My First WorldCon, From My Own House

Well, I'm back from New Zealand! This was the week of the big speculative fiction convention, WorldCon, which moves around every year and was hosted in Wellington this time. I have a dear friend who lives there so I made that my excuse to finally try it out, and my nerdiest son agreed to come along.

But, of course, just as I was belatedly going to buy my plane tickets and book some rooms in Wellington and then in other places (because we were going to spend three weeks there and see some of the country), mean old COVID showed up. New Zealand is fine and even having parties and going to movies and laughing at people in masks, but only because they won't let the rest of us in to sneeze all over them. But the SF community in Wellington performed an amazing feat and managed to move the convention online. They had chat rooms (text, audio, and video), panel discussions, group events, online parties, a virtual art gallery and display hall, and who knows what else. I certainly didn't get to it all, but then it was my first time at a WorldCon. 

I committed pretty hard to my fake vacation -- I changed the clocks at my house and tried to eat and sleep Wellington time, which is five hours behind and one day ahead of PST. So I had lunch with my family while they had dinner, and tried to sleep in as much as possible because 10:00 their morning was 5:00 AM for me. And I kept pestering my New Zealand friend on Facebook Messenger because hey, I was in the area. I got lots of good book recommendations and had many interesting conversations and learned some new things and new ways of looking at the world, and now I want to go to more of these. Although it still would be nice to go back to Wellington. 

I slacked off a bit on running, what with all the travel, but am now only one 30 minute run short of graduating from my Couch Potato to 5K running plan. My favorite run was one I did with my son (my personal trainer, as I refer to him) at 12:30 AM after the convention stuff ended for the day. No traffic, cool weather, and it was my fastest pace ever! (I mean, RunKeeper doesn't think it was my fastest pace, but that's because of that one time I forgot to officially end my run and drove off from the trail.) 

Dinners were Mexican Lasagna and Pasta Primavera, with delicious salads on the side. Which reminds me that the kitchen still needs to be cleaned from the pasta dish, as I was attending the Awards Ceremony at the time and grabbed the food and dashed back to the office. The staff at this hotel are a bit slack and seem to expect the guests to do a lot of the chores. No tips from me!

My currently reading has stayed at 20, including the three I'm just pretending to read. I didn't have time to do much reading (as opposed to listening and talking about books) but I managed not to start many things and finished the books the library wanted back.

The Book Date does a weekly roundup of what people are reading, want to read, or have read each week called "It's Monday! What Are You Reading" so I'll sign up there. Ditto for the children's lit version at either Teach Mentor Texts or Unleashing Readers. My Cybils poetry book keeps me eligible as a kidlit reader this week. 

Started

Angel's Blood, Nalini Singh. For my Cloudy book club.

Redemption, David Baldacci. Library book I've hoarded through the pandemic. Also my Goodreads team pick this week. 

Me and White Supremacy, Layla Saad. I joined another reading club!

Completed

Angel's Blood, Nalini Singh. For my Cloudy book club. The world building is these is so delightful that my usual aversion to being constantly told that it's feminine to enjoy domination is overlooked. Powerful winged beings have carved the world up between them; they transform people to vampires as a perk, and random humans are born with super senses who hunt down any vampires who leave their posts (all vampires have to fulfill a 100 year indentured servitude). But otherwise, nothing has changed in the world. It's vague as to when the angels showed up, or if they were around all along and no one noticed, or what. 

Redemption, David Baldacci. Amos Decker can't forget anything. Also he solves crime. The crime part slides along while I enjoy Decker's struggles with life; he's still traumatized by the memories of his family's murder. I mean, obviously, but for him these memories remain violently fresh. But he's also working hard at being a better person; his friendship with Alex has helped him learn to let other people in and also to actively reach out to them. 

Fences, August Wilson. I could tell this would be a gripping play, but it was hard for me to picture it. So I tended to just get impatient with Troy. I want to watch a performance which will bring the male characters to life. My play-to-reality strength is fairly poor.

Bookmarks Moved (Or Languished) In:

Tender Morsels, Margo Lanagan. 8/10 discs. I went nowhere. In fact, I traded cars with my niece for most of the week and forgot to take out the CD.

Uncompromising Honor, David Weber. Baen Free Radio Hour's serial. I did talk about the Honor books with several groups of people at the con!

Tooth and Claw, Jo Walton. No time. 

Braiding Sweetgrass (audio), Robin Wall Kimmerer. The library called it home! But I have it back now.

Parable of the Sower, Octavia Butler. Reread. No time.

Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling. I'm listening to celebrities read this to me. Finished Stephen Fry's description of Hagrid's appearance.

The Warden, Anthony Trollope. For my Tuesday Minecraft club. Didn't finish, but I skipped the meeting. I didn't really have a Tuesday, and on Monday I set my clocks to NZ time and it became Wednesday.

Black Leopard, Red Wolf, Marlon James. Sword and Laser pick. I'm starting to get traction. Which is good, because I have to read about 400 pages by Saturday.

Ordinary Hazards, Nikki Grimes. Cybils finalist.  I'm glad I'm reading this is bursts, because it lets me appreciate the language of the poems. And also handle the heartbreak. 

Picture Books / Short Stories:

 

Αλφαβητάρι με γλωσσοδέτες, Eugene Trivizas. Nope. I barely kept alive in my Duolingo!

Palate Cleansers

These books I'm barely reading; I use them as palate cleansers between books I'm actually reading.

The Educated Child, William Bennett. 

Give All to Love, Patricia Veryan. 

Wool, Hugh Howey. 

The Wind Gourd of La'amaomao, Moses Nakuima. 

Sorcerer to the Crown, Zen Cho. 

Reading and Learning to Read, Jo Anne Vaca. 

Reading Challenges

1. Cybils 2017. None.
2. Cybils 2018. None.
3. Cybils 2019. Started Ordinary Hazards, the last poetry pick.
4. Reading My Library. The librarians are considering my request. My actual library is opening this week for pick-up, so I think my chances are good. I'll ask in person next week.
5. Ten to Try. At 9/10. Haven't read it yet, but I've got #10 on my tablet.
6. Where Am I Reading: 23/51 states. Redemption was in Ohio. 19 Countries. 
7. Book Riot's Read Harder Challenge. 22/24. Fences was a play! Two left: 13 (food book about a new to me cuisine),  and 24 (Indigenous author). If I count the romance back at the beginning of the year (he was a food truck owner) I'm almost done!