Flamecon 2.0: THIS weekend, August 20th-21st

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The summer has flown by, and I’m surprised myself that it’s already time for Flamecon 2.0. I’ve actually been looking forward to it since last year’s event which was hugely successful and a lot of fun. The con’s second run has expanded to two days: Saturday, August 20th and Sunday, August 21st. The 21st has been designated as Youth Day. Anyone under 20 enters free.

Last year sold out, and this year is getting close. So if you’re not under 20, I might recommend purchasing passes in advance. Visit the Flamecon website for all the particulars on the location and the schedule of events. And of course, if you go, be sure to look for me at the Genre Junkies booth.

Genre Junkies are an amalgam of authors including Christian Baines, who writes young adult (Puppet Boy) and paranormal fantasy (The Beast Without, The Orchard of Flesh), David Swatling, who writes crime fiction (Calvin’s Head), J. L. Weinberg, who writes paranormal horror (True Religion), and myself. We’ll have autographed books and giveaways and hopefully something for anyone who likes gay genre fiction.

We’ll be at booth #128 (see the map below). I plan to tweet and post photos on Facebook throughout the weekend. Tweet me back (@ayjayp #flamecon2) and stop by the booth for some freebies.

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25 Things You Don’t Know About Me: You Won’t Believe #5!

booklaunch1Borrowing from the popular tabloid feature, and more so from its parody made popular by my favorite political comedian Bill Maher, I offer you, my curious fan, or reader, or idle surfer who stumbled on my page while goofing off at work: 25 Things You Don’t Know About Me.

Likely, I could fill this page with 25,000 things you don’t know about me. Starting with who I am and why I have this website. I’ll let you browse through the menu if you’re curious about that. But here is my revealing, and let’s hope, shocking list.

25. I wrote under the ingenious pen name Peter Andrews from age 7 to 12, creating such multifarious works as the illustrated children’s book The Secret of Friendship, the mystery novel The Murders of Moosewood Mansion, and the stage musical Hey, Lucy McKay!

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Mmm…I love JIf.

24. In times of stress, I eat Jif peanut butter out of the jar.

23. I worked as an assistant zookeeper, which largely entailed shoveling shit, hauling bales of alfalfa, and chain-smoking.

22. I later worked as a biochemistry lab technician, which coincidentally largely entailed a good amount of chain-smoking.

21. I play four musical instruments, poorly: the piano, the cello, the guitar, and the recorder.

Yeah, that's me, 2nd from the left, in shades, tailgating at a Grateful Dead show.

Yeah, that’s me, 2nd from the left, in shades, tailgating at a Grateful Dead show.

20. I used to sell love beads outside of Grateful Dead shows.

19. I’ve never owned a car other than a Volkswagen.

18. I’m half Hungarian, but I don’t like paprikash, or water polo. I do like Hungarian water polo players.

 

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Go Team Hungary! Photo courtesy of thehoopla.com.au

 

17. I saw my first gay pride parade at age five, by accident, when it erupted around my family while vacationing in Provincetown, Cape Cod. These things leave impressions.

16. I have honorary degrees from nowhere.

15. My date to the high school prom was the daughter of a Perkins Prize winning author.

14. Besides that brush with celebrity, I also lived next door to the house where Vladimir Nabokov wrote Lolita, and to entice sub-letters, I advertised it was the house where Vladimir Nabokov wrote Lolita.

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Why do I keep getting Beanie Babies?!

13. Some of my character names I can barely pronounce myself (Aerander, the Seventh Pleiade, Calyiches). I also loathe having to say anesthetic.

12. While in practice as a social worker, it somehow caught on for clients to give me gifts of Beanie Babies, though I was secretly mildly annoyed and embarrassed.

11. While stuck in traffic, en route from the wedding reception to the hotel, both my husband and I pissed in the limousine’s ice bucket.

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Me and Chloë, who doesn’t pay enough attention to me.

10. My past Halloween costumes include a Spanish toreador, a pirate, and the Unabomber.

9. I get angry at my cat when she doesn’t pay attention to me.

8. As a teenager, I had an inexplicable crush on Urkel from Family Matters.

7. If you ask to take me out to Cold Stone Creamery, I’ll go with you, even if I don’t like you.

6. When I worked at an animal hospital in high school, I used to sneak my friends in after hours to look at the dead pets in the ice locker.

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Wasn’t he cute?

5. I cry sometimes when I listen to the soundtrack from The Phantom of the Opera.

4. Instead of playing cops and robbers, I used to convince my childhood friends to pretend we were waiters at a high end restaurant.

3. I like Madonna in the abstract more than I like her in reality.

2. I’m not entirely sure what #3 means.

1. I’m still waiting for the day when I can Google myself and appear to be more famous than Andrew Peters, the former NHL player, and Andrew Peters, the disgraced Boston mayor, or even Andrew Peters, the concert organist from St. Louis.

