Day in the Life of an Idiot

 I am taking a break from reading manuscripts. I missed the official "What are You Reading?" day, but I wouldn't have had much to report at any rate.

Can I tell you how frustrating it is to finally have the ability to read back and STILL NOT be able to?? Like, I bought myself three books from the Philip K. Dick award nominations list and I was really, really looking forward to settling in and reading them. 

The problem is that I have time to read again? But when I do, I think: "I should be doing the reading that makes me money," and so that's what I do. In between the stuff for hire and the stuff for class, I am reading and critiquing the work of my colleagues in my various writers'. I mean, I love it? But I'm also looking forward to having less of it. If only so I can read a BOOK.

I am still watching shows while doing the dishes. I finally remembered to start in on the second season of "Midnight Diner: Tokyo stories."  So, it's not all critique all the time.

I also recorded a reading for MarsCON 2021, which is coming up in March. http://marscon.org/2021/  I'm also on at least one panel discussion about the various Apocalypse crafts we've all be up to, so that should be fun.

Shawn and I are continuing the Domestika course on doodling, though neither of us is convinced that we're learning much.

Did I tell you guys about this? So, Facebook decided to target Shawn with ads for art classes. I suspect she hit some algorithm or other because she buys a lot of fun pens and such for her bullet journaling.  So, she sees this thing pop up where Mattias Adolfsson is going to teach us to make fun doodles. His art is very cool. So, she decides (since they offered a special deal, the whole course for $11.00!,) she's going to sign us up. So far? He's had us drawing... pens.


Image: pen and ink drawing of pens... and an ominous as f*ck fork.


I ended up drawing a whole page of forks and their shadows, because I found the shadows (and my strange inability to draw a fork that wasn't CREEPY AF, to be kind of entertaining,) but I was looking forward to the next go round.

I mean, as I told another artist friend I was Zooming with the other day, I feel pretty confident in my ability to draw OK when I have what I want to draw in front of me. That's pretty much been the pinnacle of my abilities.I'm NOT AT ALL confident in my ability to draw from memory or, gods forbid, actually make something up. I worked on that a bit when I was teaching smols how to do cartooning (a sordid part of my history--I was wholly unqualified for a job I had for DECADES, but, honestly, when kids are 6 -10 years old you don't really have to teach drawing so much as PROVIDE PAPER AND MATERIALS. So, that's what I did.) And, as you can see above, the work I can do will absolutely impress a six year old. I did not fare as well when I tried to teach adults via Open U. However, I was (and still am) hoping that maybe this class will help push me up another level as an artist.

At any rate, we've been through a half-dozen of the video lectures so far, and we are STILL drawing pens. Last night's course? Draw pens from your imagination:


Image: more pen and ink drawings of... pens--only these are imaginary pens.

So, I don't know.  I mean, I'm enjoying the fact that having paid for the course (even if it's only 11 bucks) that I have some kind of obligation to sit down and try to draw every so often. I've been trying to draw every day, but it's more like every other. 

Forks will forever be my bane, however.


Image: pen and ink drawings of forks and their apparently terrifying shadows.



So, I guess when my grandchildren sit at my knee and say, "Grandma, what did you do during the pandemic?" I'm going to nod sagely and say, "Forks, my child. Nothing but forks."

I had a fair number of panels this weekend, many of which went very well, but a lot of my con was plagued by me NOT KNOWING WHEN THE LIVING HELL TO SHOW UP.

For instance, Friday--for some reason I got it into my head that my first panel ("Roundtable Discussion: What are You Reading?") was at 7 pm. I got dressed and headed out around 6:30 pm. I got there with 5 minutes to spare and started freaking out because I could not find a space anywhere in the hotel parking lot. I happened to see my fellow panelist, Bryan Thao Worra, walking up the sidewalk and so I shouted to him and asked him about overflow parking. I might even have said something like, "Well, I'll see you fifteen minutes. If not, you'll know I'm still hunting up parking!" I'm surprised he didn't look at me and say, "What are you talking about?"

Because our panel didn't start until 9 pm.

Bryan said that he'd heard that it was okay to park in the lot for the Wildlife Refuge Center, so I did, despite actual posted signs that said, "NO HILTON PARKING." I decided to risk it (spoiler: I was fine) and I dashed in, figuring I'd quick stop and register, because if I was late my fellow panelist at least knew I'd be on my way shortly. I'm glad I did, because in my manilla program participant packet was my schedule. WHICH CLEARLY SAID THAT MY FIRST PANEL WAS AT 9 PM.

Suddenly, I had almost two hours to kill.

