Saturday, 13 October, 2001 22:54
This seems to be a really hard entry to write, and only partly because I've already written it... and now I'm re-writing it on Monday night. The first thing that happened on Saturday was that I met the only truly insane journaller that I've known. It took me about five minutes to figger out that this fellow was a paranoid schitzo who was way off of his meds. It took that long for him to show me the scar from his latest "assination" attempt. He was relatively disruptive throughout the day, but I don't think that anyone was paying any attention.... anyway, back to him later. The panels and readings were interesting and enjoyable. I met many people that I'd been reading for years and a bunch of newer people too... newer in that I'd just started reading them when the list got put up. And naturally, I had a lot of trouble remembering names and journals, with a few exceptions. I enjoyed meeting Jen Wade and The Mighty Kymm, I've been reading them for as long as I've been doing this myself almost. Anyway, there was a long break for lunch, so I went up to my room and took a short nap... well, no I didn't, but I laid down for a little bit and revitalized my body. Back from lunch break, another panel and then some readings. The readings are really fun (usually) because you actually get to watch the author read the lines that they've written. Yeah, that sounds pretty boring, but it really wasn't. Most of the people who wanted to do this are really dramatic wanna-be actors and actresses and they're really good... serious or funny. I had tears in my eyes several times, both from laughter and from sadness. Anyway, the next-to the last reading was gonna be Kymm, and then the paranoid guy. This fellow had been building himself up for this most of the afternoon, and time was running out... we had to be out of the room by 19:30, and at 19:15 the third-from the last reader came up. As soon as she was done, the paranoid-schitzo guy came up to the front. It was pointed out to him that he was out of turn, but he ignored this fact and besides, Kymm had already left... as had most of the rest of the crowd. I stayed a few minutes, to see if he was maybe one of those guys who was really a genius. I was disappointed, and I left as he was fumbling for words. My plan for the night was to interject myself into some group, but I didn't really have the energy for that. Most of the journallers there were young enough to be my kids, and their ideas of partying and mine would have been worlds apart anyway. So I went upstairs and changed clothes and went down the street to the Golden Nugget, where I had a wonderful ommlette and pancakes. I have neglected to mention that it had been raining all day, and that I had spent a lot of time outside with the smokers. I really like big cities in the rain, they seem so much more alive then. I don't like big cities any other time, really. But at night in the rain, the lights are beautiful, everything seems so... fresh? Something, anyway. So I went back to the room and laid down to watch some TV and I didn't last very long after that....