Mykonos, Greece: A Photoessay

Friends Reunion and Anniversary

Ten of us arrived on the island of Mykonos in early July for a reunion of sorts and a celebration of Genaro and my 15th anniversary. The tradition began in 2011 for our 10-year anniversary. Here is part of the crew at the top of the hill where our hotel resort overlooks Mykonos Bay. (l to r: me, Tom, Thorsten, Genaro, Maria and Jurgen).

Harbor café

We stopped at an outdoor café that looks out at the harbor and had ice cream, baklava, kataifi, and frappes, which are ubiquitous on the island, iced Greek coffee with steamed milk.

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I bought this floral print shirt at a shop in town for a night out at the clubs. Truth be told, my husband and I only made it out until 11:30, which is much too early for the scene. Things don’t get going until 1 or 2 in the morning, and on the morning of our departure, around 6:30, we saw a parade of hotel guests stumbling home.

Dinner out at Nikos' Taverna

This is one of several big group dinners in town, here at Nikos’ Taverna which is a popular place for traditional Greek specialties.

Sea urchin

Our more adventurous friend Jayson ordered sea urchin while the rest of us had souvlaki, moussaka and familiar seafood dishes.

The ATV crew

Four of us rented ATVs to explore the island. Mykonos has roads, cars and commercial vehicles, but to see its more remote regions, you really need an off-road vehicle, plus ATVs are a lot of fun.

Fanari lighthouse

We hiked around the Fanari lighthouse on the north coast of the island.

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I used a rock to etch our names into one face of the lighthouse, among the names of many others who were inspired to leave behind an artifact of their visit.

Horses

We found horses grazing at a roadside ranch.

Harbor aerial view

At an overlook on the road back into town, we had a great view of cruise ships and ferries at the port.

Agios Sostis

We stopped at the little cove beach of Agios Sostis which has a great, little taverna that serves hearty, rustic lunches prepared at one small grill since they have no electricity.

Mykonos fucks Ibiza

The prevailing sentiment among Mykonos party-goers.

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People gather at a square in town, below the windmills, to watch the sunset, and they applaud when the sun disappears under the horizon. ‘Little Venice’ embanks one side of the water.

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The famous windmills at twilight.

Nemean wine

Naturally, I had to order a wine from Nemea with dinner one night.

Anniversary dinner

We chose a candle-lit, outdoor seafood restaurant for our anniversary dinner. Our friend Nick is in the foreground.

Kid goat

Wild goats climb down from the rugged, coastal hills to graze in the island’s few grassy fields. I caught a cute, little kid on camera one day.

Red bougainvillea

Outside of town, many country homes are decorated with red bougainvillea.

Greek flags

Greek flags flying at sunset. There was no shortage of wind during our visit, and it tempered the fierce, Mediterranean heat during the day.

Merghia

We rode about an hour on our ATVs to visit secluded Merghia beach on the north shore. But it was too windy, rough and rocky to go for a swim.

Ghost town

We visited the ‘ghost town’ on the way to Tigani beach. These simple homes once housed miners who excavated barite from the coastal mountains.

Ghost town graffit

We ventured into one of the abandoned homes and found colorful murals that reminded me of photos from the Minoan palace at Knossos.

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A view of Lia beach where a huge pavilion was being constructed for a very high end wedding.

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We took a boat trip around the island, and most of my photos did not come out great (too much wind and movement). But it was a beautiful day. The trip usually includes a visit to the evocatively-named island of Dragonisi, but it was too windy to go there. Oh, and I lost this hat I’m wearing to the Aegean.

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The boat made a stop at Super Paradise Beach, famous for its DJs and parties that go on early into the morning.

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Did you think I’d create a photoessay without a photo of a local cat? This guy hung out at a bakery where we stopped for lunch one day.

Genre Junkies coming to Flame-con!

Genre Junkies 2

Flame-con 2 is coming up this summer (August 20th and 21st), and I am excited to be teaming up with three fantastic authors at an exhibitor table. We’re calling ourselves “Genre Junkies” since we all write books within the genre spectrum. From top left clockwise, that’s Christian Baines (The Beast Without, The Prince and the Practitioner, and Puppet Boy), me, J. L. Weinberg (True Religion), and David Swatling (Calvin’s Head).

There’s will be more to report about this mayhem, but for now I’ll just share the link to the event where you can see how the program is developing and purchase passes if you’d like (link embedded below).

Flame Con 2

 

I’m on Pinterest!


I had a lot of fun creating this board for Werecat with photos, artwork, people and places that give a flavor of the story.

It’s always fun dreaming about what casting would look like, and you’ll see some of those dreams on the board (i.e. Michael Fassbender for the role of Benoit; a guy can dream!). I’ll be doing some more ‘pinning’ over the weekend. Send me your suggestions and show me your own boards!