Sasquan

Over a month ago I went to WorldCon.  Then I came home, full of anecdotes and fresh from adventure and promptly didn’t blog a single word about it.  I had my reasons (read: OMG SO BUSY) but I’m going to fix it now.

Sunday before WorldCon

I have been working my ass off all month for this moment and I achieve it – all my clients are under contract.  Inspections are done.  Nobody is going to notice that I’m out of town when I leave because I’ll be able to do everything remotely.  Perfect!

Getting to Spokane

This is the day I’m going to drive to Spokane.  My official departure time is “Whenever I’m done with work.”  Work is a little nuts because the seller for one of those transactions wouldn’t negotiate at all when the inspection came back awful.  My buyer isn’t interested in buying a money pit, I’m not interested in pushing him to, I draft paperwork to cancel the deal and get that sent off to the sellers.  I’ll need to do more with it once they sign, but they might not get to that until tomorrow.  I’d assumed I’d be leaving for Spokane around 8pm.  Instead, I leave at 4:30.

5:06.  My phone rings.  “Hi.  This is the listing agent. We should talk.”  Reader, I spent days trying to talk to this listing agent.  He was clearly under the impression that I was full of shit.  Now he believes me?  Grr.  I tell him I’ll call him when I get to Spokane.

So what’s the first thing I do when I get to Spokane?  Crash with S. B. Divya, briefly pretend I’m a social human being, then call a listing agent.  “I need this deal to stay together,” the listing agent explains.  “I’m going to Africa for five weeks in September and want everything settled before then.”  Now he wants to negotiate.

Strong A.I.: The Party

Part of why I was happy to rush out of Seattle early was that I got there in time for the reception for attendees and instructors in the Writer’s Workshop.  I could go and eat cheese cubes while dispensing wisdom to writers learning their craft and eager to take my advice.  Instead I spent most of the time sitting in front of the AC vent, insisting that it’s silly to be scared of strong AI because it’s not happening and even if it is, I’m on its side and don’t really care if it destroys humanity.  Also, very stealthily texting my client about Lately Interested Listing Agent’s offer and how crappy it is and yes, I know you really love that house, but remember how you’re on a budget and literally do no have the money for these repairs on a house that’s seconds away from falling over? I can find you better. I promise.

There were cheese cubes, though.  They were tasty.

In the Morning of the Kaffeeklatsch

I’m pretty sure that somewhere along the line I must have said something mean about the very beloved mother of some member of Sasquan’s programming committee.  They gave me very good programming, nearly all of it earlier than I’m a human for.  To the mother of whoever it was: I’m very sorry.  I didn’t mean it.  It was wrong, and I’ve learned my lesson.

I showed up thirty seconds before my own kaffeeklatsch, sans coffee.  Sans anything other than my water bottle, actually, despite a serious need for something hot and sweet to power my personality.  This wasn’t my fault.  Registration was nearly as far from my kaffeeklatsch as it could be while still in the building.  Also, I’d had to email LILA with the conclusion of the texting done with the buyer during the parties the night before.

Oh, and the other clients I put under contract last Sunday? The ones I haven’t mentioned because they were going to be an easy, straight forward closing? There’s a problem with the pet policy.  We need a board waiver for their dogs to move in.

Kaffeeklatsch was good.  I talked about me a lot.  That’s always fun.  I made the people attending talk about themselves a little.  I totally forgot that Fury Road came out this year when asked, “What’s the last movie you saw in the theater and liked?” Things I like become timeless in my head and it’s hard to remember life without them.  Or that’s my excuse anyway.

The Crazed Lady in the Hallway

I am happy to report that the floor of the Spokane convention center is stable and the walls do not flex, even after being leaned on while you use a power outlet to charge your dying phone and draft paperwork after paperwork because the done deal is falling apart and the dead deal is a zombie being actively negotiated right. now.  I bet there were great panels on Thursday.  I’d gotten up too early to weep openly in the hallway.  Instead I did a lot of shocked staring at things.

Did you know that it’s insulting to even ask whether maybe we don’t have to break up a happy family of two doctors and a pair of canines in order to move into your building?  I didn’t either.  I did draft more cancellation paperwork.  And gave up on ever making any money ever again because I’m now canceling contracts faster than I’m getting them accepted. Spokane’s the best!

