You know we will!  Actually, if I can figure out a system and if I can get Jim's permission, I'd like to record the Jim Q&A.

And Shecky, where's the thread?  Edit:  Never mind!  Found it!

My wife has an old camcorder (super 8 or whatever it's called) but we have no way of transferring it to an electronic file; otherwise, I'd charge that puppy up overnight as a just-in-case.

Absolutely! But since no one's replying positively to my "Are you going to PhauxCon?" thread, I'm going to assume that there won't be that much to report.

"Crunchy" comes from "number crunching" = lots of numbers and calculations to do at some point or other.

You have a point. With the refreshing "issue", though, I have to refresh my browser window anyway, but I still should've remembered the info@ address (we exchanged a few emails a while back). Duh.

The question about anyone who knows the hotel and the area, however, I'm putting out to everyone to get as much info as possible. It's called "doing my research" *coughpickingeveryoneelse'sbrainsoIdon'thavetodoanyresearchmyselfhack*.

I like that about some stories where it doesn't have a beginning per se but sort of just drops you into the mix.

It's a classic approach called in medias res - "in the middle of the thing". This usually has the benefit of hooking the reader into the action so they'll become interested in the characters and the background, instead of giving that background first and building up to the action. The drawback to this method is the difficulty of balancing the action with a lack of information that would be necessary to understand said action; it takes a lot more planning and crafting to pull off this approach and not leave the reader lost at sea.

I've been a translator, editor and proofreader (the latter two I've done from one language to the other and in either language alone) in some capacity for about twenty years now, and it's clear to me that the most difficult job for a writer of any form (I don't mean simply "any genre" - I mean ANYTHING that involves writing intended for public reading) is finding that balance between an editor who can make your work technically perfect but squeezes all the juice out of it that you put into it and an editor who is perfectly in tune with what you want to make but can't make the jump to making it most palatable for public consumption. I've been doing this for a long time and I STILL hit walls occasionally - it's as much an art as it is a science (which is why software just doesn't cut the mustard).

And so is finding the right editor. If your eventual publishing house assigns you a staff, in-house editor, it could run anywhere between finding your new arch-enemy and discovering your new best friend - it's a crapshoot. Unless you have that truly rare gift of the perfect writing that translates directly into publishing cash, you'll find yourself faced with a hard decision: standing your ground and facing rejection (or, in the unlikely event that your disagreement with the editor somehow wins through, possible utter failure) or giving in and being a puppet machine for the publisher. It's not an either-or; it's a case of figuring out just where it is on the continuum between those two that you're comfortable with.

Ready salted.

(I come from family that refers to icecream as ready-salted and crisps/chips as vanilla).

Er... what?

I'm fairly sure you'll pick up all that stuff at Registration, on Friday afternoon.

Oh okay. What should we bring - standard ID, that sort of stuff? And there's an OFF chance we won't be able to make Friday evening (work for both of us can get hectic all of a sudden); would we still be able to pick it up if we came in, say, Saturday morning?