8/28/06: Hugos there

As most of those reading this already know, my story "Tk'Tk'Tk" won the Hugo for Best Short Story. I am, in brief, stunned. I really, really didn't expect this. I literally sobbed with joy when I received the award (from Harlan Ellison, no less), I spent most of the next twenty-four hours clutching the Hugo and grinning like a maniac -- I mean, even more than usually -- and I'm still stopping in my tracks and going "wow" at intervals. This is a phenomenal honor and I am just plain overwhelmed.

The complete voting results and details are here. Some photos from the award ceremony can be found here.

I just got back from Los Angeles tonight, after being off-Net for the last week, and I will respond to the many congratulatory emails as soon as I get a chance. One thing that's slowing the process down is that I have to examine all the spams with subject lines like "Congratulations!" and "You won!" to see if any of them are actually from friends of mine.

A proper con report is forthcoming, but I thought I ought to clear up a few things:

1. Humping Harlan's leg. As you probably already know, I am a toon. I can and will do anything as long as it's funny. In particular, I will often put one leg behind the other person when engaged in a big fat hug. This is a joke I've done so often I just about can't stop myself. Under the circumstances it seemed the thing to do. Soon it will be all over the net... but I survived the Chicken Suit Incident, and I'll survive this. Most people seemed pleased by my enthusiasm.
2. Breaching the sake keg. All I can say is that I did the best I could with the inadequate mallet provided, and I sure hope that failure to break the lid on the first blow isn't a bad omen.
3. Does winning the Hugo help your career? So far, signs are positive. I've already received offers for Czech and Italian rights for the winning story, been solicited to contribute to an anthology, and received at least one email with the subject line "No One I've Seen Naked Has Ever Gotten A Hugo Before (I Think)." Well, maybe that last one isn't really a career thing.
4. Getting the Hugo home. There was much discussion and debate at-con about the advisability of attempting to bring a large, heavy, and very pointy rocket-shaped object in carry-on luggage. I thought I was being practical when I decided I'd ask at the security gate if I could carry it on, and if the answer was no I'd put it in my checked luggage. But no, practicality and the TSA have nothing to do with each other. Consider this Catch-22: I couldn't get an opinion from the TSA agent as to whether I could bring a bag on board until it had been X-rayed; I couldn't go through the X-ray line without a boarding pass, nor could I hand my bag to the TSA agent to be X-rayed; and even if I could get a boarding pass without checking my checked bag, it would be rejected when I took it through the security line.

   The best I could hope for was an awkward and peculiar boarding process involving a minimum of two passes through the very slow security line, whether or not the Hugo passed X-ray muster. So to save time I just packed it in the middle of my checked bag. Which arrived on time and in good shape. The trophy's on the Radiola in the dining room right now.

Tired now. More later.

See also Kate's perspective.