It’s been ten days of such ups and downs that I don’t know whether I’m coming or going today.

I began on a desperate down, with Mungo, my elderly and diabetic Westie apparently very ill, and I went downstairs on the morning of the Friday before last convinced that the time had come to call the vet.  But he got out of his bed to greet me and wagged his tail, and was so much perkier on his walk that I decided to wait a little longer (up) 

He was better enough for me to leave him on the Saturday to drive over to the RNA’s conference in Penrith for the afternoon.  I was giving a workshop called ‘Nobody mention the F-word: How to invest your story with emotional tension’ and I’d been so preoccupied with Mungo that I hadn’t prepared it as well as I might have done but it seemed to go down well anyway (up).  (If you’re interested, Carol Townend has a condensed account of the workshop on her blog). 

The following evening was a bit excessive on the socialising front (up) but I didn’t get to bed until 2.30 am, and had a hangover to show for it all the next morning (down, you’d think I’d know better at my age).  I still wasn’t sure about Mungo, so took him to the vet, who couldn’t find anything obviously wrong (up) but I ended up with a massive bill anyway (down) and spent the next morning cycling backwards and forwards across York with a urine sample for the dog (down) as a result of which he’s on antibiotics for a possible infection (more expense, down) but is much better (definitely up)

No sooner did I get Mungo sorted than I developed horrible toothache (down, down, down) just in time for the RWA conference in Washington, D.C., where I was up for three awards and so had a vested interested in what was happening.  Fortunately, Donna Alward was there, and you can read all about it at the Pink Heart Society. 

Newlyweds of Convenience was shortlisted for a Booksellers’ Best Award, which was won by fellow HarlequinRomance author Myrna Mackenzie (up)  – congratulations, Myrna! – but by that time all I could think about was getting to the dentist for an emergency appointment. 

It turned out that I had a dying nerve (deeply symbolic, or what??) and I had to go back the next day for preliminary drilling and a paste to kill off the nerve before the joy of a root canal filling to look forward to (down).   That meant another sleepless night, popping endless painkillers, and I was in such a state that when I got a text from Washington to say that Last-Minute Proposal had won the National Readers’ Choice Award for the best traditional romance (up, obviously), all I could think was ‘oh, that’s nice, but ow, ow, my tooth …’ (down) Never have I been so keen to get to the dentist for an injection! 

I spent Friday morning gloriously numb (up), but once the anaesthetic wore off, the pain came back with a vengeance (down) and on Friday night I had taken so many painkillers I was reeling and reduced to stumbling downstairs at 3.00 in the morning to rifle through my drinks cupboard for a bottle of Christmas pudding brandy to try and numb the tooth.  This was a tip from Liz Fielding (thanks, Liz!) and after a few swigs in the dark, I have to say it did work and I got a couple of hours sleep (up). 

Saturday was still grim, though, and I think I may have an infection now as my throat underneath the jaw is puffy and swollen and I look like a demented chipmunk (down). As you can tell, I can’t think about anything else at the moment, and although I suspect a Rita win for Last-Minute Proposal would have been exciting enough to jolt me out of my self-pity, it wasn’t to be.  Instead, Karen Templeton won with A Mother’s Wish (Silhouette Special Edition) so congratulations to her - and I hope she was in a better state to enjoy her win! 

So I’m ending on a bit of a down, but there have been lots of ups too, most notably the NRCA award which I am determined to celebrate properly when I’m not being so inutterably boring about my root canal!  I’m back to the dentist this week, but have a week in Greece to look forward to at the beginning of August – I can’t wait! – so that’s an ‘up’ to end on, and fingers crossed normal service will be resumed by next time …