Confinement VII

[wombat_socho]

 The Guest of Honor was Devon Eriksen, author of Theft of Fire, and instead of doing the normal reading, he played the first chapter of the audiobook version, which is actually more like a radio play, since he hired different voice actors for the three main characters. It was good. I already own the e-book, but I bought the hardback and had it autographed. Also came home with some books from the Baen Roadshow - for those of you who don’t know, this is a slideshow where publisher Toni Weisskopf talks about upcoming books, art, and the publishing business, and it’s usually a lot of fun even without the book giveaways – and a few books Mike was trying to get rid of from an estate sale.
     As usual, I spent more time hanging out in the lobby and the consuite (better than the Worldcon and it’s not even close) talking to people than I did actually attending programming – in fact, the Baen Roadshow was the only programming item I actually attended, which isn’t the first time this has happened.

      I was going to try and be cheap because of an unexpected expense that cropped up at the beginning of the trip, but that didn’t happen. I ran afoul of Southwest’s new rule regarding extra seats for the overweight, which the website asks you about but the app doesn’t. Fortunately, Tawanda and her crew at McCarran managed to fix me up without charging me a kilobuck I didn’t have, and in fact, since all my flights were less than full, I did get the money for the extra seats back.
     At the Nashville Airport, since I was tired and stupid, I forgot that payment for the rental car came at the end when I turned it in, so I got hit with extension charges on Friday when I called to extend my one-day reservation through Monday. Silly me. On the other hand, I did get a free upgrade from the Corolla I originally asked for to a GMC Terrain, which had a really weird gearshift mounted on the steering column. Unlike older column-mounted shifts, this one required you to pull the lever and flip it up or down depending on whether you were driving or backing up. Park required you to push the lever in. What a pain. Some time I’ll get a car that doesn’t require me to study the owner’s manual before I get going, but not this time.
     I didn’t go to O’Charley’s, the rather good fast casual place next to the hotel, but I did hit Whataburger, Waffle House, the Publix (their tuna subs aren’t as good as their cold cut subs, but their sushi is pretty good) and of course, after the convention ended on Sunday, I made the hajj unto Crossville and Buc-ee’s, where I got the barbeque (Carolina style pulled pork, which was meh, and the brisket, which was amazing as usual) along with large quantities of Diet Coke, entirely too many baked goods, a hat, a travel pillow, and some jerky. Because you can’t go to Buc-ee’s and not get the jerky.
     I goofed up when I extended my Terrain rental, thinking my flight back to Vegas was at 1 PM, so I agreed to bring the car back at 11 AM. I had hoped to maybe go space available on an earlier flight, but thanks to my lowly economy ticket, I couldn’t do that, so I had to wait until 4:55 PM to check my bag and it was almost 9 by the time I finally boarded the flight home. Good thing I’d picked up a couple of Publix subs on the way to the airport.
     We got in to McCarran at 2 AM Central/midnight Pacific; I got my bag and made my way to the parking ramp, got my Kia out of hock, and decided against stopping at Jack in the Box or McD’s because I really wasn’t hungry but rather dog-tired.
     Tuesday morning I made up for that by going to the Omelet House for a mile-high omelet before topping off the tank and going home, where I was so exhausted I went straight to bed and didn’t even drag the suitcase upstairs.

     I sent my zine and cover to Jeanne, who informed me that one of the other members was upset that I called them ignorant - which I hadn't, that was a different apahacker altogether - and eventually things got to point where I told her that considering my responsibilities to other APAs, the convention newsletter, and my perszine, that if she felt I wasn't being polite enough maybe I should just drop out. (Again.) We'll see what happens.