Wherein I prove that I AM the fastest seamstress in the West

Whoo boy. The day kicked off with a phone call inviting me out to breakfast with Lee and George Martindale and Esther Friesner (aka the Queen of the Musketeers). The other reason for this breakfast was so that Esther and I could return to the room afterwards and she could try on her gown.

Un petit problem -- the gown wasn't finished. I begged off and asked her to come by afterwards, and proceeded to sit down, be-jammied and with my hair sticking up in spikes, and manually finished sewing the skirt's waistband (and if you've ever tried to do handsewing over gathered material, you will understand why the tip of my right middle is now red and swollen). Even the arrival of my loyal con bitch wasn't enough to force me up and into clothes -- I had a gown to finish, dammit!

However, I did get the band 90% attached by the time Esther arrived around 10:00 AM, escorted by the Musketeer quartermaster Bill Seney (he who brings semi-sweet chocolate to the Musketeers, bless his heart). We shooed Bill off and Esther climbed into the gown for the first time. Apart from a slight adjustment at the waistline it fit perfectly, so we made arrangements for me to finish it and drop it off at her room later that afternoon so that she could wear it to the First Night event.

I settled back into sewing like a madwoman until noon, when I had to run a rake through my hair and head over to the Hynes convention center escorted by Steve and man the SFWA table for an hour. Which was perfect, because Terry Pratchett (the Guest of Honor this year) ambled by wearing a t-shirt that will go down in fan history. It read, in decreasing font size:

Tolkien's dead.
J.K. Rowling said no.
Phillip Pullman couldn't make it.
Hi, I'm Terry Pratchett.

I do love that man.

The hour went by fairly quickly, and Rochelle (aka the Diva of the SFWA table) sprung me at 1:00 PM. I didn't even get to tour the dealer's room, just went straight back to my room and kept on sewing.

This turned out to be a good thing, since my room promptly turned into SFWA Musketeer Central -- the registration lines were literally snaking around the perimeter of the lobby, and incoming Musketeers who couldn't find their roommates and dump their luggage called me instead and asked if they could store it temporarily in my room. Others were trying to find people, and for an hour there I was jumping up every ten minutes or so to answer the phone and relay questions/instructions/room numbers for my fellow swordsfolk.

More. . .