Coyote Cartography

Short report: best convention I’ve been to in years.

( Longer report... )

The observant will, of course, have noted that despite the message bankruptcy I am indeed still using AIM and logging onto MUCKs. I’m trying to do less of each, though, particularly when trying to do something else simultaneously: office work, writing, what have you. Is this “working,” whatever that may mean? Yes, even if I have some distance to go. The next step is getting more serious about workspace organization (i.e., my room) and time management. The latter’s always been a killer for me, but I think if I can take the approach of today I would like to get X done for small but concrete values of X I’ll manage. To pick a real-life example, “write something I can show for Claw & Quill” is so large it’s paralysis-inducing, but “Get something started for Claw & Quill” isn’t concrete enough to attack.

What I have accomplished is writing a short horror story, with the intent of sending it off for submission to the Eurofurence program book. (EF’s theme this year is horror.) I’m going to get a bit of feedback from the writing group before shoving it out the door, and, oh yes, come up with a title for the damn thing. I’m fairly happy with it in its current state, though. It may eventually show up elsewhere, but—assuming it makes it into the program book—you’ll just have to go to the con to read it.

As for why I am sending that off to EF, my answer for now is: because they’re just swell people. (Which is, from what I’ve seen, absolutely true.) Any other answers are waiting on other people to say something. (“You go first.” “No, after you.”)

To reiterate past mentions, I do still use Twitter, as chipotlecoyote, and update it both more frequently and more inanely than I do this journal. If you’re desperate to get in touch but e-mail is too slow and old fashioned for you, a Twitter reply or direct message will reach me faster. Theoretically.

So, the first real day of Anthrocon has passed. It’s gone well—I shouldn’t say “surprisingly well,” since it’s not as if I was expecting it to go poorly. I’ve met most of the people I’d expected to, even if in some cases I’ve merely run into them a couple times, and in a couple cases not even had time to introduce myself. Even so, I’ve hung around with a few interesting people, met a couple of them in person for the first time, and even been given an advance copy of the new Dirtbombs CD by Internationally Famous Rock Star™ Mick Collins.

It’s amazing—and maybe even a little disturbing—how much the city’s rolled out the red carpet for us. The staff of the “Steel City Diner” near the con hotel is wearing Anthrocon T-shirts they had made for them. Fernando’s Deli is running a con special. I’ve heard, albeit apocryphally, that last year Pittsburgh computed the economic impact to the city of the con at $3M. If so, this year I’d bet it’s on track to be $4M—on Thursday, there were 2500 people registered for the con.

Me being me, of course, I’m also here for the food. I did some research on restaurants to try; I found a few well-regarded upscale restaurants nearby (including the “Sonoma Grille” in the very hotel I’m staying at, which I find perversely amusing). Tonight, everyone I might have gone to dinner with seemed to vanish off on their own, and nearly always to Steel City—so I decided to go off on my own. On a typical whim, I decided to go off to a restaurant which wasn’t on my list but which sounded more interesting to me: Six Penn Kitchen. It seems to have the California approach to cuisine, by which of course I mean sprouts on everything. No, no, I mean a focus on local ingredients and food styles, reinterpreting them creatively. And it was definitely creative: a chilled watermelon soup drizzled with blueberry puree and basil, and dinner of a roast pork shank, crispy on the outside yet falling apart on the bone, sauerkraut bacon mashed potatoes, and a serrano applesauce. Even the drink I had was pretty creative: a “spatini,” Hangar One Kaffir Lime vodka, lemon sours, fresh cucumber (yes, really) and mint.

So what happens tomorrow (later today, but who’s counting)? Well, I have a badge I’ve commissioned from cooner, and I may try to get another sketch or two, depending. I have a collection I feel like I should buy from SofaWolf, even though I think I’ve read several of the stories already (they’re from the writing group).

On the off chance someone reading this is at Anthrocon and wants to get in touch with me, if you’re on my friends list you can SMS me through LiveJournal—and I’m wearing a moderately obvious name badge, too.

So I’ve been neglecting the journal again, I know. I’m considering beating myself into either writing something here every week, or (shorter things!) every day.

To catch up from where I last left off: I attended Further Confusion and had a fine enough time, mostly from meeting people I don’t see that often, which is the real reason I go to conventions in the first place. I didn’t buy anything much — if I’m remembering correctly, only an omnibus edition of Phil Foglio’s Girl Genius, something I’ve been meaning to read for a couple years.

The day before the convention, shaterri, Jeff, ladyperegrine and I went out to Kaygetsu, a fairly new and regionally-acclaimed Japanese restaurant. While it was suggested that I should do more “foodblogging,” I’d better remember to do such blogging quickly, since at this point I don’t remember much about the individual dishes we tried, other than the blanket observation that they were all good. My main entree was a marinated black cod, which went past good to pretty fantastic. (I think I’ve only had black cod before at a Seattle-area restaurant that shaterri’s taken me to twice.)

The razor handle that I’d bought at Target last year and written about has started to flake out, not holding its little Mach 3 blade cartridges securely anymore; the brush that came with the set fell apart quite quickly. (Fortunately I had a considerably better shaving brush I’d been given as a gift a couple years before.) So this last Saturday I decided to take the plunge I’d been considering and buy a “safety razor,” one of those old-fashioned razors that takes double-edged blades. (Nowadays that doesn’t sound very safe, but they replaced straight razors!) While I could have done this by mail order, I happened to know that the new Westfield San Francisco Centre shopping mall — which the Powell Street BART/MUNI station has a direct entrance to — has an Art of Shaving store in it, and that they sell safety razors there, at the “immediate gratification from a boutique store” markup. So, I made a trip up to the city and bought that razor, with its one sample blade and a couple free sample packs of Art of Shaving’s own shaving cream.

I’d like to say that after three shaves I’m getting the closest, most bestest shave that I ever have, but I can’t. On the flip side, I only got two nicks on the first shave and none on the other two, and I’ve been managing to get slightly closer shaves with each try; I’m hoping in a week or two I’ll be up to par. The one thing I have noticed is that the shave really does seem to be less irritating: the closer the shave gets the more it feels like I’m removing the top layer of skin, I’ll grant, but after even the gentlest cartridge blade shave, I could see the blotchy unhappiness of irritation. With the safety razor, that isn’t there.

The irritation that is there the last couple of days, though, is my fingers/wrist on my left hand, a somewhat hard-to-localize pain that increases with some movements and pressure. While it could well be the onset of the carpal tunnel syndrome some might think I’ve been courting the last thirty years, I’m not convinced I didn’t sprain it in some odd fashion this weekend. (I’m also not convinced I don’t have the onset of arthritis already in that hand, but that’s another story.) After a bit of deliberation I’ve bought one of those cheap wrist splints at the drug store; I’m going to see if keeping it mostly still a few days helps. It almost certainly can’t hurt.