After getting some much needed sleep and a big home-cooked dinner on Thursday night, and almost, but not fully recovering from the trip from hell, I headed off to the "Life, The Universe and Everything," literary conference at BYU yesterday. And as you can see from the picture below, I met blog friend Stacer there. Stacer is an editor at a Young Adult Sci Fi/Fantasy publishing house. I really enjoyed the conference and learned quite a bit. I am not a Sci Fi or Fantasy person, and therefore skipped the classes on the politics of "Dawn of the Dead" and "How to Create Your Own Alien Language," but really enjoyed the classes on getting published, grammer, and the writer's workshop. There was just one flaw in the day.
Food poisoning.
On top of already still feeling dehydrated from the flight out here, the big delicious home-cooked meal left me, my sister, and brother-in-law with food poisoning. Which is why today my sister and I have opted for a nice long day of sitting on the couch and watching movies together. (Her husband and 2 older boys are in Reno. We get the pleasure of enjoying 2 yr old Porter and his exploded ear drum ear infection.)
Last night I enjoyed going out with Stacer to meet some of our other "internet" friends at a party. ShaBang, Just Beautiful and Manda Panda were just as much fun in person as they are online.
Oh and something funny happened while on the BYU campus yesterday. Around 7 pm I was walking through the CougarEat (giving in and eating there for the first time in my life) I ran into Walter VanderHeide. Totally random! (Walter and I are old friends from DC. He moved to Utah about 2 yrs ago I think.) It really is a very small world!
Funny, the title of the conference reminds me of Douglas Adams. I don't do sci-fi or fantasy..but I do have the ultimate hitchhikers guide on my bookshelf.
ReplyDeleteYou would be reminded of Douglas Adams because that's exactly where the reference comes from. (42) :)
ReplyDeleteThat happened to me, too, Erin--a good three or four good friends from Boston now live in Provo, and I purposely looked one up after the friend I was staying with told me, but the other one I saw crossing the street as we passed by. Too bad she was across the street and I was in a moving car! I'll have to email her later. Turns out she works in the same office as the other friend I did find, but just wasn't around when I looked for her.
I love how BYU is such a Mecca for educated Mormons--even when you leave and all your friends from undergrad leave, you're bound to have friends in that area anytime you head back.
Yeah, that was very "random". I never expected to see you (Erin) at BYU, plus it is very rare that I would be on campus. Anyway, it was nice to see you, and I hope you enjoyed your stay in Utah inspite of the sickness.
ReplyDelete--Walter