Vacationeering
Mr. cheez & I got back on Tuesday, ran around doing stuff on Wed, and back to work yesterday. For your perusal...
First, we went to WorldCon in LA, and hung out with some of thespianmobile's old friends, C & K. Worldcons are more focused on SciFi & Fantasy literature than your average local con, and I haven't been reading much as of late. (Hmm, not true, I've just been reading nothing but comic books. Next year, I think I'll actually go to ComicCon, but 2 MegaCons in a row this summer would have been too much.) It was still fairly nifty, if not as amazingly FANtastic as it would be if I were more into the scene. It's an older cround. Not many costumes & wackyness, but you'll be reassured (or alarmed) to know that Starfleet has greatly loosened its physical fitness standards. Judging by the tubby redshirts I saw walking around, at least. :-)
Got to see some of the old great Science Fiction greats (er, before they kick off?). Ray Bradbury is still alive, but getting up there. Amazing poetic guy. Learned about some new authors, & bought a few books. Saw Walter Koenig too. He got as many Bester questions as he did Chekovs. thespianmobile had a close encounter with Harlan Ellison, who knew his dad from long ago. Ellison left a message on his cell phone for Daddums, berating him for not calling for decades. Hee hee. The really awesome part about the first week, however, was hanging out with friends we don't see too often.
Then, the flight to NY. Raw LA-throat + No Fluids = Sucktacularific. $diety bless the nice old stewardess who kept sneaking me water.
We went out to New York to visit thespianmobile's family. What's funny about visiting the in-laws (still odd to call them that) is that dad-in-law, & his place, is such a island of tranquility. In the middle of frikin' Manhattan. You just unwind. By contrast, mom-in-law (& hubby), who live in bucolic upstate NY, are a maelstrom of activity.
Great to see the Father-in-Law in NY. Dad-in-law took us out to a real live Broadway play for my birthday. A (black) comedy about the IRA. It should have been called "The Dance of the Dead Cats". By the end, the stage was drenched in fake blood. It was awesome. We also saw "Little Miss Sunshine", which I highly recommend (but had less blood), and went to the MOMA. Got to play Spot the Celebrity Painting ("Ooh, I've seen pictures of that one! And that one!). And I got to visit with an old high school friend, which kicked ass.
Upstate, the family is completely batshit insane, as usual. In a good way. In the middle of nowhere, they're just the center of social activity. My B-day is the same as my step-dad-in-law's, which was nifty. We went out to dinner, and dinnered again, and hung out, and drank way more than I am used to, and had a good old time.
The only down side to the whole trip was that I was sick, one way or the other, almost the whole time. By the end I just accepted that once one ailment was healed, another would crop up in it's place. (I really need to figure out how to up my Con score.) It was a good trip nonetheless.
I think one of the primary functions of vacations is to slow time down. By doing something out of the normal routine for awhile, you exerience each day more on it's own, and it seems to take longer (usually a good thing, if you're vacationing). When you're doing more-or-less the same thing each day, they just blur past.
I had more thoughts and details, but I get to them later. Or... I won't.
First, we went to WorldCon in LA, and hung out with some of thespianmobile's old friends, C & K. Worldcons are more focused on SciFi & Fantasy literature than your average local con, and I haven't been reading much as of late. (Hmm, not true, I've just been reading nothing but comic books. Next year, I think I'll actually go to ComicCon, but 2 MegaCons in a row this summer would have been too much.) It was still fairly nifty, if not as amazingly FANtastic as it would be if I were more into the scene. It's an older cround. Not many costumes & wackyness, but you'll be reassured (or alarmed) to know that Starfleet has greatly loosened its physical fitness standards. Judging by the tubby redshirts I saw walking around, at least. :-)
Got to see some of the old great Science Fiction greats (er, before they kick off?). Ray Bradbury is still alive, but getting up there. Amazing poetic guy. Learned about some new authors, & bought a few books. Saw Walter Koenig too. He got as many Bester questions as he did Chekovs. thespianmobile had a close encounter with Harlan Ellison, who knew his dad from long ago. Ellison left a message on his cell phone for Daddums, berating him for not calling for decades. Hee hee. The really awesome part about the first week, however, was hanging out with friends we don't see too often.
Then, the flight to NY. Raw LA-throat + No Fluids = Sucktacularific. $diety bless the nice old stewardess who kept sneaking me water.
We went out to New York to visit thespianmobile's family. What's funny about visiting the in-laws (still odd to call them that) is that dad-in-law, & his place, is such a island of tranquility. In the middle of frikin' Manhattan. You just unwind. By contrast, mom-in-law (& hubby), who live in bucolic upstate NY, are a maelstrom of activity.
Great to see the Father-in-Law in NY. Dad-in-law took us out to a real live Broadway play for my birthday. A (black) comedy about the IRA. It should have been called "The Dance of the Dead Cats". By the end, the stage was drenched in fake blood. It was awesome. We also saw "Little Miss Sunshine", which I highly recommend (but had less blood), and went to the MOMA. Got to play Spot the Celebrity Painting ("Ooh, I've seen pictures of that one! And that one!). And I got to visit with an old high school friend, which kicked ass.
Upstate, the family is completely batshit insane, as usual. In a good way. In the middle of nowhere, they're just the center of social activity. My B-day is the same as my step-dad-in-law's, which was nifty. We went out to dinner, and dinnered again, and hung out, and drank way more than I am used to, and had a good old time.
The only down side to the whole trip was that I was sick, one way or the other, almost the whole time. By the end I just accepted that once one ailment was healed, another would crop up in it's place. (I really need to figure out how to up my Con score.) It was a good trip nonetheless.
I think one of the primary functions of vacations is to slow time down. By doing something out of the normal routine for awhile, you exerience each day more on it's own, and it seems to take longer (usually a good thing, if you're vacationing). When you're doing more-or-less the same thing each day, they just blur past.
I had more thoughts and details, but I get to them later. Or... I won't.