Blue Heaven ‘09

I had the most amazing time last week at the Blue Heaven Novel Workshop (on Kelleys Island). This was my second time attending, and both workshops were fully life-changing. The level of writing and critiquing is awesome, plus there’s constant smart talk about writing, storytelling, publishing and on and on and on. It’s like thrice-daily intellectual orgasms. I came home inspired like a mad inspired thing.

Here’s the Flickr set with all my BH09 photos if you’re curious, and here are a few pics for the post.

We took this on the ferry–there’s no bridge to the island!

I finally got to hang out with Chance Morrison again, who I met at Wiscon. Here we are posing for a publicity shot for her new sitcom, “Chance!” Greg wrote a lovely theme song for it, and everyone contributed episode ideas, including a Very Special episode where fake-English Chance meets her evil twin, Canadian Chance. I’m the sidekick who always gets left holding the bag after fake-English Chance’s spurious activities.

On the last day, a few of us walked to the island’s park, where glaciers formed these really cool grooves millennia ago. This is Heather Shaw, Gwenda Bond, me and Greg Van Eekhout.

Me and Rae demonstrating how much fun we were having. Paolo must have said something inappropriate to garner such laughter.

Inside the girl’s house…
I love this pic of Chance and Bill.

And this one of Rae and Paolo.

And this one of Sandra and Greg!

And this one of Charlie hard at work. Note the Superman hat. All too appropriate.

What’s going on here?!?! o.O

Heather’s at The Pump, where we all went for a few hours of beer and internet connectivity each evening. I love this pic; I think she’s talking to her son!

Here I am posing in the ruins of some old winery. How cool is that?!?

Here’s Paolo and Greg stirring up trouble at those same ruins.

Two important notes:
1. Spiders pwn that island. Omg. They became really aggressive by the end of the week. I was so cool about it, though. I only screamed like three times.
2. Srsly amazing time.

Montreal

This August I visited Montreal with a few friends. We had a blast exploring the streets of Old Montreal. There’s a Notre Dame, just like in Paris!

Here are my friends!

A Christmas store and a gift shop. There was also a cupcake shop. And a possibly-crazy woman serenaded us from the side steps of Notre Dame while we ate.

I only had the camera on my phone, so I didn’t get many good pictures. Here’s a very blurry me by a creepy alley.

…and the creepy alley.

A fire exhibit near the hotel.

Roswell Road Trip: pictures from the road

The drive from Denver to Roswell took just under eight hours. We stopped at a few places along the way.

My favorite stop was a sunflower patch near the New Mexico border. It was cool and windy out, and there was no one around for miles. It was magical place.

Here’s Larry in front of a gift shop in Trinidad, where we stopped for fuel.

We also stopped in the tiny town of Vaughn, NM.

In Vaughn, we took inappropriate photos at a cemetery, because it was spooky, solitary and full of ghosts wanting to speak. The graves were the only thing in view for miles, amid foggy grasslands.

Roswell Road Trip: the town

Roswell is charming, with a strip of shops and restaurants dedicated to tourists. Though it rained the entire time we were there, supposedly Roswell is a sunny place with moderate weather.

Witness Roswell nightlife. We hung out at the Not of This World Cafe, which was beautiful inside (Tuscan). They have live music and poetry readings. The owners–very friendly people–have the coolest business in town.

Inside the cafe:

The tourist shops go all out with displays and atmosphere. This shop used strobe lights.

Larry in front of an alien experiment.

A local church.

Inside our favorite Mexican restaurant.

Roswell Road Trip: the museum

We toured the Roswell UFO Museum and Research Center, where you can browse a database of alien sightings. (Or report your own!) There are even support groups.

Behind the news horse (and Larry) is a map which highlights sightings/abductions/visitations all over the world.

Information about UFOs.

Sightings.

The giant box is a replica of one found in the Sacred Temples of Palenque and somehow indicates the existence of space travel in 400-600 AD.

A representation of farmer Mac Brazel discovering the spaceship remains in his field.

This prop was used in the movie Roswell.