Written by the illustrious Jay Swanson

I vlogged Sasquan, and I might manage one about NerdCon, but life has thrown enough wrenches my way that vlogging has fallen off of the wagon for the time being. It feels like “wagon” should be spelled with two “g”s. Anyways, there’s a lot to come on the vlogging/blogging/podcasting front, but that’s for another time. NOW – NerdCon:

In case you aren’t aware, NerdCon: Stories is about to take place in Minneapolis – and I’ll be hanging out in the exhibition hall. There are around 5,000 people descending on this convention center with one collective goal: to celebrate storytelling. It seems like a good place to hang out, and I’m already having a good time of it.

I had to work this morning, then I drove to St Louis and flew into Minneapolis with enough time to pick up some giant art at my hotel and drag it down to the convention center. Thankfully the Marriott here was kind enough to hold onto that artwork for me over the last few days. I had a couple of hours of setup time before I found myself the last exhibitor remaining in the hall. Rather than overstay my welcome [too far] I packed up and will finish tomorrow.

I promise I’ll clean this up before the doors open tomorrow.

They warned me that the exhibition hall was secure, with only one available key, and to be sure I didn’t leave anything important behind. I specifically promised I’d keep my car keys on me, then in my haste packed what I didn’t want to leave behind and rushed out to keep from holding anyone up. I only had a few bags to carry with me and wrestled them down the street to the parking garage.

Then I realized I had lost my keys. I searched all over, lugged my stuff back to the convention center, and couldn’t find them anywhere. As of writing this, I’m still unsure as to their whereabouts. I’m pretty sure I left them in the exhibitor’s hall. The one room that no one has a key to save one person: the guy I promised I would not do exactly this. I’m writing this as I wait for that person to deliver the key back to the hall – after he made it back to his hotel for what I presume was the first time in 18 hours – I probably owe multiple people beers at this point.

So I’m starting NerdCon off in debt. Huzzah.

I can’t wait to see what happens this weekend. Unfortunately, Nimit couldn’t join me so I’m all by my lonesome. That means I won’t be able to see the daytime panels or events. Frowny face. That’s ok though; I’m really looking forward to meeting a bunch of nerdy story lovers and hanging out when I get the chance in the evenings.

To celebrate, starting tomorrow, you can save 20% off everything in my store with the code NERDCON – it’s good until Monday, so go nuts. One caveat: the inventory is with me at NerdCon, so if I oversell, you’ll have to wait a little bit. I’ll be in touch about that if it happens, but I wanted to give a heads up and pre-apologize for any additional wait time.

Anyone here at NerdCon will automatically save that 20% – they’ll also get first dibs on some new prints and postcards.

If you’re here in Minneapolis, I would love to meet you! Swing by the exhibition hall and come aaaaaallll the way to the back. You’ll see the Dark Horse art from the hall.

Now to get my keys and find some food.

EDIT: Found them.

ALSO! Shadows of the Highridge is available for preorder on Amazon. More about SOTH next week; I need to survive NerdCon first.

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