Sam's Backup Page

So I am traveling this week, but I brought my origami paper with me! (I brought the quirky origami paper that folds weird 'cause it's paper-backed foil.) Today I made a golden Penguin And Child.



I do love the way the foil looks in the final figure, even if the corners are a bit sloppy. THE GOLDEN PENGUIN -- it sounds like a spy novel.

Otherwise today I have mostly hung out with people and played Avengers Academy on my phone. Although I did also eat fried cheese curds. Fried cheese curds sit at the parallel apexes of "food that is bad for you" and "the best thing I've ever put in my mouth".

I wake up most morning at 4 to go running, and this morning I woke up at 4 per usual, not because my alarm went off but because a cat was standing on me. And for a split second I thought, oh, the cat wants to go running with me this morning! He's waiting for me to put on my running shoes!

But then I realized that was nonsense, and I went back to sleep. NO RUNNING TODAY, CAT.

Overheard in the airport today: "He was a preacher and he'd had six bypasses, and he was going to Vegas with his wife when she broke her hip, and I was left holding this body!"

I spent the rest of the flight wishing I'd turned around and demanded that woman tell me the full story of the cardiac preacher, his fragile wife, their aborted Vegas trip, and what body?

I also spent much of the flight sleeping in order to escape from the two dreadful women I sat with, one of whom asked me to buckle her safety belt for her (I told her I'd call a flight attendant, she was creeptastic and turned out to be a holy roller). The other one asked if I could put her bags in the rack for her and the only reason I did was that she looked like she had low muscle tone and was trying to lift a bag directly over a woman holding a sleeping baby. I decided I would take responsibility for that child not growing up brain damaged from falling luggage, and helped her with her bag.

The flight got in early, which was nice, and when I arrived home dinner was nearly ready. My sister's Sullen Emo Boyfriend was there for Christmas dinner, but he turned out to be quite nice and we had a reasonably intelligent discussion about the ruination of the radio industry after a post-dinner viewing of a film called Pirate Radio, which was brilliant if a trifle naive.

Anyway he seems like a decent young guy and is probably too busy doing his hair and contemplating his manpain to be a dick to my sister, so I'll let him live.

And now I am supposed to be sleeping, so I'd better get on that. Hope everyone had as...intriguing a holiday as I did today.

I leave the state for THREE DAYS and my whole office falls apart. Honestly.

I came back this morning to the news that two department heads are leaving -- not my departments, so not my bosses, but nonetheless it's sad-making. They're both not-my-bosses that I've worked with and like; they always say hello in the mornings, which not everyone does, and they always say please when they need something. I don't really expect Please everytime someone needs me to do something, but it's awfully nice when it happens. Except for one guy I work with who manages to make it sound creepy, like he's about to ask me to cook him some meth or something.

I had a really good holiday weekend -- fun people, good food, way less awkwardness than I generally display -- marred only by the bus ride home, which is my own damn fault for believing the bus driver that it would be full and thus not pulling my bag-on-seat-and-asleep ruse. :D I'm not sure how much rest I would have got on the bus anyway, however, due to the college kid across the aisle who was COMPELLED TO SHOUT EVERYTHING HE SAID, ESPECIALLY VERY PERSONAL PHONE CALLS TO HIS GIRLFRIEND.

Still, it was a ton of fun and I regret not a minute of it. Except for how I'm maybe falling asleep at my desk just a little bit today. :D

Whoever said the bus internet would die an hour into the trip, you were not wrong.

We are at a rest stop in the back of beyond. Ride is smooth, good times. Me and the Fourth Doctor are getting better acquainted.

Also, lol Brigadier in a kilt.

Well, by the time I post this I will be home, and I can tell you right now I will be a totally limp mess of a human being.

The HOGROAST last night was a lot of fun, I got to talk to some people and the food really was good. I suppose it was too much to ask that there would be an actual roast hog, but at least they did have quite a lot of pork products. Still, I was hoping for grilled corn and a pig on a spit. Alas, another dream dashed.

