Jay Lake: Writer

[conventions|travel] Epic ConFusion Day Three, going home

Day three of Epic Confusion was very abbreviated for me, as I had to leave the hotel at 10:30 am in order to make my flight home. Still, I managed to attend a very nice breakfast, courtesy of cathshaffer and various concom folks, and say good-bye to a bunch of people by virtue of loitering in the lobby while my airport transportation ran 40 minutes late.

Which, yes, gave me a bad case of the “oh crap”s.

Nonetheless, I made it into DTW in a timely fashion. The flight down to DFW was uneventful, and I got the first part of what would eventually be 2.75 hours of editing on Sunspin done. I spent the rest of my time divided between Charlie Stross’ Laundry books and Saladin Ahmed’s Throne of the Crescent Moon, both of which I’m enjoying immensely. I don’t normally split my attention between two books, but I have Stross in eBook and Ahmed in dead tree, and the exigencies of air travel caused me to have to switch modes periodically.

In Dallas, we took a long time landing due to the 50 mph cross-winds on the runway slowing air traffic down severely. That also slowed down the arriving flight that would become the equipment for my Portland connection, to the degree of being almost two hours late. So much for my plan of flying through Dallas to avoid winter weather delays in Chicago or Denver. So much for a good night’s sleep, as well.

Anent Sunspin, I got through the first revision pass of the first half of Calamity of So Long a Life, and began embedding the comments for an initial pass through the second half. Right now, I’m actually a bit ahead of schedule for what I expected on this book. I think that’s a good thing, but it might also mean I have been skimming work when I should be digging deeper. We shall see…

Also, I forgot to mention that at Epic Confusion adelheid-p gave me a very nice gift. I need to thank her, and will post photos and a description some time in the net few days as time permits.

This afternoon is another girls’ basketball game, though the_child has been down with a respiratory infection the last few days, so it’s not clear if she’ll be able to play. She gets sick so rarely, this is unusual.

And of course, now that I’m home, Day Jobbery.

Tags: Books, Calamity, Child, Conventions, Sunspin, Travel, work, Writing

Posted: 6:42 am Mon January 23 2012 | Comments(0) |

[travel|conventions] Off to Epic Confusion

It’s early and I’m hitting the road for Michigan to attend Epic Confusion, thanks to the good offices of a number of folks who are sponsoring my trip. I’m looking forward to spending time with rarely-seen friends, and meeting many new folks from Midwestern fandom and writerdom.

As an FYI, here is a repost of my schedule there:

I will otherwise be in the bar, the dealer’s room or at parties. Find me and visit a while. Unfortunately, due to my needing to be at the airport midday Sunday, I won’t be able to make any Sunday programming. See some, all or none of you there.

Tags: Conventions, Travel

Posted: 5:49 am Thu January 19 2012 | Comments(0) |

[travel] Flying back to PDX

Today I travel back to Portland. A few errands this afternoon, some time with nobr>the_child, then I’m off to a housewarming party this evening.

It’s been a tiring but manageable week. My body seems to be (largely) cooperating with my intentions, and the writing is firing up. In fact, more of that on the plane today.

Whatever you’re doing today and this weekend, have fun and be well.

Tags: Child, Portland, Travel, Writing

Posted: 3:54 am Fri January 13 2012 | Comments(1) |

[travel|writing] Heading back to Omaha

Heading back to Omaha today for a week in the corporate office. This is my first trip to Omaha since last July (normally I go once every four to six weeks), and except for the November trip to San Jose, my first business trip since then. Part of a return to normalcy for me. Normalcy in 14 degree weather, of course.

This is a big step for me. A big piece of recovery from chemotherapy. A big piece of reclaiming my normal life.

And in terms of reclaiming, I’ll be taking a stab at first draft fiction during my downtime on this trip. I often use airplane and hotel time for writing, so we’ll see if the writing brain lights up this week. I’m a little fearful and lot optimistic. Wish me luck.

Tags: Cancer, health, Omaha, Travel, Writing

Posted: 4:42 am Mon January 09 2012 | Comments(2) |

[cancer|travel] Fly away, little chemo boy

After a trip to the hospital first thing this morning for my CT scan, I am heading to the airport to fly down to the Bay Area for Day Jobbery today. Yes, I am doing this from the depths of chemo, including my now seven days straight of significant bowel distress. Always fun on an airplane, that. Going to be a tricky day.

There’s a meeting tomorrow where I am a key resource. Normally I would have day tripped the 6 am flight tomorrow, attended the meeting, and flown back in the evening.

Uh huh, not in my current state.

So I’m taking a midday flight today, then collapsing in my hotel room for the rest of the day. Attending the meeting tomorrow, then collapsing in my hotel room for the evening, then flying back mid-morning Wednesday, then collapsing at my house.

