I got onto the plane. I picked up some newspapers, got comfortable, read several pages of a newspaper before it slipped from my fingers onto the floor. The dreams went on for millions of years and I remember only the ones about black cats slipping into television screens, and then I woke up and stretched, groggily, momentarily waking up the man in the seat next to me, and I checked my watch. I'd been asleep for well over four hours and the meal service had come and gone.
I wasn't hungry, but the first rule of BookTour is probably Eat If You Can. Because you never know when there won't be food and you'll be on the road, so I ate what they had, which was a sad salad and a cheese plate and some melted ice cream. (Rule two of BookTour is probably And Grab the Hotel Bedtime Pillow Chocolates you don't want, and drop them in your computer bag, because one day it'll be 4.00am somewhere there isn't any food, and you'll remember you have hotel chocolates somewhere, and it's better than nothing.)
And then I wrote. The middle of 1602 part 7 seems to have gotten over its hesitations (I tend to stop a bit before killing a major character, trying to see if there's any way out. I don't do it with relish until I have to) and I answered all of the questions from journalists that have come in this week, except for the Slashdot.org interview ones, which I feel some sort of obligation to write a longer reply to...
Did I mention that I flew from Miami (very early in the morning) to Minneapolis, was driven to DreamHaven Books where I signed several hundred copies of ENDLESS NIGHTS and WOLVES IN THE WALLS before going back to the airport via the Mall of America to pick up a speaker for the iPod, and going away again? No? Well, that was the morning, before I got on the plane and fell asleep.
...
Now in Amsterdam Schiphol... leave for Helsinki in 80 minutes. Then on to Sweden, Norway, Croatia and Germany.