Sunday, 03 June 2001

I'm here! And I'm already behind!

Actually, I got everything done by 11:45 (long past my usual bed time), but only because one of the stories to be critiqued (they passed out five) was one of my submission stories. So, I only had to critique four. Phew.

My family delivered me here, in a faithful reenactment of delivering me to college as a freshman. (That was very nearly 25 years ago, I was a bit surprised to realize.)

I met about half my classmates in the afternoon between when my folks left and the 6:00 PM get-acquainted buffet. That's a bunch of smart, funny people.

Steve Barnes (week 1 instructor) got very involved during the introductions, where we went around saying a bit about ourselves. He used each person's comment as a springboard to talk about some of the things he wants to teach us. He talked about telling the truth in your fiction. He quoted someone (he said who, but I forget) as saying, "You can run out of clever, but you never run out of who you are." (Possibly mangled, but that was the gist of it.)

I'm looking forward to tomorrow. I'll get my story critiqued. I'll help critique three or four others. In the afternoon we all go get our student IDs. But now I'm going to bed--I'm already behind on sleep.