Just a brief note that I went with Tim to his Best American Short Stories appearance at A Clean Well-Lighted Place for Books in San Francisco tonight, and I think it was the best writer appearance/ panel discussion I've ever attended. Seriously. Michael Chabon, who edited this year's volume, was there as well as the moderator, the fabulous David Kipen, who used to be the book reviewer for the San Francisco Chronicle for many years, but now is the Director of Literature for the National Endowment for the Arts. David was easy-going, fun and a brilliantly smashing moderator. He had wonderful questions, but each one came as if it'd just occured to him to ask, and it was the most organic panel moderating I've ever seen. Seriously, the man is a genius at this. I'm definitely picking up his book when it comes out next month (even though it's not on moderating panels :-)

Chabon is charming, modest and very fun to talk to. He had lots of interesting things to say, and I quite forgot my infatuation with his work, he was so nice. Even in the small group of us in the green room beforehand, I was at ease with him. Tim... Tim was amazing, guys. He had a response to everything (Kirpen pretty much let them both answer every question) and chatted easily and at length about various topics. He and Chabon both had a lot to say in defense of genre fiction, and I was very proud to see that Tim made points that Chabon hadn't made himself, but evidently agreed with or found interesting. Tim was funny and personable and if I wasn't married to him I would have definitely chatted him up, picked up his book and tried to pick up him as well :-) Seriously, though, I think several people there were impressed enough by how well-spoken Tim was that they picked up The Strange Adventures of Rangergirl (which the store sold out of and will have to reorder!), had him sign it, and were asking for copies of Little Gods and looking forward to his collection next year.

Very cool.

It was a fabulous evening. We even got to walk with David Kirpen to the BART station and chat with him almost all the way home on the train. I have some serious hero worship going on there, I think. I seldom look at men and think, "I want to be like that." but with him, I sort of did. He was just so comfortable and personable and intelligent and... cool, in the sense that he was connected in the world, but still willing to learn more (he claimed to not know much about podcasts, but he was the one to bring them up, for example).

But really, for me it was all about Tim and his brilliance. I told him beforehand not to worry, that he was always very well-spoken, but even though I knew this he still impressed the hell out of me. It was very exciting to watch him up there. I'm so proud!