I have to admit one of the conversations I had was truly strange -- I was explaining to the table that I wasn't a teacher or a student, just interested in the conference because I write "As a hobby". I was about to turn the conversation to Transformative Works, which are (or should be) impacted by some of the conference topics and which also distract people nicely, when the man across from me announced, "I don't understand fiction writing."

Now, it's slightly weird to say that to someone who has just said they find pleasure from writing fiction, but it's very weird to say that at a conference about writing. So, after a startled moment, I said, "Do you not understand the mechanics of it, or why people write fiction...?"

"Oh, I get why people write it, but I don't know how you just make up stories out of your head and make them mean something," he said.

"Neither do I," I told him with a grin, before I thought about it. Which is kind of a lie, but it's the blithe kind of lie that I think writers tell a lot, I think, when talking about their work.

"But how do you get there?" he asked.

I was going to launch into some big long thing about where ideas come from and how you craft them into something, but the music was loud and I was tired so I just said, "Practice. Excuse me, I'm going to get some pudding," and bolted.

So that's my new explanation of my writing process: "Practice and chocolate pudding."

I got up early this morning -- man, going back a time zone is going to be awesome, I'll be waking up in time to have breakfast at home instead of grabbing a Bagelful and going -- and caught a cab to the station. Well, called a cab. Perhaps that fleet only has one cab, because it was the same guy who took me to campus on Wednesday night when I got lost. Nice guy, told me all about how he used to run a hot dog truck and the "Fat Charlie" sandwich they used to serve: a hoagie roll spread liberally with cheese whiz, topped with chopped steak, onions, french fries, and mozzarella. Cheese whiz, for our international readers, is an infernal American creation that tastes something like cheddar cheese, only mostly not, and is liquid in its natural state. It's "cheese", but about the consistency of mustard. It's an acquired taste.

Overall, the conference has been a very positive experience. I'm glad I went and I feel it was worth the cost. It has given me a lot to think about both in terms of the scholarly world I left behind and the world of online publishing in which I now find myself. My instinct is always to take literary things apart and see how they work, which is apparently a tenent of Rhetoric; I didn't know that, and I'm a bit glad I didn't study it in school, but the crash course I got this weekend is going to be helpful. It pays to hang out with English majors, guys (plus, after theatre kids, they throw the best parties).

Anyway, I was going to write up all my conference notes on the train, but I ended up sleeping most of the way home, so the nuggets of brilliance will have to wait. I did get to see Doctor Who but I'm still working on the Three Things, so those may be a while.

Thank god I took tomorrow off.

I am at the airport, prepping for my flight out -- thankfully no delays this time. Though I'd frankly rather be delayed from a 2pm flight than a 7pm flight (this seems like tempting fate. I'd really rather not be delayed at all).

It has been a remarkably quiet visit; perhaps I burned through all my travel-unpleasantness credits with the 1am arrival on Saturday. I did at one point threaten to medicate both my parents into pleasantness, but they were bickering and at least it shut them up. Possibly because we are all reaching an age where my ability to medicate them is drawing nearer on the horizon. Deo volente it is still many years off, even if sometimes I want to slip a sedative into the family meal.

Last missive before I get onto the plane and head to Chicago -- I have to head through Houston first so I won't be home until tonight, but it will be good to be home and I have tomorrow off, so that's something. And unless I fall off the gangway or something, I have successfully navigated this trip with no injuries. Touch wood.

I am safe in Austin.FYI. that was definitely an adventur. More in the morning! The.later morning anyway.

Okay, kids, I am off for the airport and the wild blue yonder. But before I go I wanted to reassure you that I haven't forgotten him this time:



Travelin' Jack Harkness is very sad that there will be no tumbling, but there's no time for tumbling! We're on an ADVENTUR!

Plz to note: Travelin' Jack pictures from here out will be on LJ only, because of email posting. SORRY OFF-LJ PEEPS :(

On the shuttle to the fair.

STICKS BEWARE.

This is my fourth shuttle of the day. Omg please drivers stop talking to me.