Monday, October 22, 2007

Cherry Con

I am going to do this in sets of five - partly to avoid a post that is tome length and partly to create a semblance of organization.

Five Things About the Goodies:
1. The decorations and goodies and freebies and all of that rocked.
2. Blinking Sunglasses
3. Flamingos - pens, headbands, table decor, key chains, and lollipops.
4. Bubbles!
5. Books - Oh my all of the books!
The Books I Got

Five Things About Cincinnati and Covington:
1. Lovely.
2. Incredibly nice people (with the possible exception of one bus driver who wouldn't let us all on even though the bus didn't look very full).
3. Covington really suffers from a need, in my opinion, for a Starbucks that is open on Sunday. Just saying.
4. The Levee was great fun.
5. Great public transportation (even if the routes seem strange). Seriously, I am very picky about public transportation (or lack thereof).

Five Things The Authors Talked About:
1. Just write it. Sometimes the stuff that you'll end up cutting later is an integral part of the process, letting you get to know your story. If you keep polishing the first chapter, you'll never get to the end.
2. You'll be able to do a better job of polishing the first chapter once you have written the end.
3. Fuzzy goals are hard for readers to follow. Concrete is better.
4. Lots of people will give you advice and rules - down to the kind of binder clip. Take what you need, ignore the rest.
5. Anything you can do - collaging, or a soundtrack to get yourself into story mode helps.

Five Things I Know About the Cherries:
1. Cherries rock! I may not remember your name - or I may remember that there was an XXXX and a XXXXX but was XXXX the blonde or the brunette - but I still know, you all rock.
2. Cherries know how to have fun.
3. Cherries know everything. (Clearly). Books, alcohol, football, religious symbols, the wonder of Veronica Mars and the joy of Manos Del Uruguay yarn.
4. There are all kinds of Cherries.
5. Cherries are wonderfully creative - write those stories, quilt those quilts, knit, crochet, make clay dogs, cherries do it all.

Five Things that Are Probably Less Funny in the Re-telling:
1. Krissie read a sex scene aloud (having been dared) and we made our blinky glasses blink to represent the hotness.
2. I made someone take a picture of me blowing bubbles because I was at a party last month and couldn't do it.
3. I tried to convince people that they wanted to give me the ARCs they won. (Okay, that was actually serious, I would have given them back though. I just want to read them.)
4. What is the button on the back of the tiara for?
5. What happened to that bridesmaid?