MarsCON, I have decided, is a weird con. Don't get me wrong, I like it. I go every year. I kind of consider it the opener for the con season. But, given the situation with the parking lot, you'd figure I'd have no problem finding someone with which to pass the two hours hanging out. Nope. I don't know if it's the way the hotel is laid out, or the fact that I don't do much with the extremely popular musical track, or that the party floor is nine stories removed from the paneling area, or everyone else is invited to secret parties to which I did not get the memo/invite, or what, but I would NOT have guessed that this con apparently attracted between 900-1,000 people. I would have thought it was half that. The halls seemed empty.

This is also not necessarily a down side. I mean, it's nice to have a con that is not as overwhelmingly crowed as say, CONvergence. BUT, one thing that I told Minicon when preparing for my Guest of Honor gig there this year (in a matter of weeks!!), it's actually almost better to overbook me as a panelist than to leave me with huge swaths of time with nothing to do. As an extrovert, I really do feed off the high energy of a con. If I'm sitting and staring at the wall wishing I had a book, I crash. It's a lot harder for me to ramp back up to my "performance level."

So, I can't say that, by the time I actually sat down next to Bryan in the "Eagle's Nest" conference room, I was super peppy.

I did, at least, think ahead and prepared a list of stuff I'd been reading over the past few years. Bryan recommended a number of poetry books--like, full length books. Later, when i saw Bryan again, I thought to ask him a question that I should have at our panel, which is, is there a proper way to read a book of poetry? Are you supposed to just start on page one and power through? I've never done that with the few books of poetry that I own (granted at least half of them are Shel Silverstein). Mostly, I randomly pick poems and read them. There are Marge Piercy poetry volumes I own where I'm sure there are still dozens and dozens of poems unread, because I just never hit that page when I was leafing through. Bryan confirmed that that's totally how it's done, so I guess I haven't been missing some key to appreciating poetry all these years.

Because I'm a weird combination of extrovert and morning lark (opposite of you night owls), I went home directly after my panel.... oh, right, there was another reason I did that, too. I texted home at one point to let people know I'd arrived too early and wouldn't be coming home until after 10 pm, and I got a text reply informing me that our problem kitty, Inky, had peed all over the basement floor. Everyone was apparently very upset about this because Mason didn't see the mess until he plopped our brand-new beanbag chair right into the center of it. There was worry that it was completely ruined FOREVER. Problem kitty is also usually my responsibility, so everyone was mad at me for not being around to do the clean-up on aisle 5. (Before you assume the worst from my family, my responsibilities include one that I fail all the time. I'm supposed to pill our cat, because he has fewer accidents when he's consistently on his Prozac. My family rightly surmised that if he was peeing inappropriately, it was because I had forgotten to pill him. When he pees inappropriately when I'm the one who forgot to make sure he got his daily pill, it stands to reason I should be the one to deal with the fall out, as it were.) So, I rushed home to change kitty litter and to wrestle a pill into Inky.

In the back and forth with the kitty trauma, I ran out of minutes on my phone and so I also had to problem solve THAT on the fly at the hotel (it involved finding the business center and logging into TracFone)... it was, shall we say, an inauspicious beginning to my con. My only consolation (?) was that Bryan had had to deal with a puking puppy all day, too. (I don't know that that actually made me feel BETTER, per se, but at least my misery had company, as it were.)

So, that was Friday.

Saturday... let's see, I started my day off with probably the highest energy panel of the con for me, "Marvel Cinematic Universe." We talked a lot about "Black Panther," of course. We had two PoCs on the panel--Rob Callahan and a young woman named Kianna--so we were at least spared the awkward that is a bunch of white fans yammering on. Kianna had an interesting take on Killmonger (whom, it seems, is often misread by white people) and Rob talked a lot about the Indigenous response to the movie. That was probably the best panel of the con, for me.

Oh, but I forgot that my Saturday morning actually started way before that panel, when I was at home frantically making a powerpoint presentation because I realized when I got my schedule the night before, I was still the ONLY person on the "Manhwa/Manhua Explosion," and I thought, that as hard as it was going for me to fill an hour all by myself, I thought it would be even worse if I couldn't show visual representations of what I was talking about. I want everyone reading this to know one thing. I HAVE LEGITIMATELY NEVER MADE A POWERPOINT PRESENTATION BEFORE IN MY LIFE. Yet, the program is simple enough that I managed to cobble together ten or so slides before I left for the con.

I did, however, spend some of the downtime between the MCU panel (at 11 pm) and my solo presentation (3 pm) making more slides and genuinely TRYING to prepare... Even though I had no idea whether or not the room would actually have AV equipment that I could use. (Spoiler: it did. MIRACULOUSLY.)

So, I can't say that the "Manhwa/Manhua" panel was an unmitigated disaster, because I did attempt to mitigate it, but... I mean, there's a reason I prefer panel discussions. When there's at least one other person there, you have a CHANCE at a dialogue. I did tell my audience that I was not an expert, and that I had, in fact, proposed the panel because I wanted someone ELSE to tell me more about it....the other thing I warned them is that I could only talk about what *I* was reading and, frankly, what I read is SMUT. (Did I mention they put this in the "teen" track!?) But, the audience was sympathetic and somehow we limped through it.

