Got "Watersnake, Firesnake" back from Ellen Datlow on Saturday, with a nice rejection letter saying she hopes to see more from me. Which is always good to hear. So I turned around and got it ready to send off to F&SF today. I also got two other stories ready to mail, and I emailed a story and a poem off last night. Five submissions in two days. Whew. It took most of last evening just getting them printed out and ready to go.

Yeah, I have the feeling that if I hadn't read that, I would've spent way too much time shut up in my room. Clarion is a serious workshop, but you have to have some fun or you'll go insane. The Damon Knight Memorial Waterfight being an example of this fun.

Andy was right, Clarion is a singular experience, a six-week hunk of your life devoted to Pure Creation. It was a phenomenal experience and I would recommend it to everyone.

Damn, that's some excellent advice -- Jason, thanks for posting that! I wish I'd known a small percentage of that, going into my Clarion stint. I didn't do near enough socializing and extracurricular stuff as I should've, although I was right in the thick of things during the watergun fights.

But yeah -- 6 weeks of uninterrupted writing freedom. It's amazing. I still look back at that time with heavy, heavy nostalgia and wistfulness.

Of course, time uses rose-colored filters. :)

The good thing about when I went was that everyone in the class got scholarships. Everyone. That amazed me. It took care of a huge chunk of the tuition. There was still housing and food and other stuff, so it still wasn't cheap, but I saved a lot thanks to the Douglas L. Ruble SF Scholarship.

And no kidding about the lineups this year. Clarion boasts Howard Waldrop, Nalo Hopkinson, Richard Paul Russo, Kelly Link, Scott Edelman, Maureen McHugh and Jim Kelly. And Clarion West will have Nancy Kress, Kathy Goonan, China Miéville, Liz Hand, Patrick Nielsen Hayden, and Chip Delany. Whether you're going to East Lansing or Seattle, you're going to have some damn fine teachers.

Oh, how I wish I could afford to go to Clarion this year! Either East or West -- both of them have drool-worthy line-ups of instructors (though I might not get much done w/ China teaching for a week; he's just *too* dreeeaaammmy;-). Alas, it's more important to save money for grad school or simple relocation this year. I am beginning to fear I'll never attend Clarion; I'll just have to learn the old-fashioned way. Sigh.