And that, of course, is a good thing. Because, well, we all know what the alternative is! I don’t get all crazy about birthdays, or my age. I turned 62 on Friday, and really, it’s not a big deal. I don’t feel old, most of the time, anyway. Yeah, there are aches. My knees don’t like the constantly changing weather we are having, but I can still get around pretty easily. I walk the dog several times a day. I can’t run with him like I could have years ago, but that’s okay. He does enough running for both of us! I am also fairly healthy with no real chronic problems. So, all in all, I’m at a good place and I enjoy my birthdays.
I did get a special treat this year. Friday night was the local stop for John Scalzi’s book tour. He was in South Hadley at the Odyssey Bookshop. It’s almost an hour and a half from here, but it was worth it. He was there with Elizabeth Bear and Scott Lynch. I’ve read some of her books, and have had Scott’s on my Want To Read list for while now. Of course, I have read several of Mr. Scalzi’s. I bought the current one, “The Collapsing Empire”, at the store, and brought my copy of “Fuzzy Nation” to be signed also. The rest of my Scalzi collection is E-books, and they are kind of hard to get signed. Stephanie came with me.
It was a fun evening. The three authors just sat and chatted for a while about whatever came to mind, and wherever the conversation led. It was amusing and interesting and fascinating. They took questions from those in attendance. Most were aimed at Scalzi, but that’s to be expected since he was the headliner, so to speak. When we got to him for the signing, Steph mentioned my birthday, and he remembered seeing my tweet earlier in the day where I sang the Happy Birthday song to me, mentioning that I was going to be there that evening.
I didn’t get any good pictures of the three authors because I was behind too many people, but here’s a not very good one of John Scalzi, at least:
And the books he signed:
And then we drove back here and ate shrimp scampi that the BaldMan made for us. It was a good birthday.
On Thursday, we are heading for Arkansas. Friends of ours moved to Eureka Springs a few years ago from New York, and we are going to visit them and see the log home they built there. They are also chili folk, and are Chief Judge and Scorekeeper and the Arkansas State cook off on Saturday, so we will be helping out at that, also. It’s going to be a quick down-and-back- fly out Thursday and fly back Monday. Looking forward to seeing good friends again, and having a bit of a vacation!
On the writing front, I got the critiques back from beta readers on Yo-Yo #2 (no, it doesn’t have a title yet!). When we get back I will settle into pulling the comments together and doing a revision run at the story. Then I can (hopefully) get some new eyes to read through it one more time. After that will come line edits for mechanicals. I suppose I will need to come up with a title of some sort in there, as well. If I get things together well enough, there may be a Thursday Teaser for it next week. No promises, but we’ll see.
For those celebrating this week, Happy Easter or Chag Sameach, depending on your holiday.
(Image from thebump.com)
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