Put Your Head on My Shoulder

Yesterday was one of those days.

If you will recall, I woke up feeling pretty good yesterday and was all amped to get to the office and get to work. As I pulled into my parking spot for the day I got a text message notification: the building had no power. Sigh. Since I was already there, I texted my supervisor that I had arrived and should I wait? (You never can be sure when power will be restored in New Orleans and there are any number of variables involved that you can’t calculate.) Apparently the outage was cause because someone in the Bywater neighborhood took a chain saw to a power pole? #idiot

But the power came back at around nine thirty-ish, so I sat there for two hours waiting, and of course, once you stop moving when you’re feeling ambitious, it’s not easy to kick everything back into gear and get moving again. Sigh. But I did get my work going again, which was great, and then when I got off work I came home for a ZOOM chat with some writer friends that I don’t see enough of as it is. It also struck me yesterday that when Bouchercon comes to New Orleans, I don’t have to register. I live here, and can see my out-of-town friends whenever I want to and just hang out in the hotel lobby. So…my future attendance and registration is going to depend on changes being made to the dinosaur the event is, hopefully dragging it into the twenty-first century or at least make steps to making it a more inclusive place.

Beginning with no more fucking diversity panels–which they are doing again in Nashville.

There are few things that make diverse writers feel welcome at conferences more than putting them on display like fucking zoo animals.

And the code of conduct? I don’t have any confidence that they will respond to any complaints made to them–I’ve seen how they’ve mishandled things in the past–so why on earth would I believe that they’d take a complaint from me about the Very Important Writer who said “faggy” to me face a couple of time and act on it? “Oh, it was in the bar” would be the first response, and you know what? Having a code of conduct is meaningless when you don’t have the balls to enforce it. For the record, going into a hotel bar and having a few drinks doesn’t make a Very Important Author using a homophobic slur to me okay.

Likewise, I had another incredibly uncomfortable experience at Left Coast Crime the one time I went–both racist and homophobic–that sometime I will have to share here. (And yes, I am white–but the woman assumed I wasn’t…it really is a story best told in its entirety at some point. And yes, I’m still shaking my head over it. In-SANE. Almost two years ago to the day, really, and I still can’t wrap my mind around it. I think the reason I haven’t posted about it because I’m not sure how a white man writes about racism he’s experienced? (For the record, I wasn’t offended because she didn’t think I was white, it was about her approach and what followed–including doubling down on the racism and going to town on homophobia– that I still can’t wrap my mind around.)

It was also pouring rain when I came home, so thank heavens I left early for PT…only to get home and think ugh, I am not walking to the gym in this downpour with the streets flooding, so I’ll have to go after work tonight. It shouldn’t be bad, no matter how crowded it may be, because my workout is actually pretty simple and quick and easy. (Not easy, but definitely can be done quickly and I don’t have to really take up a lot of space, is what I meant. I think there’s only one machine I have to use.) The streets were flooding too–I had to drive through some standing water, fortunately not too deep–and guess what? We’re having a thunderstorm right now, but it doesn’t seem as though it’s as bad as last night. I guess I’ll find out on my way to work this morning? Not a very appealing thought, really.

And on that sad note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Tuesday, Constant Reader, and I’ll check back in again later I am sure.