kinzel: (srm)
Dear Friends of Liad and other Lee & Miller readers (and regular or irregular SF convention co-conspirators...)...

About My heart

*** Right. Serious stuff. During my week-long hospitalization for pneumonia in October, some cardiac irregularities were noted and I was diagnosed with cardiomyopathy. I'm currently on (and apparently responding to) medication, working a somewhat reduced workload, and starting on a regime intended to both stabilize and strengthen the heart muscle. I just finished a weekend wearing a Holter monitor (aren't electronics wonderful?) and as the new year goes forward we'll continue to evaluate how much world touring I'll be doing this year ... but things are looking brighter in the long run. Sharon and I both greatly appreciate the cards, letters, emails, tea, and other tokens of support, which helped make transitioning from
the old ordinary to the current reality much easier.

World touring, he said above? Yes, we're still planning on a couple Liaden Universe® World Tour events this year, one of which I can speak of at the moment, and will, because it is *starting to be time* to plan ahead.

WorldCon is going to be in Reno and we both intend to be on location there in about mumblety mumbleme mumblety -- where is that calendar, anyway? -- two hundred and thirty six or two hundred thirty seven days or so. My doctors figure I'll be up to a week in the heights by then***, so our planning is on-going .... and the hotel rooms are to be released for reservation before the end of January, so it is good to plan ahead.

For those new to this zoo, the Friends of Liad regularly get together at Worldcon and related SFictional events to meet and greet and sometimes just plain quietly party like dawn was yesterday. Oh ... who are the Friends of Liad? In a way they're a lot like the WSFS -- that is, they know they are and you can be a member by participating. No boundaries -- members come from around the world.

Friends of Liad share one or several of these traits: 1) they read Liaden Universe® books and stories by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller, they read other books or stories by Sharon Lee and/or Steve Miller, they know Sharon Lee and/or Steve Miller, or they hang with people who do and 2)they're willing to travel to conventions to meet and enjoy the company of people who also read or enjoy the company of the same authors, or to meet the authors, or to have breakfast with the authors, or to stay up all-night-long at get togethers frequented by the authors or by their friends who happen to read the authors.... Right, this is a really formal group we're talking about here.

In the past Friends of Liad have joined us (the authors, AKA Lee & Miller or Steve & Sharon) for breakfast, lunch, or dinner at worldcons and other conventions (especially conventions where the authors have been Guests of Honor or Special Guests), helped us find our way around strange cities, toted us from and to train stations, and from and to other area attractions: bookstores, zoos, restaurants, malls, office supply stores, blues clubs, and the like. FoL have also joined together to rent a suite for parties on multiple nights, for dinner outings with the authors, for an info table in the fan areas to share the joy of things Liaden with others while catching up with people who know who Pat Rin and Natessa are and who think Cheever ought to find a girl .... well, you get the idea --

And so -- if you're planning on being at ReNoVation: http://www.renovationsf.org/ ... and would like to take part in a Friends of Liad breakfast, or some other aspect of Liaden fannishness, reply here or send a note to fol@korval.com and we'll try to make sure you're put in touch with other like-minded FoL.

We're very much looking forward to getting out and about and seeing everyone in Reno this summer. And by the way, we expect to be signing Ghost Ship while we're there -- it is due out just before the convention. Come join us!
kinzel: (Default)
We're hoping for a reasonably nice day Sunday when we'll motor up the road and hour or so v early on the day to join other creative types and and fans at BangPop ...

http://bangpop.mbouchard.com/

This will be our first time there, and if you're within the radius of a quiet drive, feel free to come out and visit with us, pick-up a Carousel Tides sampler or any of the available SRM titles ...

Meanwhile I'm trying to get clarity about going to AlbaCon -- if I can schedule a small party for Saturday night who can help and who will come?
If i decide to appear for breakfast who will help with a two or three person Friends of Liad breakfast? if we push, we might beat the breakfast attendance at Raleigh for NASFIC!

