Anyway, they are an order of conventionals, as no doubt you’ve already discerned. The red is for the descending light of the New Sun, and they descend on landowners, traveling around the country with their cathedral and seizing enough to set it up.

—Gene Wolfe, The Shadow of the Torturer

And we descended on the landowners of Tempe, Arizona, this past weekend, and seized the Mission Palms Hotel in which to set up our cathedral.

The Zeppelin launch party was a smashing success (er — sorry about the closet floor, guys), even though the books themselves were locked in the dealers’ room and we didn’t have enough Scotch tape or tonic water or quite enough beer. Someone, somewhere, has got pix of Deb and Jay and I in our spiffy Zeppelin crew outfits (courtesy of Deb — go Deb!) and once I get some I’ll post ’em. At least eighty percent of everybody who was anybody was there, and several of ’em bought books later, so well done, us. Props to Greg and Dr. Lisa for helping us shop and set up. Four of our authors were there, and I got to meet the two I hadn’t, Carrie “This is the Highest Step in the World” Vaughn and Jim “Where and When” Van Pelt, whose work I had theretofore admired from a distance. Plus David “Love in the Balance” Levine and Jed “Last of the Zeppelins” Hartman.

After that the weekend’s a bit of a blur. Saturday I remember crepes, followed by some martial arts tomfoolery (pix, Jon?) on the banks — all right, near the banks — of the Salt River, and lunch at name redacted, and reading an excerpt from “Planet of the Amazon Women” (currently under examination by Strange Horizons — Jed was kind enough to fish it off his laptop for me) at the SH tea party, getting Tempest to read an excerpt from the unsuspecting Jed’s “Last of the Zeppelins” at the same tea party, and too much of some pretty decent Chinese food later in the evening, with a large crowd that included Vera Nazarian (but not, despite the evidence of the official photos — pix, Vera? — Samantha Ling). (Thanks for the appetizers, Mary Anne! And for lots of other stuff.) I went to bed early and so missed the hijinks at the Tor Party. (I don’t regret missing the party, but I do regret missing the Tor folk. Toroids? I know Toroidal is the adjective . . .)

Sunday . . . caught up on my sleep, at least arithmetically, but still felt hung over till I’d had a couple of espressos and a couple of cups of coffee and lots of orange juice. But it was sunny and we ate outdoors — try doing that in Seattle right now — and there were eggs over easy with chile-rubbed slow-roasted pork, and there was plenty of good conversation. Greg stopped his con report on account of not wanting to drop names, but I haven’t got anything better to do, so, clockwise from my left: Greg, Dr. Lisa, Ted Chiang, Jon Hansen, Samantha Ling (for real this time), Lisa Moore, Jenn Reese. They’re all sweethearts, and smart and funny too. Then I packed up my stuff (except for the laundry I knew was going to forget to clean out of the dresser drawer) and chatted with folks in the dealers’ room and the lobby for a while, and headed back to the Great Green North.

Oh, and we almost didn’t talk politics the whole time. Score!