We're home
Saturday, September 10th, 2005 06:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rolanniThe cats are unusually clingy; Scrabble even slept on the bed with us last night, which she never does, and Mozart calls if I go out of his sight for more than a minute or two. Max! and Patia are Steve's two shadows, switching over to me when he goes out to run errands.
They're usually much more sanguine about our occasional long absences -- and subsequent returns. Mary reports no unusual happenings, and no overt upset on her shift. Could be they were watching the TV news and got themselves all bothered -- geography's not exactly their strong suit...
The ride down to Dragon*Con was by turns harrowing and drear, with unrelenting gray skies when it wasn't actually pouring. We dodged out of Springfield, Mass., on Tuesday morning, just ahead of a tornado watch, and fled in the rain to Chambersburg, PA, our arranged stop-over for the night.
Argent the Forester stayed the course, got us out of at least two potentially bad scrapes and was in general a pleasure and blessing to drive. We saw several baddish accidents, the worst being the tractor trailer that had taken a hard right off the road in Virginia somewhere, and climbed the sheer stone bank. The tractor was propped against the rocks, as we went past and the cab -- wasn't in so good a place, let's say.
Thursday was still gray, but not as rainy. We did the next leg of the journey, pulling off Route 85 about 50 miles outside of Atlanta for a sandwich and a shake at Arby's, and to wait for the "rush hour" to thin. Our co-diners were a SEAL team, towing their high-speed boat and a trailer filled with scuba gear, heading for New Orleans and the relief effort. From them, we heard of rescuers being fired at and the rumor that one of the pipelines had burst, leaving Atlanta without gas. As we later learned, this last was only a rumor -- the pipeline had been turned off, to prevent it from rupturing, and was turned back on again by next morning, though not before some folks had seen fit to start charging five bucks a gallon or more for gas.
We hit Atlanta about 10:30 p.m., after an ...interesting drive in during the not-rush-hour, found our hotel with a minimum of fuss, unloaded the car, claimed our room, checked in on-line and crashed.
Friday, we slept in, wandering over to the Marriott around 1 p.m. We found the Exhibit Hall and therein both the Meisha Merlin/Don Maitz booth and The Missing Volume booth. We also had our first sight of the trade paper Liaden Universe Companion, Volume One, which is BEAUtiful, and which leapt off Stephe Pagel and![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
missingvolume's tables into the hands of many people eager to give them good homes.
Friday we had a con-sponsored signing, where we caught up with several Friends of Liad, including Douglas Winston,ellayn, swedishsis, pimpcook, gryphonlsb, nlbarber, Sasha Wagner, Brian Davis, Chris Hempel, Andy Funk -- and mea culpa to all the others who I've forgotten to include.
That evening, we had dinner with Anne McCaffrey, Todd McCaffrey, Lea Davis and Stephe Pagel. It was a noisy, animated group, the food was good, the waitstaff patient, and a good time was had by all.
Saturday, we had a pleasant late lunch/early dinner withellayn and swedishsis, after signings at The Missing Volume's booth and at the official convention venue. That evening and into the the early morning, we were at the Liaden Lounge, hosted by pimpcook, Chris Hempel and gryphonlsb, with assistance from ellayn and swedishsis. After a little bit of a timing dance, we were able to present ellayn with a well-deserved award for her years (years? eek!) of devoted work on behalf of the Liaden Universe(R) and the Friends of Liad.
We stayed up far too late on Saturday, talking, so naturally we had an early reading on Sunday. The room, once we found it (the writers track at Dragon*Con was in the sub-basement of the third con hotel, as far away from the rest of the con as it was possible to get and still be on the same planet), was gratifyingly full, and got fuller as the hour went on. We read from Sword of Orion and the response was enthusiastic.
My bad knee (never do a double somersault down a flight of concrete stairs and land on your knees at the bottom) had been acting up all day, so we went back to our room early and crashed. Monday, I schlepped the cane, which, alas, turned out to be the Right Thing to Do.
