(no subject)

Well, Virginia, I'm not convinced there is Christmas, but we have had snow*. It turned into slush about three feet from the ground and then it became light rain and now it's clearing entirely, but K and I were caught between snowy air and slushy ground during our Sunday marketing.

I'm as tired as all get-out because my allergies are in an interesting state, so K made it easy for me to spot her. She was the only tall woman in the whole markets wearing a pixie felt hat from Estonia. I must have looked as tired as all get-out, because all the stall holders who know me well enough commented on it. I don't look tired even after a late night party, mostly, so I was very impressed by this.

There's no other news this morning. There may have been, but it has slipped through my consciousness and is puddled on the muddy ground, with the once-snow.

*sartorias, I told the bitter cold to waft over you and provide some cooling breezes, but it was strangely recalcitrant.

Anyone have any opinions?

Conflux is less than two months away and it has been gently intimated to me that I might have to do one of those guest speech things. You know, the ones where you can't cheat and hand the floor over to the audience when things get rough?

To be honest, I don't often have much trouble speaking (if you're laughing, please laugh quietly and don't let those who haven't met me know just how rarely I'm quiet and soulful). My difficulty with a guest of honour type speech is quite different to that. I don't know what sort of thing a Conflux audience would like to hear from me.

I'd like to hear your thoughts on it.

I have no idea what particular insights from me anyone would find illuminating, but I do have a fair idea of the sort of thing I've talked about in the past and how audiences have responded. I won't give a "Look at my amazing career" talk, so don't ask for it: I am published, but it's not even close to an amazing career and I'd rather save the fiction for the printed page. I'm doing an idea per return (more or less), because the original paragraph was impossible to read and I am in an un-dot-pointish mood.

My first thought was telling folks about why history is important to understand speculative fiction.
I could rant for ages on why food is important to everything.
I could talk contemplatively about why I write and read and what my secret agendas are.
I could hearken back to my time as a women's activist and my time helping out with Jewish community activities and how the work I did then translates naturally into fiction backdrops and gives me lots of fabulous stories.
There's always the Middle Ages. I have lots to say about the Middle Ages.
I can talk about my personal ghosts and why understanding hauntings is important to my current writing.
There's always the subject that non-locals love to hate: why Canberra is surprisingly inspirational and why the stuff that happens within the Australian Public Service should never be overlooked.
Or how about being my particular type of Jewish and how being a minority of a minority and nevertheless native English speaking etc makes my worldview unique and complex?
I could hand out recipes.
I could talk about my particular take on culture and why it's so important both to my fiction and to my history.
I could talk about why life matters for writers and historians.
I could talk about why history matters for writers and for life.
I could talk about how fiction matters for almost everything.
There's chronic illness to be mulled over, and how my experiences change my characters and the paths they travel.
I could discuss the influence of books and about my peculiar L-space.
How about the richness of a tangled and complex family and how it affects writing?
Or how proper research training (history degrees for ever!) feeds into novel-research years later and makes it far less angst-filled.
Then there is always my teaching self. Too many possible subjects: my brain hurts just thinking of them.

That's most of the ideas at the top of my head at the moment.

If any of you are coming to Conflux and might be thinking (no obligation) of coming to my guest spot, what topics most interest you? What ones least interest you? Are there others I should think about? (everyone else is welcome to have thoughts and opinions, but my great aim is to not bore a specific audience, so input from potential audience members is very, very welcome.)

Eneit Press

Eneit Press is offline for a few days. The website is running, but there's no-one in the office to confirm your workshop bookings or answer your queries.

There's nothing wrong - it's just the pressures of moving house and rejoining the WWW again. I suggested to just pack all the littlies into boxes and leave them there till everything was finished, but apparently this doesn't work as a housemoving technique. It also didn't help their internet provider get that connection up and running quickly.

If you leave any messages on the Eneit Press site, or send an email, your message/messages/panic will be addressed just as soon as internet access is all sorted again.

That's the bad news. The good news is that Granny is offline for a few days, too. Anyone who met Granny at the Conflux Mini-Con will have strong feelings about this.

End of public service announcement. Go back to the Olympics or your book or wondering why on earth snow should have fallen in Canberra (twice today! a record!!).