The sun is shining outside. I can hear the birds singing lovely birdsongs outside. Suddenly it hits me: The Red Room contest is over!

            And wow: I won second place. Second place, baby!  I know what I'm getting everyone for Christmas and birthdays.... Books, books, books! Wait, how does this make it different than any other holiday?

            I also want to congratulate Steven Ekstom and Lynn Liccardo; I've read your writing and I am so glad that we are members and boy, did we roar!

            It's over. It's truly over. Wow. It's become such a part of my life. I'll show you with a checklist:

            Wrote about fifty something blogs: check.

            Posted twenty stories, reviews, and poems: check.

            Adopted one beautiful cat: check.

            Dealt with one jealous cat: check.

            Darlene Arden gave me advice on how to deal with a biting kitten: check.

            Got warned by Television without Pity about plugging my blog-check.

            E-mailed friends and family to help me-check.

            Wondered if I should do a video of me throwing my hat in my air-didn't do this one.

            Read sixteen books-check.

            Started working on improving my grammar and suddenly I'm the grammarphobe girl-check.

            Got a shout out from Patrick Erwin in his blog-check.

            Saw Susan Browne read her poetry and we toasted Red Room-check.

            Have been mentioned in the We Love Soaps blog-check.

            What's left to do?

            Um, thank the people who helped you get this far, you dope.

            Okay, here we go:

            My mom, who had to live with a crazy woman for two months.

            My dad, who has never been on the Internet, yet asked me "And the Larry McMurtry blog got how many hits? This is good! Write about baseball! This will get people to your blog!"

           Marc Acito, Darlene Arden, Cecilla Baaeder, Laurel Benjamin, Matthew Bilberman, Allison Black, Martin Bradley, Susan Browne, Tom Casillo, Doris Collier, Christian Crouse, Mitch Cullin, Joseph Dobrian, Thomas Dotson, Patrick Erwin, Alex Fraser, Connie May Fowler,Bob Heist,  Khan,  Alix Jernic,  Jessica Barksdale Inclan, Kirsty Kiernan,  KM, Lilly-Marie Lamar, Lynn Liccardo,  Ericka Lutz, Ivory Madison,  Jennifer Schilling, Huntington Sharp, Dennis Shay, Iananthe Swensen,  Maryanne Stahl, Maria Trivisano, James Whyle, and Belle Yang; you have all encouraged me and helped me.

            The people at Soap Opera Network and Forever Young for letting me plug my blog.

            Roger at We Love Soaps and   Snark at Snark Weighs In also helped so much by giving soap fans a place to vent and look at good gossip, and they plugged my blog as well.

            Ariel Gore deserves cheesecake and champagne for her book How to be a Famous Writer Before You Die and how it got me started blogging and being a famous writer (at least on Red Room)

            The Lit Stars: Gindy, Debi,  Devon, Melissa, Noemi, Lisa, Jenny, Angela, Jeff, Caity, and Tanya, you all rule.

            My YA writing group: Kurt, Ralene, Julie, Tamara, Jay, Dawn; thank you for keeping the home fires burning.

            If I forgot someone, please remind me, because I'm a bit goofy right now.

            To the people I don't even know, but read my blog, this amazes me.

            All I can say is this: Thank you. I'm near tears right now because no matter the outcome, I am so lucky that I have made new friends and as S.E. Hinton once said nothing gold can stay, well my friends new and old are pretty golden right now, so I differ with her.

            Stay gold, RedRoom.  I'll see you all on Monday.