Monday, we signed at The Missing Volume, and had another short visit with Anne. After, we settled withmissingvolume and Stephe Pagel, packed up the chapbooks that hadn't sold, took it all back to the room, hit the Steak and Ale for dinner, packed up and lay down for a couple hours.
We fled Atlanta at 3:20 a.m. on Tuesday, heading for Chambersburg.
The day was bright and the wind was at our back. We made good time to Pennsylvania, had a leisurely dinner and retired early.
Wednesday morning, my cellphone indicated that I had voice mail -- which I did: from Monday. This is the first time TracFone has failed me, but it was a pretty major failure. Argh. The thought of seeking out a "real" cellphone provider is Just Too Depressing.
At breakfast, we made the acquaintence of a team of FEMA rescuers and their dogs, heading back to Massachusetts from their tour in Mississippi, then we headed over to Maryland the easy way, to pay our respects to the parents.
Respects paid and a good night's sleep behind us, we got on the road early, going the back ways to Carlisle, smiling at the mist rising up out of the dawn-dewed grass and the occasional farm pond. We hit the big road about 8 and made good time -- such good time that we began to think we'd hit home around 9 p.m., much earlier than projected.
Then, we hit the traffic jam on 90. Forty minutes to go down the ramp to the toll booth, after which we blessedly had clear sailing -- for twenty miles, when we encountered another parking lot. We were trapped there for another half hour, then ditched down an escape ramp, not really caring where it was or where it went, as long as we got out of the traffic jam. Once out, we threaded many pretty Massachussetts back roads until 40 cross 3 and 3 crossed 101 and 101 took us back up onto 95 at Dover, and so home slightly before midnight.
Things I learned on this trip:
*Good music is essential for long drives.
*Singing is therapeutic, even if you can't carry a tune.
Yesterday was a bit of a wash, as the first day home from cons always are. We unpacked, started the laundry, coddled the cats, watched "Night on the Galactic Railroad" (which was Deeply Strange), and went to bed early.
Today, we did errands, more laundry, and this trip report. I've got a bunch of paperwork to do from the con, and life-as-it-is to catch up with. The property tax bill arrived today, the checking accounts need to be rectified, and we need to make room for eight or nine hundred trade papers, which will be arriving sometime early next week.
They're usually much more sanguine about our occasional long absences -- and subsequent returns. Mary reports no unusual happenings, and no overt upset on her shift. Could be they were watching the TV news and got themselves all bothered -- geography's not exactly their strong suit...
The ride down to Dragon*Con was by turns harrowing and drear, with unrelenting gray skies when it wasn't actually pouring. We dodged out of Springfield, Mass., on Tuesday morning, just ahead of a tornado watch, and fled in the rain to Chambersburg, PA, our arranged stop-over for the night.
Argent the Forester stayed the course, got us out of at least two potentially bad scrapes and was in general a pleasure and blessing to drive. We saw several baddish accidents, the worst being the tractor trailer that had taken a hard right off the road in Virginia somewhere, and climbed the sheer stone bank. The tractor was propped against the rocks, as we went past and the cab -- wasn't in so good a place, let's say.
Thursday was still gray, but not as rainy. We did the next leg of the journey, pulling off Route 85 about 50 miles outside of Atlanta for a sandwich and a shake at Arby's, and to wait for the "rush hour" to thin. Our co-diners were a SEAL team, towing their high-speed boat and a trailer filled with scuba gear, heading for New Orleans and the relief effort. From them, we heard of rescuers being fired at and the rumor that one of the pipelines had burst, leaving Atlanta without gas. As we later learned, this last was only a rumor -- the pipeline had been turned off, to prevent it from rupturing, and was turned back on again by next morning, though not before some folks had seen fit to start charging five bucks a gallon or more for gas.
We hit Atlanta about 10:30 p.m., after an ...interesting drive in during the not-rush-hour, found our hotel with a minimum of fuss, unloaded the car, claimed our room, checked in on-line and crashed.
