Sunday, October 31, 2010

The Great Party Week

So I spent most of the last week at World Fantasy in Columbus, hanging with old and new friends, and had a great time. My impressions:

1) The Columbus convention center is a little dingy.

2) That said, the Hyatt was great, and Columbus is a cute town with lots of great restaurants. I would go back in a second.

3) Writers are hugely fun, if oddly conservative. Writers and their wild ways? A myth. Librarians are totally wilder.

4) Small press publishers are the stone coolest. I want to be them when I grow up. The Chizine staff was all about the savior faire. Another dude was rocking an orange zoot suit.

5) I love my new crit group, but I miss my old one.

6) I hope my writing vacation next year is Viable Paradise.

7) I'm not good at talking like a writer, but I love listening to other people do it.

8) Although I believe stone honest critique is the only way to benefit from a crit group, I don't believe critique should be an endurance test. Really, what's with all the completely macho noise about crit?

9) I must submit more.

10) I need to renegotiate my relationship to Warcraft.

11) I love having an ipod jack in the car.

12) Podcasts are THE BOMB. Capital the, capital bomb.

13) Coming home, I took back roads to Fort Wayne and then caught I-69 up. It was a beautiful drive, good weather early on a Sunday morning, plenty of cows and ramshackle farms. Good background for thinking. Totally meditative.

14) Merrie, Dave, Christian, Kelly, Mike, Sharon, and Kate are all my writing BFF's. Really.

Got home a little after noon, carved pumpkins (FOR THE HORDE!), ate pumpkin seeds, waiting to take Poppy around for Tricks or Treats. Between our party and the con, it's been a really nice month, largely due to the company of old and new friends. I feel very energized, which is not usual this far from the summer solstice... it's either the Vitamin D or an October party/writing vacation. Or a nifty combination. Worth retrying next year.


Merrie from my last writing group, and Dave whom I met through Merrie coupla years ago. They ROCK.


Christian is in the foreground. New friend, another Michigan writer. He also ROCKS.


Mike and Gene Wolf.


Mike and Kate and Sharon, members of his online Crit Group. They all ROCK.