Tag: viable paradise friends

Writing Peeps and What You Learn from Them: The Genie Memories Edition

Then, there was the mother of all headaches. It kept Catherine home from work, it kept Catherine off the computer. At 2 o’clock, she stumbled into town, her husband driving, to pick up AV equipment for the convention tomorrow. She got on line tonight, and worked some, because it was a costly day she took off work, so she needed to make some of that up. She’s rachetted the headache back up some. Goodie…

While the headache was mostly under control, she took a look at Matt Hughes‘ revamped Genie Memories. AND she was very impressed.

I find it fascinating to look at other people’s writing. I find that I learn a lot.

Continue reading “Writing Peeps and What You Learn from Them: The Genie Memories Edition”

Rethinking that Con Thing

Courtesy of Julia Rios, you too can use your phone to do amazing things.

a photo taken of the VP XIII reunion at Readercon.

*blinks*

It’s been 3 days since I started this post. I had a faboo weekend with my family of choice, but yeah, my extrovert battery got hit pretty hard, so I’m only just getting back into the swing of extrovert things.

And work today…well, after a week’s vacation, I really couldn’t expect any better than 31 phone messages and 147 emails. Because that’s just the way the English department rolls.

So…anyway, let’s get back to the subject at hand, which is rethinking that Con thing.

Readercon was fun. It was a con. I saw some friends and enjoyed seeing others from afar. I attended valuable panels, and I burned out and skipped panels I hoped to see. It was a pretty typical con experience for me–highs, low, and the impossibility of doing it all, but enjoying most of what I did.

Except there was something unusual that has never happened to me at a convention before.

And if you don’t want to read on, I’ll cut this here. But if you do, especially as regards writer’s retreats and VP XIII-ness, you may want to click.

Continue reading “Rethinking that Con Thing”

Midnight, and the Writers are Sleepy

I am destined to not make it out of Boston cleanly. United had us at the gate on the plane for a while as we had generator issues. We did leave, and I figured I’d missed my flight. Poor Chicago weather delayed my connection, so I made it on! I arrived in Cedar Rapids about midnight, Bryon came and picked me up, and we hit the hay at 1:30.

It’s been a low key day, but luckily I’m on vacation.

***

The Clarion Write-a-thon continues apace. This is the week of chapter 7, and I got a good jump on that yesterday. More about this to come.

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In transit, I also read books: The Last Chevalier, Red Hood’s Revenge, A College of Magics, and Extras. I’ll have something to say about all of those eventually.

***

It was fantastic to see about 1/4 of my VP workshop buddies over the weekend. We hung out, a lot. Perhaps the most interesting facet of the convention was that hanging out seemed to inspire creativity in us all. We would talk, do a few panels, and wander away to our rooms to sleep or write. And then we’d get together and talk about what we were doing. It makes me think that maybe what we want to do is save our pennies for reuniting at writer’s retreats, rather than hooking up at cons, but you guessed it, more on that later too.

Shout outs also to Sarah Prineas, who wasn’t there but said hello, Eugene Myer, who one can have an action-packed hall conversation with, and Elizabeth Bear for the 4th Street information. Our reading went very well, and hanging out with alumns and meeting more VP folks and nice writing people was just good.

I won’t be going to Readercon next year, as I’m already booked for North American Discworld in Madison the same weekend. While I liked Readercon fine, it’s not going to be one that is a must go for me. I missed my Wiscon with its open parties and it’s less hierarchical structure, and its feminist vibe. It was a little bit like going to Disney World first, and then going to Disneyland–I should have done it the other way around.

Priority one is writing the novel this week, but I’ll try to get back her and say something interesting and relevant. Right now, I’m thinking more dozing.

Catherine

Reunions

I’m at work for a couple of hours this morning, trying to get a few things out of the way before I’m out of the office UNTIL THE 19TH OF JULY!!! Yeah, baybee!

A-hem. This is the time of year that two very important reunions are on my radar screen.

1. Readercon. It’s my first reader con, but I’m going to see, lessee, Miranda, Kat, George, Julia, and Lisa. There will be SIX VP XIII’ers there. That’s damned close to a quorum. There will be MUCH cavorting, I assure you.

Add to the mix several author friends, a chance to meet more VP alums, the VP reading on Sunday, some of the Codex Writers, and a programming schedule that looks really relevant. Also, I get to see one of my oldest costuming friends and my best friend from school in Japan on Thursday night.

The only thing that will be lacking is the husband.

2. Cath’s Family Reunion. I am concerned about our park being flooded, given the constant rain, but we’ll be watching that carefully. If all else fails, it’ll be at our home.

About 40 “relatives” will join us Saturday, July 17th, in a celebration of all things that a family should be. All of these wonderful people, and I get to spend an afternoon feeding them and hanging out.

Everyone should look this forward to their reunions.

So. Tomorrow I may not get here. I have packing, and some advanced writing to do. If I don’t, I will happily see you on the other side, with some Readercon reporting.

Catherine