Nothing is random: five items make a post

[desperance]

One: while I continue to assert that I had a lovely time in Dublin, it must alas be admitted that the loveliness was constantly tempered by a penny-pinching meanness; it is no fun to congo on a budget. [That should perhaps officially be con-go, but I like the double entendre...] I was positively abstemious in m'drinking, and none the less I owe pints to half of Irish fandom, and a fair few of other nationalities. Next year...?

Two: which abstemiousness was necessarily carried over into the airport: with a couple of hours to kill, my natural tendency is to kill them in a bar. With the Laptop of Heavenly Perfection, all workingly and virtuous. So I counted my coins, having no euro-notes left at all, and asked rather plaintively if they took sterling. Certainly they did, they said, but they would have to give me change in euros. Which led to more counting of my English change, because otherwise it would be a twenty-quid note and I really didn't want to commit that much of my pelf to a foreign currency just as I was leaving foreign lands. Which led to an even more pathetically plaintive question, how much was half a pint of Guinness, in euros...? Which turned out to be ever so slightly less than I still had. Never before has half a pint been eked out so long, and so longingly...

Three: as well as leaving behind me this alas-deserved reputation for not buying my round, which I hate, I also worry that people will have tagged me as a man of neurotic gesturing. Which is kinda true anyway, because my hands do fly around helplessly as I talk, as I try to shape those things I can't describe; but this latest flare-up of my RSI-related neural damage has left me with severe pins and needles in my left hand and arm. Which is exacerbated by certain positions, which include leaning forward with my elbows on the table, which is my natural posture on a panel. So all these audiences will have seen me wringing my hands and rubbing constantly at my forearm, and written me down as a weirdo. Sigh.

Four: in pursuit of not having pins and needles, I am back seeing my physio on a weekly basis. Which is horridly expensive, and hence one reason for the severe con-budget; but, once I start to spend money, I do find it hard to stop. Especially on legitimate worky tech. Karen-the-physio had urged me to invest in a laptop stand and a separate keyboard and mouse for the LHP; in the interests of economy, I had dug out an old Dell keyboard which is actually extraordinarily light. I took that into town with me this morning, and after my session with Karen (ouchie!) I went down to the Lit & Phil. And built the tower of books that people recommended in lieu of an actual stand, and plugged in the keyboard, and gave this system a test-run on a rewrite of an old novella. And then, having found that it worked fine, I bought a whole set of new kit on my way home. I bought a new mouse, because trying to use the touchpad on the laptop when you're not using its keyboard and you've set it almost out of reach anyway is ... inefficient. And I bought a USB hub because the LHP only came with two ports and one of those has suddenly stopped accepting plugs (oh noes! the LHP is no longer P! and in this really annoying way: any USB plug will only go halfway into one of the sockets, for no observable reason whatsoever, grrr...!), so if I want to run keyboard and mouse and data key too... Yup. Hub. And I bought a new keyboard: which is actually both a little smaller and a little heavier than the Dell, thus running counter to the desirable in both instances, besides costing extra money - but the Dell one is noisy! It clacks! In the Silence Room! I was, um, horribly aware. And if I'd been anyone else in there I knew I'd be hating me with a passion. So, yup. New keyboard. It's still noisier than the LHP, but not appallingly so. I hope.

Five: bar the one I bought, all the USB hubs I looked at came with a power supply. What's that about? I thought half the point of USB devices was that they all drew their power from the computer. Is this a save-your-laptop-battery thing, such that running a keyboard and a mouse will be a significant drain on power? Will I not get nine hours' consecutive runtime any more...?

Comments

[mizkit.livejournal.com]

I wish we'd had more time to talk! Next year I shall steal you away for whole *hours*, and not let anybody else near you at all!

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Oh, yes please! (It is my constant grumble about a con, that you only ever see people in passing, or down the other end of a long dinner table, or in a crowd in the bar: none of which is conducive for proper talking...)

(But you can bring Ted too. I like Ted.)

[mizkit.livejournal.com]

Well, yes, Ted is inherent to the scenario. :)

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

Ted's good folk. But then, so's Catie.

Actually, I can't think of another con with such a high proportion of genuinely nice people as turn up at PCon.

