MargoMusing

Tragically, the cake cafe where we had breakfast on Saturday doesn't open on Sundays, so we couldn't hve breakfast there. We ended up in the Boulangerie RF Long and her family,m which was a consolation.

Then, as there was some sort of convention going on at the hotel it seemed reasonable to go to a panel or two...

I started with "Ethics in YA Fiction"; the panel included Michael Carroll, author of the 'Quantum Prophecy' series, Peadar Ó Guilín (the author of 'The Inferior', which I belive involves teen cannibals) Siobhan (who is a knitter and linguist, and may well have other qualifications I know not of) and Clare Hennesy

The panel started with discussions about what can and cannot go into books marketed for children, Michael Carroll explaining that on the basis of concerns about the sensibilities of some parts of the USA, he has had to excise the occasional "damn" or "Bloody" from the books, and has therefore invented his own expletives. There was also some discussion about age banding and labelling and how libraries are (at least in part) trying to cater to those parents who don't know what might be suitable for their child, rather than trying to censor books.

The panel then moved towards issues which I found more interesting - some of the ideas and presumptions that may be found in (some) books - one example given being that in the Harry Potter books, there appears top be the idea that 25% of wizards are evil, based on selection at age 11. I had to leave at this point which was a shame, as it felt that the panel was just getting on the area I found interesting...

My second panel was Lorraine's panel "Neil Gaiman: Behind The Curtain" - which sadly clashed with Brian's horror panel, which I should also have liked to attend. Lorraine talked about her job, and answered questions from the floor, Including revealing that she had initially said No to Neil doing "13 Nights of Fright" (Because he didn't really have time), but relented when he explained he had always wanted to come out of a coffin....!)

I thought it went well, although the room had a bit of a problem in that it seemed to have only two possible settings as far as heat was concerned - very stuffy & overheated, or frigid. . .

I stayed on for the next panel, which was about invented and inventing languages, and worldbuilding, which was fun - wandered on  into issues of Irish accents/language on TV.

As if to make up for no panels yesterday, today was pretty busy. Straight after  the language panel was a panel about the Care and Feeding of writers, which featured Lorraine (of course), Parris, (GRRM's partner) Pat Fanning (R.F.Long's husband) and Ted Lee (C.E.Murphy's husband). Topics covered included The Importance of Feeding Your Writer,  Socialisation and Human Contact, lots of anecdotes  -very interesting to hear about the writing habits of different writers. I think for me one of the most amazing was Ted saying that Catie wrote her first book while on trains commuting to and from work. How impressive is that?.

Parris spoke with feeling about how absorbed and un-distractable George can be - she once got fed up and went in to tell him that that the tyrannosaurs were invading and  the volcanos erupting, and  got a "good...." and "fine, in a minute" reply. . .
I noticed a number of nods of recognition from the other panellists!

I have been looking forward to, and planning, this trip to Dublin to see various fiends and to attend Octocon, for months, but as often seems to happen, it appears to have been a long time in the future for ages, then suddenly it was week away, without any warning!

I spent most of yesterday faffing about with last minute work stuff, as my quiet day in theoffice to ensure everything was up together turned into a lot of firefighting. And then the evening was taken up with packing. I don’t know whether it’s just me, but I always seem to end up in a state of panic in case I have packed the wrong things, or too little, or that I will discover that my choices of clothes etc. are wholly inappropriate to the place, or the weather, or the event. Knowing how foolish this is does not seem to change anything. *sigh*

Still, I did manage to be quite restrained when it came to packing books, on the basis that if one is attending a Science Fiction/Fantasy convention in a major city the chances of being unable to acquire extra books if needed are fairly low…

I was disappointed but unsurprised to find my first train of the day was running late (Thank you so much, First Great Western.) Probably just as well I booked the train an hour earlier than I thought was necessary, really….

However, the train did make up much of the time and I arrived at the airport with plenty of time in hand, and was able to go through security with only a minor check (apparently books look suspicious under x-rays, Who knew?) happily, Southampton is a dinky litle airport which, at least on a Thursday afternoon, is not crowded. I actually walked past the entrance to the security without realising it as I was loking for a queue, and had to turn back!

The flight was short and uneventful. I was disappointed that low cloud meant I couldn't see much.

Then Dublin, and a long bus ride brought me to the hotel.Several very friendy and helpful Dubliners ensured that I got off the bus in the right place, and shortly after checking in I met up with Lorraine and her Spirit Guide, @Nemone7. (Check out Lorrraine's blog to see what they'd been up to all day - way more exciting than my uneventful journeying!) for dinner and chat and plaanning of nNew Fun Stuff to do tomorrow. I believe graveyards will be invovled. And maybe tea. 

Also, unfortunately, Early Rising.