Readercon, Day the Third

Continuing my ridiculously overdue recap of my Readercon memories, we dial the WABAC Machine to Day Three, which I didn’t think could possibly be as awesome as Day Two.

I was wrong.

1
After a bit of editing, I was tempted to shell out for another day’s WiFi access for twelve ninety-fucking-five.  Luckily, I was in for a second morning of coffee and free WiFi at Panera with Jaym and Eric. And by this time, there was no denying that when the three of us get together, inappropriate comments on race, sex, and drug use will be made, up to and including discussions of three-way ’round-the-worlds with literary idols.

2
I couldn’t resist the dealer’s room any longer.  I wanted so many things, but I was able to “restrain” myself to two purchases.  Jeff Vandermeer’s Booklife and the first of a two-volume set of stories by William Tenn, Immodest Proposals which was reprinted–and sold to me by the staff of–NESFA Press.  And believe me, if it would’ve fit in my bag and not been too heavy for the flight back to New York, I’d have bought volume 2 as well. 🙁

3
I didn’t hit my first panel that day until 1:00, “Folklore and Its Discontents” with Nicole Kornher-Stace, Faye Ringel, Judith Berman, Michael Swanwick, and Darrell Schweitzer.

It was a heady discussion about the meaning folklore, how something becomes folklore (vs. fake-lore), and how it all relates to authenticity.

If I forget everything else about this panel, including some yahoo heckling a panelist because of a comment made about self-publishing, I will not forget Schweiter’s reference to something that could one day become folklore, Whitley Streiber’s “xeno-proctology mythos.”

4
Next was “The Fiction of the Unpleasant” with Kit Reed, Mike Allen, Adam Golaski, Barry N. Malzberg, Kathryn Cramer, and Peter Straub.

I confess, I spent a lot of the panel staring at how close Reed’s chair was to the edge of the platform. Still, this panel was, ironically, a joy for me. I’ve always had a reaction against folks, writers and non-writers alike, who don’t like certain books or stories because they’re “too real” or who read just to escape. The counterargument? Well, thanks to Scott Edelman, you can just watch for yourself.

5
I just had to head for “True Tales of Great Editing” with Brian Francis Slattery, legends Barry N. Malzberg & Samuel R. Delany, and Patrick O’Leary.

Gordon Van Gelder was to moderate, but he was running late and Malzberg didn’t want to keep us waiting. So he had Delany moderate until Van Gelder arrived.

Some great stories and comments here. Again, check it!

6
I had the pleasure of Calista Taylor’s company for those last three panels. We then ran into Nancy and her B at the hotel bar where, thanks to Nancy, I got introduced to Blue Rose and a few others whose names escape me (cool people, too–I’m duly ashamed).  I also had some pretty good wings, food I wished I would’ve had on Thursday night.

7
Afterward, Cali and I were going to make another trip to H Mart.  But before we left, I had the chance of a lifetime.  I watched as Chip Delany and Junot Diaz part ways temporarily, so I pounced on the Pulitzer Prize-winner.  How could I not when (a) Diaz was all of three feet away from me and (b) I work at the institution from which he earned his M.F.A.  Instant in!  I spoke with him for a few minutes and quickly found out that he’s every bit the cool cat that people say he is.  I even gave him directions to the next panel he wanted to attend and introduced him to Cali, whom he gave a kiss on the cheek!  All I got was a lousy handshake ;).

That was the upside of that hour.  The downside was that Cali wouldn’t be at the con the next day, so after hanging out at the H Mart for a bit, we said our goodbyes and parted company at a nearby Starbucks…

8
…where I met Jaym and Eric for caffeine and WiFi, where the inappropriate lulz continued!

9
I let Eric talk me into a showing of Jason Scott’s Get Lamp: The Text Adventure Documentary.  I asked Eric, “Is this about MUDs (i.e. multi-user dungeons)?  I know all about those!”  Oh, little did I know.  Although you know, I did know a little bit–I had vague recollections of the names of some of the more classic text adventures and remembered old logos and stuff.  If I wasn’t so busy, I’d download all of those games right now.

10
I ended the night with Howard Waldrop reading from his soon-to-be-published novel The Moone World after having worked on it for nigh on two decades. 

Needless to say, he had my rapt attention.  Waldrop was reading from mostly handwritten pages.  A few were typed.  But all of pages I saw were a shade of brown.  Yes, he was been writing the book for that long.

It was about 11:00 PM by the time the reading was over, and when he finished and saw the audience still enraptured, his final words were, “Y’all can go now.”  And, I did.

