relay for life

Allison, Jodi and I are pleased to announce that we've been invited to participate in Toronto's Second Annual Relay For Life. The relay is an overnight non-competitive relay race where teams raise money via sponsorships for the Canadian Cancer society. Last year, they apparently had near 1500 attendees, and they raised over $270,000 for cancer research. We won't be running :-), but will be helping out with the family-oriented entertainment on June 7th at the Birchmount stadium. I'll post more details when they're available.

Went to my sister's for dinner last night, gave them Heather's Lord of the Rings poster. As you can tell from the photo above, they were pretty happy. :-) Thank you, Heather!

Are any of you watching the Olympics? I missed the opening ceremonies because of Ad Astra, and missed most of the pairs long program last night because I went to bed pretty early. I tend not to be as much of an Olympicsaholic as some others, but do admit a fondness for some of the figure skating competitions in the Winter Games...mainly dancing, and solo men's and women's skating. The pairs competition doesn't appeal to me as much because the routines don't tend to be as individualistic.

After reading the reports on CNN.com, I wish I had forced myself to stay up later and watch Jamie Sale and David Pelletier skate in the pairs competition. Sounds like NBC's broadcasters were pretty convinced the Canadians had won the gold, and were surprised (outraged, is more like it) when the Russians won. Did anyone out there see the two pairs skate? Did the Russians deserve to win? I must know! Please post your comments in Blatherchat, thanks.

I'm not exactly sure why I like the figure skating competitions so much. Jeff has zero interest. I'd be interested in finding out the correlation between an interest in figure skating and a general interest in musicals (something Jeff also has zero interest in :-)). For me, figure skating has the appeal of dance elements, music, and gorgeous costumes...plus the tension of competition and the knowledge that even a slight error can ruin a skater's chance at gold.

I confess that I haven't been keeping up with the figure skating world this year as much as I usually do before an Olympics. The only skater I'm really rooting for is Michelle Kwan (U.S), who will be skating in the women's short program next Tuesday, free skate next Thursday.

waiting for waiting

Congrats to my sister-in-law Larkin and her boyfriend Rick, who got engaged this past weekend! They're getting married on June 22nd. This means I'll be missing Contata, but I'll still be there in spirit to cheer on Dave and Tom, who will be the Guests of Honour at the convention.

More highlights from Ad Astra weekend:

- Finding out how similar Jodi and I are in the morning re: online habits. Lacking Allison's usual good influence in keeping us off our laptops (she was rooming with John on Saturday night), we tended to sink back into the morning routines we usually have at home i.e. going online first thing in the day...our equivalent of a morning cup of coffee, really. :-)

- Seeing John Hall in a tux.

- Chinese dinner with John, Allison and Jodi on Friday night.

- Tolkien art in the Art Show.



- Hanging out with Allison and Jodi in the hotel room.

- Envying Merav's gorgeous outfits.

- Sunday brunch with Rand.

- Sunday lunch with Amanda.

- Not being sick! I was actually able to enjoy most of the convention without a cold, woohoo!

As usual, didn't get a chance to hang out and/or chat with all the people I wanted to spend time. I only got a chance to exchange a few words with Cory and Michelle, for example. Michelle might be coming to FKO, though, yay!



To close today's Blathering, here are the lyrics to the song I mentioned in an earlier Blathering, a song by Heather about my Waiting For Frodo comic which I found funny and and touching at the same time:

WAITING FOR WAITING
Copyright (c)2002 Heather Borean

We're waiting for Waiting For Frodo
Watching Sam while he's waiting in line
While he's waiting in line, he is doing real fine
But what is he doing for dough?

While Debbie is making her life grow
She is busy with so little time
So Waiting must wait from time to time
So we're waiting for Waiting For Frodo.

While we're waiting for Waiting For Frodo
We debate who is girlfriend should be
Be it Gladys, Lisa or Rosie
For Irma is too old you know.

While we're waiting for Waiting For Frodo
We're hoping each day to see
A new panel so fine that we smile with glee
When it's missing we all say, 'Oh no'.

So Debbie while you're a real pro
And working real hard at your plans
Pity please take on us poor waiting fans
And give us more Waiting For Frodo.

We're waiting for Waiting For Frodo.

Blatherpics

	One of the tables in the dealers room at Ad Astra. I believe this one was promoting a bid for Worldcon in L.A.
	I took this photo during one of our panels.
	Amanda Foubister and Sandra Kasturi at the Kelp Queen Press table.
	Rand ordering sushi when he, Jodi, Allison and I went out for dinner on Saturday night.

ad astra, day 3

Very short Blathering today...just got home from Ad Astra and am dead tired. More on the convention tomorrow.

The photo today is from the "Illustrating Tolkien" panel, with Ted Nasmith (far left), Martin Springett (with guitar), and John Howe (far right). Howe is one of the artists that Peter Jackson recruited to design Middle Earth for the Lord of the Rings movie...Howe's earlier work was especially influential in how Gandalf was portrayed in the film. Enlarged sketches and prints of Howe's work for Lord of the Rings were hung along one wall of the panel room, which was very cool.


I found Howe to be the most entertaining speaker of the trio at the panel. He spent the entire panel sketching (on paper, on a cloth napkin, etc.) and occasionally answering questions that interested him...the other questions he would wave away or reply with a "I agree."

