September 2004

It's time.

1 Sep 2004

Time to go.

The bags are packed, the kitty-sitters have directions, the staff database has been nudged and massaged into its final form, and everything that can be done for DCTV has been done.

My preparation for dragon*con 2004 began in January of this year. It ends--at last!--tomorrow morning, when I stow my bags in the car and do one of the things I love best: drive.

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By the time it was over, all over, we had paid our fifty-seven dollars for parking and aimed the fully-loaded Jetta back to Brian and Suzan's, just the three of us. We had escaped the worst of Hurricane Frances thus far, but we knew it was just a matter of time before she came to pay her respects.

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Coda: Frances, part II

23 Sep 2004

After fewer than four hours of sleep, I was on the road again. I'd been shaken awake with a jolt, and I was dressed and charging headlong into Brian and Suzan's kitchen before I'd really awakened. We headed out, Jake and Chris and I, in the middle of one of the worst thunderstorms I've ever driven through. Brian and Suzan's road more closely resembled a moat, and getting to I-20 represented a difficult tightrope balance of caution and insanity.

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Greetings from Jupiter, Florida

24 Sep 2004

The phone rang.

"Jupiter, Florida?" I said to myself. It looked like a real number, not one of the pseudo-numbers that a telemarketing center might use. Still, since I wasn't sure, I decided to let the answering machine grab -

Oh, crap. We did know someone in Jupiter, Florida: Brandon, one of Jeff's Theta Tau brothers. I put down what I was doing and raced to the bedroom, hearing our old, generic message ("Please. Leave. A. Message. After. The. Tone.") play as I did so.

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Line, singular

29 Sep 2004

Let's see if we can't knock out the two most important topics at once here. No point in beating around the bush, really:

1) I am, at last, on vacation.
2) I'm not pregnant.

I am scheduled to catch a flight out of Atlanta tomorrow … uh, okay, in about fifteen hours. (Perhaps I should go sleep.) I'm winging out West for close to a week of enforced peace, quiet, cooking, and shopping. I'll have my cell phone on me, but I'll likely not be allowed near any of the computers in the house where I'm staying.

You want me to get back to #2, don't you?

Hush. I'll get there.

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