Friday, we slept in, wandering over to the Marriott around 1 p.m. We found the Exhibit Hall and therein both the Meisha Merlin/Don Maitz booth and The Missing Volume booth. We also had our first sight of the trade paper Liaden Universe Companion, Volume One, which is BEAUtiful, and which leapt off Stephe Pagel and
missingvolume's tables into the hands of many people eager to give them good homes.Friday we had a con-sponsored signing, where we caught up with several Friends of Liad, including Douglas Winston,
ellayn, swedishsis, pimpcook, gryphonlsb, nlbarber, Sasha Wagner, Brian Davis, Chris Hempel, Andy Funk -- and mea culpa to all the others who I've forgotten to include. That evening, we had dinner with Anne McCaffrey, Todd McCaffrey, Lea Davis and Stephe Pagel. It was a noisy, animated group, the food was good, the waitstaff patient, and a good time was had by all.
Saturday, we had a pleasant late lunch/early dinner with
ellayn and swedishsis, after signings at The Missing Volume's booth and at the official convention venue. That evening and into the the early morning, we were at the Liaden Lounge, hosted by pimpcook, Chris Hempel and gryphonlsb, with assistance from ellayn and swedishsis. After a little bit of a timing dance, we were able to present ellayn with a well-deserved award for her years (years? eek!) of devoted work on behalf of the Liaden Universe(R) and the Friends of Liad. We stayed up far too late on Saturday, talking, so naturally we had an early reading on Sunday. The room, once we found it (the writers track at Dragon*Con was in the sub-basement of the third con hotel, as far away from the rest of the con as it was possible to get and still be on the same planet), was gratifyingly full, and got fuller as the hour went on. We read from Sword of Orion and the response was enthusiastic.
My bad knee (never do a double somersault down a flight of concrete stairs and land on your knees at the bottom) had been acting up all day, so we went back to our room early and crashed. Monday, I schlepped the cane, which, alas, turned out to be the Right Thing to Do.
Monday, we signed at The Missing Volume, and had another short visit with Anne. After, we settled with
missingvolume and Stephe Pagel, packed up the chapbooks that hadn't sold, took it all back to the room, hit the Steak and Ale for dinner, packed up and lay down for a couple hours.We fled Atlanta at 3:20 a.m. on Tuesday, heading for Chambersburg.
The day was bright and the wind was at our back. We made good time to Pennsylvania, had a leisurely dinner and retired early.
Wednesday morning, my cellphone indicated that I had voice mail -- which I did: from Monday. This is the first time TracFone has failed me, but it was a pretty major failure. Argh. The thought of seeking out a "real" cellphone provider is Just Too Depressing.
At breakfast, we made the acquaintence of a team of FEMA rescuers and their dogs, heading back to Massachusetts from their tour in Mississippi, then we headed over to Maryland the easy way, to pay our respects to the parents.
Respects paid and a good night's sleep behind us, we got on the road early, going the back ways to Carlisle, smiling at the mist rising up out of the dawn-dewed grass and the occasional farm pond. We hit the big road about 8 and made good time -- such good time that we began to think we'd hit home around 9 p.m., much earlier than projected.
Then, we hit the traffic jam on 90. Forty minutes to go down the ramp to the toll booth, after which we blessedly had clear sailing -- for twenty miles, when we encountered another parking lot. We were trapped there for another half hour, then ditched down an escape ramp, not really caring where it was or where it went, as long as we got out of the traffic jam. Once out, we threaded many pretty Massachussetts back roads until 40 cross 3 and 3 crossed 101 and 101 took us back up onto 95 at Dover, and so home slightly before midnight.
Things I learned on this trip:
*Good music is essential for long drives.
*Singing is therapeutic, even if you can't carry a tune.
Yesterday was a bit of a wash, as the first day home from cons always are. We unpacked, started the laundry, coddled the cats, watched "Night on the Galactic Railroad" (which was Deeply Strange), and went to bed early.
Today, we did errands, more laundry, and this trip report. I've got a bunch of paperwork to do from the con, and life-as-it-is to catch up with. The property tax bill arrived today, the checking accounts need to be rectified, and we need to make room for eight or nine hundred trade papers, which will be arriving sometime early next week.