#

Next time: A very full day, only half of which was spent at Readercon.

Readercon, Day the Second

Sorry for the interruption of blog posts. I had my second geek weekend in a row, this time out in the woods where internet access was even more prohibitive than the Burlington Marriott’s $12.95/day WiFi rate. It did give me a little more distance from the squee-worthy events of my second day at Readercon.

This was a long day, so smoke ’em if you got ’em.

Thinking back to Day 2, I remember…


1
…thinking that as long as I was eating the entire cost of a hotel room instead of splitting it like other more sensible, extroverted people, I might as well get some early-morning editing in for my Rigor Amortis submission. I managed some the next morning, too.

2
…the early morning coffee/internet run to Panera with Eric and Jaym. In case we were wondering if the inappropriate jokes from the previous evening at the IHOP were a fluke, we were wrong. Not feeling evil enough, I thought that Jaym and I should make our friend Mercedes (who we really, really wished could’ve been there) extremely jealous.

3
The first panel I went to that day was, “Interstitial Then, Genre Now” with Theodora Goss, John Clute, Peter Dube, & Michael Dirda. This was another panel where I had to fight the fanboy desire to just sit and gape at the people sitting at the center of an artistic movement that’s intrigued me for years.

4
I took a second between this panel and the next one I wanted to attend to meet Calista Taylor again, for the first time. We’ve tweeted and emailed for ages and I felt bad that I wasn’t able to meet her as soon as she arrived at the con. So I had to say hi, at least for a second, and as much as it sucked, she was going to sit at one panel while I went to…

5
“History and Memory in Speculative Fiction” with my idol Howard Waldrop and a bunch of other folks, Andrea Hairston, David Anthony Durham, and Alan DeNiro.

This was the first panel where I was able to get my fanboy head out of my fanboy ass, and pay attention to one fascinating discussion about how history and memory merge in writing to try to generate this thing called “truth” which isn’t always “fact.”

6
I not only got to finally hang out with Calista at the “Voice Workshop for Poets and Writers” with Andrea Hairston, but I got to hang with Nancy again. There she is getting loosened up by Andrea Hairston…

I haven’t given any readings yet, but some of the tips I picked up will be very helpful in the future. Basically, they amount to relaxation, mindfullness, and preparedness. Doing yoga actually put me half-a-step ahead in this regard.

7
The next stop was at the “Non-Western Cultures in Fantasy” panel with one of the con’s Guests of Honor, Nalo Hopkinson, along with Shariann Lewitt, Theodora Goss, Cathrynne M. Valente, and Darrell Schweitzer.

Aside from the object lesson in taking responsibility for one’s own cultural sensitivity (those who were at the panel will remember what I’m talking about), the biggest takeaway for me came from Hopkinson herself. Because you’d think that being a minority myself would make me comfortable writing about “the other.” It doesn’t… well, depending on who you define as “the other.” But Hopkinson’s words about needing to feel the safety to “mess up,” especially since you’re always going to “mess up” in some reader’s eyes, were very helpful.

8
I was running out of steam by the time I got to the “Influence as Contagion” panel with Allen Steele, my idol Howard Waldrop and some other folks, James Morrow, Jack M. Haringa, Resa Nelson, and Mary Robinette Kowal.

The discussion was pretty esoteric as the panelists dissected the age-old question of the lengths writers should–or shouldn’t–go to to avoid others’ work for fear of “contaminating” their own.

9
I was more crispy-fried and hungry than I’d realized by that point. Luckily, Cali got me out of the hotel and took me a hop, skip, and a jump away to the local H Mart for lunch. I have to say, this was a very impressive Asian grocery store–with a food court. Now, I’m normally a purist about Asian food stores, having spent a lot of the Saturday mornings of my youth shopping in them with my folks–it’s not a true Asian market if it doesn’t reek of fresh (or freshly killed) aquatic life. But it had all the stuff and none of the, uh, atmosphere. And the food was to die for!

Plus, I was able to get some supplies to help me get thru the rest of the weekend. Thanks, Cali!

10
We made it back in time for N.K. Jemisin’s panel on “Brainstorming Inclusive Immersive Worlds.”

I couldn’t possibly explain the excellent content of this panel as well as Jemisin herself does.  Unfortunately, we couldn’t get through it all, through no fault of hers.  There were just too many people in the audience.

11
The next few hours after that were a blur, except for a nap and a caffeine run with Jaym that involved the blind leading the blind to a gas station where we got the caffeine we needed, but not necessarily the caffeine we wanted.  The best part of that particular run was “The Fraud Conversation,” which put words to fears about attending Readercon that I had trouble describing to people. This is something I really need to blog about soon–don’t let me forget!

