Tag Archive for 'San Francisco'

San Fran, Here I Come! With a Treat for While I’m Gone.

Howdy folks! Tomorrow morning I fly out to San Francisco, bright and early (I have to be up at the taint of dawn). I’m so excited to see Jana and all of my other friends in SF. I’ll either blog while I’m there or when I get back…depends on how busy I am.

For those of you in SF, I’d love for you to come see me Saturday, during Lit Crawl. You can find out more info at the official site, here, and on my Upcoming Appearances page, here.

I’ll miss everyone else, but I thought I’d leave you with something to remember me by while I’m gone. Someone had brought up Neko Case in comments to one of my “Things I Like,” and it reminded me to showcase her. I’m always going to add her to Things I Like, and then I always forget. But not this time!

Here’s my all time favorite Neko Case song, “People Got a Lotta Nerve.” It cracks me up, every time I hear it:

And another of my faves, “This Tornado Loves You”:

If you’ve never heard her and you’re interested, I think iTunes offers a good “best of” iMix. She does have a lot of albums, so it can be intimidating to dive in.

Y’all be good while I’m gone, and I’ll see you here in the Emporium when I get back. Hopefully with a lot more Jane written and some good stories I may or may not share in their entirety. ;-)

Published on October 7, 2010 in Appearances, My Travels, Nicole Peeler and Things I Like. 9 Comments Tags: , , .

This Just In: San Francisco and LitCrawl!

I’m a big fan of crawling: nightcrawling, pubcrawling, dropped-my-contact-crawling . . . and now LitCrawling!

After having planned a completely spontaneous, last-minute trip to go see my lovely friend, Jana, in San Francisco, I sent one of my typically annoying emails to Orbit’s ever-patient (and most probably magical) publicist, Jack. It read something like, “OMG! Wow, like, I’m ummmm gonna be in San Fran for like a few days–we’re going to eat from those zeppelins of meat!–so, um, could I do something there, and stuff? for the books? And stuff?”

Jack, once again, translated (hence the patient part) my mindless patois and then (magically!) found me an event to glom myself on to like an overzealous leech.

On Saturday October 9th, I’ll be appearing with the lovely Gail Carriger, amongst others, for LitQuake’s LitCrawl, at Borderlands, from 7:15-8:15. Full details can be found here, on my appearances page.

Shenanigans occur when Gail and I are together, as you can discover if you click on the pic…

As for other things I’m doing, I’ll be attending Whiskyfest that Friday night (so don’t light up any cigarettes near me on Saturday; we both may go up in flames from the fumes). I’ll also be taking my Oldest Favorite Lady, Jana, to meet some of my Newest Favorite Ladies at The House of Prime Rib. Rachael Herron, Juliet Blackwell, Sophie Littlefield, Jana and I plan on reenacting the scene from Anthony Bourdain’s visit to SF, where he gets rather blottoed and waxes poetic about the House of Prime Rib’s zeppelins of meat.

If one of us hasn’t nestled inside one of these fuckers by the end of our visit, then we obviously need another round.

I’m so excited for October, San Francisco, old and new friends, and ZEPPELINS OF MEAT! Come share my excitement with me at Borderlands! :-)

Published on September 16, 2010 in Music, My Travels and Over at Orbit Books . . .. 11 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , .

Home Sweet Home

Hello my friends!

I am back in Louisiana from my various travels. And let me tell you, I am pooped. But I had a blast in San Francisco, where I hung out with the ever charming and fabulous Gail Carriger!

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On Thursday night, the night of my arrival in San Fran, my friend Jana and I went to meet Gail and the wonderful ladies of io9 at their meetup at Borderlands. It was a hoot, everyone was super friendly even though I was a bit jetlagged and slow with the uptake, and we had a great time. There is all sorts of photrographic evidence here. I am the very short, chubby one with the very, very red hair. Jana is the statuesque, blonde goddess. She’s my oldest friend and I love her. After Borderlands, Jana and I met her brother, Louis, for Peruvian food. It was ridiculously good, and I adore Louis, so all in all it could not have been a more perfect evening.

