Arr, I'm wiped. It's Sunday morning at 10:30 am and I got to bet last night after 4 am. Am having a grand old time as a pirate this weekend, as you might guess. The whole ConFusion weekend is, as far as I'm concerned, one big bag of fabulous, splitting at the seams. On Friday I had lunch with my Tor editor, Jim Frenkel, and I took him to the Roma, my family's favorite Italian restaurant. He loved it and he's thrilled that I have a first draft of the contract book done already and he liked what I'm doing with it so that's all good.
Then, Friday night was opening ceremonies. When the Pirates were about to be introduced (by John Scalzi, who whores for ninjas) we cut the lights and stormed the room. I jumped up on stage with the 6' long blunderbuss Steve made and shot confetti over the crowd while my Captain and cohorts yelled and hooted and arr'ed the audience to within an inch of their lives. Aye, it was a mighty spectacle.
The only downside was that Steve had to work and missed the debut of his marvellous invention, but he did have many opportunities over the weekend to demonstrate it and it is consensus that he is the God-King of PVC and pressure valves.
At the dessert reception I got to catch up with some friends I haven't seen since Japan, Tom and Tom, and generally hang out and then things got rolling with the rum tasting and then we roamed as pirates will, and I wound up having pizza in the bar with my Doe Young, and GOHs Justine Larbalastier and Scott Westerfeld. By the time Steve and I got home and let the dogs out and got to bed, it was twenty to four.
But, no rest for the wicked. We got up (I got up, Steve was up earlier than me) at 9 am, to clean up and get breakfast at Larry's and then hit the con. I had the Women Pirates panel and Steve had the sports in F/SF panel, at 11 am. My panel went well although we all wished there was more reliable research about women pirates available. Steve was a little let down with his, but only because he was all ready to rant and rave about Quiddich, and everybody agreed with him that as a game it sucks.
Then we had the Rum, Sodomy, and the Slash panel. For which I was very excited. I'm very happy with the way it went. Turnout was modest but respectable, both panelists and audience engaged in a thoughtful conversation about why we like slash, why its important, how it's influencing the publishing world and where it might be going. My Top Ten Reasons Women Like Slash bit went over very well. Many thanks to all who participated, especially Erica Shippers, Liz Trumich, and Steve Ainsworth (who rigged himself out in a slashy pirate shirt just for the occasion -- Best Husband Ever).
In the afternoon I was on SF Isn't dead with Scott Westerfeld, Justine Larbalastier, Peter Halacz, and Jim Frenkel. It was good to hear others confirm much of what I've always thought about the whole SF is dead thing, but I"m too tired and incoherent to go into it now. Suffice to say, that SF is changing, yes. Dead, no.
Then I was done with all my panel duties for the weekend and free hang out in the bar with friends (which I did) until the Fan GOH induction ceremony, which was really, really nice. Very heartwarming and I want to thank all the previous Fan GOHs for making us feel so welcome among them.
Steve and I had dinner with fellow pirate Lisa and with Sarah Zettel, and then we took a nap prior to our evenings pillaging. I'll get to that later. I got to bed last night after four, and woke up around ten, took care of the dogs and had some breakfast and posted this, and now I'm going back to bed again.
Night.
"Steve was a little let down with his, but only because he was all ready to rant and rave about Quiddich, and everybody agreed with him that as a game it sucks."
My wife was worried that someone on the panel might say something nice about Quidditch and that my head would explode.
I know that, as a sportswriter, I'm hard to please when authors use sports in their stories, but JKR didn't even try.
Posted by: Dave H. | January 23, 2008 at 07:35 PM