It's a Monday Weekend

The book is off to the copyeditor, and I survived the convention weekend. I've decided to treat the next couple of days like a weekend, since I worked all weekend.

Yesterday proved to be particularly rough, as one of my friends passed away Saturday night at the convention. I'm not officially on the committee for this convention, but it's all the same group of friends running it as run the convention I'm part of, and then we're also all part of the same social group. This friend has been really pivotal in the group, so it was a real shock to arrive Sunday morning and get the news. We weren't telling attendees because we didn't want to cast a black cloud over the event for them, so those of us working on the convention and participating in programming had to go on as though nothing had happened. That meant I had about five minutes between getting the news and having to go onstage and moderate a panel. I think I got through it all okay, and I doubt anyone who didn't know me well would have been able to tell a difference (or they might have figured I just had deadline brain), but I really had to compartmentalize to do it. Then I had to come home and edit. I suspect there might be some cratering in my near future when it catches up to me.

Now I'm really regretting that I was so focused on what I needed to do that I never took the time to swing by where he was and say hi, which I usually do. I guess that's a reminder to never let those opportunities pass by because you never know when an opportunity will be your last one.

I think this afternoon I'm going to go shopping. I need groceries, so I have to go out anyway, but it's also only a few weeks before the Nebula Awards weekend, and all my evening attire is at least a decade old. I wore my newest evening dress the last time I went to the Nebula Awards. I'm thinking I'll just buy a fancy top because I have a cute satin skirt. I also need a purse small enough to fit into my tote bag (so it doesn't count as an extra carry-on item) but big enough to be useful. I had one, but it was a cheap one from Target that started disintegrating, and I want to replace it with a good one that will last.