We went to the Puyallup yesterday. This is different than just going to Puyallup; the Puyallup is local shorthand for the Washington State Fair. Among other things, we saw Dexter cattle - a very small, easy-keeping breed from Ireland, and some American Cream Draft horses - as my husband put it, a breed with a bad sense of timing, as they originated in the 1930s. Really good looking however. I wouldn't mind having one of them around for moving things, and maybe breeding heavyweight saddle horses.

I also found out something I'd wondered about for nearly twenty years - I now know what The Ugliest Bird in the World was. The original UBW was a member of a mixed flock that used to live in the SW corner of Greenlake when I used to live there, and rode around the Lake before work during the summer. It looked like the result of a turkey-goose cross, not necessarily getting the good parts of either.

There was one at the fair yesterday and now I know why it wasn't in any of the bird books I consulted. They were all for wild birds, and this was a Muscovy duck. I am comforted by the fact the UBW was not the last member of an extinct species.

This morning is housekeeping; we'll have a house guest for Foolscap later this week, and the last Foolscap meeting before the con this afternoon. There will be further meetings this week, but those will be work meetings - put the program book together and such. Next Friday is F-Day, and it looks to be fun; Michael Kaluta and Esther Friesner are our GOHs this year and we have a new hotel in Redmond. I'm not in the art show, alas - we've run out of panel space as we've become more popular. But I will have a demo table Saturday, so if you're there, please stop by. I will have a few things for sale; my new book, some prints, etc.

Or a zap'em ray, or a nanotech, or a fairy godmother or something that can kill the common cold.

I didn't need this cold with its attendant bronchitis. Neither did my husband. He didn't need the sinus infection that followed, either. But we both seem to be recovering anyhow, but it's put me behind on almost everything - housekeeping, reading, exercise - and, most urgently - prep for Comic-Con and Denvention.

The book for Comic-Con arrived though! It's gorgeous, and a big thank you to scarlettina and Kaja Foglio for blurbage. My family (a tough but kindly bunch of art critics all) likes it. Whee!



If you're interested, you can order a copy here.

And I finished the order form for special orders today - so should I get any, I won't forget important information.

Next - matt cutting, framing, packing, running in circles! Oh, and a Foolscap meeting next week. Eep!

So, Saturday, I worked on a website for a client, finished a sketchbook for ComicCon and sent it to the printer, and then went on errands with the Amazing Mr. B - bank, mail box (check, yeah!), and the local Hancock Fabrics which is going out of business for a couple of years until they get their new building built. We were hoping to find upholstery fabric for Mr. B's kneeling chair, but we waited too long. So we went down to the sale at JoAnn's and found just what we wanted, but perhaps we paid a little more. By then we were hungry so we went to Anthony's in Des Moines for salads and fresh strawberry lemonade. After that, we were tired so we went home.

Sunday we met with cyberangel and her husband for brunch at Endolyne Joes - fabulous mushroom omelette after which we all went to the Foolscap meeting. We had unfamiliar faces! We had more people than could sit around the table! That's a really good feeling - I'm happy to see that other people that I don't even know (or at least not very well) think that Foolscap is a good time investment. A lot of discussion followed, including what we should do for tenth anniversary stuff (yes, LD, you cannot escape the cake!), and new ideas for promotion. Our new volunteers had a lot of good ideas in that area. Afterwards a fair chunk of the committee went out to dinner at Atlas (very much a Chow Foods day!) and we finally got home by 10:30.

Monday was back at work and Monday evening was Silent Movie Mondays - a vast improvement over last week's movie. This week was El Gaucho - and there were parts where I didn't always know what would happen next. On the way home we stopped by B&N and I picked up a much needed black bag - this one in messenger style, with a great design in two shades of grey silk-screened on the flap.

Tuesday was not supposed to be busy - really it wasn't! We picked up pills at the pharmacy (twofer sale on vitamins) and then Mr. B. suggested a little dinner at Alki as it was a glorious evening. Unfortunately, everyone else in West Seattle thought that was a good idea too and there was absolutely no parking anywhere. So we retreated to the Admiral District and Blackbirds, where I had a thunderingly good sweet pea and morel rissoto and a fruit tart. The filling was wonderful, but the crust needed work - or perhaps I should say, less work - much less. The service was exquisite, and we didn't hurry at all.

When we got home - remember Saturday, when I sent the book to the printers? All the last three days, we'd been trading files back and forth, fixing errors, but there was one persistent one I could not figure out. So I sat down with Acrobat and went through the whole thing with a fine tooth comb and finally found what the problem was. I didn't get to bed very early.

So everything was going along swimmingly until this morning when I got up. I mean, I think I got up - at least my eyes opened. But my head hurt abominably, my muscles ached, and the rest of me didn't bear mentioning. I stayed home (darn - work had hit an interesting bit again) and napped most of the day ( I will not divulge the rest of my activities - you don't want to know the details, trust me). Woke up about 3:30 feeling much improved. So have I just been overdoing it? got bit by a minor bug? yearly migraine? ran into whatever herb it is that disagrees with me? who knows? But it better not happen again, 'cause I got lots more to do than just nap with the cats.