No weight recorded yet, but born

[Asao's Heart Sutra hanging in the basement of Tom's warehouse.] Oh, my. It is too late to say much and I need to be up again in about six hours, so: WOW. I slept in this morning and had delicious dreams, a nice change from my usual nightmares. I ran errands oh so casually and slowly and then went to pick up Asao. He was setting up for his demo that he will do tomorrow afternoon, which made me realize: "Wait, I am doing a demo tomorrow, too! So I should set up now..." So I took him and volunteer Mary to the Morgan so I could run around and work with Mason to set up the projector. Of course, I had forgotten to bring my computer so we won't know exactly how it will all work tomorrow but it will. He is a sweetheart and even worked on constructing a stand for the laptop. Then I took Asao out to a Korean lunch and came back to do last-minute demo prep before I rushed over to the hotel to set up our table for the trade fair.

Luckily, I was there early enough to get my table adjacent to Cathy's, and when she came in with her boxes and boxes of books, she introduced herself and I extended my hand across the table but she raised her arms and said, "I feel like I know you so well and have to give you a hug!" She paid me a high compliment later, saying that I was nearly as anal as her, which made it easy to work together. I ran around trying to find her water and hadn't even seen the book. Apparently, the printers offered for it to be ready a half hour before setup. Problem, since the printer is in Michigan and the conference in Cleveland. She insisted that they be ready earlier, another one of her authors picked them up, and she breezed through light traffic to make it just in time.

Suddenly, I turn around and someone had the book in her hand and showed it to me as if I had seen it already. Velma was right that there would be some crying. The tears stayed in my eyes but it was really something. Asao was there to take pictures so we'll see if they came out okay. I have nothing but the image of the first pile of books above. That stack dwindled down in the first half hour of the trade fair and Cathy kept restocking the pile. Her other books were also selling like hotcakes. The baby comparisons are all spot on and she has been the most remarkable midwife.

If that was all, I'd still have a bit of energy. But tonight the conference opened, and I got to see old faces and meet new ones and it has only begun! There is still so much left to prep for both book signings (more blotters) and the demo (cutting down paper), but I'm so pleased with how everything has begun.