May 2008

Married!
The last two weeks have been an amazing amount of "Go! Go! GO!" as Jeff and I went to Las Vegas to get married. The week before the wedding, we had professional pictures of us taken in our wedding outfits to put in small albums as gifts for the parents. I haven't seen the Excalibur professional photos yet but I'm not holding my breath in hopes of high quality for them.

While in Las Vegas, we caught a few shows: Louie Andersen who was really funny. Ronn Lucas who had some surprisingly ribald humor for a kids show and the Tournament of Kings dinner show which was fabulous. I very much enjoyed it. Also, thanks to Heather leading us on Monorail Madness, we stopped by Quarks in the Hilton and visited a number of casinos - Caesars Palace, the MGM Grand, the Luxor and, of course, the Excalibur. Then there was a brief stint to the Fremont Experience and its ceiling of lights. It was a good time.

Thoughts about Las Vegas - it is loud, bright and smoky all the time. Plus, people want to sell you stuff... all the time. This stuff ranges from the merely expensive (time shares) to the truly obscene (hooker cards anyone?). The gambling was amusing. I did very well at Casino War but that was about it. Heather was good at the slots and Jeff hit it bit at the roulette wheel. I'm glad I visited but, honestly, I never want to return. It was a good experience - once.

The wedding was great after all of the minor problems and one major crisis were worked out. 90 minutes before you wedding is not the time to discover that you have forgotten your custom made corset for your wedding outfit. It would have been less of a crisis if I had realized it when I unpacked two days earlier. But, thanks to the heroic efforts of my maid of honor, Heather, I had an adequate substitute for the wedding.

As an aside, when I was in the car with Heather, commenting that she had been awesome the entire trip but I wondered what she would do if a real crisis broke out, I really didn't want a crisis to break out. I was just speculating. As it turned out, she was just as awesome as always and for that I am ever grateful.

I am also grateful for those who made it to the actual wedding and the CA reception. It meant a lot to me to see people I had not seen in a long time. Rob was most excellent as Jeff's best man. Rich and Cil were spectacular as the candid picture takers at the wedding and the coordinators of the CA reception. Wendy and Jeff were very generous as the hosts of the CA reception. It was very cool to get the comment "Doritors, Krispy Kremes, Asti... best wedding reception ever."

I am very pleased that both of my parents dressed up as the Queen and King for the wedding. They both looked wonderful. It made all of the pictures look that much more cool. My mom gave me an old necklace she used to wear all the time. It was a gold filled glass and her gold teething charm. Somehow, it fit perfectly with my wedding garb.

Jeff, my husband, was a saint through all of the trip and the corset crisis. He understands that I get uptight. He understands that sometimes, all he can do is be there. We had a great time playing the slots and gambling. Plus, he was the handsomest man there in my eyes. Sometimes, I just can't stop looking at him.

The final thought on Las Vegas and the wedding is this: Why the heck aren't there any simple "Just Married" t-shirts in the casinos or t-shirt stores all around the casinos? I mean, Las Vegas is practically the marriage capital of the world and I didn't see so much as a "Just Married" bumper sticker. I don't get it. I really don't. Some out there in Las Vegas, you can made a fortune over this. "Just Married" t-shirts are in need.

My family and my friends are aware that I am married. I've begun the transition of letting the state and government know this as well. The license was filed immediately and I've got the certified copies to this fact. Today, I went through the process of changing my name on my SSN card. Tomorrow, I am going to make the attempt to get my driver's license changed. Next week will be the bank. All the while, I will be informing my various employers of the name change.

All this makes my life a little complicated because I will continue to write under my maiden name - which now makes it my pen name which is weird to me - while being paid under my married name.

The last bit of my wedding will be the Washington reception on the 17th. Rob, the best man, is also a fabulous chef. He is catering the reception. Also, we have a sculpted cake from Mike's Amazing Cakes for it. It is going to be the Dark Tower on a field of red roses with the broken monoliths scattered around. Two gunslingers will be walking up the path to the Dark Tower, just about to enter. I can't wait to see it. Yes, there will be lots of pictures.

Then, life will go back to as normal as our lives ever are. Which is to say, not that normal which is the way I like it. In five months, Jeff and I will be in Hawaii for our honeymoon.

Back From BayCon
The last couple of weeks have been busy-busy in an amazing fashion. I'm working on a giant project from Amazon and I've started the on-site portion of the vendor contract at Microsoft. While trying to keep up some sort of fiction writing on the side. I really do get to choose which 70 hours of the week I work.

