We walked the narrow path beneath the smoking skies

On Saturday, the husband and I swung by NorwesCon and hung out in the bar for the evening. It was great! I wore my new hat, kicked around with Kat, had a few drinks, and saw a lot of locals - including new Seattle local Shanna Germain. We also had a number of awesome out-of-towners join us, among them, Mary Robinette Kowal, Stina Leicht and Denny Upkins.

It was an excellent night, with excellent company.
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Lately I haven't done enough writing to warrant mentioning it, so I'll skip the word metrics for now. In my defense, this whole "planning a big-ass move" thing can really eat up brain cells, I tell you what - even though we're still over two weeks away from showtime.

I know this will all be worth it in the end, but I am not looking forward to carrying big heavy boxes. I am not looking forward to the drive.

And I am especially not looking forward to making the drive with one outraged, indignant animal on board.

Spain the Cat is terrible in a car. Every waking moment in transit, she acts like she's being beaten with a sock full of pennies - when in fact she is riding in a spacious, sturdy, well-ventilated carrier* ... snuggled on her favorite Comfy BlanketTM and surrounded by some of her most reassuring squishy toys.

Here. I give you a voice post from the road in 2006, at the start of my journey to Seattle. BEHOLD the HELLCAT. And yes, she did that the entire time she we were on the road. I kept thinking her voice would give out eventually, or she'd get tired and take a nap. Nope! It was all cat protest music, all the time, all the way to Washington.

For this trip, we've come to our senses - and we're heading to the vet to nab some kitty knockout drops. NAY, ALL OF THE KITTY KNOCKOUT DROPS. I want this little monster to snooze halfway to the Mississippi River, and I'm sure my husband will be happiest that way too - after all, he'll be stuck with her at least half of the trip.

I am only human, and I've already had to do this once, coming west. I cannot seriously be expected to have her riding shotgun all the way back east, too.
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And now for one of my peculiarly popular and utterly pointless television roundups. Ahem.

Still not interested in Once Upon A Time anymore, which frankly pains me. I wanted to care about it, but the characters just don't make a damn bit of sense and now I'm bored. So I'm officially calling my interest in that one All the Way Dead.

But I'm back on the Grimm bandwagon, much to my own surprise. I skipped it for a few weeks, then caught a new episode and kind of liked what I saw. This having been said, if it were up to me, I'd kill off Nick and Juliette both, and make the show about Monroe and Rosalee running that fabulous little store together - solving mysteries and fighting crime among the supernatural population of the Pacific Northwest. I would watch the shit out of that.

In other news, the husband and I finally caught up on Justified and hot damn, I love that show. I avoided it for a long time, mostly because I didn't really care to watch Hollywood make fun of Appalachia for an hour at a time ... since that's how I assumed it'd play out.

But no! It's clever, funny, tense, and surprising. I love how it's not actually the Raylan Show, and no one is more confused by that than Raylan. I love all the badass women. I love Limehouse. I love Boyd, and if you'd told me I'd come to love Boyd after I'd seen only the first couple of episodes, I would've laughed in your face.

And that's mostly what I love: I love how this show has a knack for subverting my expectations. I am hopelessly charmed by it, because every time I say, "Man, I hope the writers know what they're doing," it turns out that they do. Which makes for a happy, happy Cherie.

Except that now we're all caught up, and we have to wait for new episodes like ordinary mortals. Ah, well.


* Cat carriers usually are "rated" for cats up to ten or twelve pounds. Spain the Cat is, um, bigger than that; she's a Maine Coon mix with what could best be described as a "sedentary" lifestyle. Her carrier is made to hold mid-sized dogs.