after the fair

Saturday with Amy Lane and her family was like being caught in a whirlwind of confetti and music.  I would post photos, but I forgot to take any.  Amy tools some great ones though.  Check out her blog:http://writerslane.blogspot.com/

This is a family that loves books.  After breakfast, we took a look at the line at VooDoo Donuts that went out the door and around the block - -  and decided to go straight to Powell's City of books.  Three steps inside the door and they scattered like startled ptarmigans.  But Amy has the BEST teenagers in the world, and each of them took a younger sib in charge, which reduced the number of cats needing to be herded by a huge percent.  And thank God for cell phones!  Powell's is four stories high and covers a full city block.  As the store expanded, they kept taking over neighboring spaces, so the store is sort of split-level with stairs and rooms and connecting doorways till you could get quite lost. However, intelligent management has painted each room a different color, and every member of the staff can tell you how to get from where you are to where you want to be.  Also, the store prints off very nice color-coded maps with  helpful symbols and lists.  Amy and I started in the Orange Room ogling the knitting books, and eventually wound up in the Sci-Fi/Fantasy room.  I showed Amy the pillar where various visiting authors have signed their names or even drawn things.  Everyone bought books. I worry about all that extra poundage on the flight home, but book lovers will always manage, somehow.

Our time together was all too brief.  Amy and I have been blog buddies for years, but this is the first time we have been face to face. Amy's FIL, who was also in town, was astounded that we were so comfortable together right off the bat, but, gee, we've been FRIENDS for years!  How could we not be comfortable?  There was so much more I wanted to share and we never hit even a single yarn store.  That leaves us things to do on the next visit.