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Friday, Jana had to have an emergency root canal (fun!) so after she went to work for the morning, I went to meet my friend Sascha Illyvich for coffee. Which turned into lunch. Which turned into a rather epic bar session. In between imbibing things, however, we made one awesome stop where we did not put anything in our mouths: Cask. There we bought my favorite whisky, Bruichladdich, which is an absolute pain to get ahold of in the states. I bought two: one for that night and one to take home.

And then we drank more.

Saturday found Jana and I at brunch, with Gail Carriger and her lovely friends. Following which, Jana and I did a little shoppie-shop, and then we went to see Crazy Heart. I will be reviewing it shortly; but for now I can officially say I loved it. Then I cooked dinner for Jana and her friend, and then Jana and I had an early night.

Sunday I had brunch with Jana at a gorgeous restaurant called Plant, on the Embarcadero. It was a beautiful day and I really wasn’t looking forward to flying back to freezing cold Illinois. But fly I did, and then the next day I drove back to Louisiana (plus one bottle of lovely whisky and minus the price of one speeding ticket, as per usual).

So all in all it was a FABULOUS vacation. I miss Jana very much, so the chance to spend time with her is always a pleasure. And it had been an entire year since I’d seen her, over last New Year’s. It was also nice to finally take a real vacation from work: I didn’t do anything the entire time I was away from Chicago. I only sort of checked my email, even. I’d been flat out right up until then, and then I just floated, in Jana-space, and it was exactly what I needed.

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So thank you to all my lovely friends (both old and new) in San Francisco. I’m sorry some of you missed the meatloaf: there’s some in J-Rock’s freezer.

Published on January 12, 2010 in My Travels. 6 Comments Tags: , , , .

Young/Old Sherlock Holmes

In 1985, when I was seven, there came a movie that would be my obsession for many a year: Young Sherlock Holmes.

I adored everything about this movie. The special effects were, at the time, out of this world. The story was amazing. And I already loved Sherlock Holmes.

This will be a shocker to (none of) you, but I was raised on PBS. So I was already well familiar with Holmes, as played by Basil Rathbone, and I was becoming increasingly familiar with the Sherlock who will forever remain my quintessential Sherlock, Jeremy Brett. He first played Holmes in 1984, and, for me, he will always be the closest Holme’s to Conan Doyle’s ever created.

Watching Young Sherlock Holmes, then, offered a lot of insight into the depictions of Holmes I already knew: how he came by his method, why he wasn’t married, etc. But there was thing that bothered me. Granted, the young Sherlock Holmes was, indeed, young, but he also has so much energy in that film. He’s so alive, and physical, that I couldn’t see him growing up into the Holmes I “knew” from television.

And that’s where the newest incarnation of Sherlock Holmes comes into play. I went and saw it recently, and I adored it. It’s great fun, with amazing visuals, and RDJ and Jude Law have fantabulous chemistry together.

But what I really loved about that film is that this new Sherlock Holmes is the clear sequel to that movie I loved as a child, the Young Sherlock Holmes; Robert Downey Junior’s Holme’s is that little boy (whom I admit I had a bit of a crush on) all grown up.

That certainly wasn’t Guy Ritchie’s intention when he made the film, and he probably never even saw Young Sherlock Holmes. But that’s what the film felt like, to me. And that’s why, even without the bustles and the carriages and the like I would have loved it. That same energy and joy that infused the character of young Sherlock Holmes is in this Sherlock Holmes, and it made the film a pleasure to watch.

 

And in Other News . . .

 

Locus has weighed in on Tempest Rising, saying, “From small-town hijinks to otherworldly intrigue, this is a fun start to a new series, and a promising first novel.”

And finally, for those of you in the San Francisco Bay area, I will be attending this public event, at Borderlands Books,  hosted by io9.

Published on January 6, 2010 in Appearances, Movies, Reviews and Tempest Rising. 6 Comments Tags: , , , , .