The Ides of March (Anne Stuart)

So, while everyone is off in sunny San Diego, having fun at the Novelists Inc. conference, I get to go under the knife. Sometimes life just isn't fair. I was looking forward to a fabulous three weeks of LTD (better known as Living the Dream). I was going down to the New England Chapter conference outside of Boston, there to be wined and dined and see old friends, then go off and spend the night with Barbara Keiler (Judith Arnold) and Barbara Samuel (Ruth Wind), aka the Good Barbara and the Bad Barbara. We were going to eat Japanese food and go to a quilt store and talk and talk, then I was going to hop on a train and go stay in Greenwich Village with Jenny Crusie, where we would drink wine and talk about writing and fiber arts and buy Eileen Fisher clothes and funky jewelry and plan our trip to Australia and basically have a fabulous writerly time. Then back up to Boston and the popular culture conference where people throw out words like dystopia and post-modern with reckless abandon (they even had a fat woman track, god knows why) and then back up here.

But noooooo. All that's out the window, because I have to go under the knife on the Ides of March. I'm not sure if I'll have as many slashes as Julius Caesar did, and I'll be getting staples, not bleeding to death, and my surgeon won't have to fall on his sword unless he really annoys me.

But let me tell you, I am Not in the Mood for this.

I should be having deliciously happy times. I just wrote one of my most favorite books of all time. Another absolute favorite is just about to appear on the newsstands:

(Shameless plug here -- the last week of March is the perfect time to pick up this absolutely delightful book and help put me on the New York Times list again. I'm envisioning number 28.)

I loved this book, but then, I have a sneaking fondness for all my books. If you're looking for a place holder for Taka O'Brien you could choose any J-rocker in a butch mode, or Takeshi Kaneshiro. Lots of luscious men out there, all ready to make a guest appearance in my fantasies, god bless 'em.

In the meantime, I'll be laid up with a very sore tummy. Yup, it's the old female troubles surgery, so the rest of you will just have to play nice without me for a couple of weeks. In the meantime I've got a stack of books (Eloisa James, the new JR Ward, the last book in Tales of the Otori by Lian Hern, Dragon Lovers by Jo Beverley, Karen Harbaugh, Mary Jo Putney and Barbara Samuel, two of the Tara Janzen books that I happen to miss, and I'll watch tons of movies.

As I informed my long-suffering husband and children, for the next two months it's officially All About Me time.

Anyone got some great suggestions for books and movies to while away my time as an invalid? I intend to recline on the couch and look pale and interesting while everyone waits on me and brings me Tab and cookies.

So give me some suggestions for fabulous movies or books I might have missed along the way.

And keep a few good thoughts heading my way for the Ides of March.