the cat relaxes.

Hence, the dearth of blog entries last week.

My Music Man took our lovely munchkins camping with his parents last week, and I had a mother’s (and writer’s dream): the house entirely to myself for several days. Just me and the dog. We were bacheloretting it.

I had grandiose plans for accomplishing so very much while they were gone. (Heh heh heh.)

I’d write every day. I’d make myself lovely lunches, with a glass of wine if I wanted it. I’d take myself out to dinner at least once or twice. I’d work on my scrapbook. I’d read, read, read. I’d sleep in if I wanted to. I’d stay up late and watch chick flicks if I desired.

Well, I did a little of all of that…but not nearly enough of any of it. Where did the time go?

So now everything’s back to normal–and I’m glad for it. But I’m still wondering where that week went, and just exactly what I did during it.

The ‘Net’s buzzing with the news that the seventh and final (definitely final, according to J K Rowling) Harry Potter book will be released in summer 2007.

(She claims she is so sick of Harry Potter that she’d like to kill him. I can sort of understand that sentiment; after all, she’s been living in the head of a teenaged boy for over ten years!)

Even more specifically, rumor has it that the release date will be July 7, 2007–a fitting array of digits, if you ask me. It’s a Saturday, a day that all the other HP books have been released, and Rowling has always said that magic number is very important.

So we’ll see. The publisher has confirmed a 2007 release date, but not exactly when.

I’m just glad we have a target, because I made a decision not to read The Half-Blood Prince until the seventh book came. I wanted to read those two back to back.

Had the requisite Father’s Day get-together at our house yesterday–it was also Music Man’s birthday, so we did double duty. Had a great time, and ’cause I had such a great time, I wanted to share my new favorite summer drink.

Some of you may recall that last year at this time I did a post on making Designer Margaritas (which, if you haven’t tried, you really ought to)…but this year, I was looking for something new. So I found a few recipes for Peach Sangria, and tweaked them a little, and ended up with this lovely drink:

Colleen’s Peach Sangria

1 bottle dry white wine (I used Sauvignon Blanc)
1/3-1/2 cup peach-flavored vodka (Absolut Apeach was what I used; two of those little sample bottles is just about the right amount, if you don’t want to spend $20+ for the whole big bottle)
6 tablespoons of frozen lemonade concentrate (thawed)
1/4 cup sugar (Music Man thought the sangria was too sweet; I didn’t, so it’s up to you if you want to cut back on the sugar)
1 teaspoon (or to taste) of grated fresh gingerroot
sliced (not peeled) peaches
green and red grapes: halved

Mix it all together. Make sure you let it chill for at least two hours, preferably overnight. When you serve it, use a slotted spoon to make sure each glass has some of the fruit.

Yum.

You can now pre-order The Rest Falls Away through Amazon.com. I feel totally official now (even though the cover’s not up yet).

A week ago today, debut author Diana Peterfreund and I were trolling the streets of Soho, looking for body jewelry shops (you’ll have to read my books to fully understand why!), great restaurants, and chatting about our new books–the good, the bad, and the exciting about being new authors.

Highlights of the trip included:

• Seeing Diana’s new book in her hands–which will be released July 18
• Eating at a fabulous upscale diner called Schiller’s, recommended by Diana’s editor
• Learning how to pronounce the drink “cocotini” (it’s co-co-tini, as in a coconut martini…not cock-a-tini)
• Learning that drinking three cocotinis doesn’t leave one with a hangover, even if they’ve been preceded by three glasses of Pinot Grigio
• Having lunch with my editor, and dinner with my agent, and having my career and my books being the sole topics of conversation at both meals
• Having drinks in the Library Bar at the hotel we stayed at, and being joined by an old friend of mine from college (he’s a cryptologist who does stuff for the US government that he won’t tell me about)

Lowlights of the trip:

• Seeing Tarzan on Broadway (the only good part was Terk, who is a guy in this version, and Tarzan, and the fact that they showed off very nice bare chests during the whole production) (I’m a chest gal)
• Drizzle and rain and 50-degree weather on the second day, and nearly not making it to the theater in time for the show because of traffic
• My flight back from NYC being delayed for two hours, due to said weather problems

Weirdness of the trip:

• Being in a hotel right next to the Scientology building. It kind of creeped me out. I kept expecting to see Tom Cruise or John Travolta lurking about, looking for recruits they could snatch off the street and drag into their lair….