csquared's all around blog

Review up at TGTBTU - To Wed a Wicked Earl

2009-11-06T16:48:00.002-06:00

Swim on over and CHECK IT OUT!

Boo!

2009-10-30T22:35:00.002-05:00

Happy Halloween, peeps! I wish you much yummy candy! :o)

Vacay pictures!!

2009-10-15T19:44:00.005-05:00

Since I couldn't take you with me, here are a few of the highlights from the cruise:

We left out of Copenhagen and decided to go a couple of days early. This was the view from the hotel:

Here's the Little Mermaid. Doesn't she look sad?

This is one of the lovely waterfront areas:

Next up - Oslo! This is part of the old castle:

We went to the Vigeland Sculpture Park. Amazing!

And then we drove up into the hills. Here's a view of the fjord:

Onward to Scotland. I love Scotland!

We went to Glamis Castle - childhood home of the Queen Mother. So pretty!

And then to St. Andrews - where Wills went to college and they play a lot of golf. ;-)

Next port - Dublin. First we went to Powerscourt Gardens. It might look familiar...it's used in a lot of TV and movies. Gorgeous!

Then back into the city for shopping and more sightseeing:

The next day we were in Northern Ireland. We went out into the countryside to the Giant's Causeway. Fascinating, geologically speaking. Very, very windy!!

We also went by Dunluce Castle. The kitchen (and some of the kitchen staff) dropped into the sea sometime in the 1700s. Eeek! It's scenic, though. :o)

Then onward to Iceland. Not icy - but again very, very windy. Here's part of Reykjavik:

And here is the Blue Lagoon:

Our final stop was in Greenland. It wasn't green, exactly, but it wasn't snowy either. The population of this town: 3500. The number of passengers on the ship: 3044. Whoa!

We only saw a few small icebergs, since it isn't really the right time of year for them. The visible part of this one was about the size of a car, I'm thinking.

We were supposed to stop in Newfoundland but a bad weather forecast caused the captain to cancel that stop.

Since we had to be out of our cabins by 8:00 am and our flight wasn't until 1:00 pm, we decided to do an Everglades airboat ride in Ft. Lauderdale. Look who swam up to our boat:

So there you go, peeps. My vacation in a nutshell. I'll do a post with a vacay reading wrap-up and overall impressions of the cruise - for example, holy moly there were a lot of readers on this boat! Everybody had a book (or Kindle or Sony) in his or her hand pretty much all the time. Heh.

ETA: Let's see if I can put some very short video clips on here. First up, remember I said we missed our stop in Newfoundland because of bad weather? Well, we didn't completely miss the bad weather...here is a little bit of video I shot from our balcony after I could get the door open (the winds had us sealed in for a while) - so really, it was worse than this overnight, etc. If your volume is up, you can hear the wind get much louder as I turn toward the front of the ship. Wheeee!

And I mentioned our airboat ride thru the Everglades - if you've never been on an airboat, you should totally go. It's cool! And loud! Check out a brief bit:

I'm back!!

2009-10-12T00:49:00.000-05:00

And I promise to post tons of pictures as soon as I crawl over the mountain of laundry awaiting me. :-D

In the meantime -

To my American peeps: Happy Columbus Day!

And to my Canadian peeps: Happy Thanksgiving!!

I am OUTTA here! Woo hoo!

2009-09-20T12:34:00.001-05:00

That's right, peeps - it's time for vacation! So I'll be missing in action for a few weeks. Since I'll be at sea, internet access is painfully slow. We check our email but that's about all. I know you'll carry on fine without me but try not to have too much fun...or take embarrassing pictures, at least. ;-)

Hopefully I won't run into this guy...

...and this won't be an issue

...or this...

...and we won't run into...

...but running into this guy might be okay...

If you want to follow our route:

I'll see you in around Columbus Day, peeps!

Review up at TGTBTU - Beauty and the Duke

2009-09-17T17:46:00.003-05:00

What are still doing here? Go READ it!

Review up at TGTBTU - The Infamous Rogue

2009-09-15T17:24:00.002-05:00

Swim forth and READ it, peeps!

Happy Labor Day!

2009-09-07T00:28:00.001-05:00

May you celebrate by doing absolutely nothing. :-D

And now for something completely different...