[rflong.livejournal.com]

I don't think anyone thought you were a wierdo! And you showed concern over my cat, which was lovely! It was wonderful to meet you.

apropos of not much

[esmeraldus-neo.livejournal.com]

You now appear to know gmh and clanwilliam, although I gather you had met before.

The pieces of my life in the form of my friends are all beginning to cohere, and all in the UK.

And J. wants to go home, and wants me to come with her.

I tried very hard to be born English, but missed.

Re: apropos of not much

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

Mwahaha!

(There's a definite clumping effect on LJ in my experience too. Though G&J get absolutely everywhere.)

Re: apropos of not much

[gmh.livejournal.com]

I blame clanwilliam - who has an awe-inspiring talent for breaking the ice.

Re: apropos of not much

[irishkate.livejournal.com]

not to mention that she turns out to know all the same people as me!!

Re: apropos of not much

[desperance.livejournal.com]

I tried very hard to be born English, but missed.

It's not too late. We accept mature applications also.

And just think, in making your girlfriend happy, you could enhappify the rest of us also...

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

A USB port has a supposed maximum power rating of something like 500 milliAmperes, with a typical low power device maybe eating 100 mA. Now, if you have a 4-port hub, and plug that into one port, and then plug 4 low power devices into the hub, you have the hub itself eating 100 mA, and each device also eating 100 mA, taking all of your 500 mA.

Now, that's fine, and your mouse and keyboard will probably be fine (though your laptop battery will drain a bit faster).

If you have something like a scanner, though, it might want the full 500 mA all to itself, and at that point, an unpowered hub won't work. That's when a powered hub becomes necessary. For just a keyboard/mouse pair, it may well be that a supposedly powered hub still works without the mains adaptor.

(Figures above are representative rather than actual, though they're in the right area for USB 2.0)

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Ah, thank you! That makes sense to me entirely. (I love learning new stuff.)

[irishkate.livejournal.com]

I knew none of this but shall remember...

[green-knight.livejournal.com]

I recognised the need for a powered hub when watching the transfer rates on a USB drive: on hub, 14h. Plugged in directly: 8s. Instant convert.

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

That wasn't a USB 1.0 hub that was so slow, was it?

[green-knight.livejournal.com]

I have no idea - it wasn't mine - but could be.

[http://users.livejournal.com/la_marquise_de_/]

It's not meanness, it's cash-flow. It happens to everyone from time to time and people do understand. Plus you are lovely company.
Would you consider applying to the SoA for a small grant to help with the physio? It's necessary to health and career and they exist to offer help.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't think twice, but the SoA has helped me out more than once in the past; I kinda think I've had my share...

[http://users.livejournal.com/la_marquise_de_/]

I'm pretty sure it doesn't work that way.

[gmh.livejournal.com]

With regard to drinks and so forth: it all gets sorted out in some notional sense; some great cosmic pint-accounting in the indefinite future; remember also that guests are to an extent at work at cons in a way that we punters aren't; we can slope off to the bar and skip panels at will - while the poor authors have to be polite to the droning egomaniac in the third row with the odour problem.

(I am of course not referring to anyone at P-CON there.)

So really, don't worry about it overly; a certain drinks disparity is pretty common in all the cons I've been to - if everyone spent the entire Con matching rounds bought, I suspect that all of the guests and much of the members would spend the entire time semi-comatose at best.

Buying a drink is a way for members to say directly to a guest 'welcome to the Con, nice to see you here'.

[natural20.livejournal.com]

See, gmh has just said what I wanted to say. It all works out in the end, even if the end is many years away (which of course we all hope it is).

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Yup. I'm sure you're both right. It's just, y'know. Awkward at the time.

[natural20.livejournal.com]

Aye, not denying that, just trying to be reassuring. Was great to meet you, btw.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Likewise. Really sorry you won't be there next year, tho' I do understand the circs. Come to a con over here!

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

Oh, he comes to them over here. He's even chairing a small one in Brum next year. (850 people, say.)

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Actually, I did kind of assume that he did: just, possibly not the ones I go to. (As, f'rexample, anything with 850 people in Brum. Is that a gaming con?)

