Bouchercon Conference

Bouchercon is the largest conference for fans and writers of the mystery/crime/thriller genres with typically 1500 to 2000 attendees. This October it was scheduled to be in Sacramento, CA. but because of the pandemic, it has become a virtual conference taking place on Friday and Saturday October 16-17. I will be on a panel on Friday, titled "With a Little Help from My Friends" with Fleur Brandley, Carrie Voorhis, TK Thorne and Eileen Rendahl. This will focus on characters who help the protagonist sleuth.

Are People Basically Good or Bad

I pose this question for all of you to think about and answer for yourselves: are people basically good or bad? We see human-caused disasters and these are balanced by the unselfish acts of people. How do you come down on this basic question about human nature? I did an informal poll on Facebook a few weeks ago and the majority of responses came back that people are basically good. These were from mainly author friends who tend to be liberal thinkers. From my own conclusion, people of a more conservative bent tend to see people as bad: you can’t give poor people money because they’ll spend it on booze and they’re lazy. I know it’s hard to answer this black and white question. I believe that people are basically good but there are clearly exceptions and we can’t be naïve. We need to have a police force to protect us from predators and psychopaths. Still, I think most people want what’s right for their family and society. I will continue to think positively while paying attention to the exceptions.

The World of Zoom

How quickly things change. Back in February of this year, I hadn’t even heard of Zoom. Now I’m using it almost daily. I had used Skype but now find Zoom much more user friendly and easier to use. I’ve used Zoom to give author presentations to service organizations and book groups, to meet with family members, to get together with friends, to have a virtual play date for our grandson, to participate in a remote funeral service, to attend writers events and to allow our grandson to attend first pre-school and now kindergarten. It’s become an important tool during the pandemic.

Zoom kindergarten

My grandson started zoom kindergarten this week. He had a chance to get used to zoom classes with zoom preschool in May and June. The school had a drive-by for the kids to wave to the teachers the day before school started. Now he is learning remotely for at least the next month.