My last panel was at 7pm and it was called "Writing Humorous Science Fiction and Fantasy." I... might not have been in the best head space for that particular panel. For one, I had had to kill a lot of downtime. Much of which was taken up by the other problem with the MarsCON hotel, which is they are in a virtual food desert. The Mall of America is within spitting range, but to go there, one has to be willing to leave their parking spot (or, I suppose, have enough time to hop the light rail.) There is a hotel restaurant, but the restaurant seems to always been chronically understaffed (I swear the SAME surly waiter who served everyone last year, served us again this year.) The hotel also has a kind of convenience store, but it's stocked with the sort of convenience store food that we have in this part of the country.... sandwiches wrapped in plastic that are fresh, but which have clearly sat around long enough for the various condiments to have made the white bread soggy and gross, you know? The con suite serves food, but it can not feed a multitude before having only pumpernickel as a bread option in the PBJ room.

I'd had lunch with Naomi, her family, Rob Callahan and his friend Jei. We braved the restaurant and heard a lot of cool stories about Jay's students (they teach at a Native charter school). I'd kind of blown my con budget on that --not that I really had one, but the food at that restaurant is not varied enough--or cheap enough--to warrant a lot of return visits, so I ended up eating a couple of hotdogs in the con suite. I will say? That hungry, those hot dogs tasted AMAZING.

Anyway, I found myself feeling a little... professional jealousy towards MaryJanice Davidson, who was on the humor panel with me. MaryJanice Davidson was someone who was hot when I first started publishing paranormal romances as Tate, and sitting on that panel with her gave me a stab of the classic green-eyes "why is SHE still publishing, when I'm not." That kind of threw off my game. Luckily, the panel was totally ruled by Ivery Kirk (Melissa Buren) who co-wrote a book with possibly the single greatest title for an erotica ever: TIMEBANGERS:One Does Not Simply Walk Into Tudor.

I ran into a friend, Jason, after the panel and I told him that what was especially weird about my reaction to MaryJanice Davidson was that it caused me to attempt to talk seriously about the topic of humor in SF/F.  Jason looked aghast and was like, "What? You?  I would have wondered where my Lyda was and demanded a refund!"  And, yeah, see, this is my con persona... and, of course, the one of the dangers of running into someone you long considered a rival (I was told I couldn't use DROP-DEAD GORGEOUS for a book title of mine, because MaryJanice Davidson was putting out a book that same year with the same title.) I think I was thrown too because sometimes you set up in your mind this kind of rivalry and the other person LITERALLY has no idea who you are. (Davidson totally give me a blank look when i said i wrote paranormal romance as Tate Hallaway).  

Anyway, so that one was kind of a bust, despite how cute and hilarious Kirk/Buren was.

Today was another WAIT, WHEN AM I SUPPOSED TO BE THERE days. Shawn told me that my first panel was at 1 pm today, and, since she'd been right about the 9 pm one on Friday, I believed her.  So, I'm sitting in my chair, cat on my lap, thinking about having a nice, relaxing morning when I decide to look at my printed schedule. Oh no! According to my sheet, I'm actually supposed to have an 11 am panel. I quick throw things together and rush out the door.  I get there, miraculously find parking in the lot, jump onto an opening elevator and arrive at Krushenko's at 11 am SHARP. Only, Eric tells me that the schedule has been changed. My 11 am panel was moved to... 2pm. 

Now, I could have stayed, but I'd already run out once to get Starbuck's so I thought, no, I'm going to go home, go grocery shopping, have a decent lunch and come back for my 1 pm panel.  That actually worked out really nicely. By chance, I even arrived at my house in time to introduce myself and Shawn to neighbors who are moving in across the street from us. I had a nice sandwich at home and headed back. Two panels in a row, in the same room, on similar topics.  The first was "Androids, AI, and Gender Theory" and the second was "Artificial People in Science Fiction."  My favorite fellow panelist (besides Naomi, of course,) was Justin Grays, who was on both.  Post panel, I instantly cyberstalked him and became FB friends, etc., like you do in this, the era of social media.

So, that was my con in a nutshell.  I think the only awfulness of the con was the audience member in the Gender Theory panel who wanted to insist on an old-fashioned and outdated (and now considered offensive) term for intersex people.  But, the panel dealt with the person quite gently, IMHO, but there are always some people who take the changing terminology as some kind of personal affront, it seems.  I mean, "Oops, my mistake, [use correct term offered]" is the easiest response. It's also okay to say, "I didn't know it had changed," once, but then go away and Google, for crying out loud. The panel is there to educate to some degree, but the topic was not changing terminology, so... time was wasted on that.

