(Scroll Down for my ROW80 update)

On Monday afternoon, I rented a car and drove just over three hours to Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Tiffany Reisz and Andrew Shaffer were doing a signing at the River Run Bookstore, and I just had to take that chance to finally meet them in person. Tiffany was one of my first interviewees, and as the editor of FELT TIPS, The World’s Greatest Charity Anthology of Office-Supply-Related Erotica, Tiffany gave me my first acceptance as a professional author. I’ve been regularly tweeting with them both for several years.

Tiffany finally told me.  Bees.  Not sure I believe her.

Tiffany is the author of the Original Sinners series of BDSM erotica. (Team Wesley!) Andrew’s latest book is HOW TO SURVIVE A SHARKNADO and Other Natural Disasters. (I keep my copy in our emergency shelter, just in case.) Why are they teaming up for a book tour? They are also adorably engaged to be married.

This trip meant a lot to me. I’ve only been able to attend one professional writer’s conference so far, and the connections I made there were invaluable. For me to go to something like that, my husband has to take time off work to take care of our kids. Our teenager has special needs, and with no family anywhere near us, finding a willing and able caregiver is extremely difficult.

This wasn’t a huge event. It was a reading and book-signing at an Indie bookstore. But that meant that I was able to sit up front and chat with Tiffany while Andrew was out buying her some mints. I even got a hug from each of them. After the readings, we were able to ask all the burning questions we’ve been too embarrassed to ask over twitter. (Although I did hear two women, walking out the door after the event, saying “You should have asked that question!” and the other protesting “No!” as if she was really embarrassed.)

I was the first one to dive in after the readings and present my books for them both to sign. Andrew signed both books, since he did the cover art for FELT TIPS. Since I interviewed Tiffany before I started asking “Who shot first? Han or Greedo?” she put herself on the record, answering it in large letters inside the front cover of FELT TIPS.

Then Andrew added his response.

I always suspected. Now I know.

And how did this trip affect my ROW80 goals for the week?

After driving more than 3 hours and then going to the event, I only did about a half hour of writing in my hotel room before I fell asleep. But I wouldn’t change a thing. Finally getting to meet faraway friends was much more important.

The goal I’m struggling with most is “When you start a short story, finish it in a few days.” This shouldn’t be difficult. 5k is my goal for lunar shorts. I can easily write 1k in 1 hour, and if I’m going strong I can almost make 2k in an hour. Theoretically, a couple hours of writing over just two days should produce a 5k+ story.

It doesn’t always work out that way. I started a story last Thursday, and now it’s Wednesday night and I’m only about half done with it. As soon as I post this and share it on the ROW80 site, I’ll go back to it. I’m hand writing it in a lab-style notebook, which has been working pretty well.

OK. Time to stop #AmWriting this blog post and time to return to #AmWriting my story.

Fancy hair for the event. Tiffany recognized me right away! ❤