I should have done this update a month ago, but I have been lazy
* * *
On Saturday morning, September 24th, I was up way too early (8 a.m.!) for such a late night like the one I had before. But it was for a good reason.
My friend Melanie was up for the weekend and the two of use were headed to the National Mall for the National Book Festival. This is the second year I've gone to the festival and it was better than the last time. Last year, I went because it was a program for my campus housing. This year I went with a purpose. One of my favorite fiction authors, Diana Gabaldon, was scheduled to speek and sign copies of her new book, A Breath of Snow and Ashes. The book was, technically, not supposed to be released until September 27th, but she talked her publisher into releasing a few copies early. Bless them both.
Gabaldon is the author of the "Outlander" series and Melanie introduced me to it during our freshman year of college. I've read all the books in the series since then... more than once in fact.
So! Melanie and I trek out to the Mall on our mission. The metro trains were crowded beyond all reason. (I don't know who decided it would be fun to schedule the Book Festival, Anti-War Rally, and Greenpeace Festival on the same day, near the same area... but I would like to have a word with them. Several in fact.)
Melanie and I jumped off the train at the Smithsonian stop and it was like entering a magical world. There were signs for the Festival everywhere, people handing out fliers, and book nerds galore. We were in our element. We grabbed a map of the Festival grounds and proceeded to plan our attack. First stop, the book sales tent. We actually arrived 45 minutes before the Festival was to officially open, but it was a good thing we did. The Sales tent was open and hopping. We were able to purchase ourselves copies of A Breath of Snow and Ashes before they sold out. We bought our copies at 9:45a.m. and they sold out at 10:15 a.m.. You should have seen the pair of us, petting our books and craddling them as if they were some precious gem. I noticed that almost every one (and more than some of the men) in the sales line also had their own copy of the book. Mel and I bonded with the people around us because we all had a common love of the series. (For anyone who has not read the books, try them. You won't regret it.) I also picked up a copy of Tom Wolfe's I Am Charlotte Simmons. I've read it before but loved it so much that I just couldn't turn it down.
After we made our purchases, we noticed the Target tent was handing out seat cushions. Clearly, twenty-one year olds are attracted to random things. We then proceeded to the “Fiction and Fantasy” tent to claim our seats for our favorite author’s talk. We ended up walking in on the middle of another author’s talk. The tent was pretty full but (unfortunately for this author) it was clear that most of the audience was waiting for Diana Gabaldon. After she finished a reading from her book, most of the audience stayed and the rest of the chairs rapidly filled. It was standing room only in less than 5 minutes.
The best part of the morning followed when we heard Diana Gabaldon speak. She is much shorter than I expected. Also, I – for some reason – expected her voice to be different. I don’t know why I thought that, but I’ll blame that dream I had earlier this year. (See a previous entry for more on that.) The applause for her entrance took forever to die down. Gabaldon started out talking about how her height and brightly colored scarf ensured that she got to stand in front, next to First Lady Laura Bush for the official portrait of authors. Well done. I will say one main thing for Gabaldon, she is witty and knows a number of dirty limericks. One of which I have reproduced below:
In days of old,
When knights were bold,
And condoms not invented….[dramatic pause]
They wrapped old socks
Around their cocks,
And babies were prevented!
She followed with another, dirtier one, but I don’t remember it.
The best part about hearing her speak was that she went EVERYWHERE with her talk. She discussed how her fans sent her the most random things while she was writing and how they brought her beautiful gifts when she was signing. Gabaldon talked about the new book and the editing process it has to go through. (As a side note: I have read the new book and, sadly, there are a number of typos in it. No word I know of has ‘rrr’ in it.) She talked about the release process of the book and how she’s going to be on tour forever. At one point, Gabaldon mentioned that the Sales tent nearest her talk was already sold out and I would guess that at least 20 women got up and sprinted to the other side of the Festival grounds to get to the other Sales tent. Gabaldon finished with a reading from her new book before taking questions.
Melanie left me at the beginning of the questions to see if she could get a last minute signature from the guy who draws Eloise. I stood on the edge of the tent until the questions finished before I power walked by but down to the other end of the Festival grounds to get in line for the Gabaldon signing.
The rain that had been threatening all day started to release a few drops. There was no way I was going to let it damage my precious new books. I whipped out my umbrella and protected those things within an inch of my life as I dodged other Festival goers. The rain actually stopped and the books were safe and cozy in the bright green Festival bag they handed out this year.
Then it was time to wait in line for an hour. It was a good thing I sprinted down there when I did… the line reached a 3 hour wait in a matter of minutes. I heard that the Festival workers cut it off after an hour wait because Gabaldon was on a tight schedule. Melanie was unable to get her author’s signature so she joined me in line and we commenced our giddiness. The line was in two parts… the long long long line, and the short line across a gravel path of doom that was right in front of the tent. We inched along and once we crossed the gravel path of doom, we knew that our books would be signed. (Eep! Happy Meghan.) It was quite the exciting. When we finally got to the table I had no idea what to say. I think I said something stupid about how I now knew where all the witty one-liners came from. It was awesome. *does happy meeting the author dance* Not only was she smiley and gracious, but she had cute shoes (and writes great books,) so I can't complain.
Melanie and I did our crazy little excited hopping and gabbing all at once before we wandered around the rest of the festival. We were mainly tent hopping to get all the free stuff. The second best part of the Festival is the fact that one can accumulate massive amounts of bookmarks and free pens. Most of the tents were kid oriented so we avoided the, but we did get in line with toddlers to have our picture taken in a giant chair that looked like it was made out of books - it's now on my door.)
That photo concluded our adventures in National Book Festival land and we hopped back on the metro smiling in the way that only booklovers can. I should probably mention that we also stopped at the bookstore in Union Station before returning home… a booklovers wallet is never safe.