Last weekend, I was at BayCon 2008 in the Bay Area as a guest panelist. I had a pretty darned good time. But since I'm running short on time, ya'll will just get the highlights of the good, the bad and the ugly.

The Good...

I really enjoyed the panels I was on. They were scattershot amongst the topics of gaming, writing, publishing and storytelling. My most daunting panel was the "A Shot Rang Out..." - a panel I had never heard of much less been a part of before that has a huge following. The short version is that the panelists tell a round robin story with each of their segments ending in a quote pulled from a box. This is a lot harder than it seems. My favorite panel was the "Sex, Lies and Publishing" panel where we all discussed interesting and appropriate ways to get the attention of an agent, publisher or editor as well as what NOT to do with these people.

Brag moment: I moderated only one panel but when I was done, one of the other panelists told me it was the best panel he had been on all weekend. Then two audience members told me it had been the best panel they had seen and I had done an excellent job allowing both the panelists and the audience to speak. A final audience member told me that I was the best moderator they had ever seen.

In the aforementioned "Sex, Lies and Publishing" panel, I mentioned I did not yet have an agent but I was looking for one. Later in the convention, another author came up to me and asked me for my card. Her agent, who had just sold the author's first fantasy novel, was looking for new clients and the author thought that I might be a good fit. This is the first time I am going to get a personal recommendation to an agent before I've even written to them. I'm pretty chuffed about the idea.

Over all, the author/publishing networking was very good. I have some good leads to follow up for my anthologies as well as some of my other novels. Specific names and contact information and exactly what they are looking for.

I got to see a number of friends I had not seen in a while. That was really nice. Plus, I made a bunch of new convention friends which will make going down to the Bay Area working conventions (as opposed to the ones that I play at) that much more interesting.

Weird but cool moment: I was recognized as the "Jenn Brozek" from the Casey and Andy comic strip by a girl who told me that "I" was her favorite character in the strip. That "I" had just the right amount of coolness and craziness and, of course, I won the Quantum Cop in the end. It was very surreal but fun.

The hotel staff was very friendly and very helpful. They really got into the spirit of things. I was very amused to see the hotel staff running around with convention ribbons.

Oh, yes. I have a new filk artist to enjoy. I accidentally wandered into a Seanan McGuire concert and didn't leave until it was done. That woman has a beautiful voice and a wicked sense of humor that I can identify with.

The Bad...

The new hotel was interesting. It's got a lot going for it. A whole lot. However, the hotel rooms are very small as are the upper hallways. This is difficult with so many people in the hotel at one time. Plus, the elevators are always a problem. The beds themselves seemed a bit worn in the fact that mine had a distinct divot in the middle that caused my ankles to bend at odd angles when I curled up.

Also, while the food was only slightly expensive and very tasty, I never seemed to hit the restaurants at the right time. Ditto with the Green Room. It closed pretty early. So, my eating was completely thrown off.

The Ugly...

The hotel is connected to a convention center and another hotel on the other side. That hotel was hosting a Charismatic Catholics convention. Needless to say, there were some clashes. By-and-large, everyone who visited us from the other convention was very nice and merely curious. I was happy to tell them what we were and what I was doing there.

Unfortunately, there was one unpleasant incident that involved me personally and I heard about a couple of others. Saturday night, I was gaming with friends. As previously mentioned, I sucked at actually eating properly so at 9:30 at night, I broke from the game to run to the gift shop to grab a snack. While there, I was accosted by an old man from the other convention who yelled at me for wearing black and for participating in a harmful culture. "Don't you people understand what kind of culture you are creating for yourselves? Don't you people understand what you are doing to yourselves?"

Needless to say, while I had been polite to the man, I was livid by the time I got back to the game. Outraged and furious. I wasn't even in costume. I was in black jeans and a black sweater. Clearly the man had seen me as an easy target because I was polite and friendly and because he had not been able to yell at someone else that he wanted to.

The next morning, I reported the incident to program operations, who sent me to convention operations who escorted me to one of the hotel managers. Apparently, some of the Charismatic Catholics had been complaining about the existence of the Bay Con convention going on at the same time as their convention. I believe I was the first official complaint of being attacked by one of them. The manager said he would inform hotel security and would ask them to speak to the convention hall security and see if they could make sure that nothing like this happened again.

I suppose it meant more coming from a visiting author who was not dressed in a costume and who was there because they were working. Either way, it should not have happened at all and I am upset that it did.

Over All...

Despite the bit of ugliness in the middle, I had a really good time and I was happy to be a guest at BayCon. I've already been assured by program operations that I will be invited back again next year. They like me and I like them.