I survived! I made it through. Granted, it was only two and a half days, but still! I triumphed. Okay, okay. This wasn’t actually a marathon, although there were certainly times when it felt like it.

My first stint at RWA was a brief one—just Thursday through Saturday—which also means that it was jam-packed. After landing around 3 on Thursday afternoon, I met a number of authors at a lovely tea party, then went to the amazing Margaret Mitchell House event Lucia wrote about earlier (scroll down). Friday and Saturday were non-stop, running from one Avon event to another, heading to one conference event after another, and occasionally eating. And sleeping. (Although not at the same time; that tends to get messy.)

RWA was my first time meeting most of Avon’s authors, not to mention seeing authors from other houses (I stood about five inches away from Nora Roberts. That was…yeah. I can’t really talk about it. I may have to go lie down now.). While it was, at times, just a little bit overwhelming, everyone was so nice and welcoming that I always had fun. And the readers! You guys are incredible. I’ve always read romance, but I never knew this community of people existed before I started working at Avon. Now all I can think about is all the years I could have gone to events like this. (Gayle Callen and Mary Reed McCall live in my neck of the woods!) I think it’s great that all of you are so on top of what’s going on with romance. It helps keep us on our toes, too!

Thanks to everyone who worked so hard on RWA—and now I’m off to start planning my outfits for next year. Oh, and, of course, I have to build that addition onto my apartment so I have space for all my new books.