I Couldn't Help Rooting for the Giants

I wanted to root for Kansas City, because I know my grandpa, a onetime manager of the Kansas Wheat League, would have loved to see Kansas City win.  My oldest son is also for KC, having gone to college in Missouri.  But the Giants kept pulling me toward them. Being of a (sometimes unfortunately) analytical mind, I had to figure out why.
In 2010 I traveled to San Francisco to attend Bouchercon, which is the be-all, end-all of mystery conferences.  I didn't have a book out and didn't  ask to be on a panel or ask a bookseller to flog my old novel, but I was hoping to have fun and meet some folks, network  and eat, breathe and sleep  crime fiction for a few days.
We didn't stay at the conference hotel, but parked ourselves across town at the Seal Rock Inn, a funky place where Hunter Thompson wrote one of his books.  The rooms are big, the parking is free,  the restaurant serves a mean  breakfast and down the hill sits the historic Cliff House for drinking and dining. 
  I went to a great pre-conference workshop and I'm still digging out Elizabeth Lyons' advice whenever I  begin to write something.   Next came the Noir Evening somewhere in North Beach with the Ramshackle Romeos providing the music. Famous and near-famous writers read noir passages, and it was so cool except for my excruciating jet lag that had me dozing off at nine p.m.
A first-ever trip to City Lights Bookstore, long a dream of mine came to pass.  We ate at The Stinking Rose, a garlic lover's paradise.
But the confernece?  Disappointing and kind of blah.  I would see someone I knew across the huge room, wave, and never see that person again.  I met no one.  Hardly talked to anyone.  All the so-called mid-list writers were courting the  a-list writers, and  well, I  suppose I was a no-list writer, or a low-list writer.  Low, as in lower than whale shit.  The same conference in Chicago had been friendly and fun.  This was neither.  And there was the one-hour bus ride across town every morning.  Was the ghost of Hunter Thompson traveling along making snide remarks about my writing?  Chastising me for wanting to be part of things?  That's how it felt. Alienation was my constant companion.  Sometimes one just has to suck it up.


The Spanish Civil War Lincoln Brigade Monument in the neighborhood of the conference hotel was unexpected.  And moving.  Only in San Francisco. The city itself was splendid. No complaints about SF. 



Then, like the surf crashing into the Seal Rocks, a huge feeling of relief washed over me when Bouchercon was over.  We spent a day or so sightseeing, and ended up in the late afternoon in the bar of the Cliff House, watching the Giants play.  Everyone was friendly, just what I had been missing. We focused on the game.  The food rocked, the drinks rolled and for the first time all week I was enjoying myself.  Loved every minute.  Go Giants!   And they did win everything including their first world series since moving to the West Coast in 1958. 
Bouchercon is in California again, but I'm not going.  Been there.  Done that. But I rooted for the Giants again this year, recalling the happy confines of the Cliff House bar and the excitement and camaraderie and cheering.  Sometimes a trip takes an unexpected turn.  And sometimes you have to face the fact that you are a minnow in a big lake and that the muskies and the catfish and the pike will swim on by.  Observing the feeding frenzy is not always a bad thing.                                  

No NaNoWriMo for Me

Mel's Diner in Reno

Abraham Lincoln Brigade Memorial

Giant's Stadium

Funky North Beach

North Beach--what a great neighborhood!

Welcome to Bouchercon!

The Seal Rock Inn 

Eeek!  The last thing I can do this month is start a novel, although I have one planned.  Need to put some finality and polish on the current one.  Lots of good editing tips from Elizabeth Lyon at the SinC writing event before Bouchercon.  It was such fun to finally see City Lights Bookstore, North Beach, San Francisco Noir (the Ramshackle Romeos rocked!) and revisit the Seal Rock Inn.  And the Cliff House.  And Fisherman's Wharf.  And... And...And.  Here are a few photos.

Ready, Set, Go, Return, etc.

2010 Bouchercon Logo:  isn't it cool?

So, long time no post.  We were in San Francisco at Bouchercon, the mystery convention, and then in Reno, Tahoe, Gerlach, NV, and finally back to Boston via Reno, Las Vegas and Providence. 

A long trip, in distance as well as time.  We didn't stay at the convention hotel but across town at the Seal Rock Inn, which is at Land's End at Sutro, and around the corner from the Cliff House where we dined one evening and propped up the bar one afternoon watching a Giants playoff game.  The Cliff House serves seriously good food, as has a nice vibe.  The whole dining room grew quiet as the sun dropped behind the horizon.  Yeah, fab view, too.

I read some reviews for the Inn which weren't exactly stellar, and yes, it's a bit funky, (Hunter Thompson wrote a book there),  but the price is right and parking is free and there's a bus to downtown next door, and a Walgreens and a laundry down the street and parks and walks and oh, did I mention the Cliff House?  And that the rooms are suites with a stove and a fridge and a coffee maker along with a nice new shower and fresh wallpaper.  Free WiFi?  A cafe that serves a decent breakfast and lunch for a good price?

We've stayed there many times and it's like home, now.  Well, that helps too.  End of rave.

So the convention was like all mystery conventions with everyone trying to network like mad and he b-team sucking up to the a-team and the c-team likewise to the b-team, and somehow it was hard to schmooze at the bar this year, but the Sisters in Crime had a great hospitality suite with lots of food and coffee.

I haven't published anything for a year, and find an ugly gloom setting over me in the midst of so many success stories. 

We went to an instructive  editing session the day before the conference, and I learned so much from Elizabeth Lyon, who conducted the seminar that I'm scared to death I won't be able to apply it before I start forgetting.  Already I reworked some of In Flight, both beginning and end.  I still have a page and a half to write, but I'm in no hurry.  In the meantime, the world count  is like, totally incredibly HUGE, and that will have to change.  Except one cuts a paragraph here and adds a sentence there, so you never actually  slash and burn.

We returned home with a big bag o' books.  I read a Janet Evanovich Stephanie Plum novel  on my Kindle, one of her better ones, and now I'm almost done with the latest Maisie Dobbs by Jacqueline Winspear, who was also at the conference.  Her books just keep getting better and better.  Don't know how she does it.  Hard work, for starters.

On Thursday, there was a noir evening.  You had to pick up a black envelope at City Lights Bookstore that told you where and when.  Knock three times and the password (I can give it away now) was "fleurs du mal."  Booze was free, but I was sated with wine and collapsing with jet lag and kept a low profile all evening.  The readings were riveting and the bad was so cool.  This was really fun.

We went to Fisherman's Wharf for a seafood dinner on Friday.  Delicious halibut.  I rampaged through the seafood all week.  

Suffice it to say that San Francisco is a primo city, beautiful and challenging, and always exuding an air of mystery.  Ah noir!

Grapeshot, glad to be home to laundry and a newly cleaned house for company Wednesday.  Cats delighted to see us.   The orange one has decided nothing beats sleeping on a human.   We "share" him.

My beautiful begonias froze two nights ago.  Fall is here.  The orange cat caught two more mice in the garage, and is eyeing the chipmunks that scamper around collecting acorns.  Yes, fall is definitely here.

Finally, Grapeshot  with more anon