“This con just gets bigger every year,” said Alex.

“It does,” said Greg. “And every year I think about not coming back next year, but I always do.”

“You know you would be miserable if you missed it,” said Alex. “Don’t even pretend.”

“Yo, ‘sup dudes?” called Treville, ambling over to the pair of them.

“Well, this might change that,” said Alex.

“Oh, uh, hi, Treville,” said Greg. “I wasn’t expecting to see you here!”

“First time,” said Treville. “How about those cosplay babes, are they hot or what?”

“The work they put into their outfits is certainly impressive,” said Greg.

“I don’t get cosplay,” said Alex. “I mean, spending all that time on money on something you’re going to wear one weekend and then put in the closet for the rest of your life? Crazy.”

“It’s a craft,” said Greg. “I like it. The amount of creative energy that goes into it just amazes me.”

“I like it if the right girl is doing it,” said Treville.

“Yeah, I’m not surprised by that,” said Greg.

“I just got back from the ‘Slave Leia’ contest,” Treville added.

“I’m not surprised by that, either.”

“You shoulda seen the gal who won. All I gotta say is, ‘that’s no moon, that’s a space station,’ if you get what I mean.”

Greg blinked. “Actually, no. I haven’t the slightest clue what you mean.”

-The Gneech

<-- previous B&G
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I have more to say about AnthroCon and I’ll say it later, but I do want to mention this before it gets lost in the shuffle.

On the way home yesterday evening, as we approached the Allegheny Mountain tunnel on Route 70, Lee and I were privileged to see a gorgeous, vibrant rainbow created by the storm that was in front of us and the sunset behind us. However, that was nothing compared to the vision we received on the other side of the tunnel: it was, as the man said, “a double rainbow, all the way,” and it was spectacular. It easily spanned half the horizon, stretching from one mountaintop to another, with route 70 shooting the gap. All seven colors of the spectrum were clearly visible, with the edges “fraying” into a fuzzy red-purple on either side.

Drastic action was required, so we took an emergency pull-off spot and got out to gawk. My little phone camera was not up to the task of capturing the whole thing, so I just took a pic of the most vibrant arc to send off to friends. Lee tried to get some better pics with his craptacular little point’n'shoot, but I’ll be very surprised if that was up to the task either.

Neither of us blissed out and starting ranting about it — that’s just not how we roll — but it was still a very cool experience.

-The Gneech

PS: At the time, we were pointed in the general direction of New York, which had just legalized gay marriage over the weekend. COINCIDENCE???

Well, the revised Volume II proof arrived from primary printer, so the order went in. Unfortunately, the earliest they can get copies to me is the Tuesday after AnthroCon, and that would cost an extra hundred bucks as it is. As for Volume I, I’ll be lucky to see those by the end of July at this stage.

So yeah … they might not like their feedback survey too much this time around.

The good news is that Mammallamadevil’s back-up plan has made it so that there will be at least some copies of Vols I-II at the con. Thank you, Kerry! However, this also means that if you’re wanting to pick up copies of Vol I or II at AC, you’d better come grab ‘em early, because quantities will be very limited.

-The Gneech

The downside of self-publishing, of course, is that when things go all pear-shaped, you’re the one who has to scramble to fix it.

In this particular case, I’m referring to Volumes I and II of No Predation Allowed, which are currently floundering in the Hell of Printers Who Don’t Q.A. Ironically, Volume III, which is the one they received last, had no problems whatsoever and will be on my doorstep tomorrow, ready to take to AnthroCon on Thursday.

The sticking point in both cases is the text on the spine, which for some unspecified reason, keeps being mucked with by their tech department. First, Volume I came in with the text at the right size, but reading “No     Predation Allowed.” What the heck? So I poked ‘em and they said, “Oops, we’ll send you a fixed one.”

Then, Volume II came in with the spine all disproportionately crunched, so the letters were all wide and short. Why people who are presumably trained in at least the basics of typography would not see this as an unacceptable gaffe, I can’t imagine, but again, I poked ‘em and they said, “Oops, well send you a fixed one.”

On Friday, the “fixed” Volume I arrived (a day after it was supposed to): the giant empty space between “No” and “Predation” was gone — but the text was now scrunched like the initial Volume II proof.

Dude. Seriously?

So I called and beat ‘em up in my nice and non-antagonistic way; they said “Uh … it doesn’t look squooshed to us.” So I took a photo of the squooshed Vol I next to the correct Vol III and sent it to them, and they replied, “Oooh, you mean squooshed! We see that now. We’ll show the tech team. They are working on Saturday, you might hear then.”

Oh, and no sign of the corrected proof for Volume II yet.

So I call this morning, to be told, “The tech team doesn’t work on Saturday, they’ll get back to you as soon as they can.”

…

…

Okay. Time for Plan B.

So now my plan is, with the gracious help of Mammallamadevil, to get some “emergency copies” printed posthaste (and probably at very high cost, le sigh) so that I can have at least some on hand for AC, hand-carried by Bill Holbrook and John Lotshaw. If my current printer manages to get their heads out of whatever orifices they’re stuck in quick enough, I might be able to get them to ship copies to the hotel, but I would be very surprised at this stage to see that happen in time.

The part that drives me craziest is that these are the books they had first! So it’s not like they haven’t had time to get it right — they got Volume I fourteen days ago. They got Volume III last Sunday. Nuts.

The part that drives me next-craziest is that the people there can’t seem to see what’s wrong with these books they’re shipping out. How hard is it to figure out that “No     Predation Allowed” is wrong? What are you doing in the print business if you can’t see it when proportions are scrunched? Argh.

-The Gneech, now in scramble mode ’cause somebody else screwed up

I meant to watch Dr. Who last night … it was the last really feasible window to do it in before my trip. And I just flat-out forgot. So I need to either carve out an hour for it sometime today or tomorrow, or be on vigilant guard for spoilers during the entirety of my U.K. trip.

I know this doesn’t sound like much of a crisis, but it’s sorta symptomatic of how things are with me right now. I’m forgetful, easily distracted, and feel like I spend a lot of my time fighting my way to a place where I can sit down and engage in something mindless … usually a sign that my brain is chewing on too much.

Some of it, I suspect, is continued grief on a subconscious level; my family in general and Dad in particular have been prominent in my dreams lately, and earlier this week I woke up wishing I could give my dad a hug. (And really, any time I can remember my dreams, it means my sleep is not very good. Dreams and I don’t have a happy relationship.) And some of it is also just the never-ending jumble of noise that’s always in my head and occasionally just wears me out. When the jumble of noise can be channeled into something productive, I get a book or something out of it … but the rest of the time, it’s just noise and it makes me tired.

I’m hoping that when the U.K. trip is off the table, that will free up some mental bandwidth and allow me to focus on getting some other things done and even — gasp — do some real writing again. I really need to put some serious work into finding a real project, settling on it, and getting somewhere with it. I feel like I’m spinning my wheels right now.

-The Gneech

I do love being able to add stuff to the Bibliography! In other words, Attack of the War-Cats is now available for preorders. Big, big thanks to everyone who waited!

And for those who’ve been asking, we have finally worked out a way for it to be available at Confuzzled without having the customs people look askance at us, so yes, you’ll be able to pick it up in Manchester if you’re planning to be there. I’ll also have it at AnthroCon; I’ve applied for a table at InterventionCon as well, but haven’t heard back on that one yet.

Been a big month! And next month will be even bigger. O.o

-The Gneech