There were a few other awkward moments in the two Sunday panels, but, I think, for the most part, people were unintentionally awkward, instead of malicious... which I guess makes it a little better? I hope so, anyway. (For broad context, let's just say things get weird when white people try to explain away reasons for slavery.... even in the out of historical context and about why we might have clones.)

I dashed home after that, too, because WEATHER is supposed to be on its way.  In fact, Saint Paul schools just closed in anticipation of another afternoon storm tomorrow. (I imagine the superintendent does not want to deal with another situation like last time.) I think it's the right call, but if it ends up raining all day tomorrow and not snowing, people will no doubt say he was too hasty. Honestly, the poor guy can't win. I think it was smart to err on the side of caution this time, however.

Right, that's me to bed.  Hope you guys all had a good weekend.

Before I get to my reading list, I need to post this, as it is coming up THIS weekend: March 2 - 4.

Roundtable Discussion: What are You Reading?
3 Eagle's Nest - Re(a)d Mars — Friday 09:00 pm
Readers talk about written words—especially, though not exclusively, speculative fiction—that they're enjoying and that they think you might enjoy, too. Print and electronic works are both welcome.
With: Lyda Morehouse, Bryan Thao Worra, and You, Gentle Reader!


Marvel Cinematic Universe
Room 1117 - Krushenko's — Saturday 11:00 am
Catch up on all Marvel films and TV shows.
With: Tony Artym, mod.; Rob Callahan, Aaron Grono, Lyda Morehouse, Kiana Williams

The Manhwa / Manhua Explosion
4 Hawk's Ridge - Anime/YA — Saturday 03:00 pm
Manga is so yesterday. All the cool kids are now reading manhwa and manhua, manga's Korean and Chinese cousins (respectively.) This panel will introduce people to some of the fun new titles out there and where to get them.
With: Lyda Morehouse, mod.

Writing Humorous Science Fiction/Fantasy
Room 1117 - Krushenko's — Saturday 07:00 pm
On the pitfalls and pleasures of combining these two distinctive writing forms.
With: MaryJanice Davidson, Roy C. Booth, mod.; Melissa Buren, Naomi Kritzer, Lyda Morehouse, S.N. Arly



Androids, AI, And Gender Theory
3 Eagle's Nest - Re(a)d Mars — Sunday 01:00 pm
Androids & AI in sci-fi disrupt the idea of a gender binary and play with gender fluidity in a way that implies gender is not essential or passive but a construct in which one must actively participate. How do these narratives translate to other contexts.
With: Michelle Chmura, mod.; Justin Grays, Naomi Kritzer, Lyda Morehouse

Artificial People in Science Fiction
3 Eagle's Nest - Re(a)d Mars — Sunday 02:00 pm
This is about biological people, enhanced or otherwise, who are not conceived and gestated in the normal way. From "Frankenstein" through "Rossman's Universal Robots," "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep" and "Friday" this has been the topic of many classic, and not so classic, science fiction stories. Why are authors drawn to this idea? Is there any real word reason for artificial people?
With: G. David Nordley, mod.; Justin Grays, Naomi Kritzer, Lyda Morehouse, Kathryn Sullivan


---
Important information re: Marscon:

THIS WEEKEND: March 2 -4, 2018

MaryJanice Davidson will be a guest! The hotel will be: Hilton Minneapolis/St. Paul Airport Mall of America3800 American Blvd E., Bloomington, Minnesota

For more information: https://marscon.org/2018/index.php

Thanks to an unnamed pharmacist at Walgreen's, there is, shall we say, 'movement' in Shawn's recovery.

Last night, we were in desperate straights and Shawn said, "This isn't working; there's got to be some other medicine. Something gentle, but actually effective!" Her father was a small town pharmacist on the Iron Range, back in the corner drugstore days, when you could lean in over the counter and whisper symptoms to a sympathetic ear and get straight-forward advice. So, she sent me to Walgreen's to "talk to a pharmacist."

I really thought that in order to accomplish what she wanted, I'd need a time machine.

But, I must have hit the sweet spot in terms of timing, or, if I were a believer in such things, Pat Rounds looked down upon his daughter's plight and sent me his earthly avatar. It was quiet enough at the store that I didn't even have to wait long for the pharmacist's attention. He actually walked me over to the aisle and pointed out all the important things, taking the time to explain which did what. OH, he said, thoughtfully, you see, what you've been using only really did "x," what you need is "x *and* y." And, he said, if that won't work and she can stand some pressure on her stomach, take a bottle of "z."

We've not even had to resort to "z."

Shawn is still in some wretched pain, but I think, honestly, she'd been losing hope. Faith in recovery is now restored. I suspect that's going to be the real miracle worker.