* * *
On Saturday morning, September 24th, I was up way too early (8 a.m.!) for such a late night like the one I had before. But it was for a good reason.
My friend Melanie was up for the weekend and the two of use were headed to the National Mall for the National Book Festival. This is the second year I've gone to the festival and it was better than the last time. Last year, I went because it was a program for my campus housing. This year I went with a purpose. One of my favorite fiction authors, Diana Gabaldon, was scheduled to speek and sign copies of her new book, A Breath of Snow and Ashes. The book was, technically, not supposed to be released until September 27th, but she talked her publisher into releasing a few copies early. Bless them both.
Gabaldon is the author of the "Outlander" series and Melanie introduced me to it during our freshman year of college. I've read all the books in the series since then... more than once in fact.
So! Melanie and I trek out to the Mall on our mission. The metro trains were crowded beyond all reason. (I don't know who decided it would be fun to schedule the Book Festival, Anti-War Rally, and Greenpeace Festival on the same day, near the same area... but I would like to have a word with them. Several in fact.)
Melanie and I jumped off the train at the Smithsonian stop and it was like entering a magical world. There were signs for the Festival everywhere, people handing out fliers, and book nerds galore. We were in our element. We grabbed a map of the Festival grounds and proceeded to plan our attack. First stop, the book sales tent. We actually arrived 45 minutes before the Festival was to officially open, but it was a good thing we did. The Sales tent was open and hopping. We were able to purchase ourselves copies of A Breath of Snow and Ashes before they sold out. We bought our copies at 9:45a.m. and they sold out at 10:15 a.m.. You should have seen the pair of us, petting our books and craddling them as if they were some precious gem. I noticed that almost every one (and more than some of the men) in the sales line also had their own copy of the book. Mel and I bonded with the people around us because we all had a common love of the series. (For anyone who has not read the books, try them. You won't regret it.) I also picked up a copy of Tom Wolfe's I Am Charlotte Simmons. I've read it before but loved it so much that I just couldn't turn it down.
After we made our purchases, we noticed the Target tent was handing out seat cushions. Clearly, twenty-one year olds are attracted to random things. We then proceeded to the “Fiction and Fantasy” tent to claim our seats for our favorite author’s talk. We ended up walking in on the middle of another author’s talk. The tent was pretty full but (unfortunately for this author) it was clear that most of the audience was waiting for Diana Gabaldon. After she finished a reading from her book, most of the audience stayed and the rest of the chairs rapidly filled. It was standing room only in less than 5 minutes.
The best part of the morning followed when we heard Diana Gabaldon speak. She is much shorter than I expected. Also, I – for some reason – expected her voice to be different. I don’t know why I thought that, but I’ll blame that dream I had earlier this year. (See a previous entry for more on that.) The applause for her entrance took forever to die down. Gabaldon started out talking about how her height and brightly colored scarf ensured that she got to stand in front, next to First Lady Laura Bush for the official portrait of authors. Well done. I will say one main thing for Gabaldon, she is witty and knows a number of dirty limericks. One of which I have reproduced below:
In days of old,
When knights were bold,
And condoms not invented….[dramatic pause]
They wrapped old socks
Around their cocks,
And babies were prevented!
She followed with another, dirtier one, but I don’t remember it.
The best part about hearing her speak was that she went EVERYWHERE with her talk. She discussed how her fans sent her the most random things while she was writing and how they brought her beautiful gifts when she was signing. Gabaldon talked about the new book and the editing process it has to go through. (As a side note: I have read the new book and, sadly, there are a number of typos in it. No word I know of has ‘rrr’ in it.) She talked about the release process of the book and how she’s going to be on tour forever. At one point, Gabaldon mentioned that the Sales tent nearest her talk was already sold out and I would guess that at least 20 women got up and sprinted to the other side of the Festival grounds to get to the other Sales tent. Gabaldon finished with a reading from her new book before taking questions.
Melanie left me at the beginning of the questions to see if she could get a last minute signature from the guy who draws Eloise. I stood on the edge of the tent until the questions finished before I power walked by but down to the other end of the Festival grounds to get in line for the Gabaldon signing.
The rain that had been threatening all day started to release a few drops. There was no way I was going to let it damage my precious new books. I whipped out my umbrella and protected those things within an inch of my life as I dodged other Festival goers. The rain actually stopped and the books were safe and cozy in the bright green Festival bag they handed out this year.
Then it was time to wait in line for an hour. It was a good thing I sprinted down there when I did… the line reached a 3 hour wait in a matter of minutes. I heard that the Festival workers cut it off after an hour wait because Gabaldon was on a tight schedule. Melanie was unable to get her author’s signature so she joined me in line and we commenced our giddiness. The line was in two parts… the long long long line, and the short line across a gravel path of doom that was right in front of the tent. We inched along and once we crossed the gravel path of doom, we knew that our books would be signed. (Eep! Happy Meghan.) It was quite the exciting. When we finally got to the table I had no idea what to say. I think I said something stupid about how I now knew where all the witty one-liners came from. It was awesome. *does happy meeting the author dance* Not only was she smiley and gracious, but she had cute shoes (and writes great books,) so I can't complain.
Melanie and I did our crazy little excited hopping and gabbing all at once before we wandered around the rest of the festival. We were mainly tent hopping to get all the free stuff. The second best part of the Festival is the fact that one can accumulate massive amounts of bookmarks and free pens. Most of the tents were kid oriented so we avoided the, but we did get in line with toddlers to have our picture taken in a giant chair that looked like it was made out of books - it's now on my door.)
That photo concluded our adventures in National Book Festival land and we hopped back on the metro smiling in the way that only booklovers can. I should probably mention that we also stopped at the bookstore in Union Station before returning home… a booklovers wallet is never safe.
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