I’m back from New York City and L.A., just in time for the launch of I Can Has Cheezburger’s 2012 daily calendar. My two cats feature in this most “awsum” publication. I’m a tad miffed that my cats got published with almost zero effort. All they had to do was look kewt. You can purchase the calendar through Amazon. Learn LOLcat-speak with this translator. (No purchase necessary for that.)

So…New York and the Romance Writers of America conference was nothing short of amazing. Thank you to the lovely people who showed up at our Ruby-Slippered Sisterhood workshop, The Road to Novel Completion. I hope you had as much fun as we did. For conference highlights, check out the RSS’s daily recaps:

• Arrival Day with Anne Barton (who not only WON a Golden Heart, but also landed book deal during conference!!!)
• Day 1 with me (who had a fashion faux pas involving blue cake icing)
• Day 2 with Hope Ramsay (fabulous Grand Central Publishing author who became a grandmother during conference)
• Day 3 with Sara Ramsey (who was also a GH nominee this year and is probably having a very cool time in Germany right now)

Post-conference, I celebrated Fourth of July in true American style with NY native Jen McAndrews and my Brazilian friend Gabriela Lessa. Fireworks and fine diner food. Perfect. I stayed in a beautiful boutique hotel on West 44th Street. I’m convinced it’s haunted, but then I do have a very fertile imagination. On my way downtown to Greenwich Village, I spent a shamefully long time shopping at discount chainstores Marshall’s and TJ Maxx. (Actually, I’m not that ashamed — I came home with some amazing bargains and one not-so-cheap Italian leather handbag, but a heavily discounted one nonetheless.) I spotted Aussie designer Wayne Cooper’s clothes on some of the racks.

I officially became addicted to Broadway. I saw four shows, forsaking meals in order to do so. Wicked - wonderful. (Thank you to Kim MacCarron for making that possible.) How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying – Daniel Radcliffe; joyous. Catch Me If You Can – Aaron Tveit as Frank Abagnale Jr — great voice, great costumes and set design. Memphis - I’ll be honest and say it was my least favourite show, but I *adored* the 50s dresses. The music was written by Bon Jovi’s David Bryan. The beginning of one song, to my ears, was slightly Bon Jovi-esque but otherwise faithful to the era.

A trip to the States would not be complete without some form of star-spotting. We bumped into Jim Parsons of Big Bang Theory fame as he exited the John Golden Theatre. My sister is gonna be sooooo jealous when I show her the video I took…of the back of Jim’s head. Earlier on my trip, my dear friend Tina Ferraro and I had a close encounter with Topher Grace in West Hollywood. He dined next to us at a chi-chi cafe on Sunset Strip wearing mirrored aviator glasses and a sunburnt face.

I left with a few regrets — not stopping for a sa