Caitlin and the Cubs

Well, the Cubs didn’t come back. The things that I harp on all of the time bit them in the butt again. Jim Hendry has an amazing love for power hitters with no plate patience and average defensive skills. The Cubs of the last few years have been killed by bad OBP and unproductive outs. The bad defense has also put a lot of strain on the pitchers.

The real shame is that this is not a young team that can look to get better next year. Our farm system has almost no impact prospects. The new ownership will have no choice but to throw around more money at free agents if they want to make a run next year. Let’s just hope that this time some of the new guys will be able to get on base.

Caitlin is fine. She had a good weekend with Grandma. There was a small vomiting scare, but it turned out that she wasn’t sick. This will be the last week with her loaner Dynavox. Hopefully it won’t take to long to get her permanent device.

Tomorrow is picture day. Everybody keep your fingers crossed that her photos this year are as good as last year’s.

Geek.Kon

Geek.Kon exceeded all expectations. We had an amazing time in Madison. This was our first time in the campus/downtown area, and it really lived up to the reputation. This was one of the coolest campus towns that Lynne and I have ever visited with its beautiful buildings, lakes, shops, and restaurants. We immediately fell in love with the State Street area.

The con itself was fine. It took place in the UWM Humanities’ building. The building is terrible marriage of urban brutalism and bomb shelter. It must be the most depressing place in the world to take a class. There were quite a few people at the convention. My unadvertised Doctor Who panel had at least 45 people there. It was fun. I love doing this panel. People are just so damn enthusiastic about the new series. They really can’t get enough, and it creates such a positive vibe.

We had a great lunch on Saturday with Amanda, a friend from Odd Con, at a Nepalese restaurant. We then went to panel with game designer/writer Monte Cook. It was a lot of fun, and I learned a lot about the creation of D&D 3rd Edition.

Lynne had a very successful coffee with a well-known, fantastic author. This person is very cool and some very positive stuff came out of the meeting for Lynne and the library. Hopefully, I will be able to talk about more of this soon.

That evening we had dinner with the amazing author Sarah Monette (http://www.sarahmonette.com/) and her cool husband Allen. We ate at very good Afghani restaurant. Lynne and Sarah got along extremely well as they talked shop and baseball, and the news was great for the NIU library. The next day, Sarah Monette officially donated her archives to NIU, joining Jack McDevitt and E.E. Knight. This is a huge deal as Sarah is one the best fantasy authors out there. She has won a Gaylactic Spectrum Award and has been nominated for the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer at the last two Hugo Awards. I’ve read her first two novels, and I can’t recommend her enough.

Lynne’s library panel went well, and we had a great time at all of the SF lit panels. We also found some time to have a delicious breakfast at a European style cafe and to shop at an excellent feminist bookstore called A Room of One’s Own (http://www.roomofonesown.com/). While we were there we bought Caitlin a “Girls Rock” t-shirt and an “I’m a Mini Feminist” button.

The trip was capped off with dodging a pot rally and a trip to Sarah and Allen’s house to pick up the first part of her archives. We couldn’t have asked for a more successful trip.

We can’t wait until we’re back in Madison for Odd Con.