Life, the Universe, and Cons
Oct. 13th, 2009 10:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lydamorehouseI've been really absent lately, but this time I think I have a pretty good excuse. First, as you know, Bob, I've been frantically working to make deadline for Tate's young adult novel ALMOST TO DIE FOR. I'm happy to report that as of ten o'clock last night, I did (electronically. Now I have to send mss. via post.)
Also, Gaylaxicon was this weekend, and I was in attendance on both Saturday and Sunday. (I actually brought along my laptop and was working on the novel in between panels and, rudely, in the corner at Eric Heideman's party. But I wanted to be there and Shawn had said I'd better only come home when the novel was finished. :-)
Otherwise, I had a great time at Gaylaxicon. I have to admit I'd never been to one before. My big problem is that I often don't feel gay enough. I don't write about gay or queer issues, I just happen to be a lesbian who writes SF/F (and straight romance, talk about not feeling Q!) It's sort of like that feeling of "being a fraud" that some writers go through when they're held up as experts on panels when they've done only "x" (written short stories, published one novel, not broken out into best-seller-ness, or fill in insecurity here.) It's been a long running joke of mine that I don't "do" the professonal lesbian potluck scene because I'm really just a nerd that happens to be lesbian. I have way more in common with people who get wound up about Battlestar Galatica than I do with women who sleep with women on a semi-regular basis, you know? So I felt a bit out of my element.
I will say I was surprised (and impressed) by how much of a READER oriented (if you will) con this was. I only saw a couple of people in costume, and then, only briefly. There weren't a whole ton of media panels that I noticed (although our BSG panel rocked!), but most of the literary track was peopled with people who also intimidated me by the sheer volume of gay/queer SF/F they'd read.
On the flip side, I met some truly impressive people and am harboring a deep intellectual crush on a queer fellow-Wiccan I met there. And the con has inspired me on a number of levels. The first of which is a desire to check out the Spectrum Awards page for a reading list to take to my local library, and to pick up my pen and get queering the genre!
In mundane life, I've been not only frantically finishing Tate's novel (and the next proposal which I have to also turn in on the 15th, aka Thursday,) but we're getting ready to head off to Indiana to visit the relatives on Thursday as well. So I have to do the usual house cleaning and car mantainence bits on top of all this book-related excitement.
Whee.
We have an appointment with Mason's teacher when we get back from the break, which I think will go fine. I'll be curious to hear the general plan for his reading stuff (he's clearly enjoying his pull-out time with the second graders, he keeps pointing them out to me in the halls as I take him into to school in the mornings,) and figure out the whole library privledges thing.
I think that's all the news fit to print, though I feel like a lot more has been going on in my life. Perhaps you heard that it snowed here? I like it. Most Minnesotans are complaining about it, but it's pretty and I doubt it will last. We'll have a few more warm days before winter settles in, and Mason was so excited to see it he burst into Christmas songs and almost cried when I told him we couldn't check out the sleding hill until a little later.
Okay, I'm off to get new tires for the car and FedEx Tate's book.
Also, Gaylaxicon was this weekend, and I was in attendance on both Saturday and Sunday. (I actually brought along my laptop and was working on the novel in between panels and, rudely, in the corner at Eric Heideman's party. But I wanted to be there and Shawn had said I'd better only come home when the novel was finished. :-)
Otherwise, I had a great time at Gaylaxicon. I have to admit I'd never been to one before. My big problem is that I often don't feel gay enough. I don't write about gay or queer issues, I just happen to be a lesbian who writes SF/F (and straight romance, talk about not feeling Q!) It's sort of like that feeling of "being a fraud" that some writers go through when they're held up as experts on panels when they've done only "x" (written short stories, published one novel, not broken out into best-seller-ness, or fill in insecurity here.) It's been a long running joke of mine that I don't "do" the professonal lesbian potluck scene because I'm really just a nerd that happens to be lesbian. I have way more in common with people who get wound up about Battlestar Galatica than I do with women who sleep with women on a semi-regular basis, you know? So I felt a bit out of my element.
I will say I was surprised (and impressed) by how much of a READER oriented (if you will) con this was. I only saw a couple of people in costume, and then, only briefly. There weren't a whole ton of media panels that I noticed (although our BSG panel rocked!), but most of the literary track was peopled with people who also intimidated me by the sheer volume of gay/queer SF/F they'd read.
On the flip side, I met some truly impressive people and am harboring a deep intellectual crush on a queer fellow-Wiccan I met there. And the con has inspired me on a number of levels. The first of which is a desire to check out the Spectrum Awards page for a reading list to take to my local library, and to pick up my pen and get queering the genre!
In mundane life, I've been not only frantically finishing Tate's novel (and the next proposal which I have to also turn in on the 15th, aka Thursday,) but we're getting ready to head off to Indiana to visit the relatives on Thursday as well. So I have to do the usual house cleaning and car mantainence bits on top of all this book-related excitement.
Whee.
We have an appointment with Mason's teacher when we get back from the break, which I think will go fine. I'll be curious to hear the general plan for his reading stuff (he's clearly enjoying his pull-out time with the second graders, he keeps pointing them out to me in the halls as I take him into to school in the mornings,) and figure out the whole library privledges thing.
I think that's all the news fit to print, though I feel like a lot more has been going on in my life. Perhaps you heard that it snowed here? I like it. Most Minnesotans are complaining about it, but it's pretty and I doubt it will last. We'll have a few more warm days before winter settles in, and Mason was so excited to see it he burst into Christmas songs and almost cried when I told him we couldn't check out the sleding hill until a little later.
Okay, I'm off to get new tires for the car and FedEx Tate's book.
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no subject
Date: 2009-10-13 05:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-10-14 01:28 am (UTC)This claim can essentially be summarized as:
a) Science Fiction is primarily read by strapping manly men, because
b) strapping manly men like science, engineering and other "hard" subjects (Yuk, yuk, he said "hard"), so
c) they go to colleges, universities, etc. to study in those fields, having been inspired by science fiction, but
d) science fiction is now being corrupted by women and gays, so
e) men won't go into science and engineering anymore, and
f) live on Earth as we know it will suffer for its sins.
no subject
Date: 2009-10-14 05:36 am (UTC)Wish I could've gone to Gaylaxicon, if only to hang out with you and