[bellinghwoman.livejournal.com]

No - Discworld Convention 2010.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Ah, right. I know about that. Other friends of mine go to that...

[ephiriel.livejournal.com]

Oh let's go please? :)

[maeve-the-red.livejournal.com]

I managed to get through the whole of last Eastercon spending a grand total of twenty-two quid, seventeen of it on a book ('Alice in Sunderland' since you ask). And I don't feel guilty, oh no.

Having said that I was helped in my blaggage by laryngitis: holding up a sign saying 'I have lost my voice: please buy me a drink' was remarkably effective. Only works if you've actually lost your voice though.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Heh. I would so have bought you a drink, had I only seen the sign.

That is an impressive blag, though: and a very righteous proportion of book-buying. For a very righteous book. I do not have the words, to say how proud I am to have been involved in the making of Alice. It's a work of genius, and long after my own books are forgotten it will still be around. With me in it.

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

Your signs were deeply entertaining, and I reckon you earnt every one of those drinks. ("That's an ecumenical matter" was one, do I remember correctly?)

[maeve-the-red.livejournal.com]

'That would be an ecumenical matter' was indeed one of them. I can't really take credit for the signs I used for the 'Sex and the Singularity' panel - they were largely Green Room's doing; afterwards they asked to keep the one saying 'Shut up, Charlie', as they said it might come in useful...

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Heh. Bad person. But who would dare to use it...?

[iylliana.livejournal.com]

Two points from my admittedly limited POV...

1: sometimes Irish folk just want to buy you drinks because otherwise they're self concious about how many they are getting through themselves. I doubt its really thought of as a reciprocal thing :D

2: Being fanatical seekrit fanboys, the highlight of many events for hubby and I is getting to come home and say in swaggeringly casual fashion to friends 'yeah, I got to buy [insert author name here] a drink' :D Obviously the solution for authors on a budget is to hang out with the unknowns ;)

[icudoc.livejournal.com]

Well I got a cool hard back book for free so the cosmic balance is applied...

[irishkate.livejournal.com]

1&2- sorry you were feeling unflush with cash but I still think I owe YOU a drink so next time... and I think we have all had those airport moments, once I even had a total stranger insist on paying for my coffee cause I was short when i was investigating the cost of coffee and cake...Here's hoping the UK joins the Euro - at least that would solve part of the problem at airports!

3- Nope- don't think I noticed any hand wringing, but then a little tip I was given many many years ago while a teenager has always helped - everyone is so worried about what others think of them that they don't really notice anyone else. So we were probably all so intent on whether we were embarrassing ourselves in front of you the great and godlike writers we didn't notice anything ungreat or ungodlike about you- I sure as hell didn't..

4- hope the RSI gets better soon.

5- TOYS, envious drool. I do so love new toys, especially when I can use medical reasons as an excuse. I wonder if you can put them against tax...

[desperance.livejournal.com]

5: Heh. Of course I can put them against tax. My lovely accountant told me twenty-some years ago, when I first signed up with him: "Chaz, just remember, as a writer, everything you do is tax-deductable..." A principle I have dutifully followed ever since...

As for the rest of it: thank you.

*is great and godlike*

(*yeah, right...*)

[irishkate.livejournal.com]

Of course you could MOVE to Ireland and everything you earned would be tax free, and getting to the cons here would be cheaper...

[desperance.livejournal.com]

You tempt me sorely. But it would be foolish - wouldn't it? - to make such a decision on the basis of one weekend, spent mostly in one hotel...

[irishkate.livejournal.com]

Oh I dunno - I have met people who moved here with much less reason... And we can widen your irish adventures easily enough...

[(Anonymous)]

Some people give you drinks; you give them new worlds to explore. Seems fair.

[sciamanna.livejournal.com]

Glad you enjoyed P-Con -- I enjoyed meeting you, though we didn't talk much (but I listened to you in a couple of panels). I'd noticed you commenting on friends' LJs before but didn't have a person to connect to it. Which is why I've only friended you now :-)

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Hiya! I'm sorry we didn't get to talk more. It's the nature of cons, I find: one always regrets those conversations that never quite seem to happen...

*friends back*