12
I had to get over those fears if I was going to survive the Meet the Pros(e) party which was after the Cordwainer Smith Rediscovery Award.  Here’s a clip from it.

13
I did, in fact, survive the Meet the Pros(e), thanks to Eric.  And I have the markings to prove it:

Apparently, the tradition of this party is for each pro to carry around a sheet of labels upon which a line from their work is printed.  And the idea for the rest of us is to meet as many pros as possible and get their lines in order to form a pithy prose poem.  (Remind me to blog that too, one of these days.)

Of course, there was no way I was going to remember exactly which quote was whose except for Elizabeth Bear (who popped my sticker cherry), Howard Waldrop (‘cos he’s Howard Waldrop), and Elizabeth Hand (who, being the iconoclast, put her sticker on my upper right shoulder away from everyone else’s).  Later on, I did pick out Benjamin Rosenbaum’s line, which came from a story I love, “The Orange.”

Anyway, I met about 98% of the author’s I’d intended to meet, even though it was only for 5-6 seconds on the average.  Even Mary Robinette Kowal, who I reminded had told me via Twitter that I should come and say hi!

The red figure in the picture behind me reminds me that this was the first time I got to hang out with Marlin May a bit, not to mention Nancy and her B, and MCM.

###

I was already blissed out by that point.  I could’ve ended the con right there and have been happy.  But then, before going to bed, I realized that it was only Friday, and there were two more days left!!!

Readercon, Day the First

It’s taken me a week to fully process my Readercon experience, partly because I think part of me would rather just sit back for the rest of my vacation and just live inside my memories. But as the saying goes, “After the ecstacy, the laundry.” Time to move this stuff out of my head, so I can move on with the rest of my life. So, here’s a rough synopsis of my first day:

1
A week ago today, I was flying from my little patch of upstate New York, thru LaGuardia, then to Boston’s Logan International Airport. It was the first time I’d flown in fifteen years. Not a bad experience. My horrible visions of being cavity searched, despite how careful I tried to be meeting all the TSA requirements, didn’t come true.

I spent most of the trip stressing over my MBTA route. The process was fairly painless, except for being long. Excluding layover time, I spent more time riding on public transit than I did in the air.

2
Once I got to the hotel itself, I checked in, and the first person I saw when I stepped out of the 6th floor elevator was legendary editor Kathryn Cramer. She was talking while walking with someone, providing me with a convenient excuse not to say hi.

I’d tried to check in with emails and tweets during my trip. But there was no free WiFi at LaGuardia where I had my longest layovers. So, I had no choice that first night except to pay for the hotel’s WiFi at the ridiculous price of twelve ninety-fucking-five a day.

3
I managed to blow one-third of my food budget on dinner at the hotel bar. This did not make me feel good, considering the money I’d just paid on WiFi.

4
I finally meet one of many folks on my Twitter friends list I intended to stalk find. Rather, it’s more accurate to say that Nancy Brauer, along with MCM, found me. Of course, we lost track of each other temporarily, going in our own directions, but we would have time to connect later.

4
The first panel I went to that night was “I Read This Book, So I Started a Band,” with F. Brett Cox, Leah Bobet, David G. Shaw, Paul Di Filippo, & Glenn Grant.

I had my notebook open and didn’t take a lot of notes. I was too busy looking at all the folks, on stage and around the room, who I recognized from their work and/or their blogs. 

5
Afterward, I went to the “Speculative Poetry Workshop” with Mike Allen. Recall that I went to a Sci-Fi Poetry panel at Astronomicon 11, which was mostly readings and a discussion, and a workshop on (non-genre) poetry a few months later. This workshop was right in between, which I enjoyed even if I didn’t read anything aloud. The piece I generated, much like the rest of my Vogon poetry, is safely stored away in a Pandorica-like box where it won’t hurt anybody.

6
After that, I was still hungry and pondering my next move. Luckily, I was found by another one of my tweeps, Jaym Gates who, along with Eric Rosenfield, had just arrived and wanted to go on a food run. After navigating our way from Burlington to Cambridge (Well, they were navigating. I was pretty much useless.), we find an IHOP, where we established what would be an ongoing pattern of abject silliness and innuendo.

I ended the day around 1:45 AM, jazzed and clueless that the best parts were still to come.

Next time*: Cool panels, meeting one of my bestest Tweeps, meeting the Pros(e), and more.

