I was lucky enough to be a presenting author at the 2012 Festival, but it was physically a miserable time for me. I developed an awful sinus infection, and I was barely able to make it through my panel and the author dinner that followed. The next morning I had to teach part of a class on drug cartels, during which I developed a fever and had to leave early. I spent the rest of the day in bed in my hotel room more or less unable to walk. Needless to say, I didn't have very good memories of Tucson after that--until we moved here, of course, and I fell in love with it!
So when I arrived at the Festival yesterday on the University of Arizona campus on a 72˚ sunny day, my disposition was considerably more positive. I was slated to be part of a panel for the UA Confluencenter for Creative Inquiry and their Voices Across Borders program. I didn't know what to expect as far as turnout because it was the program's first year at the Festival, and the panel was taking place at the FAR east end of the event, away from the hub of the vendors and other panel venues. Fortunately, the turnout was pretty good! The questions and comments made by audience members were interesting and I think there was a good dialogue between them and the panelists.After the panel was over, I was able to say hello to several friends, old and new, who came out to see the panel: Ricardo Ainslie, who is a professor at the University of Texas and author of The Fight to Save Juárez, my new friend Lindajoy (who I met on my flight from LAX to Tucson on Friday), and two other local friends who were kind enough to take time out of their day to see me.
I was the only one with published books that were available (sort of), so I slowly electric-scooted my way to the signing area and sat by myself without really knowing what to expect. My new book isn't out yet, so I wasn't going to be signing that, and I had no idea if they were carrying copies of Cartel or the Spanish translation, El Cartel. It turns out they did! I signed several copies of Cartel, and was told that the copies they had on hand sold out, which is awesome. I'm a member of the Tucson Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, and I was very pleasantly surprised to have President Lea Márquez Peterson stop by the signing to tent to say hello and tell me she really enjoyed the presentation. I was also able to hand out several gorgeous book info and discount cards that Palgrave Macmillan made for me, as well as several invitations to locals for my book release party on April 22nd.
But the day did NOT end there. As soon as I got home, our annual crawfish boil final preparations were well under way, and our guests started to arrive shortly afterwards. We had a great turnout and a fun mix of friends, including my husband's coworkers and some of our neighbors. We ordered 40 pounds of crawfish and a king cake, both of which we had shipped overnight from Louisiana. Friends brought several yummy desserts and some hamburgers and hot dogs for all the kids, and honestly there weren't too many leftovers--we definitely went through all the mudbugs (as crawfish are also known). All the kids behaved well, nobody fell into the pool, nobody broke anything, and nobody needed to take a trip to the ER; that's a success in my book.
We don't entertain as much as we'd like, but it was truly a great party. We managed to clean up a large part of what was left out, and even though everything ended by 9pm, my husband and I were both wiped out! I think at one point, I just leaned over to rest my head on the arm of our couch and the next thing I knew, my husband was patting me on the shoulder and telling me to go to bed. I had a great night's sleep, and now today I start the process all over again--this time, prepping to head to Phoenix tomorrow for two days at the Border Security Expo 2014. More blog posts to come about that event!
No comments:
Post a Comment