Let's hope she's going to be well enough to be on her own this weekend, because I'd almost forgotten that it's MarsCON 2015. I hunted and pecked through the on-line programming list and I think I found everything I'm scheduled to be on:

How Come Nobody’s Heard Of Me, Dammit!!
Room 419 (Krushenko’s) -- Friday 04:00 pm
Let’s figure out all the things we did wrong!
With: Lyda Morehouse, Naomi Kritzer, mod.; Rachel Gold, Michael Merriam


Fiction Reading: Lyda Morehouse
III Eagle’s Nest (Re(a)d Mars) —Friday 08:00 pm
Come hear our Author Guest of Honor read her work.
With: Lyda Morehouse

FanFiction - Who, What, and Huh?
IV Hawk’s Ridge (Anime/YA) — Friday 09:00 pm
From the basics for the beginners to your favorite websites to share your own stories.
With: Lyda Morehouse, Rakhi Rajpal mod, Bailey Humphries-Graff, Susan Woehrle

Marvel Phase 2, on to Phase 3
Room 419 (Krushenko’s) — Saturday 12:00 pm
Catch up on all of Marvel films from phase 2: Iron Man 3, Thor: The Dark World, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Guardians of the Galaxy, The Amazing Spider-Man 2, and X-man Days of Future Past. Marvel One-Shots: Agent Carter, All Hail the King, on TV with Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and Agent Carter. (There will be spoilers for all listed above.) The end of phase 2 with Avengers: Age of Ultron and the start of phase 3: Ant-Man, Captain America 3, Doctor Strange, and the rest of phase 3.

With: Lyda Morehouse, Tony Artym, mod.; Aaron Grono, Bill Rod, Ruth Tjornhom

The Rise of Women Superheroes
Room 419 (Krushenko’s) — Saturday 01:00 pm
Let’s talk about some awesome female superheroes who have become breakout sensations in recent years! Why do we love them so much, and how can we get more?
With: Lyda Morehouse, Christopher Jones, mod.; Cynthia Booth, Catherine Lundoff, Chandra Reyer

What is Anime?
IV Hawk’s Ridge (Anime/YA) — Saturday 02:00 pm
What really is Anime? What’s the real difference between Anime and cartoons, and why do we classify them like that? Hear all the facts and argue it out yourself!
With: Lyda Morehouse, Bailey Humphries-Graff, Hojo Moriarty

Lyda Morehouse Interview
Room 419 (Krushenko’s) — Saturday 04:00 pm
Learn about the mind and works of our Author Guest of Honor.
With: Lyda Morehouse, Naomi Kritzer, Interviewer

Mass Autographing
Room 419 (Krushenko’s) — Saturday 05:00 pm
The Author Guest of Honor and other interested authors sign their work.
With: Lyda Morehouse, Sammi Kat, Rachel Gold, Michael Merriam, Kathryn Sullivan, et al.

The Wyrdsmiths: Twenty Years
III Eagle’s Nest (Re(a)d Mars) — Saturday 08:00 pm
GoH Lyda Morehouse is in a writers’ group that was founded in 1994. How does a critique group sustain itself for two decades?
With: Lyda Morehouse, Naomi Kritzer, mod.; Eleanor Arnason

Hero Support: Sidekicks and Minions
III Eagle’s Nest (Re(a)d Mars) — Saturday 09:00 pm
How does your hero go about getting a really good sidekick or a really good minion? Who are some of your favorites in literature and other kinds of storytelling? Who is the hero of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings?
With: Lyda Morehouse, Rick Gellman, mod.; P M F Johnson, Ozgur K. Sahin, Tyler Tork

Otaku Dilemma: Wait for Season Two or Read the Manga?
III Eagle’s Nest (Re(a)d Mars) — Sunday 11:00 am
Your friends just turned you on to a hot new anime (think: “Attack on Titan” or “Yowapeda”) and you burned through the first season in one sitting. Now you’re wondering that age old question, should you jump in and read the manga or sit back and wait for season two to air? What are the pros and cons to reading “ahead”? Is there a reason that waiting is better, is there a reason NOT to wait?
With: Lyda Morehouse, mod

No Country for Old Heroes / Happily Ever After
Room 419 (Krushenko’s) — Sunday 12:00 pm
Topic one, No country for old heroes…. Life after heroism. How do former heroes—real or imaginary—continue to have meaningful lives? Topic two, Happily Ever After. Consider act two of Sondheim’s Into the Woods. Many if not most stories end at the moment of maximum joy for their characters. But life is more complicated. How do two people—real or imaginary—go about staying reasonably happy together for a long time? What are some good examples of this in fantasy literature?
With: Lyda Morehouse, Rick Gellman, mod.; Rachel Gold, Ozgur K. Sahin

