"The notion that such persons are gay of heart and carefree is curiously untrue. They lead, as a matter of fact, an existence of jumpiness and apprehension. They sit on the edge of the chair of Literature. In the house of Life they have the feeling that they have never taken off their overcoats."
- James Thurber, My Life and Hard Times

Tuesday, February 19, 2013

What day is this?

Finally met Andrew Kaufman. Sweet!
Howdy, Peeps! I'm home from the Southern California Writers' Conference in San Diego, where I spent three glorious days and one semi-conscious morning talking, teaching, learning, and laughing. I barely have a voice left, and my brain feels like pea soup, but I did want to give you a few highlights:


Tameri at High Tea on the Queen Mary
1. My workshops went over really well and they were fun for me to teach. The PowerPoint slides were invaluable, as they kept me on track and slowed my pace enough. In my first workshop, I thought I breezed through everything a little too quickly,  and kept saying so. My buddy Tameri Etherton, who attended the workshop, threatened to smack me if I didn't stop saying that, so I've modified my opinion - my workshop on Rhythm, Pace, and AMUSEment was perfect.

Rick gave out prizes!
2. I learned a lot from attending other workshops. One example: Rick Ochocki taught me some great tools for keeping my writing process flowing. He was referring specifically to NaNoWriMo (National November Writing Month), wherein writers everywhere try to produce 50,000 words in 30 days. This  is something I've tried once and failed miserably at. I don't know that I'll try it again, but I'll certainly use some of the tools.

3. I laughed a lot (and learned) from the conference directors Michael Steven Gregory and Wes Albers. Michael is mostly about film, and when he discusses why certain movies do and don't work, he gives me ideas about why certain books do and don't work, too. And in his new(ish) job as a coordinator for hostage negotiation/standoffs/SWAT activities, Wes gave me some rather fabulous insights into the recent Dorner case, psychological insights I can use in my books.

4. I discovered that if you are hopping from table to table in the bar and you leave your cell phone with one rowdy group, they are happy to take rude pictures on your cell phone. I don't know if they're happy to have said pictures posted on my blog...

Prepare yourself...


They only get worse
There may be more insights and discussions (and rude photos) later in the week, but this is the most I could muster with my thick gooey brain cells, and I didn't want to leave you hanging, wondering how the conference went.

Trust me, it was fabulous!

2 comments:

Jennifer Carlevatti Aderhold said...

Great wrap up. This conference always leaves me amazed at what can be with my writing..

Tameri Etherton said...

Awesome! Your workshop on pacing was, well, paced perfectly. Trust me.

It was such a fun weekend and I'm glad I got to meet your buddy Andrew Kaufman, too. Even though he made me cry.

I have learned my lesson. I will never swipe someone's phone and take illicit pictures. That kissy face one was just for you, but I'm kind of glad you shared my kisses with your blog readers. I'm also extremely glad you didn't share Marla's picture!

By the way, I have no voice today. The guys keep laughing at me and the dogs aren't sure what I'm trying to say, so they're ignoring me.

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