Albert goes west, he crossed the vast indifferent deserts of Arizona, oh yeah

As you know by now if you keep up with my Twitter feed, I have returned from Tucson and Wild Wild West Con – which was held (largely) out at Old Tucson Studios. I might have hypothetically been a huge flailing fangirl over the studio itself, a nifty place I explored and climbed all at copious length; and I might've also hypothetically had a few prickly pear margaritas and nommed a vast platter of chiles rellenos that was pretty much to die for – right outside the spot where much of Three Amigos was filmed.

Also, there were root beer floats. But those sound a little less "the oooooold west" and more "it's rather warm out here and ooh look, an ice cream shop." I don't care. They were delicious.

During my time in Tucscon I met many super-cool readers plus the inimitable O.M. Grey – with whom many shenanigans did occur; and likewise I got to hang with Nick Valentino & Liz Darvill, plus Hans Meier – all folks I already knew and liked quite a lot. Pictures were taken, and a most excellent time did occur!

The event had a few of the expected hiccups – you know, the kind likely to happen in a first-year event – but hey, nobody got left in the desert to fend off tumbleweeds, and I had a hell of a lot of fun. I'm terribly glad I went, and not just because of all this weird candy I brought back – or because it was a chance to test out some "casual steampunk" long-wear daytime costumes, and I learned that my favorite straw hat really can survive being stuffed into a rolling carry-on, only to fluff up fresh and adorable upon arrival.

GOOD TIMES.

But now I must tackle the mountain of paperwork and writer-business stuff that can pile up (over one! slim! weekend! plus a Thursday!) and head over to the University Book Store to sign some stock, as promised to Duane; and therefore, I will likely be offline the rest of the day.

Have a good Monday, everyone.

[Crossposted from my website. If you'd like to comment, you can do so either here or there.]