2009-09-01T21:01:00.007-05:00

...enough of this bookish-ness (not that books aren't important) and stuff about my boring life (except vacay is coming - WOO HOO!). Let's talk about something even more important:

the NEW TV SEASON!!!

Wow, summer TV is nothing but bad. Pleh. The only thing worth watching was So You Think You Can Dance, says me.

But those long sad days of bad reality shows and reruns are coming to an end, peeps. And I, for one, say YAY!!

Some TV linkage for my peeps:

TV Guide's full fall schedule can be found HERE.

A calendar of season premieres can be found HERE.

Now let's talk about what I'm looking forward to ('cause, you know, it's all about me)...I can't wait for GLEE to come back full time! The sneek peek that aired after the American Idol was such fun! :-D If you have an iTunes account, you can download the GLEE cast's cover of Kanye West's Gold Digger for free right now. You know you want to. Also, this Friday, they are re-running the pilot and the cast will be tweeting along over on Twitter. I'll try to find a link about that later...I read it somewhere online yesterday. Fox is also re-running the Fringe finale this Thursday, supposedly, and the cast will be tweeting along during that, too. Follow @FringeOnFox to read along. However, my cable guide says some football preview is on this Thursday. Maybe that's just local? Yup, I checked...it's a local game. Ah well, I'll be on the road anyway.

What other new shows am I looking forward to, you ask? (I'm not linking everywhere because I'm lazy and the TV Guide pages have done part of it and Google is your friend) FlashForward looks very good, I think. Both because it sounds interesting and because Joseph Fiennes and John Cho are in it. Heh. Lovessss Joseph Fiennes! And John Cho is a cutie. And I'll be checking out Vampire Diaries, although my expectations are low. That's it for the new stuff I'll be setting the DVR for while I'm vacationing.

But what about returning faves, you might be wondering...well, So You Think You Can Dance is coming back for a Fall season, so YAY! And I'm looking forward to Dollhouse's return, as well as Castle (Nathan!!), Fringe, Grey's Anatomy, Gossip Girl, One Tree Hill and a few more shows.

What about you, my peeps? What new shows are you excited about? Any returning faves you can't wait to see? Don't be like this guy...

ETA: This is what happens when you post while under the influence of cold medicine. Don't do drugs, peeps! Heh.

Review up at TGTBTU

2009-08-21T12:55:00.003-05:00

My review of Julie Anne Long's Since the Surrender is up.

:o)

I know it will be hard to tell...

2009-08-20T23:16:00.002-05:00

...since I'm the world's worst blogger, but I'll be missing in action for the next little bit. My mom is coming on Friday and will probably stay the week so I'll be distracted. And probably sore from playing Wii games - my mother is a cutthroat player, FYI.

Try to stay out of trouble while I'm away, peeps.

Review up at TGTBTU

2009-08-18T19:18:00.002-05:00

Wanna know what I thought of Stephanie Laurens' Mastered by Love? Sure you do!

I have the bestest cyber-friends in the whole world!

2009-08-11T21:14:00.004-05:00

Look what Ames gave me (and other really cool peeps) today!

Awww...I feel so special! ((((ames))))

Now, who shall I share the love with? I believe Stacy and Holly should be awarded, too. They're a couple of my favorite peeps! :o)

The countdown is beginning!

2009-08-10T16:21:00.004-05:00

Yes, soon it will be vacation time - well in a month and a half! Woo hoo!! \o/ The reservations are made, the excursions are booked and the packing lists are in progress. Say it with me, peeps: C2 must pack light! C2 must pack light! C2 must pack light! *sigh*

Anyhoo, if anyone has any must sees for Copenhagen or Dublin, let me know. Those are the only places we will have enough free time to seek out stuff on our own.

Help out a library!

2009-08-05T21:50:00.004-05:00

In case you haven't heard, the Louisville Free Public Library had severe flood damage earlier this week. Shiloh Walker is heading up a book drive to help them out. Surf on over to Shiloh's blog and find out more!

Review up at TGTBTU

2009-07-30T17:59:00.002-05:00

Go forth and READ IT, why don't you?

Hot Pursuit review up at TGTBTU

2009-07-28T14:22:00.007-05:00

Clickety HERE!

I don't get to combine by Snoopies and my duckies very often so it's a red letter day, peeps!

