Bad night for sleep and my brain is numb. This, on the day that I need to stay up until midnight or so. I'm pretty sure it won't happen. We booked a room for tonight at Baycon, so we don't have to drive home. The general idea was so we could stay up for the concerts and dances. I'm not sure I'll make it through, now.

In my bleary, befuddled way, I'm trying to figure out what to bring with me. I prefer to just live in my jeans, but should I hitch it up a notch for the writer's workshop? Plus, we're going from the convention to a baseball game on Saturday evening, so we have to take all the stuff for the game. Which, in Oakland, means sweatshirts, jackets, sweater caps, gloves, and maybe a blanket. 

There are fireworks after the game and I must say, the A's put on one of the best fireworks shows to be found, anywhere. Always worth it, but always freezing!

All the paperwork is printed and packed. I know it's just a convention, not a writer's conference, but I want to be prepared, Just In Case.

Side note: I'm still considering other titles for Dunallon. How about "Shipbuilder"?

Nothing else. Just "Shipbuilder." I still like "The Time Travel Journals" for the name of the series. But each book in the series should have a distinctive name, right?

I guess I like vacations, but I sure am glad to be home. Five days in Philadelphia, ten days in Hampton, VA. Immersion in American history, which was kind of cool. I liked seeing all the old buildings and clothing styles and checking out colonial recipes and reading the old documents. Those guys had the right idea for the most part, except for the Indians and the blacks and the women and...

Anyway, it was fun. One of these days, I'll get around to the pictures. Would you believe we forgot to bring the cord for charging the batteries on our new camcorder? Sure, you'd believe it. We got about 15 minutes of film in Philly and that's it. Everything else is pictures.

I've decided I really like those old houses. I want one, slightly modernized in the important areas (bathroom and kitchen).

The cold that hit me just before leaving was enough to spoil the conference. I attended everything, but felt lousy and looked awful (I've seen the pictures). It didn't last long though, since by Wednesday and Hampton, I was feeling pretty much okay. No coughing at all, thank goodness. That can go on for weeks!

Adventures at home while we gone: Cissy met a skunk. Cissy is our 14 year old Australian Shepherd and our dog sitter called with the bad news. He got some enzyme stuff and washed her up, for which we will be eternally grateful. Quite a mess when we got home though. The shampoo made her shed like crazy and we were nearly inch-deep in fur. Took two hours to vacuum and I actually threw away her bed sheet rather than face it.

But not much smell in the house and once we'd spent one night with the windows open, it's all gone. So life continues...

My husband brought home a cold from his business trip to Houston a couple of weeks ago. He spent a week with a fever and misery, took a lot of time off, but is just about over it now and is back at work this week.

I got it last night.

In a case of karmic-go-around, I'm scheduled to fly tomorrow, with a three-day conference (Sat - Mon) in Philly. Rick is meeting me there and we're driving down to Virginia for 10 days to visit his sister and brother-in-law.

There's no doubt I'm going to be contagious. I can use tissues constantly and make liberal use of the hand sanitizer, but still. Six hours in a metal tube with a couple hundred innocent people. I'm sure I won't be the only one who's sick, but I hate to expose them. And I'm going to feel like hell for the entire conference, too.

I don't tend to get as sick as my husband. I doubt that I'll have a fever and most of the time my colds are mild, but you know how the first few days can be. Already, I'm a little dizzy and I'm really tired and the throat is a bit sore. Tomorrow, multiply everything by 2 or 3.

Sigh.