Tag Archives: conventions

I’m back

with updates.

Turns out my lost post was made too quickly as Saturday was not super.

Oh most of the day went fairly well and I had a fun time at the San Diego Vintage SF screening of Them! However I learned just how modern I have truly become. During them film one of the characters, a female scientist named Pat, is looking at information on a clipboard. It was the style of clipboard with a flip-top cover, and she held the cover up while she read the sheets underneath. The camera’s POV was from the far side so all the audience could see was the cover upright and vertical, I saw it and the first thing my mind registered was a scientist working at her laptop. It took a moment for me to realize that I was NOT looking at a laptop fifty years early. I swear I had to make myself look and realize it was just a clipboard.

Anyway I Got home from the screening and with a couple of friends proceeded to play on the Xbox. I started feeling poorly, headache and upset GI tract. I had to suspend the xbox gaming and call it a night.

The next morning I was feeling a little better and I went and saw Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows Part 1 with my sweetie-wife. (Good film I really liked it.) We had lunch and soon after I was feeling worse. We made it home but by that time I was weak and feeling like someone had overinflated my abdomen.

This is was state until yesterday. I made it back and forth to work, but beyond that I end no energy or inclination for anything more strenuous than watching videos, and not much of that.

(My Sunday Night Movie was going to be The Omega Man, but I couldn’t watch the entire film. I bailed early and went to bed.)

Tomorrow we’ll scoot for LosCon and luckily I seem to be recovered. I took a walk this morning, about an hour across uneven ground and I tolerated it well.

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Weekend Update

So today I hung out with my pal Bear. It was a typical Sunday Afternoon for us. First we visited our local specialty bookstore, Mysterious Galaxy. I did not buy anything as my ‘to read’ stack is currently five books high. (I personally am not a fan of buying books when I have not finished reading the ones I purchased the trip before.) Then a  quick stop at our local games store Game Empire — nicely located next to Mysterious Galaxy — where I picked up an expansion deck for Munchkin as a gift to my sweetie-wife.

We had a large lunch at Outback Steakhouse. hmm I love that Sundays I do not count calories. we discussed my re-invented zombies and I am pleased to say that now two friends — both fans of the zombie movie genre — have enjoyed the ideas I bounded around about re-inventing the zombie. I still am not sure that I have a plot that will fully form, but it could be that it will just take time. My Macbeth ideas bounced around my skull for nearly a decade before they became Cawdor late last year.

I am very sorry that Conjecture’s programming looked so weak this year. I love going to my local conventions, but I am there primarily for programming and it is on that basis that I judge if a con was a failure or a success for myself.

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A post Westercon report

There is one bit of data I learned at Westercon that truly was depressing.

In the Mohave desert right now, a new industry is being born. Passenger Spaceflight. In the Mohave you will find companies like Virgin Galactic and Xcor racing to establish the first safe, reliable, passenger service to space. Both companies are looking forward to at first sub-orbital hops, but much more could be had further down the road.

This is truly the American spirit. Bold visionary people, taking enormous risks as they build something new from the ground up.

When asked about regular operations and where the Lynx spacecraft would launch from, a member of Xcor told us that due to the business climate it all likelihood the company would move from California. The government climate makes it too difficult form the new industry to be born here. They can get their R&D done here, just as Rutan has with Spaceship One, but it looks like New Mexico is ahead of the nation in the race to make it an industry.

That is truly a shame.

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Surviving, but not pleasantly

So Today was my first full day back from the convention, but sadly it was not as care-free as I would have liked it to be. I injured myself at the convention and that injury has continued to plague me.

On Saturday morning my sweetie-wife and I were walking back from a spot of breakfast before the convnetion when disaster struck.

I sneezed.

Now you are probably expecting at this point something like I tripped while I sneeze and fell hard to the ground. Or that when I sneezed I lost track of where I was walking and walked into danger or some such exciting event.

Nope, I sneezed and noting more. When I sneezed a sharp pain stabbed me in my side. Very much like a cramp from running too far too fast and I thought I had triggered a cramp. The rest of the day it hurt to walk, to get up from sitting or to go down to a sitting position.

The next day, yesterday, I sneezed again and it was clear that I had strained a muscle or muscle-group in my left side. the pain continued throughout the day.