Convoluted Quests: The Modern Writing Career
III Eagle’s Nest (Re(a)d Mars) — Sunday 03:00 pm
Book contracts, self-publishing, short fiction, editing… writing careers these days are often made up of a patchwork of options. Join GoH Lyda Morehouse and other professional writers to talk about how they’ve dealt with current publishing realities.
With: Lyda Morehouse, Naomi Kritzer, mod.; Roy C. Booth, Michael Merriam, Kathryn Sullivan

I will, of course, also be at Opening Ceremonies and Closing Ceremonies as to be expected. I may be AWOL from the con for a brief period on Saturday morning in order to take my son to his swimming class, but otherwise he and I will be around the whole weekend. Maybe, with luck, Shawn, too.

The last thing I wanted to report is that I finished reading THE GIRL IN THE ROAD and am now on to what appears to be a contemporary fantasy novel called MEMORY GARDEN.

THE GIRL IN THE ROAD is a difficult book to describe or categorize. I was talking to a friend about it and, while there were a ton of things I really enjoyed in the book (future India, future Africa, the strange journey across the wave power generator), the main character(s) were problematic in that they were not only typically unreliable, they were also, at times, hallucinatory. I can't say that necessarily got in the way of my enjoyment of a book, but I'm usually a careful enough reader that I can get to the end and have a fair idea of what happened. I'm not nearly as sure as I normally am having finished THE GIRL IN THE ROAD. Again, I'm not entirely sure that detracted from my enjoyment of the book, honestly. It was well written, engaging, science fictional and many things like that that I normally enjoy but... I don't know that I could recommend it with out the caveat of, "Okay, but this one is seriously TRIPPY."

Between THE GIRL IN THE ROAD and ELYSIUM, OR, THE WORLD THAT CAME AFTER, I have to wonder if 'trippy' is the new black. From the looks of things (so far) MEMORY GARDEN is more traditional in its narrative tropes, but we'll see. THE BOOK OF THE UNNAMED MIDWIFE had some oddities in its storytelling practices, but I wouldn't have labelled it "trippy," per se. I will say, in light of the conversations I've been having about women's writings, all of the four books I'm mentioning here are very feminine in their approach to science fiction.

I think a lot about what my friend Richard had to say when trying Margaret Atwood's HANDMAID'S TALE for the first time. The books women write are often (though obviously not always), quite intentionally, infused with the feminine. It probably does seem somewhat alien and unsettling to someone who isn't used to ever thinking about pregnancy, periods, and sex (and its corollary: death). These things all showed up in the books I've been reading--sometimes just casually, but sometimes as the point. THE BOOK OF THE UNNAMED MIDWIFE is very much a female apocalypse, both literally and figuratively. ELYSIUM less so, because the gender of our pov character constantly shifts.

So, it's been an interesting ride so far. The library tells me that ANCILLARY SWORD is ready for me to pick up (speaking of oddities in gendering. I read a large part of ANCILLARY JUSTICE before I had to return it and the ship AIs, who are the pov characters, always identify any human they encounter as 'she' regardless. They will sometimes tell you 'she was male.' But it really f*cks with a person's perception of gender identity, gender stereotypes and other such things when everything is always female. Makes you think. Particularly when women are always told, "oh, 'he' includes you." I'm thinking, by this way this feels, that doesn't work the way we think it does.)

I'm looking forward to reading that one, too.

All this reading has also inspired me. I'm about 3,000 words into a short story that, I'm thinking, is ultimately about redemption. I saw an anthology call for "angel and demons" and so I started considering what I might write since, as you know Bob, this is directly in my areas of interest. So, fingers crossed.

I don't think I can really pull off 'trippy' though, so....

Saturday morning Mason has swimming lessons, so, rather than negotiate the back and forth, he came with me to MarsCON.  I stopped by registration for my badge and bought Mason a day pass.

This was Mason's first ever con.  I thought for sure he'd hook up with his friend Molly and that'd be the last I'd see of him, but he ended up sitting in the back of the panel room, which was Kruschenko's, so there were comfy chairs in a kind of antechamber.  So Mason didn't even have to listen to us drone on about "Getting into the Mind of a Fanatic."  Actually, the panel was pretty good, though there were a lot of panelists and we veered into the NAZI analogy, despite naomikritzer's valiant attempts to keep everyone on track.

The rest of the con was me showing Mason what a con is like.  Mason, being Mason, adored the demonstrations.  We watched a Korean sword martial art and we learned the difference between a Korean sword and a Japanese katana.  But, Mason and I were pretty excited to talk to the Sa Ba Nim of that dojon because, apparently, you get to learn sword at any belt.  We tried to win a sword, but, alas, we didn't get the prize.  I did, however, get to cut paper with a bokken.  That rocked.

