IAs I age I find I take less and less well to this whole travel caper. Sitting at the Perth airport my mine thoughts are on the flight itself – will it take off on time, will I get a good seat, will I be comfortable etc etc. Normal boring stuff. Might be time to break out the Kindle and get lost in a good book.
T-Zero days
Well, I’m all packed and leave in about 35 minutes. The family will be here, and I’m going to miss them. Dinner in Sydney tonight with pals, Ellen K tomorrow, and then on to Reno. Should be a great week and a half. I’m going to be interested to see how it is flying Virgin. This is the first time I’ve walked away from Qantas on an international flight, so it’s going to be a real test. We hope to take the whole family to the US in October/November, so this is a trial run.
I expect to be tweeting while traveling, and possbily blogging. There’s also some chance we’ll podcast, though don’t be surprised if there’s nothing next weekend. Consider it a possible hiatus. Anyhow, till the other side, g’bye!
And this is what Winter looks like here, right now.
T-One Day
As I write the big clock at RenovationSF says it’s five days and five hours till WorldCon. What’s focussing my attention much more is that it’s about sixteen hours until I board a flight for Sydney. Tomorrow night I’ll dine with friends in Sydney, then on Sunday will fly on to San Francisco. I’ll be tired and jetlagged, but I’ll also be staying with a dear friend and preparing to see many more in the coming days. It should be a wonderful week and a half.
Have I been preparing? Well….yes. I have packed (looks over shoulder at suitcase on floor of office). I have also got the day job to at least the point where I can be away for a short while, most projects are fine, and the reading is only a dreadful tsunami now. I have new business cards for Gary and I for the podcast, and I’ve also posted the last podcast before WorldCon. All is in hand (I think).
I have also read Snuff, the new novel by Terry Pratchett. It’s a Sam Vimes novel where Vimes, Sibyll, Young Sam and Willikins retire to Sibyll’s country home for a holiday. It goes as well as Vimes in the countryside ever does and, even allowing for a slightly bumpy start, I loved it a lot. One of my favourite books of the year. I hope to finish reading two other novels between now and WorldCon, but who knows? Till then!
Episode 63: Live with Gary K. Wolfe!
It looked, for a moment, that technical difficulties would prevent us getting this final pre-WorldCon podcast out to you, but we persevered, recording this one twice. We discussed many things, including changing concepts of the field, books that we’re reading and so on. We’ll be at WorldCon and look forward to meeting as many of you there as possible. We’ll also be recording, and hope to get something online from there (though it’s possible we might not). Hopefully we’ll see you here next week. In the meantime, we hope you enjoy the podcast.