Welcome to Sunday All Day Brunch. This is an open topic thread so help yourself to the goodies and sit a spell and let us know what is going on in your life. I'm at a comic book convention this weekend so Geeks are on my mind.
When I was eight years old I discovered a new type of book. It was science fiction. I was hooked from the start. Even at that young age I was looking at the stars and wondering what was up there. I was fascinated by astronomy. My Dad and I watched the first moon landing on television and we were both wiping away tears. Dad and I traded astronomy books. One of our favorite places to go was the Morrison Planetarium in San Francisco.
Science Fiction and Fantasy became my favorite type of reading as I grew up. Later I added mysteries to my reading and to this day I will go back and forth between the two genres. I got into science fiction conventions when I saw an ad for a small one in San Francisco that had the late Ray Bradbury as Guest of Honor along with Forest J. Ackerman. I met some people there who were planning on putting on a Star Trek convention. I asked if they needed any help and from that point on I worked conventions for many years. I even ran my own convention. In the last few years I have exhibited my art work at conventions.
One of the things I loved about science fiction fandom was that the people I met were as crazy as I was. I got tired of people telling me I was weird for wanting to be able to explore Mars. Just because I like putting dragons and unicorns in my pictures doesn't mean I'm strange. I have read The Lord of the Rings multiple times. I have met and worked with some of the biggest names in the business as far as writers are concerned. I have met many actors and directors and producers over the years. You cannot imagine the number of brownie points I have earned from the young people in my life with the stories I can tell of being a part of science fiction fandom for so many years. My niece owes her happy second marriage to the fact that I had her working a science fiction convention where Tom Baker was a guest and her now husband is a huge Doctor Who fan. It got her the second date.
As my favorite t-shirt says, ""I'm not crazy my reality is just different."