HE WROTE: Survived the St Martins Hit Women

Ok. Here's my take. We've had two escorts so far. Shannon and Kim. And I think they were both hit women from St. Martins corporate headquarters who were ready to take us out at a moment's notice. The first night we drove very far out on Long Island with Shannon who looked quite young but had that gleam in her eye that said she'd kill you in a heartbeat if that call from 'mother' came in saying 'do it'. I think she was just sitting there with a silenced gun in her lap and all that talk about 'checking flights' with 'mother' was just a euphemism. She was 'checking flights' even when we were in the book store. Then she was sitting in the back of the signing as we did our little show reporting on us.

And I can see all the bigwigs at SMP sitting around, sort of like, you know, Dr. Evil and his people, around the table, deciding whether it was cheaper to nip this little show in the bud, or let it continue. Actually it's more like in THE PLAYER where the industry people are all sitting around going "This business would run so much better if we could only ge rid of the writers." Sally Richardson, Jen Enderlin, Matthew Baldacci, John Karle, all of them, deciding our fates. Yep. Sure they like the Jen & Bob show, but we're artists. Maybe our tragic deaths could boost sales. But we made it through the first night. But unlike Sonny Corleone's driver we were not left with the gun on Long Island and made it back to the city with the canoli.

But then they sent Kim 'needles' Cardascia, well known for her ability to put one through the eyeball into the brain with one jab. She was watching me like a hawk. And boy did I screw up right from the start. "Bob, you missed signing one of those books," she said when were in a B&N in Union Square. "No, I didn't," I said. But I had. Later, I saw her whispering into one of those wrist transmitters like the Secret Service. I bet there were some heated discussions around the old SMP head honcho table then. Jen Enderlin was probably pleading for our lives. Then again, maybe not. Maybe she said: Ah, you can have 'em.

Of course I refused the chocolates Kim kept offering us, but Jenny who was clueless kept going "Chocolates, GREAT." I kept digging her in the ribs. "Poison," I was hissing. Jenny was going, "Huh?"

Sigh.

Where was I?

Anyway. Everyone was very, very nice to us. BTW, any stock signings we do today isn't Kim 'needles' fault. We volunteered. We're getting rental car at Avis on East 11th. I had to explain to Jenny we're on the west side of Manhattan and that East 11th is like, on the other side of the island. Directions she's not too good at but she bought a big atlas last night at the lovely B&N we did the signing at. I also have a small handheld GPS. We might make it to Mass. We also might end up in South Dakota. We stop at the Agency where I have to talk to Meg about Chasing the Ghost which Meg likes while Jenny sits in the doulbe-parked car, Bob chuckles evilly. Then we drive to the Bronx to look at the log cabin on the Bronx River where I was born. Then up Route 9 on the Hudson so Jenny can look at log cabins to perhaps move to, then shoot east toward Hartfort, then toward Worcester, then toward Natick. Then collapse.
Then stock signings and a signing tomorrow in Peabody where I am sure there will be another hard-case hit woman from St Martin lurking around talking to 'mother.'