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Writer's Weekend
Jun. 28th, 2006 04:37 pmI made it back from Writer's Weekend (and a few extra days for vacation) and decided that this time I'm not going to do a blow-by-blow, day-by-day update of the con because . . . well, I ended up not attending that many panels. I'd specifically asked not to be included on any panels because I wanted this to be a relaxing, vacation-con. But I was still busy. Here's what happened:
Got to Seattle without incident except that of course the flight was delayed so I arrived an hour later than expected. Not a problem since I was getting a rental car. However, since I was an hour late on pick-up of the car, they'd given it to someone else. They're supposed to know that I'm running late because of a delayed flight, but I was too tired to be a bastard about it and took another, more expensive car: a convertible PT Cruiser. Nice. Especially since the weather was spectacular while I was there so I got to actually put the top down. And was subsequently burned to a deep-fried crisp. I'm now wallowing in aloe. Literally.
But that's skipping to the end of the weekend. First day in Seattle I met an old junior high school friend I hadn't seen since then. Good lunch. Too short. Then I hit the con, registered, chatted with a few people, and had dinner with my brother, who was putting me up for the first three days (so we thought). Overall, good day. Next day I hit the con early to help with the workshop session, where people had brought multiple copies of five pages of their novels and they were traded around (the pros just taking a copy) and then read and critted. This was a multi-genre con, so I helped with the fantasy, sci-fi pieces along with Claire Eddy (![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
claireeddy), editor at TOR, Elizabeth Bear (matociquala) and Jay Lake (jaylake). There was one story that I felt was ready to be submitted to the vicious editors and agents out there. The rest I hopefully gave some helpful crits of so that perhaps they will be ready for submission after a rewrite.
I then ended up eating lunch with the Sun Totem group, even though I was a Crocodile. See, on check in, you had to choose a totem. Then the members of the totem were to get together and write a creation myth about whatever and hand it in later on in the con. The Crocodiles never put any signs up saying where or when they were meeting, and I apparently never ran into any of them in the know, so I missed the Crocodile meeting, which sucks because Elizabeth was a Crocodile. Anyway, I didn't really participate in the Sun creation myth much. Mainly I ate lunch. But then I helped a few people with their pitches which were happening either that day or the next. I met a lot of interesting people and hope their pitches went well. Most seemed to get at least a request for a partial, which is encouraging.
That's pretty much how the rest of the con went. On Saturday I met Elizabeth and actually managed to chat with her at length for the first time. We'd run into each other at cons before, but always on the way to a panel or dinner with an editor or agent or whatever. So we chatted and then ended up at the banquet at the same table. A very riotous table. Composed almost entirely of sci-fi people, including Elizabeth, Jay, Claire, editor Anne Groell, among others. EXTREMELY riotous. We were by far the loudest table there, but we were also the one having the most fun. It was a costume banquet and someone came dressed in the best Vorlon costume I've ever seen, smoke coming out ot he pipes on the sides, an irising "eye", everything. Very good costume. I forget the guys name, so if someone remembers, please include it in the comments. He deserves the recognition.
Then there came the auction. A very good auction, the high point being an ARC of Elizabeth's Worldwired that was signed by all 26 pros attending, from all genres. However, we all signed it as, for example: "Joshua Palmatier as Elizabeth Bear" or whatever. It bid high. Then things went crazy as people began adding things to the package so that the bidding would go even higher. Claire threw in her keepsake fan from a Worldcon (I think) from the 80s. A lock of Jay Lake's hair was thrown in. Along with signed Totems from Jay and Elizabeth (Monkey and Crocodiles respectively). Signed Jay Lake tie-dye socks worn by E-Bear. After that I lost track what the package included. In the end, the auction raised a ton of money for charity, so it was all good. And I laughed so hard that my abs hurt. Which was good because I did no exercise at all that weekend.
The rest of the weekend I spent going to the Seattle Pride parade, hiking in the mountains with another high school friend and my brother, meeting Duane Wilkins at the U-Dub bookstore, signing books, etc, etc, etc. A great weekend overall, spoiled only by:
a) The massive sun burn I got for going to Pride and hiking, because who the hell brings sunblock to Seattle?
b) The flight back, where the plane left late and I got stuck in Philly waiting for a flight that was supposed to leave at 10:45 (after the 8:40 flight was cancelled) then at 11:57, then 12:10, then 12:35, then 1am . . . and finally leaving at 1:10, getting me back on the ground in Binghamton at 2:30 and home at 3am and in bed by 4am, just to get up at 6:30am because of course while I was gone it rained continuously and so now everything is flooded. If you don't believe me, go check Headline News. Most of the scenes they're showing can be seen from my 3rd floor loft. Which leaves the last spoilage:
c) My storage, where I keep pretty much all of my stuff at the moment, has been flooded. I'm not sure how bad the damage is (MY BOOKS!) because we can't get close to it yet, but we'll see. I'm hoping it's not bad, but if you get a blubbering post in another day or two that's totally incoherent, you'll know it was bad.