So, no open dinner as I would usually do. Continued blogging is expected. It will be odd to fly and camp out in a hotel and not gobble up that time for writing as I almost always do when away from home. There’s a lot of books in my luggage.

The upside is all the logistical brangle around the trip is keeping my usual CT scan freakout somewhat abated. I should know more about that — specifically, whether I am clean of further metastases — Wednesday or Thursday. That in turn will set the tone for next year in a huge, important way.

Tags: California, Cancer, health, Personal, Travel, work

Posted: 6:43 am Mon November 07 2011 | Comments(1) |

[personal|travel] At the Mountains of Madness – more thoughts on Antarctica

I’ve given some more thought to the idea of going to Antarctica, and done some additional research.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: Antarctica, Cancer, Child, health, Personal, Travel

Posted: 5:27 am Thu September 08 2011 | Comments(9) |

[travel|awards] Heading for the Hugos

I’m off to Reno shortly. Won’t be around the con much today, as I figure I’ll spend most of it in my room, recovering my energy from travel stress. Look for me starting tomorrow. I’ll be there…

In other news, yesterday I had my head Hugo’d.

Looking like a low-rent superhero

The rocket is painted on

The final product

We’ll see how it holds up with my minimal head fuzz.

Photos © 2011, Joseph E. Lake, Jr. and JD.

This work by Joseph E. Lake, Jr. and JD is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

Tags: Awards, Conventions, Funny, Photos, Travel

Posted: 5:09 am Wed August 17 2011 | Comments(3) |

[travel] Away I go

Off to Readercon. Expect limited blogging through Monday. I’ll see some, all or none of you there.

Tags: Conventions, Travel

Posted: 4:53 am Thu July 14 2011 | Comments(1) |

[travel] The joys of flying as a cancer patient

One thing I’ve learned about TSA screening is that if you approach the security area wearing a hat or gloves, you will always be randomly selected for additional screening. Apparently having peripheral neuropathy profiles one as flying while Muslim. So I routinely remove my hat and gloves now to be a compliant flyer and avoid the hassle. Still, it’s more than a little weird.

Now TSA is warning us of surgically implanted explosives. Speaking as someone with an implanted medical device (chemotherapy access port in my right chest, a hollow titanium knob almost the size of a golf ball) and multiple surgery scars festooning my abdomen and chest, I’m pretty sure this will make me a high risk flyer once TSA starts scanning for evidence of surgical history.

Which, if it becomes true, will just piss me off. Basically, the sickest travelers will be in the high risk pool. We will be forced to explain, or possibly document, our medical histories. On top of the myriad indignities of serious illness will be heaped the ingenious indignities of TSA.

Meanwhile, yesterday in America, almost 90 people died from gun violence, almost 1,700 were killed by poor diet and a lack of exercise and a little over 1,200 were killed from smoking cigarettes. No people using the air transit system were killed by surgery patients or persons wearing hats and gloves.

Feel safer yet?

Tags: Cancer, health, Personal, Travel

Posted: 3:09 am Mon July 11 2011 | Comments(3) |

[travel] Flight of the Emerald City

Yesterday the_child and I finally managed a balloon flight, courtesy of elusivem, garyomaha, and the good aerostat Emerald City. Not to mention a group of willing volunteers on the ground crew.

We hauled out to Valley, NE after work yesterday, where the ground crew set the balloon up. Another balloon, Celebration, was launching close by. It’s a long, complex process with a lot of key steps. (Many of which I missed because I was resting in the van.) Once the balloon was set up, we were off quickly, rising over the Nebraska farmland to cruise across the Platte River. We mooed at cows, watched deer, rabbits and fox run from us, inspected crops and railroad tracks, waved at farmhouses, and generally had a grand time.

The sensation of being up in a balloon is fascinating. Except when you’re close to the ground, there’s almost no sense of motion. You’re moving with the wind, after all. The pilot lights hissed slightly, but we could hear all sorts of things from the ground, from cattle lowing to frogs peeping to someone’s peacock calling. I found that I experienced vertigo when we were close down, but not above a few hundred feet from the ground. elusivem explained that’s because the sense of motion disappears as you ascend. Still, I clung to the stays pretty tightly.

On landing, as we came in over the contour of a hill, we even flew through corn. (There’s a sentence I never thought I’d say.) Which is to say, the basket was cruising a foot or two off the ground through a cornfield, the plants hissing and snapping at the wicker as we flowed by.

The landing was clean and uneventful, though Emerald City‘s envelope got snagged on a barbed wire fence during takedown. Sadly, the good aerostat will be going in for repairs due to that mishap.

It may be a few days before I can post a good, solid photoblog of the event, but this might keep you happy for now:

Photo © 2011 Dr. C.

This work by Dr. C. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

Tags: Child, friends, Omaha, Personal, Photos, Travel

Posted: 5:09 am Thu July 07 2011 | Comments(1) |