"Got Competence?"

10.30.10 Washington DC. On the Mall.

Where will you be on October 30th? A friend of mine from California just spent frequent flyer miles to be in Washington, DC for Jon Stewart's Rally to Restore Sanity. I'm hoping to be there, too.

Jon Stewart announced the Rally at the beginning of The Daily Show on Thursday. Stephen Colbert followed with his announcement of the March to Keep Fear Alive scheduled for the same time at the same place. (The announcement starts about 3:55 into The Colbert Report video.)

Entertaining though I'm sure Stephen Colbert's march will be, I'm much more in tune with restoring sanity in our nation. And doing it with laughter is enough to make the 400 mile trip worthwhile. If only for the opportunity to carry one of the signs they promise to provide. "Got Competence?" is my fave, but I'm also fond of "I disagree with you, but I'm pretty sure you're not Hitler."

SFContario, here I come!

Two weeks ago, I wrote a long, sleep-deprived post that included my adventures in passport renewal, specifically the problem of following directions literally rather than sensibly and stapling both photos directly to the renewal form rather than just one. As I wrote then, To quasiquote fredcritter, "Where was I, jonsinger?"

Gazing at my navel. Right, I know. If they bounce my renewal application, it's going to be no big deal. There will either be time to submit a new one by mail, or I'll go the appointment route at any of the three Regional Passport Agencies within an easy drive of Toad Woods. Two of them even issue the US Passport Card on-site. I'm driving to SFContario; the Passport Card would work fine for that trip. Sure, any of this would be something of a hassle and an expense, but as mistakes go, the consequences are totally down in the noise. And I don't even know yet that it's a mistake that will lead to my renewal being returned, just that it might.

Rationally, I'm fine with every action/consequence scenario that could reasonably follow. Emotionally, I'm making the effort to stop kicking myself for being human, and for being who I am. The fact that I just wrote this much about the whole thing suggests that kicking is still underway. C'est la vie. Onward. And All That Jazz...

Sure enough, they're no doubt used to the stapling thing. My shiny new passport arrived in today's mail. I can now leave the country two months from now for SFContario, or for anything else I want to. Leave it and come back in again, too.

And, hey, take a look at the member list and program participants, and GoHs, too:

Randy Byers, Carolyn Clink, Ctein, Jule Czerneda, Mike Glicksohn, Ruth Lichtwardt, Karen Linsley, Patrick & Teresa Nielsen Hayden, Jeff Orth, Rob Sawyer, Michael Swanwick, Billy Tackett, Pat Virzi, René Walling, Jo Walton, Peter Watts, Taral Wayne, Robert Charles Wilson, and what looks like a couple hundred more.

How is a start-up convention doing so well? The concom has a fair bit of experience under their belts. Jeff Beeler, Catherine Crockett, Diane Lacey, Murray Moore, Barb Schofield, Marah Searle-Kovacevic, Alex von Thorn, and more. I'm going to stop naming names because I'd have to list everyone, including the closest, most intimate friends I haven't met yet.

I'm looking forward to it, big time. And I'm not just saying that because Dave Langford wrote my bio.

(Whee!)