There’s so much I want to do next year and if I want to do it I have to start planning out the finances now.

• There’s The Reason Rally in Washington DC March 24 – giant maybe (Flight/hotel)
• There’s Balticon May 25-28 – absolutely (Flight/Hotel/Con Fees)
• Convergence – just the Skeptrack part – July 5-8. (Con Fees/gas to drive)
• TAM 10 is most likely in July – likely too expensive in Con Fees
• There’s Dragon*Con in late August – if I can convince Calla to go back with me (Flight/Hotel/Fees)

Seriously, Calla? What do you think of going back?

I wish I could just stay at the hotel as a regular guest, that way I could see the people in their costumes and hit the parties. I really have no desire to actually attend any panels or whatever. Maybe visit the dealer’s area – which would require a con badge. Not that Dragon*Con itself is very expensive, it’s the flight and hotel that costs.

It’s all about the benjamins.

Damn, I’m going to be soooo busy this month! Even though I’m missing Dragon*Con this year, I won’t be sitting at home feeling sorry for myself.

Friday evening there is the usual #evfn. This week we’re back at Studio 5C. It’s a nice little gallery type place with a great patio for socializing and it’s right off Mill Ave if we want to carry on for the rest of the night. Plus, lots of people I kind of know through podcasting (and some I really do know) are gathering this weekend for…

The Deadpan BBQ Saturday afternoon-evening at my friend CJ’s house. Those are always lots of fun, and with no kids around this time I’m pretty sure it’ll be even better than before.  Sunday evening is another Deadpan party, this time at the Tempe Palms hotel.

Tuesday evening I’m helping someone set up their recording studio and Wednesday night is our usual Evo@11 recording at Gangplank.  Friday (11th) I’m going to my friend Dani’s for another “Slumber Party.”  This time it’s a different presenter so we’ll have to see if she’s as funny as the last one.

My Dad turns 73 on the 13th. I wish he didn’t live so far away. He called me today while I was at IKEA so I was a bit distracted, but I had the hardest time explaining to him how my cell phone number stayed the same even though I’d moved. He just doesn’t get it. He wanted my new address so I’m standing there in the middle of the stupid store practically yelling it out for everyone to jot down. I was one of *those* people!

There’s a Brand-X T-Shirt Tweetup the following Thursday night. I’m still debating that one.

On the 18th I’m joining friends for my very first major league baseball game at Chase Field. I’ve never been so I can’t pass up this chance. After that I’ll be going to my very first Rocky Horror Picture Show! Thanks to the light rail I won’t have to do a lot of driving as everything is on the rail.

Yet another Can’t Stop the Serenity showing on the 19th. I don’t care what anyone says, it never gets old. Plus there’s a sing-along to Dr. Horrible’s Sing Along Blog, so there!

And Kira’s 3rd Birthday is on the 29th. I don’t know what’s planned for that yet, but I’m sure we’ll do something. She’s excited. Practicing her three finger thing and asking where her birthday cake is already.

Busy, busy month and I’m sure there will be more adds to my calendar as I go along.

Plus that certain someone has said that September is a good possibility for a visit. We don’t communicate much so I’m not sure yet. Everything (except the slumber party) is something I could actually take him along and have fun. We’ll see.

I’m getting excited about my trip to Minnesota. I got the laundry done and most of my stuff packed. I may have to use the bigger suitcase.

I talked to the people at the new apartment and apparently my credit sucks so I have to come up with a bit more security deposit. The date is still on, August 8th. And I’ve decided there’s no way this carpet will ever get clean so I’m sure these guys will take replacement costs out of whatever deposit I may have had coming here. Oh well. EVENTUALLY money will loosen up.

I finished a couple of books last week. My Horizontal Life by Chelsea Handler was first. My friend CJ suggest it. It’s just a slightly amusing play-by-play of this woman’s one night stands. But about halfway through it just got boring and stupid. I mean, one amusing story at a time is cool, but this just goes on and on. I finished it.  The other book was Seth Harwood’s Jack Wakes Up. I met Seth a couple of times (and we twitter) and he was in town Thursday for his book signing so I figured I’d get his book. I went and we all hung out after. He’s another podiobooks.com author. I’ve completely given up on listening to podiobooks. I can barely keep up with the regular podcasts I like, much less get involved with an ongoing story.

