The soak turned out to be less "blessed" than it was "marginally adequate". The hotel had disabled the bathtub drains, and only had one stopper to offer to guests who actually wanted a bath (as we had specifically requested). The desk clerk managed to find us a coffee can lid which more or less held the water back, provided we didn't move around too much in the water. But hey, we managed.
The next day we passed up "A Mission to Mars" and "Women Role Models in Science Fiction" in favor of "Guilty Pleasures", thereby showing where our priorities lay. We also experienced "Magical Realism" and pondered "At What Point does Society Stop Being Civilized?"
We walked the halls, and I observed that goggles are the new propellor beanie.
We went into the dealers' room and as I looked casually over a table full of books, the dealer laid a book down as though especially for me to see. It proved to be A Houseboat on the River Styx by John Kendrick Bangs, a book I had been looking for for some time, and which is noted for being associated with a surprising number of synchronicities (for instance, Alan Moore named his character Promethea, whose stories are all involved in the interplay between reality and fiction, "Sophie Bangs" long before he'd heard of John Kendrick Bangs) and cultural curiosities (for instance, its cast of famous dead people included Sherlock Holmes, who at the time of the book's writing had been killed off and had not yet been resurrected).
Finding the Houseboat was good luck for me, and I hope that it will prove to be an omen of good fortune for both Kathe and me, also.
Since we weren't staying at the con hotel and were pretty tired also, we left in the middle of the afternoon rather than dead-dogging it. Maybe next year.
//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "Regarding next year, ask again later."\\
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