Also, I need to start planning RSN about a solo trip to Boskone or Arisia -- I've never been to Arisia, can you believe?  -- and also doing the long range on what we'll do at Reno. Are there good carousels out that way? Are there good non-Amtrak railroads? What's the best hotel for food choices?  Never too soon to think about a Friends of Liad breakfast, or other get togethers with fans and friends!

Note: not planning on any overseas worldcons in the next decade, though a Western Canadian might draw our interest ... and a reminder to convention committees -- er need a long lead time for any GoH planning, due to Sharon's work.  Nine to fifteen months is good.
kinzel: (SFSteve)
We like to have our train tickets in hand before we head out for the station: an old habit. So today I ordered the tickets for our trip to Denvention, figuring that, with other convention in town that week and operatives moving in ahead of time for the Democratic Convention (which is in town a couple week after us), room on board might get tight.

So I went through with the deal and found space on-board... and discovered that AMTRAK will permit us to pick up the tickets at the station or ... they will charge us $15 for Express Mail delivery. Got to be someone here to sign for them -- Priority isn't good enough... sigh. I feel so secure.

I am not pleased. On the other hand I'm not driving 2200 miles (each way) in high summer just to object.

So far then: we have ordered tickets. We have reserved rooms. We have put in motion requests for party space. We're looking to have a Friends of Liad breakfast. We have each sent off a bio. We have made preliminary arrangements for cat sitter. We have each sent of a photo, we have begun planning what me might read since ... Duainfey will come out at the end of August (or early September) and not the beginning.

I was also going to start my walking tomorrow, so I'll be in decent shape for the Mile High City. On the other hand, there's snow in the forecast, so I did a short walk today, and rescued Santa Claus to boot.
==========================================

Amended to add: It looks like, given baggage limitations, that I may need volunteers to bring some items with them to Denvention. If you are going to be driving to the con
and might have room for a box or two around 10X18X11 or 12X12X10 (approximates)and under 30 lbs... let me know. Thx!

version 2
kinzel: (Cardinal)
We seem to be rushing off in all direction at once today. I expected to be putting up a post of more note but.. we have freezing rain on top of about 8 inches of snow and the lights are flickering so I'll just say hello, thanks for reading, hope you're comfortable, and hope to see you at Boskone. We'll get there, though if conditions are like this too long tomorrow we may have trouble making the train...

2 quick questions:

does your family have a member who ... everything happens to? The person most likely to buy the chocolate ice cream miss-marked as vanilla, most likely to have the wheel fall off the car after having new tires put on, most likely to be stuck in the 12 mile back-up in a snowstorm, most likely to be the one to arrive at the theatre after the doors are shut, or mislay the wedding ring?

If the answer above is "yes" ... are you that person?

One last note:The Friends of Liad party should be Saturday night at Boskone -- be there or .. .well... be elsewhere.
kinzel: (Default)
After yet another morning of driving around in RL, I've been spending some time this afternoon in SL looking at the submissions for the science fiction photo contest... interesting. The actual judging has started i guess, since every time I stop by the gallery I drop one out of my mental "Best In Show" list...

IN RL I see Locus Online mentions us in their New and Notable/ New in Paperback listing today... that is, they list Balance of Trade's Ace edition. Cool.

More later...
kinzel: (Default)
I want to mention that after I re-read my post yesterday I realized how .... familiar and even comfortable... the act of doing a voice broadcast from the house felt.

Not only have we done many online chats and IRC sessions over the years, but we've also been on radio together a number of times, (and TV a couple) and there's a similar sense of dislocation from being in the same "place" in the metaverse while sitting twenty feet apart, with walls between.

This might be because we most often do morning radio gigs, where it's not unusual for the "morning crew" to be sitting in different studios while giving the on-air semblance of sitting side by side and even sometimes swatting each other with a newspaper or some such...and some of the rock stations we've done "meet the sci-fi guys on Halloween" type gigs for were in converted houses with studios spread over three floors....

