You know the drinks are good...

...when after you've had two of them, you can no longer feel your face. Such were the excellent Margaritas at Casa Rio, where we had dinner on the Riverwalk tonight. And check out this giganormous Mai Tai they brought Mrs. Toast:


This is not a trick of camera perspective folks, that glass is actually bigger than her head. But in her defense, she needed it after a hard day of pounding the show floor, picking up all the swag that's given away at librarian conventions such as tote bags, pens, various stuffed tschotkes, and of course books. Lots and lots of books. Most of these books are in the pre-publication stage, with big "proof copy" labels on the outside requesting anyone who finds spelling mistakes and/or errors of fact to please contact the author before it's released to the public and said author is embarrassed to death because they claimed in their book that Fidel Castro once played shortstop for the Washington Senators baseball team, or mention that thing with Richard Gere and the gerbil, or whatever.

It's also a fact that book-pushers are not shy about pandering to librarians at these events because they dearly want to get their writing into public collections. They will therefore come up with titles like this (honest):

Catalogue of Death! (A Miss Zukas mystery) by Jo Dereske. Jacket blurb: A diligent Dewey Decimilast, Miss Wilhelmina Zukas believes in doing everything by the book. But one night something sinister transpires outside her library window. While inspecting the site he's generously set aside for the town's new public library, local billionaire Franklin Harrington is mysteriously blown to bits! Since the surviving heirs are more inclined to build pricey condos on the designated land, Miss Zukas must defy her boss, library despot May Apple Moon, and delve into the Harrington's affairs, because a murderer may be hanging off the family tree!

Think they're counting on the fact that many of the convention attendees may be acquainted with a "library despot" or two of their own?

Anyway, we've had a great time but today wraps up our adventures and we'll be homeward bound in the morning. Hope y'all have enjoyed my travelogue; I'll have a bunch more pictures to post next week after I download them from the camera ... and my hangover wears off.