Nine Things About Nine Worlds

*cough* *splutter*

Blimey, lets open a window in here and let some air in, eh?

*waves metaphorical duster about*

Ok.

We just got back from Nine Worlds 2015. It was great fun, and only caused a bit of stress because I slipped into the mindset of "Must Do All The Things!" which is impossible, especially if you need to eat. So a "Nine Things About Nine Worlds" post seemed like a good idea, as a bit of a post-event wind-down.

1. Staying in the same hotel as the con? Big and clever. Not only is the Radisson a pretty darn nice place (as you might expect from a 4-star hotel) with an impressive breakfast buffet (cheese for breakfast - it's the way forward), but virtually no travel time means you get to experience much more of the event. Case in point: dragging an already tired 11 year old to Just A Minute Only a Moment starting at 10 pm would be impossible if it wasn't just a two minute walk back to our room at the end. 
2. Only a Moment! I've been wanting to see one of Paul Cornell's fabled "Just A Minute"s at a con for some time now and wasn't disappointed. Joe Abercombie all but walked away with it, but all four panellists were great and even the Boy enjoyed it despite being shattered and not understanding half the topics (or indeed, all the rules). 
3. All the panels and discussions we made it too were pretty good: some better moderated than other, but interesting, well-informed panellists, good humour and audience participation were the order of the day. I never had the courage to ask a question, but the Wife did a fair bit and got some good responses. 
4. We took a stack of books down to get signed and actually got them all signed, despite missing one scheduled session. This is because Joanne Harris is lovely and recognised us from previous day and a book-signing we went to earlier in the year. And possibly Twitter.
5. Actually all the authors we spoke to were lovely. As well as the three mentioned above, we bought and has signed Snorri Kristjansson's first book after seeing him on a panel. And not just the authors - every single person we interacted with was friendly and helpful. I just wish I hadn't had an attack of shy every time I approached someone: just about managed to give away my "Awesome Cosplay" tokens.
6. We bought other books too - some that we'd been meaning to get for a while as well as those on a whim. With the freebies given away in the goodie bags, we came home with quite a lot of books. Just before moving house. Oh well.
7. Genki Gear t-shirts! I splashed out on the convention tee, the Boy got the classic "Hamsters Everywhere Salute You" and the Wife got one of their 10 for 10 - the new "Science Investigates the Unknown". 
8. It's not all positives though: the popularity of some panels meant unless you got there early there was no chance of getting in - resulting in long queues and quite a few disappointments. And having the Boy in tow meant I didn't feel up to running about trying to squeeze into second or third options. 
9. Once again, I tended towards the All The Books track and once again I came away thinking "I should try writing again". And so I will. 

Definitely, definitely going again next year. With more flexible plans but hopefully more courage to get involved.

Procrastination and an update

It's been nearly six months so it's about time I posted something here. I'm still not dead. I'm still working and mostly not hating it. Some days drag and then other fly by and then suddenly it's Friday and I'm wearing the wrong socks or something.

I've started writing again. Like, today. I'd been trying the "just write what I feel like it" and that worked well for a bit and then I stopped as usual. Now I'm trying to concentrate on just one story and actually carry on with it when I get time. Like during my lunch break at work today. My laptop is just about light enough to not be too much of a hassle to carry to work and back for less than thirty minutes of use. I may not do that too much though. And no doubt I'll lose enthusiasm for this as well. Writing is hard. You need to actually press the keys and everything.

I haven't been reading much, though did get through a couple of the books we got free from Nine Worlds. Yeah, we went to Nine Worlds this year. We're going next year too. I may end up using all my annual leave on geek activities again and have to call on family and a lovely partner to help entertain and supervise the boy. Larp was also good and also something I'm keeping at despite not really doing the things I intended to. Plot is for other people. I'm happy enough drinking cider and angsting about all my friends dying.

 Back into the autumn now and school and uni and stuff. The boy went to Robinwood with his class despite spending most of the summer adamant he didn't want to go. He had a whale of a time and apparently is really good at archery. He sure as heck doesn't get that from me. My better half appears to be even more busy than she was before which I didn't think was physically possible, And might have Freshers' Flu. Occupational hazard.

