The Sword and Laser discussion
Local Group Meetups
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Monthly S&L Meetups at Borderlands Books in SF - first is Thur, July 31
Oh, that sounds so cool! SO wishing I lived near enough for that, but England is a teeny bit far away. Will we get reports on how it went? Maybe Veronica could grab little audio bites from folks for the show.
Mod
Yes, we do want to do a short report about each meetup on the following podcast, so we will likely try recording some sound bites just like you suggest!
Tamahome wrote: Can you have the next one in Jersey?
I know Tom & Veronica would like the SF meetups to inspire people to organize their own S&L meetups in other towns, so if anyone does that, message me the details and I'll add the other S&L meetups as goodreads events, too!
Mod
There was talk of a MD/DC/VA meet up but that never seemed to go anywhere.
Sadly Mysterious Galaxy closed their Redondo Beach (LA) store on the the June 15th, so no meetups there anymore :(
Anyone in SC? I'm not gonna be in SF any time soon. :)
Rob wrote: "So..I need to plan my next trip to visit my sister around one of these meet ups. Lol.There was talk of a MD/DC/VA meet up but that never seemed to go anywhere."
Oh, seconded to the DC Metro area.
Jenny wrote: Anyone in SC? I'm not gonna be in SF any time soon. :)I'm in NC, but that's still a fair distance (Fayetteville, right next to I-95, less than an hour from the NC/SC border.
Where in SC?
awesome, although I'll be in NYC on the 31st, I'll catch you guys next time
So many confusing letters on this thread! I have no clue what half of them refer to.Lets try it. I'm in the NW of E. Maybe somewhere in M would be a good meet place. Does that make sense to anyone?
Can't make the first one, but will probably be at all future ones
Ruth wrote: "So many confusing letters on this thread! I have no clue what half of them refer to.Lets try it. I'm in the NW of E. Maybe somewhere in M would be a good meet place. Does that make sense to anyone?"
Here's a quick primer for anyone not in the US:
DC - Washington DC
MD - Maryland
VA - Virginia (all three are close enough that we consider them a single "area")
NYC - New York City
NC - North Carolina
SC - South Carolina
SF - San Francisco (California)
Did I miss anything :D
Walter wrote: "Jenny wrote: Anyone in SC? I'm not gonna be in SF any time soon. :)I'm in NC, but that's still a fair distance (Fayetteville, right next to I-95, less than an hour from the NC/SC border.
Where in SC?
"
I'm in Greenville, in the upstate.
Jenny wrote: I'm in Greenville, in the upstate.Ah, you're a bit south of Asheville. One of my favorite places to visit. Fantasize occasionally about buying a vacation home there.
Thanks S. Usher! :D This thread is becoming a geography lesson. I got DC (I figured but wasn't certain), NYC (I was pretty sure) and SF (of course) right. :)And Tamahome, are you really bringing up football to an English person now???!!! (I'm joking, I do not care one bit for football/soccer. Apparently England did really really badly. People scowl at me when I find this amusing)
Sky, I can't tell if you are joking or serious, but if serious, I am SO glad I'm not the only one who was confused. I was looking at MD and all I could think was 'doctor?'. Okay, now I'm curious. Where does the 'D' come from? And the 'A' in Virginia? And what about the 'DC' in Washington DC, and why have I never wondered that before?
'DC' stands for 'District of Columbia'.With the other two, the second letter in the abbreviation comes from the last letter in the name; i.e., 'D' for Maryland, 'A' for Virginia.
Walter wrote: "With the other two, the second letter in the abbreviation comes from the last letter in the name; i.e., 'D' for Maryland, 'A' for Virginia. "Thanks Walter.
Odd to choose the last letter. I've never seen that before. Can anyone think of other examples? Sorry to derail the thread.
It's America, Ruth. We rarely make any sense. Like not changing to the metric system.
lol the metric system is a poor example, given the very odd way we kind of sometimes when we feel like it use it in England.
I was involved in the DC/MD/VA discussion (wanted to wait till spring and here it is summer). Still sounds good to me!Ruth, those are the postal abbreviations. Maryland couldn't be MA because that went to Massachusetts.
Thanks Serendi. Wondering now if all US postal abbreviations have to have two letters, or if M on its own was already taken. A postcode local to me is BB for Blackburn (B is Birmingham, I think) so I guess I would have expected Maryland to be ML, but perhaps that is somewhere else too. Actually, now that I'm thinking about this, Bolton being BL doesn't make a great deal of sense. There is no BO, so far as I know, which is probably just as well. I conclude that postcodes are strange creatures.
