Sunday, October 12, 2003
yeah. things got a bit hectic. running around the day beforehand trying to get ready for the festy. then running around at the festy, who the hell has time to blog? not so well planned out, then.
and now, what? a week later? haven't had time to blog. arg.
okay, in a nutshell. festy was good. saw some innaresting people saying stuff that made me think. also saw some less-than-innaresting people saying stuff that made me think. maybe that's the point. every year for the last three years i come back from the festival and the first thing said is "that wasn't quite what i'd hoped for". lots of ground being covered that i'm kinda familiar with, so not so many epiphanies for yours truly. but maybe that's not the point of the festy. even when people are saying stuff you don't agree with, it still makes you think about the topic of conversation, and in newcastle almost every topic of conversation is an interesting one.
one thing you can't argue with is that since i came back I've been jazzed to the nines and getting some real good work done. been feeling creatively empowered. and when you're creatively empowered you do satisfying work, which makes you feel even more creatively empowered, which makes you do more satisfying work. a lovely feedback loop.
so yeah. my muse got the big recharge. I made four zines to take up, while i was there I got a sample of my novel to Tara Wynn from Curtis Brown (fingers crossed that something comes of that), since I've been back I've finished the wee cartoon with the walking lizard that's been hanging around not done for ages, I started another cartoon starring a character of mine called Jumway, I've been revising and re-editing my novel, I've started planning a chapbook of poetry... all good.
re: the actual festival, highlights for me were the GDS open mike/Voiceworks launch where I got to see the mouthpiece poets in action and the contributors to the Vworks CD in action too; the cardigan press launch of Normal Service will Resume, where some fine short stories were read to a small and wonderfully attentive crowd; at the "Me and my fictional friends" session I got to see Gerald Roche in action and buy his wonderful book Fox Story, as well as hearing Rachel Leary's excellent story "Milk" and watch spunkrat Anna Hedigan in action; I got to see Cristin O'Keefe-Aptowicz in action about a zillion times as she strutted the stage MCing the GDS open mike, did poems at the final night Newktoberfest, and talked dirrrrrrrty at the brainy sex/sexy brain session (though I was disappointed there wasn't more brain and less sex in that one, but I suppose anecdotes about internet porn are crowd-pleasers); the booyah Skipping Girl Posse were in action once again (I have photos but I'm not sure how to put them on this blog); and I got to catch up with Tanya who makes Nerdling, who was nice enough to invite me out to her place outside newcastle so I could play with the beehive she's just inherited (bees! bees! bees! eeeeee!).
And of course there was the zine fair. Oh, the zine fair. Surprisingly, people actually bought copies of my novel, which was nice, because it meant I could have dinner and pay for petrol on the drive back home. I got lots of exxo zines, and I think maybe now I'll tentatively promise to very slowly review them over the remainder of the year. Maybe. But it was ace.
The other acest thing was the drive to and fro. Hanging out in the big red bus ov luv with Craig, Ed, Tom and Anna was so cool - you get to bond with people on 13 hour drives in a special kind of way, drifting in and out of consciousness as one does if one arises at 5am. So thanks guys all y'all for making the drive such fun. Submarines, Dogs on Tuckerboxes, Paterson's Curse, truckstop vegie burgers - all good. All good, good, good.
So yeah. A good festival experience tempered with some cautionary instances - a bit too much cigarette smoke leaking from the ventilation pipe in our hotel room for comfort, a few too many unprepared panellists and technical snafus - but on the whole a worthwhile trip up north to hang with people who are smart and funny and interesting. and sometimes drunk, too.
And, of course, the bees.
