Cancellation

Because of the recent flooding, regretfully I’m not going to be able to attend the RomantiCon coming up next month. I had registered early on, had my hotel room reserved, had gathered all my goodies for readers and was making my list of authors I wanted to meet and hunt autographs from.

I was so looking forward to it because I can’t attended the RT conventions because they always fall during the state standardized testing week my school has to undergo each year.

So now I have to move to plan B. I’m boxing up some of the goodies and sending them express to Ellora’s Cave. They’ve promised to set them out on the swag table for me. However, that still leaves me trying to figure out what to do with 200 cherry-flavored white rose suckers, 100 old-fashioned candy sticks, and a ceramic bear holding a medium sized fishbowl that I was going to fill with red, white and purple stones and use to hold the candy. (Red for rubies, purple for amethysts and white for opals – the stones in my Jewels of Ursus series.) It would take far too long to individually label each one of the treats to send.

So, I think I’m going to take the bear to school with me and use the bowl for candy or maybe for a small beta fish to liven up my classroom. I’ve always had fish in my room until the last couple of years. I had a group of kids who had no respect for anything or anyone one year. In one 50 minute class period, while I was out and a substitute was supposed to be watching them, the destroyed my stereo, tore posters off the walls, and tried to kiss my fish. In addition to dumping the whole canister of food into the tank, they sprayed it Lysol. The sub of course saw nothing, but you corner a 13 year-old and he’ll rat on his friends so fast you’ll smell the cheese.

Well, Bob the Beta showed them. He lived another 9 months, safe at home in his tank. He finally passed away after a little fishy stroke that left him unable to move his left fins. He hovered at the bottom of the tank and when he swam, swam in circles.

Our school population has changed since then and I can’t see my current kids being so deliberately vicious. Not to mention that sub was banned at our school. When she objected that she hadn’t see anything, she was told that the option was she could pay me for the almost $300 in damage that had been done her watch.

Sorry to digress. I’ll miss seeing all of you and as a way to make up for it, I’ll be holding a give away or two in the upcoming weeks and giving out copies of Jewels of Ursus and some other goodies. I’ll also be sponsoring some giveaways for Bitten By Books’ Halloween anniversary celebration.

Til then, be safe.