Mason and I tried to go into the game room, but the rules of said game room kind of baffle me.  Like, it's not clear how one starts a game.  I presume that one can just sit at a table and open a game and people will join you, but every time we went in there were no open tables.  It was also unclear how one jumps in to a pre-running game, or even if one can.

So, we took some jelly beans and left.

Mason really loved the prop room, and if the picture ever makes its way through the aether fem my ridiculously un-smart phone I'll be posting a shot I took of Mason standing next to a very, very realistic looking Dalek.  Mason also really loved all of Umbridge's proclamations/rules from Harry Potter... and all of the Harry Potter props, actually.

Then when we came out of there the SCA people were doing a demo of their battles and Mason tried to watch that, but the SCA people were very... postalizing and kept wanting to TELL us things about their organization, armor, etc.  Mason just wanted to see the bashing of heads.

After that we just kind of killed time waiting for the Anime room party to start.  When it did, they'd started watching Wolf Children, which I adored.  Mason and I sat on the floor and ate girl scout cookies and commented along with everyone else.  This might be the moment that Mason realized that the world is filled with nerdy otaku JUST LIKE HIMSELF, because he was beaming through the film, his ears all perked up, like he finally felt, as the heroine of Wolf Children says, "like he found his pack."

Oh, and my furry friends?  YOU SHOULD WATCH THIS.  It will make you cry.  It made Mason and I cry, but damn it, I think it would be even more powerful for anyone in the furry fandom.  The basic message is not only 'you need to accept who you are," but also, "let your children be what they are."  And, bam! Right in the FEELS, if you know what I mean.

Also, I have to confess that they had an Anime quiz and Mason and I got THE ONE BLEACH QUESTION...

...WRONG.

Mason says he knew the answer but didn't want to speak up.  Meanwhile, I wrote down the year that the Bleach Anime came out wrong.  I remembered it had a "4" in it, but didn't realize it was 2004 (I might have put down 1994).

THEY HAD ONE BLEACH QUESTION AND I BLEW IT.

I may have to leave the fandom in shame....

So, today I'm off to go back to the con by myself.  I think I'm going to miss having Mason there.  He's a good companion for these things.  He and I have already agreed that he'll come along for at least one day for the rest of these.... and I couldn't be more proud.  Leap, my little wolf child!  Leap!

First of all, I should say that I woke up this morning in the mood for Irish rebel music, and I've been giving into it. Currently on the CD is the Fighting Men from Crossmaglen's "50 Irish Rebel Songs," including a song that sometimes even makes me cringe a bit -- "Fennian Record Player." (Which I should say is quite a feat, because I'm perfectly okay with belting out lyrics such "A curse on you, England, you cruel-hearted monsters; your deeds they would shame all the devils in hell" and "the only craic [pronounced "crack"] in South Armagh comes from an Armalite")

But, I thought I should try to quickly sum up my experience at MarsCON, which I attended this weekend. Probably my biggest take-away from the weekend is that I am a FAR bigger Harry Potter fan than I ever realized and that I could TOTALLY cosplay in that universe. However, Shawn is less than excited about the idea of me dying my hair bright blonde in order to cross-dress cosplay Draco Malfoy. There was a very awesome Harry, Voldemort/He Who Must Not Be Named, Dumbeldore, Sirius Black, and Professor Lupin (among others.) The only problem of course is that I feel that I need to be a lot more weasel-skinny to really pull of Malfoy.

Also, I need to go to more cons generally, because I get a lot of joy from hanging out with like-minded folks and screaming about Star Wars and Brian Michael Bendis and things that mundanes tend to not know about or tell you not to get so worked up about because, you know, they're *only* fiction.

On the flipside, I was beginning to worry that MarsCON was turning into one of those cons where you spend a lot of time trying to figure out how to fake your own death in order to escape the panel from Hell. My very first panel of the con I was about 45 minutes late to, but I decided to embrace my inner diva and show up anyway. I wish I hadn't. One of the panelists dropped the n-word. A word, I should say, that I haven't heard out loud from a white person since about 1973. He was making a reference to certain characters representing the "reviled underclass," but instead of saying that, he totally casually used the n-word. And this flew out without any reproach. By the time I found my voice to say, "Uh, you're really not supposed to say that word, dude," someone else had used the term "pussification" which shocked me right back into silence.

I fled that panel to read at the BroadUniverse Rapid-Fire Reading. I hate readings. There's never a packed house, and my current book has a lot of plot twists/character revelations that make it hard to pick an action packed chapter that is spoiler free. Also, my first chapters in Ressurection Code have a bit of sex that makes for awkward afternoon readings when kids might be in the room... but I love hearing other people's stuff. Plus they had chocolate. So that one was a win.