*I’m off on a camping trip this weekend, so I’m not exactly sure if “next time” will be a timed post set for tomrrow, or if it’ll be on Sunday when I get back.

Chapter XXXVII

Today, Chapter XXXVII of my life begins.

“I’m 37. I’m not old.”
-Dennis, Monty Python and the Holy Grail

I’m starting this chapter off right with a two-and-a-half week vacation from my dayjob, a trip next week to Readercon, a camping trip with friends the following weekend, and after that, my next NSO gig at the next home derby bout.

Role ModelsFor the past couple years, I’ve tried to obtain writing-related birthday gifts. This year, though, I dusted off my Audible account, and treated myself to Role Models by John Waters.  I quoted it a lot recently, having read snippets from it and heard various podcast interviews and readings.

I’m listening to the first few chapters now, and thinking about my own role models.  I’ll blog about them some other time.  But this book is making me give some thought to who’s influenced, not just my art, but my life as an artist.  In Waters, I think I’ve found a new one.  Just look out the quotes I’ve used recently as well as the links below.  If you’ve been paying any attention to how I feel about writing and how I pursue it, I’m sure you’ll understand why. 

“What’s my name, fool?”

I should apologize for the ratio of roller derby posts to writing posts lately, but you’ll probably see that ratio continue to skew just a little bit more in the coming days.

Last night at a scrimmage, I had a crash course in the art of penalty-box timekeeping, making me a Non-Skating Official (NSO) in my local derby league. My first bout will be in two weeks.  Unfortunately, I’m out most of July, what with Readercon and the “annual camping trip”* with friends.  But I’ll be around for their bouts in August and beyond.

The only thing missing, they tell me, is my roller derby name.  So, I’m taking suggestions.  Tell me something good in the comments.  Or if you’re one of my tweeps, you know where to find me.

My wrojo seems to have bounced back.  Toldja these ladies were an inspiration.  But while I’ve reconnected with my Inner Drill Sergeant, my Inner Gordon Lish is still MIA. I’m 700 words into the puke draft for a flash anthology with a 1,000-word limit, and I haven’t gotten to the point of the story quite yet.  I have time to play with, though–about two weeks.

I’m not quite fully recovered by whatever Andromeda Strain put me out for two days.  Between the writing, a bout of insomnia, and last night’s scrimmage, I’m using up energy as fast as I get it back.  It’s like I’m treating my body like a video game character with slowly regenerating life levels, where you’d take some hits to give some until you’re near zero, back off to get 2 or 3 tics of life back, and then go into it again. It’s not ideal, but if I’m going to allow derby further into my life, I can’t let the writing slack because of it.

So, yes–berate me for not taking it easy, just as long as you leave a roller derby name suggestion for me. 🙂

*Yes, this is code. If I say more, ninjas with the dim mak death touch will kill me before I finish typing.

“Come to see victory/ In the land called Fantasy”

Apparently, I just can’t seem to get enough of the Ithaca League of Women Rollers and watching home bouts. I drove to an away bout last night to watch the Sufferjets play the Utica Roller Girls.


I’ve been engrossed in my share of sporting events, but I just don’t know what it is about roller derby.  Yeah, yeah, I know–it all has to do with prurient fantasies brought on by watching women play rough with each other, right?  Sure, being a straight male, I’m certainly not above anything like that.  I’m comfortable admitting the possibility that I’m just a slimeball.  But that’s not it.

After all, the point of having a fantasy is sitting back and imagining yourself being engaged with the object(s) of your fantasy, right?  But do I have slimeball thoughts about these ladies?  Despite basic biological tendencies, not really.  Between being taken, being of advanced age, and knowing that my deteriorating eskrima skills would be of little use against a roller-girl beatdown–those are enough to keep those types of fantasies in check.

I hear you scoffing, “You are so full of shit!” like Jack Lemon to Kevin Spacey in Glengarry Glen Ross.  But hear me out.

I’m thinking back to the John Waters quote on discipline from his “10 Best Pieces of Advice for Functional Freaks.”  Especially the bit about how…

Discipline is not anal compulsion; it’s a lifestyle that breeds power.

I think that’s the real object of my fantasy where roller derby folks are concerned.  Any derby organization consists of folks busting their asses to do something out of pure love.  I’m not just talking about the skaters putting in hours-upon-hours into training, either.  They and the whole gaggle of folks behind them–volunteers who officiate, run the merch tables, run the scoreboard, &c.–put in a crapton of work to put a season of bouts together, to say nothing about the service projects they do.