The only saving grace from the flood issue is . . . going to be written up in the next post. Because I am a bastard. And because I feel it deserves it's own post.
Got to Seattle without incident except that of course the flight was delayed so I arrived an hour later than expected. Not a problem since I was getting a rental car. However, since I was an hour late on pick-up of the car, they'd given it to someone else. They're supposed to know that I'm running late because of a delayed flight, but I was too tired to be a bastard about it and took another, more expensive car: a convertible PT Cruiser. Nice. Especially since the weather was spectacular while I was there so I got to actually put the top down. And was subsequently burned to a deep-fried crisp. I'm now wallowing in aloe. Literally.
But that's skipping to the end of the weekend. First day in Seattle I met an old junior high school friend I hadn't seen since then. Good lunch. Too short. Then I hit the con, registered, chatted with a few people, and had dinner with my brother, who was putting me up for the first three days (so we thought). Overall, good day. Next day I hit the con early to help with the workshop session, where people had brought multiple copies of five pages of their novels and they were traded around (the pros just taking a copy) and then read and critted. This was a multi-genre con, so I helped with the fantasy, sci-fi pieces along with Claire Eddy (
claireeddy), editor at TOR, Elizabeth Bear (matociquala) and Jay Lake (jaylake). There was one story that I felt was ready to be submitted to the vicious editors and agents out there. The rest I hopefully gave some helpful crits of so that perhaps they will be ready for submission after a rewrite. I then ended up eating lunch with the Sun Totem group, even though I was a Crocodile. See, on check in, you had to choose a totem. Then the members of the totem were to get together and write a creation myth about whatever and hand it in later on in the con. The Crocodiles never put any signs up saying where or when they were meeting, and I apparently never ran into any of them in the know, so I missed the Crocodile meeting, which sucks because Elizabeth was a Crocodile. Anyway, I didn't really participate in the Sun creation myth much. Mainly I ate lunch. But then I helped a few people with their pitches which were happening either that day or the next. I met a lot of interesting people and hope their pitches went well. Most seemed to get at least a request for a partial, which is encouraging.
That's pretty much how the rest of the con went. On Saturday I met Elizabeth and actually managed to chat with her at length for the first time. We'd run into each other at cons before, but always on the way to a panel or dinner with an editor or agent or whatever. So we chatted and then ended up at the banquet at the same table. A very riotous table. Composed almost entirely of sci-fi people, including Elizabeth, Jay, Claire, editor Anne Groell, among others. EXTREMELY riotous. We were by far the loudest table there, but we were also the one having the most fun. It was a costume banquet and someone came dressed in the best Vorlon costume I've ever seen, smoke coming out ot he pipes on the sides, an irising "eye", everything. Very good costume. I forget the guys name, so if someone remembers, please include it in the comments. He deserves the recognition.
Then there came the auction. A very good auction, the high point being an ARC of Elizabeth's Worldwired that was signed by all 26 pros attending, from all genres. However, we all signed it as, for example: "Joshua Palmatier as Elizabeth Bear" or whatever. It bid high. Then things went crazy as people began adding things to the package so that the bidding would go even higher. Claire threw in her keepsake fan from a Worldcon (I think) from the 80s. A lock of Jay Lake's hair was thrown in. Along with signed Totems from Jay and Elizabeth (Monkey and Crocodiles respectively). Signed Jay Lake tie-dye socks worn by E-Bear. After that I lost track what the package included. In the end, the auction raised a ton of money for charity, so it was all good. And I laughed so hard that my abs hurt. Which was good because I did no exercise at all that weekend.
The rest of the weekend I spent going to the Seattle Pride parade, hiking in the mountains with another high school friend and my brother, meeting Duane Wilkins at the U-Dub bookstore, signing books, etc, etc, etc. A great weekend overall, spoiled only by:
a) The massive sun burn I got for going to Pride and hiking, because who the hell brings sunblock to Seattle?
b) The flight back, where the plane left late and I got stuck in Philly waiting for a flight that was supposed to leave at 10:45 (after the 8:40 flight was cancelled) then at 11:57, then 12:10, then 12:35, then 1am . . . and finally leaving at 1:10, getting me back on the ground in Binghamton at 2:30 and home at 3am and in bed by 4am, just to get up at 6:30am because of course while I was gone it rained continuously and so now everything is flooded. If you don't believe me, go check Headline News. Most of the scenes they're showing can be seen from my 3rd floor loft. Which leaves the last spoilage:
c) My storage, where I keep pretty much all of my stuff at the moment, has been flooded. I'm not sure how bad the damage is (MY BOOKS!) because we can't get close to it yet, but we'll see. I'm hoping it's not bad, but if you get a blubbering post in another day or two that's totally incoherent, you'll know it was bad.
The only saving grace from the flood issue is . . . going to be written up in the next post. Because I am a bastard. And because I feel it deserves it's own post.
