An Us To Start From

29 August 2001

Bright and early good morning, all-y'all. While some of the other happy SF geeks are preparing to travel to WorldCon, I'm preparing to travel myself, to Omaha, to see the parents and the grandparents. We leave for the airport tomorrow just before 6:00 a.m. So you won't be hearing from me again until the 5th or so.

There will be another Morphism entry in that time frame, though, since Timprov will be posting a link to the project I've been working on but haven't been telling you-all about. So look for another short entry in the middle here somewhere.

My weekend with the folks is remarkably unscheduled. So far we've got a family cookout set for Sunday afternoon, and that's it. I'm going to see Kev and Michael for sure, and I may give a few other people a call, but mostly I don't know people in Omaha any more. It feels weird to go there and not have Scott there, too. I haven't spent enough time in Omaha without Scott that it feels natural. I don't know if I ever will.

Kari and Jake are coming down for the family cookout on Sunday, so that means I get to see my whole family in the area and not just the ones who are actually related to me. The Wileys, all of them, are part of our Us. Everybody needs an Us to start from. When you have an Us to start from, you don't have to worry about who likes you and who doesn't like you, whether you're in the cool crowd or not. Because you're the core of your own cool crowd, along with the rest of your Us.

My Us out here is different from the one I grew up with, but that doesn't mean it's supplanted them. Just a different facet.

I just read Heather's article about San Francisco, and it was good. Go read it. Gave me a few ideas of museums we should go see, and if I was going to try to tell somebody from home what San Francisco is like, that would be a pretty good starter. (I think they should pay her to do more on the East Bay and maybe on San Jose, too. In fact, I think they should just pay her more. And cut less of her article when they print it.)

My internet connection just died. In the middle of tutoring. You know what? I give them my money for fun. I don't expect that they'll be able to go two days straight providing me the service I pay for. It's a charity, really. I think AT&T is the best charity I could be supporting.

Oh wait. No.

Well, it only stayed dead for about ten minutes; small favors, I suppose.

Even Karina thinks I should relax more. Even Karina. Who has not met me in person. Thinks I should relax more. I don't think this is a good sign. So I am relaxing over The Drawing of the Dark, which is a lot of fun so far and very Powers-y. I'm glad I got it with Aunt Ruthie's birthday money. I wanted something really Powers-y, and I wasn't sure that Night Moves and Other Stories, being short stories, would deliver the fix I wanted. So. It's good. Fun. Relaxing.

Catherine is coming for dinner tonight. Yay! She almost missed us -- she's only in town for business for one day, and if it had been tomorrow, I'd be gone. Cath is one of the Lingen-side cousins, funny and caring and reads good books, and she doesn't lie to you when she doesn't like books you recommend. All good traits. Break out the company chicken!

Pictures to follow.

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