I’ve watched these bouts over the past couple of years and I realized that their power isn’t in the fact that they skate and whoop ass at the same time.  Their power is in their willingness to do whatever they have to do in order to get to skate and whoop ass, and do it for the love.  That’s a little difficult for me to get my head around.

Sure, I love to write.  But while I may not have any expectations about making enough money off it to quit my dayjob, I also love the fact that the one piece I got into the McSweeney’s website still gives me some juice with other writers five years later.  And that folks seem to like my writing enough to publish it and sometimes, pay me for it. I am not one of those writers who go, “Oh, I’d do this even if I never got published.” 

The point is, it’s inspiring to watch a group of people can put in so much work into something other than their own self-aggrandizement.  The least I can do with that inspiration is to get back on my horse and keep putting in my time in the ‘shed, despite the writing troubles I’ve been bitching about lately.  I’ve got upcoming story deadlines, stories that need revision, and rejected pieces to resubmit. Not to mention, a conference to prepare for.

And I’m getting to all that right now. Well, after I look at the pics I took one last time…

“Let her go, let her go, God bless her/ Wherever she may be”

One D.O.A., One on the Way One D.O.A., One on the Way by Mary Robison

My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Mary Robison’s prose is as dense, sparse, and evocative as ever. You might call the snippets of text disjointed, or gripe about a lack of obvious plotline, but there’s still a narrative to be followed.

The main character is certainly the sort who might reveal a lot of the facts of her life to you, but still keep you at arm’s length. Indeed, Robison’s prose seems to purposely keep me at a distance. I know a lot of people who would complain about that too, but it was a curious experience for me. It’s almost as if I had a front-row seat in the theater of the main character’s life, but with a splatter-shield in front of me.

And believe me, with everything she goes through, that’s a good thing.

View all my reviews >>

Functional Freakiness

I made a small effort toward getting back in the writing saddle after my weekend adventures. I confess, I haven’t had much luck. This is how I’ve been feeling for nigh on two weeks…

Reading between the lines of those blog entries, you can probably detect a tinge of guilt.  It was fed, in part, by this quote I’d read (and posted to my tumblr) from filmmaker John Waters in his “10 Best Pieces of Advice for Functional Freaks.”

I’m a fascist about my work habits and I expect you to be, too. Never have a spontaneous moment in your life again. If you’re going to have a hangover, it should be scheduled on your calendar months in advance. Rigid enjoyment of planning can get you high. Militant time-management will enable you to ignore how maladjusted you would be if you had the time to notice it in the first place. Discipline is not anal compulsion; it’s a lifestyle that breeds power.


I may have reasons for my lack of discipline and productivity since the end of the academic year, but no real excuses. At least none that my Inner Drill Sergeant would accept, especially with the amount of rejections I’ve received lately.

I think it’s time for Gunny to come back out and square me away.

Now, between that John Waters quote and Gunny up there, a lot of you are probably fearing for my sanity. But if you’re not familiar with the flims of John Waters, here’s a sample of his mindset. This is a little something he did for some indie movie theaters that I remember seeing in high school.

There may not be much difference between Waters’ and Gunny’s attitude toward work, but if someone who works as hard as Gunny can produce the stuff what Waters does, then you know what? I want to be a functional freak.

“Everybody needs a little time away…” Part III

I took one final day yesterday to relax from the stresses of life, the dayjob, and my writing. I know what most writers say about needing to write every single day and the thing is, I agree 100%. It’s just that I’ve come to the realization that I can’t do it.  I should, and I should keep working toward that.  But if I treat writing like another job, then like any other job, I need a break.

Yesterday was the third and final day of the annual summer festival. Whereas Saturday was sunny and hot, almost to the point where I was worried about heat stroke, Sunday was gray, drizzling at times, and about 20 degrees cooler. I thought all I needed was a thicker polo shirt, but I was wrong. Still, some hot chocolate warmed me up enough to enjoy what I saw: People dancing to a circle of drummers, folks doing Yoga in the cold, and a local group of bagpipers which includes a sci-fi writer who is a frequent contributor to Analog as well as Asimov’s Science Fiction and other places.

If nothing else, I’ve got a third day’s worth of potential character sketches, here. 

Now, I’m getting slowly back on the wagon. I’m finally getting the first draft of my story for Rigor Amortis together, building it around the skeleton of an unrelated flash fiction I wrote about 6 or 8 months ago. I figure if Carol Emshwiller can include “Acceptance Speech” and “Report to the Men’s Club” in the same collection, then I can make a story “the same, but different” than one I’ve previously written (not that I’m 1/10th of the writer she is, but still).