As you know Bob, I just spent a week out of town with Mario Acevedo, Mark Henry, and Caitlin Kittredge. — undergoing my first ever book tour. This tour took us out to Las Vegas, over to San Diego, up to Los Angeles, and on to San Francisco … then back up to Portland, and then home to the Seattle area.

Or to put it more succinctly: four authors, one car, eight days, six stops, and 3300 miles.

Nobody killed anybody (of which I am aware). We didn’t sleep enough, we ate poorly — mostly gas station munchies and fast food — and we slept in hotels that ranged from four stars to about a quarter of a star. We listened to many a road-tripping iTunes mix. We Twittered like fiends. We missed many phone calls, all but abandoned the internet for the week, and invented our own religion based around an intergalactic fruit bat named “Steve.”

But we did take lots of pictures, and the easiest way to talk about the tour without spending all evening recounting every little moment … is to create a highlights version with Bonus! pictorial evidence.

So. Kindly click the “Read More” jump below to see much mayhem and wackiness :)

First up: Vegas. Well, actually First up: Two days of driving; but all the cool pictures come from Vegas, so I’m starting there. Also, I’m stealing the first two pictures from Caitlin’s Flickr stream, which you should totally go click for more.

This is merely the middle third of the Vegas crowd. 70-80 people showed up, many of whom bought books — and all of whom made us feel warmly welcomed.

Here’s Mario, Me, and Mark – Right before things got underway.

After the event, we went to supper/drinks with some of the locals; and the next evening (after shopping) we hit the town.

At some point, Caitlin spotted a woman drinking a chilled adult beverage from a hot air balloon … and we went on a quest to locate some hot air balloons of our very own. We found what we wanted at the Paris hotel, and lo, we did verily sip ourselves silly beneath a fake, painted sky.

We spent two nights at the original: The Flamingo. There, we were menaced by giant portraits of Donny and Marie. Also, we collected many tiny bottles of lotion and I lost twenty bucks but Caitlin won a couple hundred. Such is life.

We left Las Vegas for San Diego, where I regret to confess I did not take many pictures. We scarcely saw anyplace except the hotel and Mysterious Galaxy, but we did dearly love Mysterious Galaxy and the folks who turned up to see us there. The crowd was standing room only, and very cool. Here it is in part.

[P.S. - No bitching about the breastfeeding on the front row. Seriously. Don't do it.]

The hotel in which we stayed was markedly less pleasant than our reception at the bookstore, I’m afraid. In fact, I was so traumatized that I didn’t even take pictures of it. I think Caitlin did, but she hasn’t uploaded them yet. You’ll just have to take my word for it.

For starters, the back window wouldn’t lock or even shut all the way, because someone had (visibly, deliberately) filed the bolt that held it in place. Half the lamps didn’t have any lightbulbs in them. There was an ungrounded electrical outlet about four inches from the sink. The other outlet in the main area fell out of the wall when I tried to plug my phone charger thereunto. All the furnishings seemed designed to disguise arterial spatter, which didn’t do a thing to reassure us. And oh, yes — when we first approached this hotel, about a block down the street we passed a guy who was getting his ass kicked in the middle of the sidewalk.

Caitlin kept mumbling, “We’re gonna die here,” and I was tempted to agree with her. But on the upshot, the hotel had a restaurant attached, and this restaurant had waffles. The waffles were really good. The Waffle King costume left in the lobby was even better.

Mark made a new friend.

But then things got weird.





Mr. Waffle King got a little “grabby.”

So we hit the road once more, this time bound for L.A.

In Burbank, we saw SuperObama.

And at Dark Delicacies, where the event took place, I got to meet all kinds of cool folks. I finally set eyes on the marvelous Justine Musk, for example (picture forthcoming, I hope), and Jess Nevins, who I’ve known online for several years (or about a century in internet time).

Later, Jess and I were joined by some dude who wandered in from the parking lot. [:: winks at Wil ::] In other news, yes. I’m kind of short. Seriously. I was on tip-toe, thus the apparent lack of neck.

By the time we made it to San Francisco, we were all pretty wiped out from all the travel, the terrible food, and the lack of sleep.

But by the time we reached Borderlands, we’d perked up a bit — and the crowd was great. Here’s part of it.

Resident alien cat “Ripley” approved of the proceedings.

The next morning bright and early, we packed up and headed back north, to Portland. By this point, we were pretty slap-happy from exhaustion.

But the crowd was good (it actually grew by eight or ten people after I took this picture) and we had a great time. Powell’s has always been very good to us. Also, out there in the audience, were a pair of LJers who I’ve had on my lists for ages. There are silly self-portraits waiting in the PBT set

Finally, it was time to head home. And last night we wrapped up the tour in an official fashion, back at the University District bookstore. About fifty people turned out; here you can see about half of them.

Here you can see most of the other half.

And anyway, that about wraps it up. There’s more to tell, of course; I need to create a webpage loaded with doctrine and blessings from the Great Intergalactic Fruit Bat, Steve … and there were hours upon hours of silliness which only partly found its way onto Twitter, or into the voice posts. But I’ve spent roughly an hour and a half writing this, and I just can’t think of anything else.

If you’d like to see all the pictures, you can check out my Flickr set or Caitlin’s Flickr page; and if more pictures appear, I’ll try to link them later. Or hell, post your own links here if you caught us on the tour and you’d like to share your shots.

Anyway, I must conclude by offering my great and sincere thanks to all the fine book purveyors who hosted us, and to my three friends for inviting me along. It was truly the trip of a lifetime, and I’m immensely grateful for the opportunity.

<3