure up passionate heartwarming stories with plenty of humor. I started imagining stories in my head at a very young age. In fact, I got so good at it that friends asked me to create plots featuring them as the heroine and the object of their affection as the hero. We'd spend hours on the phone while I came up with a series of unrealistic, yet tender events, which led to a satisfying conclusion. You've heard of fan fiction... this was friend fiction. Even with that, it took many years to realize I could produce an actual full-length book that readers would enjoy. I try to make my stories humorous, realistic, with flawed but redeeming characters. I hope you enjoy my stories and always find The Happily Ever After in every endeavor. My most recent book, Unwanted Girl, is a multicultural romance between an East Indian girl and New York City author.

Friend fiction -- what a cool hobby!  Your friends must adore you. Would you believe I did a similar thing in high school? Except they weren't nice at all. Mostly I wrote little things mocking the teachers I didn't like. And I never showed them to anyone!  Ok, MK -- may I call you MK?-- let's talk about RustCity!

You can totally call me MK! Let's go!

1. Fill in the blank: "I used to be really good at Scrabble , but these days I'm pretty rusty." Ooo, I love Scrabble, but I don't like to play where everybody makes those parallel words with 4 or 5 two letter words? I am outclassed there.

2. Eminem or Aretha? Explain.

Hmm...interesting. Truth is, I love all types of music, but I'm partial to Eminem. Or actually, Kid Rock. I've actually been kicked out a Kid Rock concert before (shhh!). OK, wait. I'm trying to imagine what might get a person KICKED OUT from there... (you can tell me at the con, I'll take it to the grave, pinky swear).

3. Choose One:
Vernors
Faygo
I'm confused. And not from around here.

4. What are you looking forward to most at the RustCity conference? Getting to know other local authors and readers. I love talking about books and getting new recommendations too. Most of all, I'm so happy some of my pals are attending too.

5. Which is NOT an actual community in Michigan? (no googling!)
Bad Axe
Mullet Lake
Alpha
Hero
Colon
Kalamazoo
(The correct answer is "Hero." I got very tickled at some of the names, especially when I saw that "Alpha" was one!)

6. Your latest work of fiction features a wealthy industrialist and an R&B singer. What's the first sentence? "I was a confident, wealthy woman who could buy and sell him a million times over, but for whatever reason, Anthony's smooth buttery voice churned me into a giddy school girl. "

Optional: What's it about? Constance Malory, a rags to riches girl who found her fortune in publishing finally meets the one man who challenges her. Problem is, R & B singer, Sloan Monroe is not the kind of man to play second trumpet to the woman he loves. 

 (oooh...maybe I'll actually write this!) That would be so cool! One of my Five Words authors (Roselynn Cannes) for RUDCon last fall wrote a novella based on my prompt!

7. And finally, would you like to participate in the Alpha Heroes Five Words Fiction Game?  
Absolutely! I love the story. Thanks for creating this fun game!

Fantastic! this is round three in our contemporary story, which appears to be a reunion trope at the moment -- but anything could happen!  Your challenge words are:

romance, inky, letters, hodgepodge, breakfast

Part One, by Shelly Bell

Part Two, by Josie Kerr

Part Three:

CURVE AND HOOK*

“Hello Hunt.”

That clenched it. Only one girl had ever spoken that nickname.

“Maddie,” he replied in a raspy whisper. “It’s been a long time.”

She gave him a slow assessing look. “Time has been good to you.”

It had been good to her too, although Hunter always saw the beauty behind the mask of unruly curls and insecurities. Clearly, judging from the hungry looks men were throwing in her direction, everyone else could see it now too.

“Yes, time has been good to both of us,” he said, holding up his drink for a toast.

She clinked her glass against his. The sleeve of his shirt rode up. He noticed the three inky letters carved across her wrist – Lov. He wanted to ask the story of them, but he kept his curiosity in check. Maddie smiled brightly, but beneath that there lurked a veil of suspicion toward him.

“What are you doing here?” she asked.

He shrugged as if he’d forgotten himself. “Signing up a fighter. I’m a manager.”

She took in the information. Perhaps remembering the scuffles he used to get into at North High. What she didn’t know was that most of them involved her in one way or another.

“Interesting.”

“And you, Maddie? Last I heard you left for Julliard.”

Her smile wavered. “Right, it didn’t work out the way I planned. I’m an author now.”

“Is there someone in your life?” His own question surprised him, especially since it was tinged with irrational jealousy.

Her eyes widened before she answered. “No. What about you?”

“You know me, Maddie.”

She took a sip from her glass. “Yes, I do.”

The regret in those words hung between them. But then she bit her bottom lip – a telltale sign of her lust. For the first time since the conversation started, Hunter relaxed. Maddie and he had always spoken the language of lust with great fluency. Time and regrets hadn’t changed that.

Hunter noticed for the first time her hands shook slightly. Despite the hodgepodge of memories flooding through him at this moment, there was one thing he knew for sure – Maddie had always had steady hands.