On top of that was the late-night low-power talk radio gig Rolanni did for some months in the middling-late 80s, where she reported mentally placing certain of the names on the computer screen as being "at the table under the fake palm tree to the left" and someone else obviously just plain sitting at the bar with the bottle open..." ... and when I joined her in studio and saw the names popping up on the big computer screen I immediately saw what she meant.

So having the on-screen chance to see names over faces is something of a melding of all those IRCs, radio shows, and even the unreality of TV preparation with the convention experience of having people sitting with nearly unreadable namecards side by side on a panel (the name cards ought also to face sideways so you can remember the name of the person you've just met and are supposed to be bantering with in front of a worldcon audience....

As as been pointed out by others: if you start making a career out of writing, expect to have to talk about it a lot.
kinzel: (Lord Black Cat)
Due to requests in various threads and email, I'm asked to talk about the Friends of Liad Park meeting in Second Life on Sunday.

It was quiet; and that was my fault, because I didn't mention the idea until quite late. Still, we averaged about three people at any one time, and -- perhaps oddly -- a number of folks showed up after the expected ending time. We also ended up with several people stopping by during the day on Monday, and later Monday evening.

Mostly we all showed off. Some showed off dragons perched on shoulders, others had adventures with dragons afterwards. We eventually managed to get a working copy of our first snippet selection -- that'd be snippets from Changeling -- available for reading at the FoL park bandstand/pavilion; as time goes on we expect to have snippets from most of our chapbooks and books in a readable-in-Second-Life format, available for Friends of Liad members at the park and also at Nifty Snippets, where we expect to make them available to the general SL populace for the princely sum of 1 Linden (amounting to about 1/3 cent, US, I suspect.)

We also shared some of the places we visit, practiced teleporting, practiced building things (please don't make it a habit to build things in the park, go to a sandbox...)and sat around and chatted about things in SL and RL. Rolanni was in writing form so she stopped in and out dress as Kit depending on her muse, Dulsey, and how hard I was laughing....

Once in Second Life there are several ways to find Friends of Liad Park. One is to use the "Find" tab at the (bottom center) of the Second Life screen and then select "All" on the right side at the top... to get a small window where you should have success with any of a number of searches. For example, Friends of Liad Park tends bring up a short list from which you can select the park and then teleport in. You can also use the "places" tab for similar results, and simply typing "science fiction" into "places" or "all" will also give the option of selecting the park. I will note that at last test "scifi" was not a valid search string for the FoL or FoL park!

We now have around 13 members of Friends of Liad (that's signed in as members in Second Life) and a smaller number signed up for ElseCon. My first attempt to start a group for folks with beards (and people in favor of folks with beards) was not successful, but I may try again, in time...

The park at this point (which is in the region named Clay, you can teleport directly to 9,230,130) consists of some "mature flat land", a couple of benches (donated by Kit Jimenez) and a pavilion with various SF related books in it. There's a Tree-and-Dragon sign on the wall of the house next door -- and on the roof of that house is a cube looking a lot like the cover of Crystal Dragon. I hope to be adding a small pond; if I can that will make it a very musical place since we already have a windchime. I'm also looking into affording a welcome robot for the park. Depending on interest level it's possible that the house next door could be removed, or if someone's *really* interested, the egyptian style home,mansion/temple perched more or less above the park is for sale and could be added to the property quite handily. We'd need to hold a bake sale or two to afford that, since it looks like the sale price would work out to about $170 or so in US$!...I've seen a couple of small outdoor stages with seating we could add, assuming we have enough "prims" available.

Oh yeah, if you get into Second Life you can also visit Second Childhood Carousel in Boreal (178,252,125, handily next to the still a-building Nifty Snippets shop. If Kit has time she can explain about the joys of the Independent State of Caledon and the clock shop there. As for me, as I type this the sound and image of the surf at Caledon waits beyond this text, and it's breakfast time.

July 2017

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