It's our anniversary tomorrow. We had a meal out on Monday while boy was away (and over-indulged in both food and wine) but otherwise have no plans to celebrate. I may manage a card, but utterly failed to think about presents. We're travelling down to the deepest South for friends' wedding and their daughter's christening and it was enough of a scramble to get organised for that. I really am no better at planning ahead, although I've been managing to order repeat prescriptions before running out of medication for quite a while now. And I have been on this medicine for quite a while now. I think it's still being useful, despite a few slips. Certainly the one day I missed a pill this month had noticeable effects. Although I have been worried I was starting to withdraw again....I've made a small effort to try and actually pay attention to people, although I'm no better at getting in touch with friends and family who live further away. But that's what Facebook is for, isn't it? And I have been getting grunpy and short-tempered with people. The problem with trying to avoid introspection because that leads to rumination is that you avoid noticing potential problems in your own behaviour. I may be relying too much on other people telling me when something is wrong. Fortunately at least one person in my life is very vocal about when I've been ignoring him and never want to play on the Wii with him. That he probably does get from me.

[Fiction] A Morning Adventure

Inspired by fragment of dream just before waking and hastily written up over breakfast.
--

Daddy left the play pen gate open. He was grumpy as he was most mornings, but he'd come when he called and picked him up gently and taken him downstairs. He put him in the pen then headed straight to the kitchen to let the dogs out – they barked excitedly when they saw him and drowned out the faint calls from the front room.

So he pushed open the gate and stepped out of the play pen. He followed Daddy to the kitchen and found he wasn't there and the back door was also wide open. A blast of cold air came from it; there was a sprinkling of snow on the ground and an eerie sort of pale light that looked much whiter than daylight usually did. He picked up his sippy cup that was lying on the floor under the table and shook it. It was empty.

He headed out into the back garden. He could hear Daddy and the dogs but couldn't see them, they must have gone round the side. But something caught his eye in the woods that started just the other side of the hedge – a glimpse of bright red moving among the trees. He toddled down the lawn and squeezed through the hole in the hedge that the dogs kept making.

He'd wandered some way into the woods before realising he'd lost sight of the red and that he was starting to get cold. He stopped and looked round for Daddy or Mummy but couldn't see either of them and was getting ready to start crying when he saw the red again and was captivated. It was a man, taller than Daddy, wearing a bright red coat that went all the way below his knees, and a bright red hat too. The coat and hat had white fur along the bottom, like Mummy's big coat, and the hat had a ball of white on top that bobbed up and down as he walked. He was carrying a bag over his shoulder, and walking alongside him was something that looked like a horse but with horns, something like a cow's but much bigger and branching off.

He forgot about crying and went towards the man and his not-horse, who seemed to slow down just for him to catch up. When he reached them he was a little scared, the man and beast were both so big, but they stopped walking and the man turned and bent down to look at him and smiled. He handed his sippy cup up to the man, still a bit too shy to say anything, and the man didn't say anything but put his bag down and took the cup. He put the cup into the top of his bag and pulled it out again straight away and handed it back.

He snatched it and drank greedily – it was full of slightly warm milk which tasted better than anything he'd had in a long time. The man started walking again, so he stuck his hand up and the man took it and together they walked through the woods, the not-horse following behind, snuffling slightly and breathing warm air down his back. He didn't feel cold any more.

They left the woods and turned down an alleyway and onto the main street that he recognised from going into town with Mummy. The man led him right to his front door and gave it a slight push – it drifted open just wide enough for him to slip through. The man let go of his hand and he looked up at him. The man smiled again and put his bag down, reached into it, and brought out of piece of toast with butter melted in. He took it, it was still warm, and bit off a mouthful. He finally felt brave enough to say “bye-bye” and waved, dropping bits of toast from both hand and mouth. The man just nodded and turned to walk away.

He went inside and immediately heard Mummy and Daddy calling for him. He tottered down the hallway – there was a bang as the front door closed behind him – and went into the front room. Mummy came in from the kitchen and shouted in relief. She rushed up to him and picked him up and hugged him and kissed him. The Daddy appeared in the doorway and exclaimed “Thank God!” and then frowned. “But where did he get that toast?”