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When one looks in the box, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the cat.

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Well, kids, it is 2:30 am in the morning on Day 2 of JordanCon 2011 (or Day 3, technically, but shut up), so obviously once again it is time to report on the proceedings of the day!

Really, I am just not sure what is wrong with me.

For me, the day started with the Opening Ceremonies. This year JordanCon’s Toastmaster is our very own Richard Fife, commenter and blogger right here on Tor.com. I must say he did a great job. The now-traditional ridiculous opening skit was very appropriately ridiculous (and for all I know may be up on YouTube somewhere by now), and everyone seemed to enjoy it very much.

My part in it was very fun, as I got to employ an extreme Charlie Daniels drawl as we did “The Dark One Went Down to Andor”. Heh. Brandon, naturally, was playing the Dark One, and Bao Pham was Matrim, and it was very fun. And of course lots of other people got in on the fun: Jennifer and Jason switched roles, only for Jason to find that his role as Egwene meant he had to give a tribute to “that big hunk of man meat” Gawyn (ha), and “Narg” decided to eschew weapons lessons for the costumes workshop (since, as he pointed out, his last sword fight didn’t go so well for him). It was good silly fun, I think.

Richard also brought up the more serious side, speaking of how Robert Jordan inspired him to be a writer, and I was really quite moved by his sincerity – even if he did manage to Rickroll the entire con five minutes beforehand. That boy, I swear.

After that was the Towers of Midnight review panel, which for some reason is the only panel I am officially on for the convention, which is obviously silly, but Jennifer told me I could just jump in on whatever one I wanted later, so that’s all right. The panel went very well: I got to throw things at Jason, as is traditional at this point, and a very lively and fun discussion over the highlights of the novel was had, even if I did totally embarrass myself by being completely wrong about… er, something I can’t remember now. Afterwards a bunch of people came up and introduced themselves and chatted with me about the series and ToM, and it was really awesome.

After that I wandered about a bit, and stuck my head into where Brandon and Harriet were doing a signing, and frequent Re-read commenter Jay (whose tor.com handle I am unforgivably blanking on at this moment, sorry!) introduced me to some of the Tor.com folk who had showed up: Tektonica, Lannis, Misfortuona, and Scissor (is that right, Scissor, or was it a longer name?). Who are all delightful people, by the way, and we chatted for a good bit and passed a nice time before I headed off again to the Daes Dae’mar Trivia Contest.

I ended up joining Team D’ais’y (which is Old Tongue for “This is the question that made us lose last year”) to play, and I am pleased to report that we came in second, yay! Though I’m still kicking myself for missing that question about Berelain’s House name. (TOTALLY a trick question, y’all – it’s Paeron, not Paendrag. Bah. BAH I SAY!) Good times.

Then I wandered into “The Industry” panel where David B. Coe, Jana Oliver, and Eugie Foster, award-winning authors all, held court to talk about the writing industry, and the challenges that face both established and aspiring writers in the ever-changing world of publishing today. Altogether a very interesting discussion was had, mostly concerning the rise of e-book publishing and the ramifications it has both for the industry in general and for individual authors in particular, and also about the changing expectations for authors concerning web presence and various hazards maintaining that presence can present. David, Jana, and Eugie spoke knowledgably and informatively on these subjects, and Harriet sat in as well and had many insightful comments to add. Excellent panel.

Then the heavens opened up and hailed – literally – but no one really noticed because we were all having such a good time inside. I really really meant to make the Poker Tournament this year, because I do love me some Texas Hold ‘Em, but once again got detoured by good food and people (like, say, David Coe and Jana Oliver) being really really interesting and fun to talk to, and so once I again I missed that. Sowwy. Fortunately I got to steal some whiskey from second-place tournament winner Ben later, though, so that’s all right.

I did manage to make the screening of the rough cut of the documentary The Wit of the Staircase, about the life and times of Robert Jordan, and – well. You guys are going to need to check this out whenever it comes out, is all I’m saying. Even in rough cut it was pretty amazing. I’ll try to keep track of what happens with it so as to induce you all to watch it, because, yeah. Wow.

And between it all there was much chatting and cheer and hugging of Maria and teasing of Wilson and meeting of many many people and toasts and games and torrential downpours and people with absolutely amazing costumes which I hope to have pictures to link you to soon, and now it is 3:30 in the morning and I am going to bed.

More tomorrow, yeah? Yeah! Cheers!

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Leigh Butler

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