Mod
Yes.
https://www.usps.com/send/official-ab...
Thank you!And in exchange:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_...
Some of these are really odd. I never knew Blackpool was FY. We don't tend to use these for anything but mail though. I guess US ones, covering much larger areas with more definite borders(I'm presuming - I would guess that State borders are fairly well defined), make them more useful in practical terms than our vagueish and oft confusing postal districts.
Ruth wrote: "So many confusing letters on this thread! I have no clue what half of them refer to.Lets try it. I'm in the NW of E. Maybe somewhere in M would be a good meet place. Does that make sense to anyone?"
I'll give it a shot... Northwest England, Manchester?
Yaaaay! Paolo wins a prize! The prize is... (drum roll please) the satisfaction of being right. Congratulations. :D
Another vote for DC here. Kramer books on H street, what with the booze in addition to the books, might be a good choice
For us east coasters, maybe we could do a meet-up somewhere in NYC during NY Comic Con (October 9-12).
Anyone interested in a Sword and Laser meet up at Loncon3?
There was a thread about that on here somewhere, it seemed a few people were going. I cannot afford it.
Ruth wrote: "There was a thread about that on here somewhere, it seemed a few people were going. I cannot afford it."Yes, I found the thread, sorry for posting here first. It is quite pricey which is a shame but I live locally so I didn't have to pay for a hotel which saved a lot. It's my first con in ages, I'm quite excited!
Maybe another UK meetup in the future?
No need to apologise, Vickstar, I was just letting you know. :)It's handy that you live close, though I think even without the travel and accommodation the cost would be beyond me. I'm a student, and the flat I rent by myself costs more than I can really afford. >.<
But do let me know how it went! It sounds really cool, and I'm sure you'll have a lot of fun.
And I'd definitely be interested in another UK meet up in the future, though, of course, I would still be limited by funds etc. As I say, Manchester is a good location for me, but I'm open to other suggestions.
Anyone interested in making a Los Angeles monthly meet up happen?
My wife and I will be attending the July S&L meetup. We've never been to San Francisco before (it's a combination vacation/research trip), and I wanted to ask you folks who live there: If you could share one thing with first-timers like us about the city, what one thing would that be?
I'm switching to a new job in San Francisco next month - I won't be able to make the July meet-up, but I hope to be there for the August or September one!
Walter, the beauty of SF is its walk ability, I'd go down to the embaracadero/ferry building and walk around. Avoid Fisherman's Wharf. Go to Alcatraz, it is worth seeing and gets you on the bay
I'm unfortunately in NYC today and Philly tomorrow, so I'm going to miss the meetup. Do we have dates for Aug/Sept?
Thanks, Fresno. I've already discovered the walkability of the city. Would help if I were part mountain goat.We did a bus tour yesterday, saw Fisherman's Wharf. Driver/guide said it was the second most visited attraction in the state. Not sure why, but I only saw the area from outside the windows, so maybe I missed something.
We do plan to do Alcatraz while we're here. Really looking forward to the meet today. Wife is primping as we speak. :)
You didnt miss much only seeing the outside of fisherman's wharf. Its basically a huge tourist trap, I am not sure what all the hubbub is about :)
Well, my 2012 edition of the Frommer's SF guide (a major research tool for the current novel project) pretty much said the same thing about Fisherman's Wharf, so we did arrive here forewarned. :)
Guys, guys, how did it go? I'm excited to hear what went on.
Walter - If you have the time see Baker Beach, Muir Woods, maybe the Berkeley Botanical Garden or Inverness and Point Reyes.
Paul.
Mod
Here's a pic:
Pretty sure the next San Francisco date will be Monday, Aug 25, but I'm waiting on final confirmation from Borderlands before creating a new post and event.
That place looks surprisingly official/ board roomy, but you all look happy and chilled out, so yay for that. :D :D
Sorry I missed it! Was sick that day, hopefully will make the Aug 25th meetup.
Supreme Sword Veronica will attend whenever her work travel is not taking her to faraway locales, and maybe Supreme Laser Tom can occasionally teleport in, too.
The first will be Thursday, July 31 from 6pm - 8pm.
Come to discuss the July pick, Dawn by Octavia Butler, and chat about anything else Sword & Laser-y. Borderlands will also stock up on whatever our August pick will be, and you'll be able to grab a copy at a 10% discount!
After this first one, the meetups will likely be the last Monday of each month.
Hope to see you there - you can RSVP here:
https://www.goodreads.com/event/show/...