We never did get to see what he was sketching. :-)

Martin Springett did the covers for the Fionavar Tapestry series (Guy Gavriel Kay was a Guest of Honour at Ad Astra) as well as other books (mostly children's, I think). I was surprised and quite delighted when he pulled out a guitar and played a beautiful instrumental piece ("Tears of ???" -- I can't remember the title. Arbonne? Arwen?).

I did attack Rand's registration package for a Lord of the Rings poster for Sara and Annie (he said I could), but was crestfallen to find that it was a Time Machine poster instead...I guess the convention had run out of LOTR posters. Kudos to Rand for offering, tho.

BUT! Heather Borean tracked down a poster for my nieces...thank you, Heather! Sara and Annie are going to be thrilled, I guarantee it. She also graciously agreed to let me post her lyrics to Waiting For Waiting For Frodo; I'll do that tomorrow when I am more coherent.

Blatherpics

	Tolkien artist panel on Saturday.
	Merav performing at last night's open filk.
	Heather cringing as someone performs a song with a lot of very bad puns. :-)

ad astra, day 2

Jodi's in the shower and we're leaving to grab some breakfast soon, so only a short Blather this morning. Fun panel last night, two more today.

Saw Amanda at the Kelp Queen Press table in the dealer's room; she gave me a late Christmas present...a Gandalf goblet from Burger King! :-D It glows red when you turn on the switch.

Jodi and I got here first yesterday, picked up our badges at registration, chatted with Tim Jennings. Allison and John arrived shortly after and registered as well...Allison and I were mightily jealous when John found a small Lord of the Rings poster in his registration bag (the one with the Fellowship at the top) when we had none in ours. He refused to be tricked out of it, so we decided to practice our music instead.

Shortly after, John came back to the room with two extra posters in hand, yay! I was so pleased that I think I might have, um, overwhelmed him with my enthusiasm when he pulled them out. Allison and I each got one, and I'm hoping to beg Rand out of his when he arrives today so I can give it to Sara and Annie. (Notice how I didn't mention anything about giving up mine =:-O...I'm such a bad aunt!)



The highlight of the filk last night for me was when Heather Borean sang her "Waiting For Waiting For Frodo" song. (!) Apparently Allison knew about this project all along but kept it a secret. VERY cute song; I'm hoping Heather will let me post the lyrics online after Ad Astra (or that she'll post them in Blatherchat).

My cold's a lot better, yay! Probably due to the fact that I opted to crash relatively early last night instead of staying up to the wee hours as usual. I got over eight hours sleep, probably more than I usually get during an entire convention. Last night after I changed into my pajamas, Jodi was highly amused because I actually did have pajamas just like the ones in the illustration on my current Blatherings layout. :-)

Anyway, looking forward to the rest of the weekend...



Blatherpics

	Allison and Jodi practising "Starsoul" in the hotel room before the panel.
	Ad Astra registration table.
	Waiting in the hallway with Dave and Judith Hayman before the panel.

pre ad astra

So I ended up not going to Urban Tapestry practice last night. I was already feeling icky (I bet you couldn't tell from my entry yesterday) and wasn't looking forward to feeling icky AND lugging all my stuff in rush hour on the subway, but never considered cancelling out. So when Jodi suggested that it might be better if I stayed home and rested, I jumped all over that suggestion. Jodi would obviously make a much better mother than I would. :-)

Whether I'll be able to sing at all will depend on my cold. :-( Feeling somewhat worse today; I suspect I won't be up very late tonight filking. Which sucks bigtime since I was still sick at OVFF last October. I haven't been able to fully enjoy a filk convention since last spring. It's not even as if I'm sick a lot...the last cold I caught was around OVFF time in October, and that was left over from a bug caught in California).



No use in getting too frustrated about it. :\ I just hope I don't pass the bug to Allison and Jodi (or anyone else at the con).

Funny how you sometimes hope and pray that you're sick enough to stay home from school as a kid, but dread it as an adult. I clearly remember the fervent crossing of fingers and toes on certain school mornings as Mom lay her cool palm against my forehead, hmming and wondering aloud if I had a fever as I coughed weakly, murmuring that I was sure I'd be okay.

When she went to get the thermometer, I'd hold my breath as soon as she left the room, somehow imagining that I could elevate my temperature by a few degrees if I held it long enough. A couple of times I even held the thermometer close to the lightbulb of my bedside reading lamp when Mom was out of the room.

I think she caught on, though, when I accidentally held it TOO close one time and the mercury in the thermometer shot up to a temperature that would have clearly resulted in my brain exploding in a spectacular way, if it had been anywhere close to accurate.

I'll be heading over to the Ad Astra hotel about mid-afternoon today. I'm bringing my laptop and might post reports and photos during the weekend, depending if I can get online from our hotel room. I signed up for The Ultimate Journaler Challenge last month for fun...it's a list of online journals who have posted daily. If you miss a day, you're off the list. I've been posting daily since Dec. 31/2001 (thanks for pointing out my typo, Lissa :-)). I know that I'll have to leave the list eventually (I'm not about to take a laptop with me on a canoe trip), but I thought it would be interesting to see how long I could last. :-)



Blatherpics

Today's pics were taken from an old undated photo album on the shelf.

	An Urban Tapestry concert from last year's Ad Astra. You can read about it here.
	Andrea Dale and Graham Leathers. I can't remember what year (at least several) and I can't remember what convention. Both will be at FKO this year, yay!
	Jodi and her sister Reina (sp?), performing at am Free Times cafe open mike. Again, can't remember what year this was. Urban Tapestry performed as well.