“So what do you write?” he asked, trying and failing, to go for casual.

“Romance novels.”

“That’s great.”

“Are we done with the awkward questions now?” There was the Maddie of his childhood, the no-nonsense girl some would call blunt and others insecure. For Hunter, she always fell between those two extremes. The girl he’d failed. The one he’d loved.

A strange uninvited desire to have her in his bed again throttled him like a stinging punch to the gut. It wasn’t possible. He was leaving tomorrow. But maybe, he could have her for just one night. The past may have destroyed their future, but could it give them a reprieve for one damn night? It wasn’t too much to ask...

Was it?

“Just one more question, Maddie. What do you like for breakfast?”

Smoooooooth, Hunt. Smooooooooth.  If you'd like more where this comes from, MK has provided a detailed list of resources, for whatever flavor of fiction addiction works best for you:


Website | FB author page | FB personal Page | Amazon Author page | Twitter | Goodreads author page |

Book Buy Links for Unwanted Girl:
Amazon US
Amazon UK 
Amazon Canada 
Amazon Australia  
Publisher’s site  
Goodreads 
Barnes and Noble
Kobo 
Google

*working title -- get it? she's Curve, with the size and the perfume, and he's Hook, on account of the fighter thing? Maybe? No? Got a better idea for a title? put it in the comments!

=====================================  

Registration is now open for #RustCity16!

Be sure to keep up with all things Rust City 2016, by following it via your own personal social media drug of choice: Facebook |Twitter | Google+ | Tumblr | Instagram | RSVP at the Facebook Event.

Sunday Soup - Valentines' Day!

In The Soup This Week... More from old favorites, some predictions, plus SCIENCE.

Soup Dish:  on my mind
✽I thought this was a great article about the evolution of publishing following the trajectory of television -- a few networks who catered to the broadest possible audience fragmenting into hundreds or even thousands (think YouTube) of niche channels, and all that goes along with that, particularly the monetization model.  Good stuff.

✽There have been lots and lots of articles about e-reading versus "p" (physical book)-reading, but it continues to fascinate me. We all have our opinions and theories-- it's always good to get a re-set on what has been supported by science: The Reading Brain in the Digital Age: The Science of Paper versus Screens. Plus, I think that the baseline is going to change as time goes on and e-readers evolve.

✽Think you know what's going on and what's coming up for the romance world? I can't think of anyone better-positioned to opine on this than Angela James.  Love this post.

✽Since it's all over the news today in the US, and I'm sure rippling outward, I will say that as a woman, a supporter of gay rights and legalized abortion, I am very pleased that President Obama will have a chance to name the next member of the Supreme Court. I have no doubt that the political drama around the remainder of his presidency will escalate to new heights of hysteria. I will not enjoy that. This is one of the reasons I read fiction.

What I'm reading
✽Okay, okay, I broke my stash resolution. I bought two new books in the last couple weeks AND I'M NOT SORRY.  One of them is the third in Lilith Saintcrow's Dante Valentine series, The Devil's Right Hand, which is in progress and getting quite good.

✽I finally got around to reading Penny Watson's A Taste of Heaven. It's on sale right now for 99 cents, if you haven't picked it up yet, you should. This is a quick read with unexpected substance. Watson has charmed me before with evocative writing about food and dedicated foodie characters-- the bakers in her Christmas series comes to mind-- and it's unleashed fully in this book. You can almost taste the food she describes. But as always, it's the characters that do it for me.  A little quote that made me fall hard for Sophia - one of those pivotal character moments:

He took one step...

One step.

And suddenly, she wanted to win.

She wanted to beat the giant. She wanted to beat everyone.

She wanted to sneak into the game like a quiet little mouse and crush them all.

She was tired of being someone's wife. Good little wife, with the sweet little garden and charming parties and so self-sacrificing."

Yeah, Sophia! You go! and she does. I love how she holds up against the blustery, bullyish demeanor of the hero. Romance fans are well-accustomed to the arrogant, egotistical hero, which is not necessarily my favorite flavor of alpha, but I love the way the trope is executed here. I love the way the heroine sees through it, not just to puncture the hot air, but to leverage the strength underneath it while bolstering the vulnerabilities it hides. This is one of the important elements of a great romance, IMO.

✽I was in sort of a reading slump so I decided I need a sure thing. I looked at a handful of my favorite PNR/UF authors whose series I'm behind on and chose Nalini Singh's Shards of Hope. I know all the Nalini fans out there read it long ago; it's been out for a year or so, but I got stubborn about paying hardback prices for an e-book, and it finally came down to $7.99.  I have to say though, it was worth far more. I am completely stunned by how much I loved this book, and that's comparing it to other Nalini Singh work. It's pretty staggering for the 14th book in a series to deliver such a powerful story. It was so, so, good. 6 stars out of 5. It goes to 11. It's amazing.

