Not making that mistake again...
Two years ago, I was delayed coming home from Confluence by serious weather, and I didn't buy the Harry Potter book. I spent five hours in the airport terminal being kind of bored.
This weekend, I was again delayed coming home from Confluence by serious weather. I bought the book, read it, and enjoyed it — and I didn't get bored waiting around the airport. Right choice. I won't comment on the book here (and don't you, either!).
Confluence was great. The featured filkers were Meg Davis and Kristoph Klover, who are amazing performers. I helped out with ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif)
batyatoon's concert, and got to do a lot of hanging out with people I've missed and have lots of interesting conversations. I also finished two songs (in this case, two which had been sitting around almost-finished for some time):
"The Ballad of Surf and Turf": Just as "Glass Half Full of the Sea" is my happy-ending take on Talis Kiberley's "Still Catch the Tide", this turned into a happy-ending take on Cynthia McQuillin's "Mermaid's Lament". It began, however, as the back-story of two minor characters in a fantasy novel I'll probably never write, because my idea for it was turning into a too-obvious mash-up of LotR and Greenwitch. Our Young Heroes find themselves on a small island enjoying the hospitality of a faery-ish couple who identify themselves as Surf and Turf — the spirits of the island and the sea around it. But he didn't start out that way...
"Cracked": I've commented before (in passing) on the association in my mind between Tisha B'Av and The Dark Crystal. The destruction of the Temple is really two stories — one about a mundane national tragedy, which is historic, and another about a metaphysical rift in the harmony of the world, which is mythic and shouldn't be tied down to any one people, place, or time — and that latter story is pretty much the same as that of The Dark Crystal.
I'll have MP3s of these up, and add links to them here, later this week.
