My mind, and the places it goes

I think I forgot to mention I was *going* to Readercon, but now I am back. However, I haven't read LJ since Friday at about noon, so please let me know if there is anything I need to see.

Readercon was fun, and it was good to see people; if you were there and I missed seeing you, I'm sorry to have missed you.

A reminder:

This Saturday night, beginning at 8 PM, mabfan and I will be hosting my annual Arisia birthday gathering at the Hyatt Regency Cambridge, 575 Memorial Drive, Cambridge, MA.

Even if you're not attending the convention, you're welcome to come to my party. I'd love to see folks! I'll be posting the room number tomorrow as soon as we have it.

-- BSG fans, should I be worried that I woke up this morning with the Jimi Hendrix version of "All Along the Watchtower" playing in my head?

-- I'm mostly making my own fun after work this week, because mabfan is working on a project for his class, and it's eating all of his available evenings and likely a decent chunk of the weekend. So far, my fun seems to be a combination of working on various freelance projects and getting together with friends.

-- I knit my way through the non-Shabbat portions of Readercon and at the end had a 99% done sock. I have since finished that sock and cast on the next one. I spent some time sitting on a chair at the doorway of the dealers' room on Friday, knitting away as mabfan chatted with some folks, and people kept stopping to ask me what I was working on or (if they were knitters themselves) what yarn I was using.

-- Learned while knitting in the dealers' room on Friday: If you are sitting in the doorway of the dealers' room, people will think you want to see their badges.

-- Going back to knitting, I'm up to the final rows of the back of the cardigan sweater I'm currently working on, and I have to say that a 264-stitch row takes forever to knit, even if you're a decently-fast knitter. I'm not going to be sad when I hit the end of this section.

-- The headphones I use at work are being bizarre. If I move them past a specific point along the tightness spectrum (tight against my head, I mean) to where they're most comfortable, the right ear goes dead. Considering these were relatively inexpensive headphones from Radio Snack Shack, I figure that the 3+ years I've gotten out of them is a good run. I may have to invest in another relatively inexpensive set soon, however.

In just a couple of hours, mabfan and I will be heading off for Readercon in Burlington, MA. Since my parents live in Burlington, we're going to have dinner with them, then go to the convention for the evening, and then we're off to see a midnight showing of "The Dark Knight" before heading back to my parents to crash like great crashing things.

On Friday, we'll be heading back to the convention and will be there for the rest of the weekend.

We're not bringing our laptops with us, so it's likely that from about 5-ish this afternoon until late on Sunday, I will not see anything posted.

Have a good weekend, all, and don't do too much redecoration around here without warning me where you hid stuff.

Hope to see those of you who will be there!

Everyone else, have a great weekend!

::points to icon::

Arisia Weekend, In Handy-Dandy Bulletpoint Form:

-- Went to con. Had good time.
-- Saw lots of folks. Made many of them eat chocolate cookies.
-- Was on panels. Talked about lots of different things. Introduced people to the verb "obnoxed."
-- Took stuff home Sunday morning. Attended birthday party. Returned to convention in afternoon.
-- Developed killer headache beginning at my 2 PM panel.
-- Tried to go to "Buffy" sing-along. Too crowded.
-- Went home. Sent mabfan out to get food. Whinged about headache.
-- Put headache to bed. Slept like rock. Still exhausted.
-- Back in office today. Convention going on less than a mile from work. Contemplated going over at lunch time, but it's 15 degrees out plus windchill.

-- Both lcmlc and mabfan came through their various procedures fine and are now on the mend. Thanks to all of you for your good wishes.

-- I came to the decision (after making more than 10 dozen cocoa cookies) that I will not be making chocolate chip cookie bars for the birthday thing at Arisia.

-- Which reminds me: people in the Boston area who are around this weekend should feel free to drop by my birthday thing this weekend, even if you're not going to Arisia. Details are here.

-- Still lots to do before Arisia. But I found one of the things I wanted to bring with, so that's good.

-- Still flailing. ::flails:: ::flails some more, mostly for the amusement of tygerseye::

-- Finish TARDIS
-- Figure out what I want to bring to knit
-- Figure out food for meals
-- Figure out food for birthday thingy
-- Flail
-- Bake for birthday thingy
-- Post my schedule so people can find me at-con
-- Figure out clothing to be packed
-- Pack
-- Flail some more
-- Figure out logistics for getting me and stuff to con
-- Decide if all Who-related knitting (two Daleks, K-9, and the aforementioned TARDIS) is coming to con (because of one panel I'm on)
-- Find pics brought last year for aforementioned panel
-- Update resources list for aforementioned panel
-- Print and photocopy resources list for aforementioned panel
-- Flail yet more

...and behind like whoa. No guarantee I'll catch up, so please tell me stuff here that you want me to know.

Readercon was a lot of fun. Saw lots of fun folks. There will be, I hope, some semblance of a con report forthcoming. I took lots of photos today, so the con report may be illustrated.

For now, however, I need to wait for my brain to return from the con.

There may or may not be a more in-depth con report down the line. Right now, it's taken me three days to get the time to do this much, so here goes (with some chronological order, but not much)...

-- Telling cab drivers which way you want them to get you from point A to point B may result in a lecture about time = money.

-- New Jersey Transit ticket sellers are very nice people. Or, at least, the guy I dealt with was.

-- Buying new hats and visiting with friends can be accomplished simultaneously if you've made friends with haberdashers.

-- Dinner with friends is always a wonderful thing.

-- It takes less than half an hour from Forest Hills, Queens to Penn Station at 6 AM. Much later, and it takes double that.

-- Penn Station is a lovely place to eat breakfast at 6:30 AM (provided you've brought your own breakfast).

-- Commuters on NJ Transit don't necessarily know where their trains are going other than to their own stops (inasmuch as the question "This is the right train for Princeton Junction, right?" got me many blank stares and shrugs).

-- Violating my no-coffee-except-in-the-office policy is excusable under certain specific circumstances.

-- Time flies (even on a long car trip) when you're with great conversationalists.

-- Being the navigatrix goes much smoother when I'm looking at the correct page of directions.

-- Tiny diners in the middle of nowhere in Delaware occasionally will surprise you with the availability of kosher junk food. Related to this, a package of cheese crackers and UTZ cheese puffs do not a healthy lunch make. Satisfying, maybe, but healthy, not so much.

-- The Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel(bridge-tunnel-bridge) is quite a sight.

-- Swearing in public is illegal in the tourist areas of Virginia Beach.

-- Virginia Beach apparently closes at 10. Finding somewhere that would serve food to a large party was an adventure.

-- Grocery stores that carry national brands are wonderful. Grocery stores whose home brands feature many kosher items are even more wonderful.

-- Peanut butter: it's not just for breakfast anymore!

-- Apparently, I can be replaced by aspects of four other women.

-- I may be Bizarro Nomi. There's also a possibility that cbpotts is Bizarro Nomi. We'll let you know when we figure it out.

-- cbpotts is an exemplary roommate. She's fun to talk to while lying in the dark.

-- "No process for you!"

-- When taking a walk along the beach at sunset, one of the group should keep track of how long/far we've been walking.

-- Having a group of people who are (a) aware of my Shabbat issues and (b) capable of helping me with them makes conventions amazingly smooth.

-- Given the opportunity, I will geek out about editorial process/writing process with very little provocation. It's much more fun when others play too.

-- Blatant idiocy will, in fact, provoke me to squelch my instinct not to make trouble in public.