The next panel was comics, so that was a blast. I worry that a lot of SF fans don't cross over into comic fandom, but I so RARELY get to talk to actual people about the stuff I'm reading that I totally geeked out on this panel. I was also happy to discover that the "Heroic Age" is already over in the Marvelverse. I'm a big fan of the darker storylines.

Right before dinner, I had a panel about self-promotion, which I left feeling even more like I have no idea how to find the audience for my work and that EVERYONE ELSE has the secret handshake. :-)

I had an awesome dinner out in which I busted out my deep fandom and started telling people about my unwritten STAR WAR fanfic (it's unwritten because I *know* this could easily become my life's work/ruin, as I would obsessively write it and not get paid, thus destroying my actual writing career.) The food was really good and the company was even better, so it was probably the real highlight of Saturday.

The final panel of Saturday was a bust, as it was one of those where two people have to try to carry the idea -- and one of us had a lot more to say on the subject. We did, however, have an interesting pre-panel discussion about early fandom, and a fan project called "Midwest Side Story." I kind of wish the panel had been about that, though I would have to have sat in the audience for that.

Saturday night I hung out briefly at the Harry Potter party, but I will confess that my brain is so fannish that I was a little freaked out to be hanging out with He Who Must Not Be Named. (That's just not very relaxing, you know??) That was the other take-away for the weekend, actually. I really, REALLY love fans who come in costume. Because right before the Masquerade on Saturday, I was hanging out chatting with a bunch of friends and got to see everyone come by in full regalia, and there's just something mind blowing about seeing a fairly-perfect Lord Voldemort standing next to a Prediator. For a moment, too, we thought there might be a face-off with Lord Voldemort and Glenda the Good Witch. And, you know what? I love that! Some of my favorite moment at cons are those in which I speak to people in costume as if I'm talking to the real thing.

Sunday were my best panels by far. I got to talk/gush about the new Sherlock (the BBC miniseries) and about the current dystopic trend in young adult lit.

A good time, and, in the end, an experience I wouldn't mind repeating after all.

In my mind, this week started a lot better than it did. I'd been looking forward to Mason being back at school so I could get back to my routine, particularly going to the gym (which I haven't done since December). BUT on Monday, Shawn had a bunch of errands to do, including one I had to come along for -- taxes. Our tax guy used to be our neighbor (he was a tax guy before being our neighbor,) and he's phenomenal. And gay. Which is actually kind of important since the Federal government doesn't let us jointly file, and he specializes in dealing with gay couples and their messy tax situations.

I've often thought that someone like Stephen Corbert should make the case that Republicans MUST support gay marriage to stop all the tax wonkiness we've been perpetrating all these years.

Today, I was sick. Like food poisioning sick, only (knowing true cases of food poisioning) fairly mild as such things go.

So I spent much of the day in bed (or the bathroom). I'd hoped to start the day at the gym and then settle in for some much needed writing time -- which I've mostly put on hold while Mason was on vacation.

Bleah.

I'm feeling better at the moment. I pulled myself into an upright position and to the coffee house, because now I have a caffiene headache on top of all the stomach yuck. I knew the folks here would be able to recommend a solution. I'm drinking a black tea that has fairly mild acid content, and so far so good.

I wanted to write down my impressions of MarsCON, because, dude, if you weren't there you missed out. I think MarsCON is becoming one of my favorite local conventions, not only because they had the wisdom and taste to have me as a Guest of Honor many years back, but also because a lot of writers show up. I finally got a chance on Friday night to hang out with Bryan Thao Worra (among other luminati like Catherine Lundoff, Mike [damn the badge policy of only first names], Rebecca Marjesdatter and swords_and_pens) and talk about Captian America and the rest of the gang at Marvel. As I told them at one point, I need to do this more often. I forget how awesome it is to hang out with "my people."

Probably the panel of most note was "Villany for Dummies" at 11:00 am in Krushenko's on the 13th floor of the hotel. naomikritzer and Kelly McCullough were the other panelists and I had just the magic amount of caffiene in my system to be in the right frame of mind for this particular panel. At one point one of the audience members tossed down Eric Heideman's glove as a challenge to Kelly when he suggested that rather than hire fashion designers to make our costumes (no capes!), we should just pick the cheaper and more plentiful costumers. Though no one actually broke into fisticuffs or stood on tables, it was much like the sort of panel where that could have happened.

Dude, where were you? You would have LOVED it!

naomikritzer did a fantastic job moderating. She fed our weirdness while keeping the whole thing from becoming, well, TOO weird and out of control.

Also, you missed me reading from RESURRECTION CODE at the Broad Universe Rapid Fire Reading, though probably I'll be reading from it again at a convention near you (hopefully) since it's the one book I have coming out this year that isn't going to have a major NY publisher's powerhouse publicity machine behind it. Also, by chance catherineldf read an awesome short story that also had an Egyptian theme.