Fannatiku Fest 2009 -- Utah March 2009

Travelin' Man

This has been one of those peripatetic months for me. During the first week of April, I stayed in San Francisco on business. Two weeks later, I drove up to Paso Robles and stayed overnight, again on business. Then, last weekend, we went to Utah for the Fannutiku Fest convention, at which Amy worked as a dealer, running her magical embroidery machine and wowing the con-goers with its seemingly mystical movements. I, meanwhile, called up one of my past skills (making change on the fly without a cash register) and handled the green stuff. This was the first time I had worked retail at a convention since, oh, around the mid-1980's.

The most startling moment was when the dealer's room closed; and before we could break down our table, the wall behind us disappeared. We were in one half of a divided ballroom; and the hotel was taking the room apart around us to prepare for their next event. ("Did I break anything?" asked the hotel worker as he whipped the sliding wall out from behind us.)

The St. George Holiday Inn where the convention was held had an unusual feature: a pool that began in the lobby and extended outside (with in and out separated by a cat-door-like rubber flap). I spent early Sunday morning swimming laps under the cat-door, while the hotel sound system played seemingly un-rural-Utah-like songs from Elvis Costello, Jamie Blunt and Sound Asylum