Sean Williams

Holidays are impossible to sum up, but I'd like to give it a whirl because we had a particularly good trip and the attempt will help me remember it.*

I've tried to capture some important facets of the trip in words. No more than a sentence or two, both lowlights and highlights (considerably more of the latter, I'm pleased to say), and in no particular order:

( I may think of some more in the next day or two, as my brain gradually de-fries. )

* Since I consistently failed to bring my camera with me, anywhere, I have very few snaps to jog my failing memory. Also, tearsxintherain told me I had to blog about it, and I always do what she says. :-)

After weather related-delays in Heathrow, an unplanned stopover and a check-in computer crash in Dublin, some lost luggage and a cryptosporidium outbreak, I am pleased to discover that Galway is really quite delightful. The food is mostly fried (yum), the hot chocolates are delicious (double yum), the summer is cold and wet, and the buildings are stupendously ancient. I'm not so fond of the crowds, but that's just me. Luckily our base camp, The Western Hotel, couldn't be more comfortable. I can't recommend it highly enough. Now we're here, I don't want to leave.

Meanwhile, back in the real world, a couple of pleasing podcasts have gone online.

The first, with Stage Noise, features interviews with Jeff Wayne and myself (separately, alas) and can be located here. I talk about The Books of the Cataclysm, Star Wars and all manner of things.

The second comes from Adventures in Sci Fi Publishing, where both Tobias Buckell and Lou Anders are interviewed at some length. Toby very kindly plugs the Cataclysm series, describing it as the best fantasy series he's read recently. I am seriously chuffed.

Anyway, I don't intend to sit here at the computer all day. Amanda and I are off to Connemara this afternoon. This should tie with the experience of drinking Guiness on Irish soil as a highlight of the trip (in the touristy sense) so far--assuming we survive the drive. This will be my first time behind the wheel in a foreign country (under which term I include such places as Sydney, where the roads aren't flat or at right angles to each other) so fingers tightly crossed...