What a shame – no boudoir pictures in the Washington Post today. Who wants to post a pic of their hot hot romance bedroom here? Lemme know.
But in case your thoughts aren’t turning to the bedroom (and I’ll admit: mine are. I’m so sleep deprived I’d commit a felony for three extra hours of sleep) here are a hodgepodge of links and funny for your amusement.
If you are in a mind for pictures, here’s a rather fun contest: Where in the World is The Spymaster’s Lady? Take your copy of the hunkalicious man-titty that is wrapped around the awesome that is Joanna Bourne’s The Spymaster’s Lady 
Bourne is judging the entries, so there’s plenty of room for creativity. Winners get a signed copy of the book plus a pink bejeweled book thong (that’s not a euphemism). The entry I linked to says the deadline is Feb. 16th but I hear from good authority that the deadline will be extended to Feb. 28th so many more folks can get snappy and creative.
My copy is an ARC that’s currently in the wrecked construction site that is my basement so alas, my entry won’t impress anyone, unless the idea of dust is a big turn-on.
Bitchery reader Taylor, from the hot, dry, sexxorific locale that is Iraq, sends this story that made my hoerk coffee up my nose:
I’m in Iraq as a civilian contractor and the holidays out here can be a bit depressing. However, one of my friends got a fantastic Valentine’s Day gift from his wife.
Apparently she misses him so much that she sent him a the kit so he can make a dildo of his own penis for her. And, just in case he can’t keep the 2 minute hard-on necessary for the mold to set, she also sent him a vibrating cock ring.
Now that is some red hot lovin’ right there. Although, I wonder if the poor thing knows she has opened her Hubby to a whole world of humor among his pals.
On the eve of Valentine’s Day comes good news out of Texas in a link courtesy of Azteclady and Michelle: a federal appeals court has overturned a Texas law forbidding the sale of sex toys. Women all over Texas sigh in pleasured relief.
I personally love Texas, particularly because the state brews the best beer ever, but wow. That law needed to be spanked. Hard.
Michelle said it best: “So now us bitches can play with our toys. Nice V-Day prezzie, huh?” Agreed. Everyone’s V should be celebrating in Texas today. Pass me a Shiner.
What better way to celebrate all that chocolate-coated lovernating than to also celebrate a birthday? RomanceNovel.tv was born one year ago today (how appropriate!) and one year later things are pretty damn awesome – and no, I’m not just talking about Candy’s and my videos, though they are hot, especially when you get Candy going on the joys of discovering that oral sex is REAL OMG.
Maria and Marissa are very quiet and behind-the-scenes about the whole thing, but I know that their efforts to launch romancenovel.tv require a great deal of personal time, generosity, long hours and a true love of the genre. From one fan of romance to pair of class acts: Happy Birthday and Happy Valentine’s Day.
And thanks for putting such an attractive out-take of me in your video. I’m going to go hide under my desk now.
And finally: fun stuff!
Miri has dedicated cupcake toppers of awesome to us for Valentine’s Day. “Where’s my actual cupcake?!” is the second thought that crossed my mind, right after, “AWESOME!”
Ever wondered why guys from Jersey are so damn cool? Some of them are exceptionally talented illustrators who design romance cover art for Harlequin.
And speaking of, they’re offering a free mini e-Book today plus a huge selection of books are 25% off, so load up your eBook reader and have a lovely weekend.
Love those cupcakes. They are insipirng me to add them to my menu tonight. Every year, I make a heart shaped pizza for my kids for dinner and I think we need some snarky cupcakes to go with.
I like my kids to have a balanced diet of junk food and snark.
I haven’t made it any further than the Clone A Willy link, but have to comment: “Insert your willy into the mold until it solidifies.” OK, until WHAT solidifies, the mold or the willy? See, this is the problem with the word “it” in some situations. Harm could be done to joy sticks everywhere.
Must check the cupcakes.