Just a quick note...

2009-07-18T14:18:00.004-05:00

...because I'm the worse blogger ever!

Sorry, peeps! I've been visiting blogs and Twittering, though. So most of you know I'm around. :-D My mom's headed to my house for a visit, so I'll be missing again.

Let's see, what have I been reading? I am halfway through Blue Diabolo (courtesy of the fabulous Bree - half of Moira Rogers, for those who don't know...Donna is the other half and also fab) by the fabulous Ann Aguirre - very, very good. I had to put it aside temporarily because I got an advance copy of a most coveted book. Heh. Before that I tried to read Christine Feehan's most recent Drake Sisters book but I had to put it down - too dark for my mood. I might try it again later...and skim my way through the dark parts. Disappointed. I enjoyed Julia Quinn's newest - a fun, quick read. And I'm enjoying Alyssa Day's Atlantis series.

In other news, this is the first season I have watched So You Think You Can Dance and I am loving it! Why wasn't I watching before? Also, I can't wait for the Torchwood mini-series to start on BBC America. I loves me some Captain Jack! Design Star starts back up on HGTV tomorrow night and that should be fun. Otherwise, TV is pretty dead right now.

Let's see...oh, I know! For those of you still not on Twitter (*coughAMEScough*), let me tempt you with stories of Twitter contests and giveaways. In the last few months, I've snagged at least 3 or 4 books. And two were advance copies (very advance)! Plus we're fun! We're friendly! You'll see lots of familiar faces around. Don't you wanna come play, peeps? Of course you do! :-D

In other news, if you haven't heard Holly's news go here and read all about it. :o) RWA coverage abounds - you can read all about it at Kristie's blog, the Smart Bitches site, over at Katiebabs' blog and a dozen other places (including all over Twitter). Next year I am going!

I haven't been to see the newest Harry Potter movie but I'm going soon. I did see UP and Star Trek - both were excellent! I'm looking forward to The Ugly Truth, too. ;-)

Well, that's it for now. I keep promising myself I will do better with posting but I am full of fail. Still, I persevere. :-p

Review up at TGTBTU

2009-07-09T17:21:00.002-05:00

You know you wanna go READ it, peeps.

Review up at TGTBTU

2009-07-04T19:09:00.002-05:00

Go forth and READ it! It's the patriotic thing to do.

Happy Fourth of July!!

2009-07-04T00:48:00.001-05:00

I'm at the 'rents - visiting with family, eating lots of yummy food and hoping for some good fireworks! I hope you're doing the same, peeps. :o)

Happy Canada Day!

2009-07-01T21:43:00.001-05:00

You thought I'd forgotten, didn't you my Canadian peeps? ;-)

Happy Father's Day!

2009-06-21T16:16:00.004-05:00

Give a dad a hug today - in person or by phone - 'cause that's way better than an ugly tie. :-D

In other news, I'm back from my cousin's wedding. It was lovely and a good time was had by all. Yay!

I'd like to thank the Academy...

2009-06-10T18:26:00.003-05:00

...I mean CindyS (from Nocturnal Wonderings, if you don't know). She nominated me for the Lemonade Award. Aww, isn't she sweet? Yup, she is. :o) What is the Lemonade Award? Read on, peeps -

The Lemonade Award

1) Put the Lemonade Award logo on your blog or post.

2) Nominate at least 10 blogs that show great attitude or gratitude.

3) Link to your nominees within your post.

4) Let the nominees know that they have received this award by commenting on their blog.

5) Share the love and link to the person from whom you received your award.

Hmm, I'm guessing I show attitude. And just what do you mean by that, Ms Cindy S?? Huh? Am I a clown? Do I amuse you?? Yes? Oh, okay then. GO ME!

I won't nominate 10 people but I will nominate a few - Katiebabs, JenB, Bridget Locke, and KMont, please step forward to receive your accolades! *applause from the crowd...or just me*

In other news, lightning reviews coming this weekend. I know you're excited.

Excerpt alert!!

2009-05-31T21:14:00.006-05:00

Yup, peeps...you know what the Snoopies mean. Suz News! She just posted an excerpt from Hot Pursuit - coming to a bookstore near you on July 28th.

What are you waiting for?? Go forth and be creeped out!