Speaking to Class at Mt. SAC and After

This was before time for the class and the students were wandering in little by little. Some knew I was taking their picture, others did not, which is obvious. I gave everyone a book, Wingbeat, and early one in the Deputy Tempe Crabtree series.

When we arrived and parked in the right parking lot, I called the teacher's cell phone. He and a student came to help haul all my stuff to the class. Thank goodness! It was up hill most of the way and I bet about a mile away.

I was early, I learned, though we came at the exact time he'd told me, but I think he was used to people who didn't arrive on time so always gave an earlier arrival time.

We'd left home at 8:30 a.m. and ran into road construction with a flag man first. Got through that finally, then came to a stop again and sat and waited for ages. Found out that a truck had spilled a load of gravel all over the two-lane highway. We had to wait for that to be cleaned up.

Finally we got on our way. Once we hit the 5 then the 210 and all the traffic, my husband said, "I'm not going to do this again." Thanks to Mrs. Magellan, or wonderful GPS guide, we found out hotel. They had no rooms available until 3 p.m. except for a handicap room with what was supposed to be a Queen bed but turned out to be a double bed. We took it. In the guest book in the room was a room service menu. We called room service no answer. Hubby went to the desk--they no longer do room service. So we shared a breakfast bar and I ate some miniature chocolates we brought with us.

We followed Mrs. Magellan's directions to get to the college along with the teacher's after we arrived.

For this talk I was asked to do some readings and what inspired the idea for the books. That was fun. I only read a first page of each and didn't manage to get through all the books I'd brought. The students asked some great questions and I didn't put anyone to sleep. Always a good sign.

Another student helped haul all my stuff back to the car--a good thing, because we'd never have found th way on our own.

When we arrived, an old friend was waiting for us in her car. By old friend, I mean we went all through elementary, junior high and high school together. We've only seen each other a few times since at various school reunions. She followed us back to the hotel where my cousin and her husband were waiting and they took us all out to dinner. What a fun time we all had, yakking and eating. (Turns out my cousin attended Mt. SAC--small world.)

Back to the hotel, my friend headed on home and cousin and husband came to our room for awhile where we continued our conversation. On tomorrow's blog, I'll write what happened the next day.

Marilyn
http://fictionforyou.com