Aw, you linked me! So Awesome! Thanks!
Anyone wants the recipe for the vanilla five spice cupcakes i’ll be more than willing to put out… I mean give it up… i mean, er… come across…
So, I went to click on that free book link (I’ve never read a series romance in my LIFE, but free book? Gimme.), and I see this at the bottom in the Digital Rights section:
Adobe PDF eBook
Copy: not allowed
Print: not allowed
Reading aloud: not allowed
Please to explain? Reading aloud not allowed? Does that refer to those things that get your computer to read the text onscreen aloud, thus making it possible for blind users to use the internet? Or…what? I mean, what? I’m totally lost here. Reading aloud is infringement now?
(I am NOT trying to start another g-d copyright thread. Please, no. I am just very, very confused.)
Miri, I would LOVE to get that recipe. Five spice powder is such an interesting way to flavor a dessert. I’ve made warm bananaegg rolls w/ five spice caramel toffe sauce and they are awesome!
A word to the wise on the Clone a Willy kit? Make sure the area’s shaved. Seriously.
Perhaps they mean no reading excerpts to a large audience? I mean, if the NFL has decided that their games can’t be shown on TV screens larger than 45” without violating the NFL’s copyright (45’+ equals a “public broadcast”), maybe Harlequin’s copyright is violated if you read it aloud to audiences larger than, say, three people. Or one person, a dog, and two cats. Or two people and one dog and a parrot.
Regardless, the wording on it looks dumb.
Texas is sooo behind the times.
Arizona passed a similar law in 1988, although the argument there was that dildoes were too difficult to clean.
Diana Gabaldon described it at the time. Various people diverged into matters such as the Dildo Olympics, dildoes as prostheses, Sweet Savage Dildo and heat-seeking dildoes. Judith McNaught baptized her keyboard, and got a freebie by showing the discussion to her repairman.
For a trip in the Wayback Machine, drop by
here.
closetcrafter: Sure thing! I’ll post the recipe at the link provided by TheSB’s or here for the lazy people
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mirimoonsong/2263086211/
I dunno, couldn’t a parrot be considered a recording device?
Wow, can we have a link to that video of Candy? Because I certainly need to watch it…at work…with pictures of Hello Kitty vibrators on my effing enormous monitor.
Miri, thanks so much for the recipe. Can’t wait to make them. If anyone is interested in the banana egg rolls, I got the recipe from epicurious.com
I think what they mean is you can’t use the file with the reading aloud feature in Acrobat. It’s an accessibility feature.
http://www.adobe.com/enterprise/accessibility/reader/pdfs/reader7_accessibility.pdf
Thanks Jean. But that seems pretty shitty to me. Sorry, blind folks! No book for you!
Not that they’d miss much. It’s a pretty meh story.
I’ve never tried it, but I wonder if the reading aloud feature can be recorded? I can record anything that comes through my speakers. However, if you didn’t have to use Reading Aloud, I don’t see why you would. I’ve tried one program like that and it made me want to pull my hair out—that * measured * male * voice * reading * in * monotone.
A shabby ARC?
But it’s the surroundings that are important here, not the book’s condition! (Well-read is GOOD.)
Well, if you wanted to record it, you could read it aloud yourself into a tape recorder, you know? It just seems a bit paranoid and weird to me.
Thanks for the quote from my e-mail. As a single woman in Texas my private life is of no concern to some idiot lawmaker or ‘authority’’ and I was hoping this stupid law would be overturned. I just wish Molly Ivins had lived to see this.
Speaking of reading aloud, there’s a great site for free recorded books (they use the Project Gutenberg Library for most of their texts). It’s at librivox.org . They are always looking for volunteers.
I went to download the free eBook and found nothing but this:
http://www.ebooks.eharlequin.com/DEB7CCB9-098D-4310-81D2-F2A4874676AC/10/126/en/Error.htm?ErrorType=130
Have they taken it down so soon?
Darn! 🙁