Dear Diary,
Yesterday at the World Fantasy Convention in Saratoga Springs, I had drinks with, caught up with, or otherwise hung out with Chris Roberson, Lou Anders, George Mann, John Picacio, Paul Cornell, Deanna Hoak, John Joseph Adams, Douglas Cohen, Allison Baker, David J. Williams, Tom Doyle, and Raani Graff.
I rubbed elbows and said hello briefly to Amy Tibbetts, Beth Delaney, Eugene Myers, Garth Nix, Chris Cevasco, Jay Lake, Elizabeth Bear, Jeremy Lassen, Cat Rambo and her husband Wayne, Christian Sauve, Dennis Danvers, Joy Marchand, Scott Edelman, Cheryl Morgan, Carol Berg, Carol Emshwiller, Ian Randall Strock, Stephen Segal, Andrew Wheeler, Ellen Datlow, Michael Rowley, and Neil Clarke.
And I also met Marc Gascoigne, Diana Pharaoh Francis, Lucienne Diver, Rob Sawyer, Meg Turville-Heitz, Kim Newman, John Klima, Jess Nevins, and at least a dozen other folks whose names I don’t remember.
I was accosted by no fewer than four strangers who wanted to tell me how much they liked Infoquake, and received compliments from at least ten people about the new Stephan Martiniere covers for Infoquake and MultiReal.
I learned that Johnny Depp is very shy in person (from Allison Baker), that John Picacio won an International Horror Guild award for his Cover Story collection, and that Chris Roberson believes he wasted many writing years trying to emulate John Barth and Paul Auster. Lou Anders gave me a synopsis of the entire plot of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.
Someone took a picture of Scott Edelman strangling me.
Somebody told me that Rob Sawyer was a dick, and someone else told me that Rob Sawyer was a terrific guy. Then I met Rob Sawyer and joined a big group of his for dinner at the pub across the street. So far my impressions of him slant towards the latter, but I was sitting at the other table.
I attended parties for Australians and for Zombies, and wandered through an ice cream social (without actually remembering to get any ice cream).
I attended Tom Doyle’s reading of his Oz story for the third time, and it keeps getting better each time.
And that… was just Day 1. Whew.