Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Norwescon 2009 Pt. 2

I have to lead this in with the comment that by now my recollection of Norwescon is pretty hazy.  I'm in the throws of prepping to travel to a women's retreat and Ireland (squee!!) and that's where my focus has been.

Saturday morning I got up waaay too early for Cat Rambo's writer's breakfast, and I sat right in the middle so I could listen to multiple conversations if I wanted.  Great stuff.  Then at 10am I met with Sonia Lyris and had second breakfast with her.  We fired up Skype after a bit and my DH was able to attend breakfast as well.  Steve Barnes dropped by but he couldn't stay--he was waiting to meet someone else.  And Richard Threadgill also popped in.  So that turned into the three hour breakfast, not nearly as long as the five hour dinner Friday night, but just as fun.  Lunch was not necessary under the circumstances.  Richard nicely helped me pick out which story to read at the Broad Universe reading for later that night.  I ended up not reading Inner Skull, but my hard SF paranormal "Advances in Science."

I had my picture taken with Darth Vader and a couple of stormtroopers (sorry, it's not digital and I still don't have my scanbed working!) then crashed the Fairwood Writers social.  Not sure crashed is the right term since I'm pretty sure I was welcome, but I'm not a Fairwood Writer and I haven't been part of their workshop, so ... anyway, all the usual suspects were there, and it was fun to be an atypical suspect, since I'm not a regular at Seattle cons.  If they didn't travel to Portland, I might have been a curiosity, but I'm slightly too familiar to be that.  

I dashed off to lurk in the hall outside a panel so that I could catch up at last to Mary Rosenblum, and we went to the Green Room to talk.  I know pros have kids too, but you know, it was not relaxing to have kids running around screaming in there.  Not sure what the best thing to do in that situation would have been except to grin and bear it, so that's what I did.  I got to meet one of Mary's students from Longridge, which was cool, and we got to chat with a ballista maker (he had a ballista with him, btw) and talked about potato guns and fun things to launch.  I also met Steve Barnes again, and we talked about life and death and physicality.  One of these days I'm going to have to get over to Mary's for a drowning of sorrows, and get a chance to talk much longer to Steve about Stuff.

I went to grab something to eat and saw Cat Rambo and her husband.  I pounced and we got to talk about animals and stuff.  (hand waving something else I did that I can't remember) and then I went to Talebones Live!  If you can make it to one, please do.   At the end the sad announcement came--Ken Rand would no longer be with us, as he had requested the machines that sustained his life for so long be switched off.  (If you know Ken, he and his family have requested privacy at this time, so feel free to spread the word, but don't try to contact them.)  One of the first books I had recommended to me as a new writer was Ken's 10% solution.  I've recommended it countless times myself, and loaned out copies, and when the copies don't come back (as is sometimes the case) I just get a new one.  This chapbook is worth every writer's time.  Ken, many blessings upon you and yours.

Sobered, I went to the reading.  We had some folks turn up that were not Broads, and I think the stories were all great, but then again I was adrenalized.  Not as badly as the first time I read.  I practiced some breathing techniques, and imagined that I was teaching rather than reading.  How weird is that?  I'm much more comfortable showing people stuff they don't know how to do than reading something I wrote.  My brain can be very weird and poopyheaded sometimes.  After, some of us had some absenthe and navan.  I wanted to hit the Reno Worldcon party and the dance before the Radcon party, so our group temporarily split up.  This caused me to miss hanging out with Lizzy Shannon--drat!  Anyway, I must have been dehydrated or something.  I was at the dance all of fifteen minutes when I suddenly felt very ill.  I drank lots of water and went to the room for some quiet and fresh, cool air.  Some balcony time and quiet reading fixed me up famously.  

The others showed up, so we headed down to one of the best dances I've ever been to that didn't include my DH.  The fact that they mostly played retro didn't dampen things too much, though I would have preferred more techno.  Dan shouting that he was with the two hottest chicks at the con, and dancing with an amazing gentleman with a powdered face, elegant clothes and a crystal cane were highlights.  We closed it down and helped wind up the hundreds of feet of electrical and sound cords before calling it quits.

Sunday we said goodbye to folks and parted ways with Mary Hobson after reiterating that she was the most awesome roommate a gal could ever have.  C.S. and I had breakfast, and then we drove home.  I managed to make it to my mom's birthday party without falling asleep at the wheel coming or going, and thus concluded a stellar weekend.

More stellar journeys to come.  Stay tuned, but be warned--posts will be very sporadic.  


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