I cleaned the nail polish off my toes last night and freaked at how long my nails had gotten. Don’t have a man around to bitch about getting poked.

I have a bit of a dilemma regarding ThatGirl. You know she skipped town with her twins and ended at a homeless shelter in Indiana. She’d ran after the wrong man online. I heard she dumped her year old twins with his Aunt and now has signed them over. The aunt is adopting one of the girls and her cousin is adopting the other, so at least they will still have a connection. My dilemma is, I feel I should contact this family and give them Kira’s basic information so if in the future those girls want to find their sister they have something to start with. I’m not sure if I should leave well enough alone… or stick my nose in. There’s no telling what the future holds and how often Casey will move and change addresses and phones so if there’s to be an information exchange it should be now. For the kids’ sake. Then again, at the rate ThatGirl pumps out babies and then abandons them, there might be a whole litter out there in a few years so why bother.

Speaking of not having a man around. I don’t know why. I get out. I socialize. People seem to like me. I have (married or too young) men friends but I can’t seem to find or interest an available guy for me. Geeze, I don’t want to get married I just want companionship or even an occasional date.  I wish someone could just tell me what I’m doing wrong.

I’ve had three different bites on my Dragon*Con tickets, yet no follow through. How hard is it to paypal $70 and your address to my email?  Today if not sooner. Really, stop saying you want my ticket if you aren’t prepared to do it right now.

I think my ex-husband got married last week.

Has-been celebs have been dropping like flies in the last few weeks. I think Americans give their celebrities way too much attention and it climaxes with their deaths. Hours and hours of TV retrospectives and gossip mongering. Okay, David Carradine died jacking off, that’s all we need to know and maybe a quick replay of his credits before winning the Most Bizarre Finale Award. We don’t need 1,867 headlines of piecemealed out “information” repeated so often that the actual facts (if you ever find them) get lost in the noise. But that was just a warm-up for the whole Michael Jackson drama. Seriously, doesn’t anyone remember the child molesting? When he bought and paid for his children and dangled one over a balcony other weird shit we’ll never know about?  Until the kids get old enough to write their own stories, that is. Although the man was one of the most talented pop songwriter/dancers in our history, he was FUCKING CRAZY. Yeah, I cut him the eccentric artist slack for a long time, but the scales were too unbalanced at the end. Maybe now the rest of his family will find some other tit to suck on. Probably Janet’s, she sure likes to put it out there.

Okay, I’m done for now. I really need to get stuff organized. Later…

Finally managed to get my already-paid-for plane tickets changed over so it’s official.

I’m going to Minnesota for 10 days next month to attend CONvergence and get to hang out with my VERY good friends Cara and Heather.  You D*C people know them as the ladies I usually stay with there and they come to the good parties with me. This time I’m going to their neck of the woods to check out… Minnesota.

All my bestest friends have cancelled on Dragon*Con so there’s really no reason to go. Oh sure, there are a few other friends I’ll miss (Cat and Taipa and Loren and A and all my author friends and peeps like that) but this trip sounded like more fun.

And it’s like, three weeks from now and I REALLY NEED to get away from the people I live with NOW and not in September.

So, Cara, specifically:

US Airways Flight 351 arriving July 1 at 5:00 pm

US Airways Flight 35 leaving July 10 at 5:55 pm

I can’t bloody wait!  Anybody else (fans, friends, folks) who want to get together just email spellwight over at gmail and we’ll set up a meetup of some sort.

Finally managed to get my already-paid-for plane tickets changed over so it’s official.

I’m going to Minnesota for 10 days next month to attend CONvergence and get to hang out with my VERY good friends Cara and Heather. You D*C people know them as the ladies I usually stay with there and they come to the good parties with me. This time I’m going to their neck of the woods to check out… Minnesota.

All my bestest friends have cancelled on Dragon*Con so there’s really no reason to go. Oh sure, there are a few other friends I’ll miss (Cat and Taipa and Loren and A and all my author friends and peeps like that) but this trip sounded like more fun.

And it’s like, three weeks from now and I REALLY NEED to get away from the people I live with NOW and not in September.

So, Cara, specifically:

US Airways Flight 351 arriving July 1 at 5:00 pm

US Airways Flight 35 leaving July 10 at 5:55 pm

I can’t bloody wait! Anybody else (fans, friends, folks) who want to get together just email spellwight over at gmail and we’ll set up a meetup of some sort.

