Here's a fun game to play!

[shadowgirlvg.livejournal.com]

I thought I'd de-lurk in a showy fashion. I recently saw A Midsummer Night's Dream (I'm a long-time fan). That's a fun play to play "Who would perfom each role?" with. You can make all the Thief characters play parts that don't really suit them and imagine the hilarious results.

( Lord what fools these mortals be! )

Niantic Meet-up

[nutmeg3.livejournal.com]

Apologies to all for not posting this sooner, but it was all work, work, work for me this week. I never even got the pictures downloaded 'til today, and that's the quick part. So...

The Book Barn, where the meet-up was set to happen, is actually six buildings full of used books and cats, lots of cats. There are also places to sit, at least one pond, a playground and goats. It's definitely a place I'll go back to, because it was way too much for me to deal with in one trip. However, since I got there an hour early due to extreme time paranoia, money was spent. (Albert Payson Terhune, Walter Farley, Gerald Durrell, some books about zoos - because I volunteer at the Bronx Zoo - and yet another copy of Black Beauty, because I have issues.) Megan was running several hours late, but she had my cell number and called to keep me posted. She also told me that Charlotte would be there, and possibly a third person. I found Charlotte at 3:30, but neither of us ever found the third person, though I know she was there at some point, because she'd also asked at the register for Charlotte. Since we had time to kill, Charlotte went off with her family, and I drove around and explored the area, then went to a nearby diner for a snack. She and I met back up and chatted for a while, and then Megan appeared, walking across the lawn and looking completely recognizable (thank heavens) from the pictures in the books and here on lj.

I forgot to notice what time she arrived, but probably around 5:30/5:45, and though she had her hungry (and probably bored) family with her, she stayed and talked until 7:00. I hope Charlotte will chime in and add details, because I know I'm not remembering everything by a longshot, but really, we just talked a lot about books. Other people's books, mostly, which I realize in retrospect seems kind of strange, but I, at least, just didn't have any brilliant questions to ask. Because I found Megan's books (via a friend to whom I'll always be grateful) via my interest in fantasy, rather than YA, there was a lot of talk about books and authors I didn't know. (Hence my hope that Charlotte will fill in details.)

Random memories:
Megan tends to like endings that are endings vs. vague drifting-offness or unsettled issues.

I'm not the only person in the known world who hasn't read beyond the first few Harry Potters. Megan hasn't, either.

Megan is The Curse of Bookstores. She used to work at several, and after she quit, they all closed.

We talked about Alan Garner - author of Thursbitch and The Owl Service, among other titles - at some length.

Megan's a big fan of Dorothy Dunnett's Lymond books, and talked about how Lymond himself is just so flashy that you can't help liking him, even though he does some terrible things. I 'fessed up that I tried reading The Game of Kings and found it impenetrable, but Megan said there's now a companion book that explains a lot of the obscure references and things, so I may actually try again.

I was deeply saddened to hear that Megan had tried to read George R.R. Martin's "A Song of Ice and Fire" and been put off by the huge cast of characters and length of the books. (Also, she didn't start at the beginning, and I can't even imagine how confusing that must have been.) So, Megan, if you're reading this, I'm pushing for you to try again, because one of the best things about Martin's world is that so many of the characters are varying (not just from each other, but at different points in the story) shades of gray, like Lymond and like real people. And if you like Lymond, I think you'll love Jaime (though not, I warn you, right away - in fact, you'll probably join everyone else in hating him at the outset).

Eventually it was time for Megan to feed her family, but she generously signed books for us and posed for pictures, which Charlotte's husband took. They came out rather dark, so I had to enhance the brightness on the computer, so if they look a little off color-wise, that's why.

( Pictures Under the Cut )

ETA: I suspect Megan thinks our earring fixation is very weird, but...sideways silver ovals, thicker at the bottom, and inlaid with what looked like mother of pearl. (Sorry. Unless I can say something like "silver giraffes," I'm not very good at describing jewelry.)