Today I went and saw Toy Story 3, a fine film and a worthy sequel, it was very funny. That turned out to be not the bets of things. It hurt to laugh. When I sneezed twice today, I really put pain into my left side.

There’s no doubt about it I have injured myself with the power of my own sneezes.

One the plus side I have a new idea for a short story; something fairly subversive in my opinion. It’ll be fun writing it when I am through with Cawdor,

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Westercon Update #3

Here it is sunday morning and the last day of the convention. I’ve had a blast and I am exiting the convention energized and motivated.
I started yesterday with a two hour ‘workshop’ with literary agent Ashley Grayson. I put workshop in quote because in the schedule it’s billed as a workshop, but it reality it was Ashley Grayson giving us the benefit of his knowledge about what works and doesn’t work in writing with tips on how to get to what works.
From there I went to a panel on the basics of writing. Nothing there I did not already know, but the panelists were the draw, the room was packed, and it was a lively discussion.
After that my friend Brad and I went to the presentation, ‘riding rockets’ by one of the engineers and flight crew for Xcor’s rocket plane. Very informative and entertaining. By 2013 Xcor hopes to be competing with Virgin Galactic for sub-orbital rides for paying passengers.
The final panel of the day was a bit of a surprise. It was on Global Warming, and while both points of view (Man-made vs unknown causes) were present in the room the discussion did not devolve into bitter verbal fights or political point scoring.)
After the dinner break my sweetie-wife, Brad, and myself played the game “Are you a werewolf’ for the first time. That was a lot of fun, then it was the usual parties and then bed.

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Catch up

There is no Sunday Night Movie this weekend as I was at Condor and too tired after the convention for movie watching. I wish I could do Condor justice in a review but the combination of a really busy and good con plus a series of headaches that has been pretty consistent since last Weds has just ruined my ability for decent blogging.

However I can say this. This was the best Condor I have been too. There were plenty of interesting panels, I rarely felt that I lacked anything to do. I had a number of really good conversations and re-connected with a number of friends I only see at conventions. I also came away with the idea I needed to make chapter three of Cawdor work. So despite the pain it was a pretty good weekend.

Today I managed to write over 1500 words on Cawdor. 750 at work on my laptop and the rest at home after my sweetie-wife went to bed. If I can keep up that pace I will have the first draft finished by the end of June early July.

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Condor Convention Day 1

Here in San Diego we have a local sf con in February/March called Condor. Today was the first day on the convention.

Now Condor is a small convention. 300-400 people in attendance usually is my understanding. I went to several panels, the best being on weapons of the Victorian Age. This turned into a show and tell of fire arms from 1830 thru 1900 and the panelists brought their own collection. It was a big table full of firearms. The panelist were well informed and I had a good time.

There were other panels on the theme of the convention – Steampunk, including panels on Oz and  Alice in Wonderland and other aspects of Victoria culture, such as their interest in the paranormal.

All in all it was a decent day that ended in a mild headache.

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Why I write with an outline

There is a saying in Hollywood, “Paper is cheaper than film.” That means it is always easier to experiment and work out story issues in the script before you start trying to film the movie. I find a similar thing is true of writing novels.

Outlines are faster than novels.

When I write I use an outline for anything larger than a short story. I find it is an essential part of my tool-kit in learning what my story really is and how to make it work to the best possible advantage. In the outline I can experiment with plot developments and twists. I can have a characters captured, killed, or ignored and see how that affects the overall plot and the other characters. If something doesn’t work, I have not wasted dozens of pages, perhaps thousands of words and who knows how many hours chasing down the wring path.

I understand not all writers can use the outline method. When I go to convention sometimes I feel like I am the token outline using author there and everyone else in the world simply fires up their favorite word-processors and the characters take off on adventures. I cannot do that. I have to know how my story is going to end. To get to that ending I have to have an outline. It’s like a map. I may go off the trail here and there exploring things as they pop-up, but the map lets me know which way is out.

I have had a major breakthrough in my understand of my next novel, ‘Cawdor.’ Because I am still in the outline stage it is easy for me to go back and incorporate all the new ideas and ramifications in the story without having to tear down and re-write most of a novel.

I cannot comprehend writing any other way.

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He Dies At The End

I mentioned seeing short horror films as this year Loscon. Here is the youtube of one of those films. Frankly I think the film makers did a bang-up job.

Remember, it is a horror film.

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