Starting Again
November 8, 1999
5:59 a.m.
Just flew in from World Fantasy Convention, and boy are my arms tired. Yeah, yeah, yeah...just what you want after a several day span of no entries, a day that starts with an overused joke.  Anyway, I can report with full confidence that I am really, really tired this morning. The brain is a harder start than a '67 Chevy in an Alaskan winter. Our flight back yesterday was at 8:10 in the morning, so we wer up at 4:30 to catch it. But, Ron, I can hear you say, you're up at 4:30 every day, right? So what makes this so difficult? quit your whining and get to work, all right? Arg. We went to bed at the early hour of about midnight the evening before, so we managed about 4 or so hours of sleep. This after beginning to get my body arranged to cnvention time, but not quite making it. [aside -- Something bad about a four day convention rather than a five day is that it's in that never-never zone for bodily adjustment. With a five day Worldcon, it's worth the three days it takes to adjust my body rhythm because I get a solid two days benefit. With a four day WFC, the benefit is only a single day (but the payment remains fixed).] Enough of this though. What did I get from the convention? Not as much as I wanted to in hard fact. Or a lot more than I wanted to, depending. Bottom line, I spent most of the time observing, which means I didn't sell myself a whole lot. I chatted with lots of folks--met NAW people, James, Steve, Chiara, Caroline, John, Tamela, etc., etc. (I think Tamela was worried that I was going to mention her spilling water on me at the SFF.net party, but I would never stoop so low as to do that, so she shouldn't have worried. [chuckling evilly]) I attended a couple panels. Nothing major. But I took what I saw, internalized it, and used it to place my writing in some context that will help me here soon. What I learned is that (duh), I need to be writing novels. This makes me feel pretty good, of course, as that's what I have up on my plan. But as I watched people work this weekend, I was really struck by this. (That slapping sound you hear in the background is Steve Leigh whacking me over the head). I had never been to a World Fantasy Con before because it usually falls on halloween weekend, which, of course, is Brigid's birthday. We all need to pick our priorities, and right now, doing the trick or treating thing with Brigid easily outweighs a convention. WFC is a much more "pro" oriented conference than the others, though. And I'm glad I went. So I came back with many thoughts in my head. I have a business trip for much of next week, which kind of gets in the way of a few things. It's an opportunity ripe for postponing any serious work. But I'm not going to do that. Well, okay, maybe I am. I had planned to start working on a new novel right now. I will push that off just a little. But instead of falling back on short material, i'm going to make my goal for the rest of November to go back to the three novels I've got, read and assess them, and either slate them for rewrite or get them in the mail. Simple as that. Then comes December, and a book. Then January and a book. Nothing like a little work to take ones mind off how tired you are, you know? Many Thanks to Shannon Wendt for her award   Yeah, but will they be any good? Daily Persistence is © Ron Collins |
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