Ugh. Feeling tired again. I went way too long yesterday between my meal of a power bar and coffee for breakfast (7 a.m.) and beer and wings for a late lunch (3:30 p.m.). It didn't that I've been dog-ass tired from not sleeping much at night (last night was much better though).

Maybe it's the lack of sleep and bad hotel food, but this con has been an eye-opener for me. Like a shot in the arm is needed with my own fiction. I feel like my previous stuff hasn't really broken any new ground. I'm too traditional. Dull. Both my writing and my personality -- I feel like I don't have anything to talk about! Elizabeth has felt this about herself as recently as a couple weeks ago at a party with our friends. So I think it's more just a case of us coming out of our caves, where we've worked so hard in the past 2 and a half years while she was in school, more than anything.

Maybe I just need to forget about stories for a while and work on the novels. The 13 stories I still have out to various editors will have to do while I'm finishing up the SF novel and reworking the Blackbeard novel and taking a good hard look at the urban fantasy novel.

Today should be a much better day for me than yesterday. I was tired all day yesterday, and just didn't feel like doing much. Plus there weren't a lot of good panels and readings other than the few I went to (Kelly Link's reading from The Dark was good, and the panel about the reviewers' year's best fiction was fairly interesting, and David Moles got a nice plug from Jay). I was sort of bummed that the beer and wings shindig didn't come off as well as I'd hoped. Our party got too big, and we couldn't hear what the folks on the other end of the table were discussing. But we had a good group, and I chatted with Jay and Jenn and John on my end, and missed out on the lively genre discussion with Karen M., Susan, Ben, Alan De Niro and a couple other folks. Ah well. I tried.

Today is lunch at Jaleo and then the Strange Horizons tea party and then setting up for the small press party. I'll probably have to run across the street to get more beer and munchies, unless folks bring some. I just hope the suite is big enough! I'm hoping to get to the slipstream panel this afternoon, and that's probably all the programming I'll see today. I'm looking forward to the party. Hope we get a good turnout.

And that's about it. I think in the future, if I continue coming to cons, I need to keep it short. Coming on Thursday may have been a bit of a mistake. It wears me out, being around people all day long. I did see some more writer and editor folks last night in the bar (I went down around 9 and had a few drinks with Susan, John S., and Kristin, and we were joined by Ted Chiang, Alan, Ben, Chris Barzak, and various others throughout the evening, until I crashed at midnight). I dunno. I'm terrible at networking. And I'm even worse at small talk. What do people talk about these days???

Okay, it's 8:59. Time to get cracking on some novel wordage. Later!

UPDATE 10:04 a.m. -- just finished chapter 27! And it's pretty damn good, if I say so myself. Now I'm off to get ready for lunch and stuff. Later!

Today's Words:
1,400

Words for '03:
137,900