on Jul 24 05 19:50, Robert Bull wrote to Kay Shapero:

 KS>> himself.  Sigh...)  Finally someone asked him exactly which part of
 KS>> the engine the oil belongs to and he seems to have caught on - or at

 RB> Nice way of putting it  :-)

For years I've used that as a metaphor for common courtesy, especially
around folks who don't see the use of it.  Lube oil doesn't steer the car,
start the car, stop the car, or make the engine run... but watch everything
freeze up if you leave it out.

 KS>> gaming room or the head of the Art Show forgets to eat (or sleep) for
 KS>> 24 hours I'm the one most likely to catch it first - and inform Con

 RB> Do they really do that?  Sounds very, well, teenage geek.  I can see 
 RB> why they'd employ a woman - especially a mother - to keep things in 
 RB> order...

When I first started this, I really did have an Art Show director who would
try to micromanage everything and forget to sleep, sometimes starting the
con in that condition.  She was considerably past the teenage geek stage,
but not far enough I guess.  Fortunately someone else took over that
position after a couple of years, so I had time to deal with other factors.
 Oddly enough, one big reason we started the position in the first place
was a non-staff member but close friend of most of ours who got so worked
up at the con that he went aphasic for a bit.  Sleep dispelled it,
thankfully.  This scared him into behaving himself most effectively
thereafter, and got the rest of us thinking about what would've happened if
he'd been in charge of something.  I made the suggeston, and as usually
happens when you do this sort of thing wound up in charge of it.

Be it noted that it doesn't have to be a teenager - it is very easy for
anybody actually working a convention to forget when they last ate or
slept.  You get focused on the job.

 KS>> Oh yes, and Saturday afternoon in the dealer's room, I've been known
 KS>> to pass through with a pitcher of icewater and a stack of paper cups,

 RB> Living in the UK, the American obsession with iced water rarely seems 
 RB> important.  OTOH, we're experiencing a very dry spell and I can start 
 RB> to see the point.  The speech therapist I went to even said to put a 
 RB> bowl of water in the room (at work) to try to make the air more humid.

I live in Southern California.  We get hot dry weather out here.  During
which time you drink water frequently whether you feel thirsty or not, or
you get dehydrated. And ice water will also cool you down more effectively
than room temperature.  These days most dealers I run into have the sense
to bring along their own drinkables, but I still get plenty of takers. 


CBIP (about 4/5 - it's an ebook and mobipocket does weird things with page
numbers): _Night of Power_ by Spider Robinson.  Rewritten and reissued
version of a novel he wrote in the mid '80s, about a revolution in the USA,
as observed by a family from Halifax.  Rather Heinleinian in style, not
that that's unusual for Spider.  There seem to be a couple of things the
writer hasn't taken into account, but I'm not finished with the book and
they may just be things the characters haven't thought of.  The characters
are convincing.

Before this, I read _The Shiva Option_ by Steve White and David Weber (in
The Stars At War II)... and I'm not sure why I bothered to finish.  Space
battles between titanic fleets throwing mighty acronyms at each other,
leaving shattered planets in their wake... and cardboard characters with
stereotypical motivations.  Exposition excesses like stopping in the middle
of a battle to explain the weapons to be used, the tactics to be used, the
weapons and tactics that might have been used but weren't and why. It's
three years old, copyright 2002; maybe nobody bothered to reread it before
deciding to reissue it, even as part of a collection.

Oh well, I just heard from the Library and the copy of Lois McMaster
Bujold's _The Hallowed Hunt_ I reserved is in, so I get to read THAT next.

--- Msged 6.0.1