February Stash Reads: 0
February Bought Reads: 1.5
February Non-Fiction Reads: 0.5
February Other Reads:  2

Sunday Soup - February 7

In The Soup This Week... Avon, Portland RWA, Anna Richland, and Thea Harrison. Maybe a little snark.

Soup Dish:  on my mind
✽This documentary. If I play my cards right, I might get to go to a screening on my actual birthday. That would be pretty awesome!  I should probably finish making the arrangements to attend the wRomance event in Portland.

✽A really nice write-up of Avon's recent 75th anniversary in genre and popular fiction. Blogging for the Avon Addicts has been a terrific experience for me. Everyone I have interacted with at Avon has shown the highest professional standards, while still sharing a profound and sincere love of the genre.

✽While I am not much of a gamer, my husband has been in the industry for decades and my daughters also love playing RPG games (RP games?). The game industry has been looking to capture women's interests forever and the link between storytelling and women's preferences is not new, but here is a specifically-romance oriented entry to the field. I'm still not particularly hooked by this game's premise, but it's interesting to watch gaming and storytelling fall in love. Perhaps someday they'll have a beautiful magical baby.

✽Facebook's "show 'em what they want" algorithm is starting to understand me. The promoted posts in my feed are now about 80% book posts, and mostly romance of one sort or another. One thing it does not purport to do is to assess or filter on any kind of quality dimension. So those of you who are promoting books on Facebook, here is a little example of how to do it very, very badly:

Let's break it down, shall we?

1. First, your image is a hot guy. Fair enough. But you distorted the aspect ratio. C'mon now, that is seriously amateur hour.
2. That text box. Really?
3. "Kidnapped and thrown in the trunk" -- I'm not here to judge your fantasy, but so far there is zero sexiness about this book.
4. No author name and no title. What are you even doing?  I did not click through to Amazon to find out what I was dealing with. I don't know who this author is. I hope whoever it is finds some better PR help, stat.

What I'm reading
So I skipped the soup not once but twice, and it's mainly because I didn't have much to talk about. My reading brain has just not been terribly engaged, for whatever reason. I've spent a lot of my normal evening reading time playing mindless solitaire games, and lunches have involved a lot of working and networking meetings rather than me in a corner with a sandwich and my kindle. I think most of that is symptomatic rather than causal, though; not much has really caught my attention.

✽I read Liam Takes Manhattan and it was awesome, but quite a bit shorter than I had hoped. Really a short story, not a novella. Fun though. It's interesting to watch a supernatural character develop from infant to full grown within a year or two, and Thea Harrison is handling it beautifully.

✽The one full length book that got me from beginning to end was Anna Richland's The Second Lie. Although these are PNR stories, about immortal Viking heroes, there isn't a lot of magic and paranormal foo; the only paranormal element is that these dudes can't die. The rest is fairly straightforward thriller-style fiction. I do want to do up a full review on this one, but the short version is, well done, great pacing, good characters, possibly a wee bit too many threads going on for a perfect rating. Perhaps it's understandable, if you've been around for 15 centuries you have more than the usual amount of baggage following you around...

✽I'm still working on getting through The Big Switch for my non-fiction book. Clearly I'm not executing too well on this goal, but it's early in the year, I'm optimistic that I can catch up.

Conference Thursday: Featuring #RT16!

Imaged used with permission from RT Convention

Features for #RustCity16 will resume next week, but for today, I'm mixing things up a little bit and talking about #RT16!

This is the juggernaut of conferences for romance readers, for sure.  Although the magazine is no longer called Romantic Times, fans of romance and all of its crossovers are still a major chunk of this audience, which makes them my people.

Folks who have been reading here for awhile will be aware that I'm on the every-other-year plan for RT, which slightly mitigates my guilt over the amount of money I spend on this big giant party that is essentially a vacation and total indulgence for me. So I've been to Chicago in 2012, and NOLA in 2014 (let's go there every year, please), and my third trip will be Vegas in 2016.  I haven't done a Thursday Thirteen in a while, and happily, the meme has found a new home so without further ado, here are:

THIRTEEN THINGS

On My To-Do List For RT16...

1. Make my list of can't-miss authors.
2. Check it twice (wait, wrong list).
3. Make up my mind about the Book Blogger Con. (Who am I kidding, I am going.)
4. Register for the Book Blogger Con.
5. Finish up my scrapbook pages from RT14. I mean seriously, come on.
6. Write up scrapbooking post.
7. I have new Moo cards already, so this is done but it's always nice to have something easy to check off, plus I need thirteen things.
8. Fix my stupid password that I keep forgetting on the registration site so I can
9. Browse the agenda and pick out some can't-miss events.
10. Research a few non-conference things to do in Vegas.
11. Possibly organize a beer-related outing.
12. Roommate? no roommate? I can't decide. I like having no roommate, but I also like spending less $$.
13. OMG, what am I going to wear? Gah.

Are you going? are you ready? What do you do to build anticipation?