My Dulcet Tones

Friday morning.  Early reading.  I get up with lots of time to get over there, get lost, and still make it on time.  Then my phone rings.  It’s LILA.  He wants, very badly, to have a very long argument with me. No, of course he hasn’t given his seller the cancellation paperwork.  Don’t I know that as professionals, we have to hold this deal together?

I did not actually raise my voice.  I did get rude.  “You have to meet me half way,” may have been answered with, “I don’t have to do anything.  The only reason I’m even talking to you is because my client is in love and won’t listen to me when I tell him to run screaming from your shambling mess of a house.”

For the record: As a professional, it’s my job to serve the interests of my client, placing those above my own, and definitely above LILA’s desire for an uninterrupted African vacation.

I gave people fudge at my reading.  And then I read a story about a cannibal.  It was cheerful.

Wes Chu is not Ken Liu

I had plans to meet Ken Liu in person for the first time, and then yell at him a bunch about Iago.  I yell at Ken a lot.  I think he thinks I’m funny.  This is probably good for my future as a person against whom there are no restraining orders.  We meet, are planning where to go for chatting, and Wes Chu shows up.  Then tells a story about how, for the 9th convention in a row, he’s had somebody ask him whether he’s Ken Liu.

Oooookaaaaay.

I blurted my honest immediate reaction.  “New career goal: Get mistaken for Ken Liu.” Because, come on!

“Oh man, did you catch that?” Wes Chu asked.  “She’s all, ‘Yeah, he’s no Ken Liu.'”

And that, gentle readers, is how you insult a soon-to-be-Campbell winner within two minutes of first meeting him.

Oh, That’s a Convention

Dr. Unicorn was supposed to catch the train out to Spokane Friday afternoon in time to arrive for a final sweep of the party circuit.  The train did not work out.  That’s okay: I was supposed to leave for the convention when I finished work on Wednesday, and I didn’t actually get around to showing up until late Friday afternoon.  But it was pretty great once I did.  I learned things about identifying textiles through a healthy application of fire!

Speaking of fire: I could not breathe.  Friday was awful.  I have learned that when I set the world on fire, I definitely want to do it down wind of my vantage point for watching it burn.

The buyers with a dog have canceled their transaction, everybody has signed the paperwork, and they’re already in love with a new place.  Can I get them into a second showing over the weekend while I’m gone?

Maybe I wasn’t quite all the way at the convention.

Dinner was had.  There was more talk of strong A.I.  Also, impromptu creation of a checklist for how to tell that your social club is turning into a cult.  Also, Seth Dickinson has more interesting dinner anecdotes than I do, should you ever need to choose between us for dinner companions.  Ask him about the cat.

Saturday Morning

The headline is a lie.  I slept through Saturday morning.  It was glorious.

Dr. Unicorn, that cheating bastard, brought me bubble tea from Seattle.

Then we went to lunch.

Panels

Short fiction definitely has a future.  Chosen ones are boring.  I said mean things about Arthur and sheltering teens.  I sat next to Sara Monette/ Katherine Addison and did not blather on at length about how cute Maia is and how much I want two of Csevet.

Hugos

I lost.  This was precisely according to plan.  The ceremony was fun.  I turned my phone off, with prejudice, and left it off for the evening.  After, I kidnapped Ann Leckie and made her listen to me scold her for being insufficiently sympathetic to Anander Mianaai the whole way to GRRM’s loser’s party.  She called me Fleet Captain.  I won Sasquan.

I may have been covered in “Justice of Toren” temporary tattoos by the time I got home.

Because I’m a winner.

Epilogue

If you’re wondering what the special thing I have in store for the Strange Horizons bonus podcasts is, I can tell you that it’s a thing cooked up entirely as a result of me having been at World Con.

The zombie shambling house of money pit “At least your boyfriend knows you’ll never leave him because good grief what does it take to talk you out of a thing,” of doom?  Still. Not. Dead. Also, will never close.  The couple with the easy transaction that blew up over dogs? They’re closing on an even better place next week.

I’m definitely thinking thoughtful thoughts about Helsinki in 2017.