I'm glad I had Friday afternoon and evening off. It was needed.

However, I'd planned on going to Boskone with alcarnor for nearly a year, and we'd settled on the trip out Saturday, trip back Sunday. And, frankly, being at a convention would give me time to process and not dwell on Sith, so I didn't cancel going. I'm glad I went; it was what I needed.

We arrived Saturday at noon and registered. We then sat down in the concourse lobby and went through the program book, deciding that the programming people hated us and had scheduled everything we were interested in all at once. Mean programming people.

We wandered through the Art Show and Hucksters' room for a while, then headed off to Steve Miller's reading. I now count things. It's a problem. If I get a clipboard in the mail, I'll be very concerned. We also got told about the Liaden party that evening and the room number, which we both promptly forgot in various stages of sleep-deprivation.

We headed down to Consuite for a Kaffeeklastch with Brother Guy Consolmagno, who was pleased to hear I'd bought his most recent book, and one of his friends from MIT or somewhere appeared, and then the Kaffeeklastch really became hers, but most of us didn't seem to mind since he host didn't seem to mind.

3:00 was a dead time frame, plus checkin. So we checked into the hotel, lugged up our stuff up to our room, and had lunch. Yay lunch. Then back to the Art Show and Hucksters' room, wherein I preceeded to spend a vast fortune on books and art.

And by art, I do mean ART. Specifically, a simply wonderful print of Luke Skywalker in his pilot's gear, running towards the viewer with lightsaber lit, looking gloriously marvelous and yummy. alcarnor said I needed to get David Seeley to do one of Palpatine. If I had Luke AND Palpatine by one of my favorite artists? I'd just melt. I also just emailed David Seeley and he's confirmed the pritn is signed and number, and there were only 250 done, and about half of those were the large size such as I have purchased.

jetshade, I totally need this framed. I'm not taking it out of the tube until it's going into the frame shop; I'm terrified I'll accidently wreck it. I spent FAR too much on it not to frame it properly.

We then stood in line for David Weber's autograph. His eyes lit up when I handed over my battered, well-read, well-loved paperback copy of On Basilisk Station, and he flipped to the copyright page as I regretfully told him, "No, I checked earlier, it's the fourth printing, not a first edition." He grinned and signed it: "Hey, it's ALMOST a 1st edition!"

Last panel before eating dinner was The Year in Physics and Astronomy, wherein I learned that apparently plants are using a form of quantum computing when photosynthesizing, which I think may be the coolest thing ever. You can find the references and sources for the Science News article here. I can't link directly to the article since I'm not a subscriber. Also, great quote from the panel: "If you get enough mathematicians looking for a pattern, they'll find one."

After dinner we headed to the Battle of the Mutant Plot Mashups, wherein book titles were mashed together and the panelists had to come up with plots. This was terribly silly and a great amount of fun. It was followed by a radio-style production of The Stinky Princess by Bruce Coville, and the NESFA award ceremony.

After all that, alcarnor and I headed into Consuite for what is becomming the traditional "Saturday Night of Sitting in Consuite with gnomi and mabfan and Discuss Whatever Comes Up." (We also couldn't remember where the Liaden party was, and besides, we like the chatting with gnomi and mabfan. In this case, we ran the gamut of yarn to religion to heritage to cultural assimilation to dead languages to zombies.

Quote: (I think I said it first, but gnomi just kept repeating it) Other than zombies, we're okay.

So, how are you?
Oh, other than zombies, I'm okay. You?
The same.

Also: I can haz apocolypse.

And: I made u an apocolypse but I eated it.

Then everyone pretty much left at once. Amusingly, while saying goodbye to gnomi I was remembering her recent post about giving and receiving hugs and so I actually had to think my way through the "Are we at the hugging stage of fandom yet amongst ourselves?" and decided not yet. This was an important question because there had just been the hugging of the Mike McAfee, who is such a wonderful guy. I went up to go to bed and -- lo and behold! The Liaden party we wanted to go to! Right next door to my room! Convenient!! I got my books and went to the party and had them signed, and got ribbons for my badge, and alcarnor showed up having finished smoking and realized Look! The Liaden Party! Right by our room! and then the authors looked very tired so off to bed for everyone.

Sunday I did not want to get up. The long week, the late hours, etc, caught up with me and I just wanted to sleep. However, food arrived and so I woke up. After fixing a problem with the order, we packed up and then went to panels.

As an aside, wen_spencer has finally remembered that alcarnor isn't my husband, and his copy of Endless Blue even states such. Wen, you'll be amused to learn that this year the HOTEL decided he is, calling him "Mr. Burger" anytime we called room service or so forth. I then pointed out that actually, the Hotel is deciding he's my FATHER, since I never took madraxus' last name when we married.

First panel was on quantum teleportation, which was absolutely fascinating since it deals with entanglement which I think is one of the coolest things in the quantum world. Also, the speaker was a professor and so able to give a coherent lecture in easy terms AND answer questions without getting lost. He has a book coming out next year about discussing physics with his dog, and his blog is here.

Then Xsolthynire made me go to a panel. No, really, I'm not kidding. *I* was going to go to the 20th anniversary of Liaden panel, but there was a panel called "Artists and Crafters Talk about Materials Science" and tey would not shut up in my head until I went. Actually, it was a great panel, and I learned about how the french fashion industry started on bicycles, all about various safety practices when crafting, Japanese pottery, and how the materials to hand help create the kind of culture your planet will have in your book, and not enough people think about the art in this context.

The last panel we attended was the Honorverse panel, and got to hear about the plans for the upcoming Honor Harrington movies (apparently the first three are being considered), ask questions about the universe of Honor Harrington, and hear how a tree attempted to kill David Weber while he was in his office. "Hey, am I covered against damage such as trees?" "Yes, did one fall through your roof?" "Not exactly..." One hour was not enough time for that panel.

Then we were done, not even needing one last run through the Hucksters' Room. I picked up the other piece of art I'd won, wrangled some more author autographs, and we headed home.

I've already finished one of the books I bought at the con. *grin*

My book purchases:

Wen Spencer: Endless Blue
Sharon Lee and Steve Miller: Partners in Necessity, Liaden Universe Companion vol 1 & 2, Dragon Tide (chapbook)
Eric Flint and Virginia DeMarce: 1634: Ram Rebellion
Charles Stross: Glasshouse, Accelerando
Karl Schroeder: Sun of Suns
Carrie Vaughn: Kitty and the Midnight Hour, Kitty Goes to Washington, Kitty Takes a Vacation, Kitty and the Silver Bullet. (The bookseller saw one of the books in my hands and said, "Here, you'll like this." and gave me the first one. I started reading it Saturday evening before bed. I went to the dealer on Sunday and bought the rest of the series so far.)
Linnea Sinclair: The Down Home Zombie Blues (It doesn't seem to have real zombies in it, which is good, because except for zombies, we're okay.)
Patricia Briggs: Iron Kissed
Connie Willis: Impossible Things
Sara Douglass: Druid's Sword
Esther Friesner: Temping Fate

And now I'm home again. Morganti was actually happy to see me; she obviously misses Sith if she's pleased I'm here. She spent about an hour purring loudly at me and desperately seeking attention -- I even got a headbonk from her. I'm still sometimes looking around for Sith before I catch myself, and the apartment feels emptier than it did before, but I'm crying every time I think about him now, which is good, and I've gotten some downtime, which I REALLY needed. Thank you everyone for your thoughts and well wishes during the last few days; they have meant a lot to me and to madraxus.

Now, off to organize my books into my Read In This Order pile and to bed.