SHE WROTE: I Heart Columbia, South Carolina

Okay, Columbia, SC, was not on my list of top ten places I wanted to go, but it is now. I'm telling you, this place is a gem. First, they have an amazing airport. Beautiful, light-filled, clean, with rocking chairs in the waiting section. When you hit an airport parking garage and think, "This is really pretty," you've come to a good place.

The the SC Book Festival is organized down to the last detail, and the last detail is food. Lots of it. Great restaurants all around in a really pretty town, chocolate chip cookies in the hotel lounge, baskets of cheese and wine and chocolate in my room along with a wonderful squooshy chenille Moot with an sequined eye patch and big red lips and THANK YOU DEBBY JOHNSON because I'm loving this gator. Moot also has a necklace of cherries and a pink feather boa. Debby is a diva of alligator design, that's all there is to it.

But before we got to the hotel and found Moot, Bob and I gave our Yex & Violence talk. We used to have 56 slides, so Bob said after we did it the last time, "We have to cut it." And he was right because we were spending so much time reading slides we weren't interacting with the classes. So I said I'd make it shorter.

So I land in Columbia and get to the waiting area and there's Bob, typing on a couch, and we go to eat at a really good restaurant and over coconut shrimp he says, "So did you cut the talk?" "Yep." "How many slides is it now?" "Don't know." So I bring it up on the laptop screen--yes, over coconut shrimp, you didn't think we'd eat without working, did you?--and count them.

"Fifteen."

Bob chokes on a coconut shrimp.

But he'd done this great intro slide set that I made prettier (he does content, I do design) and then we ran through the slides and decided to give it a shot. And it came out pretty close to fifty minutes, which is good. We've got some kinks to work out of it, but it's good.

Then we got to the hotel and they had fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies, a jacuzzi tub in the bathroom, separate shampoo and conditioner (Go Hampton Inn), and Moot in a pink feather boa.

So now Bob's out running and I'm sitting here with my chenille Moot, typing and eating the cheese tray and plotting how to get Bob to hold Moot so I can get a picture to post here. Maybe tonight when we're working. I'll get him drunk, and when he passes out, I'll put Moot in his arms. We were supposed to go to this fancy dinner , but ties are required, so needless to say, we will not be there since Bob doesn't own a tie and I get itchy in the kind of place where you need one. Also, I could use some coconut shrimp without a side of laptop so I'm hoping we go back to the place where we had lunch.

So to recap, the South Carolina Book Festival knows how to treat its presenters, Debby Johnson is a stuffed gator genius, the Hampton Inn is terrific, and the Columbia airport is to die for. Also the coconut shrimp should not be missed.