IMMORTALITY BITES: The best part of Comic-Con...friends!

My Comic-Con report is coming late this year. And I have a really, really, good excuse. Although the event started with a bang, for me it ended in a big bust. I ended up with a horrible case of food poisoning Friday night. It was so bad that I not only had to miss my panel, I had to miss my signing. I still feel ill, just thinking about it.

As soon as I came up for air from that, I had an editorial deadline to face. I finished proofing The Sacrifice about an hour ago - so now it's time to catch up with my neglected blog. See how things snowball?

Now that the crummy part of this update is out of the way, on to the fun stuff. Since I'm a local to San Diego, for the past couple years I've tried to schedule an author get-together for friends that come into town. This year we did it at my house. Although it was a bit more work than meeting as a restaurant, it was so much more fun and relaxing. Comic-con is sensory overload to the max. Having an evening of quiet where we can let our hair down, laugh as loud as we want, and gab to our hearts content was a blast.

Jackie Kessler recently became a vegan. Those of you that know me, know how much I enjoy cooking. This gave me the perfect excuse to experiment with some different recipes. I served a great corn salad (recipe courtesy of Cat Johnson), lamb/chicken/and veggie kabobs, a rice pilaf, caesar salad, and then a variety of nuts, fruits, and cheeses for desert. And this gave us the perfect excuse to pull some really nice wines out of the cellar.

I'm including some pics from the evening below. You'll see my son Max showing off the chain mail tunic and steel guantlets that he'll be sporting at DragonCon next month. There are pics of Charlaine Harris, Jeanne C. Stein, Diana Rowland, Jackie Kessler, Caitlyn Kittredge, and moi! A great time was had by all!