I have unexpectedly and fortunately come into some money so I went ahead and got my Dragon*Con tickets and airfare.  Anybody who thinks my priorities are out of whack have no clue how much going every year means to me.  Bite me.

Thursday – US Airways Flight 610, leaving here at 9:03 am and arriving ATL 3:41 pm

Monday – returning Flight 70, leaving there at 5:35 pm and arriving here 6:56 pm.

Now, if my friends have thunk ahead and have room reservations, I’m all set. If not, I may not have a room!

Can’t wait til September 3rd!

I’m tagged for another new meme. TSDivaDani from The Truth Seekers Podcast tagged me, and the meme is you have to go to your 6th page of flickr photos, and blog about the 6th picture. Here’s Dani’s post.

*mumbling* Flickr, my photostream, page 6, 6th picture, oh!

I love a parade, but my kids never really acquired my love and so once they were old enough to say no, I don’t go anymore. Except for the Dragon*Con parade. If you’ve never been to D*C and/or don’t know about the parade, here’s a synopsis. Saturday morning all the different interest groups gather in their quaint (and some not-so-quaint) costumes and parade through the streets of downtown Atlanta. Huge parade. To get the idea you can wander through this photo set if you haven’t already.

Friday night was a great party so none of my friends got up with me. I got out there early and sat by myself with my McDonald’s breakfast and waited. The street filled up pretty fast and I was surrounded by normals with kids, some bratty some not. Midway through the parade here comes Donald Duck and that little girl was screaming with delight. Until he headed directly towards her those screams changed from delighted to desperate in seconds. She went more ape-shit the closer he got. You could tell this wasn’t a regular gig for the guy inside. Most of those guys know to back off if the kid ain’t happy, but he kept trying to make up to her. She wasn’t buying it and her Dad finally picked her up and took off through the crowd. Donald shrugged and went off to terrorize some other small child. Fun!

Whew, that wasn’t so hard.

*mumble mumble* Find and tag some folks from your flickr list.

BusyMe, Elizasea, and Cj – You’ve Been Tagged.

I heard on a podcast today that there was a WI3D recorded at Dragon*Con. My first impulse was WTF? A little pissed, a little hurt, a bit disappointed. And then I listened to it.

Let me list some former WI regulars and guests who were actually at D*C:

Me
Evo
TD0013
Kris the Cheesecake Lady
Thomas from Flagstaff
Tee Morris
Mur Lafferty
Trucker Overdrive (Jack Jaffe)
Brian Brown

And I’m pretty sure we were all there by Thursday evening.

People from the previous list who were at the D*C recording:

Brian Brown – the guy who threw down his headphones and said, “I quit” and stormed out of the studio at our last regular studio recording.

And this makes sense how? Whatever. And then when something was mentioned about other cast members not being there he had the nerve to say, “yeah, but you have the best one here.” Way to go asshole. You know, the asshole you didn’t want to be?

Brad Bower (podculture) and Brian Richardson did a good job hosting (except for their levels – Brad is a bit overpowering on this recording) and there was the usual trying of new drinks and randy innuendo. The show was fine, but as a listener it didn’t feel like a Wingin-It to me. I hope they’re all happy.

Again, whatever.

This is one of my favorite pictures so far:

Well, not quite yet actually. As usual, I’m up before the alarm clock (or my cell phone in this instance) and I don’t plan to leave here for another 30-45 minutes. Everything is packed and ready to go. I’m trying to print out the schedule grid now, but if’n it doesn’t work that’s fine too.

Have I mentioned how much I hate flying? For some reason, this morning I’m fine. I may get tense until I’m actually ON the plane, but I think I’m cool this time. No snapping at family members, no upset stomach.

Had a ridiculous phone call from my mother this week. Old Lady Drama went on and on about how worried she was about me whenever I go to “these wacko conventions” alone. Jezuz Pizza like I don’t go every fucking year. Like I don’t explain EVERY year how most of D*C is as safe as going to the mall. Dad called me this week, too. And Max called yesterday afternoon! Casey called twice. I refuse to get freaked out by all this family devotion.

Well, I should start loading my stuff into the car. See you in Atlanta!