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Wow! Day one was just great. The promoter has clearly done a great job with this show. There was a *big* crowd waiting to get in and it was pretty steady all day long. It was 330 in the afternoon before I remembered to have lunch.

Joyce from Brattle Books (great books, bags, peanut M&Ms and just generally nice to share a booth border with) watched the booth while Eli and I went off for a quick and good lunch right on the pier (and, hypothetically, a cherry Slurpee on the way back to the show).

I saw a fair number of old friends...other dealers and "real humans" and, as mentioned, we really did have pretty steady traffic in the booth all day long. There are not many shows you can say that about and it was a nice treat today. With luck, tomorrow will be more of the same.

We sold some good books today...shockingly, only one sale was to a dealer. It is a really nice day when you have a good number of sales and the vast majority are to real humans. We've also had a lot of people say really nice things to us today, about the booth, books and boy *laughing*.

Images show the booth before set-up. There are pretty nice "right view" and "left view" of the booth. My assistant...he of "I really don't like these long ties, could you get me a bow tie, they're cool" was wonderful pretty much all day...going between playing with some actions figures/game boy and offering cards and book advice to customers. Also, Eli is-clearly-at least as excited about my recent ABAA membership as I am. He proudly tells people about this (in the booth, at restaurants, checking into the hotel, etc) and is quite convinced that he is a "half member" due to his status as Thing Two (perhaps his brother has the other half).

The last shot is strait downt he middle of the aisle at about 2pm....pretty typical of the day.

Tomorrow starts at 10am...I am the seminar speaker for the 2ish pm seminar. It should be fun, though I hate having to leave my booth abandoned (though watched) during a chunk of the "wind down" before show end. Oh well. Then break down starting at 5pm and home. Most likely no update until Monday. We shall see.

Day Two started for me at The Morgan (see next post). Suzanne (wo)manned the booth alone for the first time and did a masterful job. She even sold something whilst I was wandering about.

I made it back to the Huntington College site by about 11am and found it reasonably busy. It has just occurred to me that I have not mentioned the most interesting aspect of the Hunter College venue. It is a gym complex...buried THREE STORIES UNDERGROUND. We were so deep underground that there was no cell coverage. We were, effectively, in a dungeon. A very nice, roomy, carpeted dungeon...with champagne...and good books. The only downside is that there were apparently some reasonably strict rules about signage...so it was a little hard to find from the outside...but there were "show staff" at every turn to help shepherd the cats down the various escalators.

There was more champagne in the afternoon and a nice, steady flow of people until the show closed...not huge numbers, but steady and engaged. Two of my favorite new clients showed up, which pretty much made my weekend....young, focused and really just all together too much fun. I pretty much always love what I do...sometimes I love it even more...they just made my day.

Credit where it is due department: I was hoping to be able to make it off the waiting list and be able to do the Armory show as my first ABAA event...though I knew the likelihood was very slim (and, as it turned out, impossible). We had more or less decided that we would just come down for the weekend and shop both shows and visit and try to get a better feel for the proverbial landscape. More or less at the last minute, we decided to take a single case at Bruce and D's show and bring a small amount of really nice material...mainly because it was just such a great location, a block and a half from the Armory (and 3.5 stories down). Logistically, it was a very difficult venue (60ish dealers, two elevators, a loading bay that holds about 3ish vehicles and a rather narrow street). D arranged for valet parking (so you could take your material in and your car would just disappear at the garage rate), great porters and just generally had things running so smoothly and efficiently that it seemed effortless...not small feat given the complexity and number of moving parts. There was carpet covering the gym floor, all the tables were draped, there was food and drink (snacks and a boxed lunch) during set up and problems, when they arose, were resolved quickly and with apparent ease. It was a great show, extremely well run and we are very pleased we decided to roll the dice on it.

Also making my day was Susan Weiser Liebegott of Enchanted Books fame. I stopped by her always lovely booth to see what she brought with her and just to say hi and chat. Centered in her lit case, on the bottom shelf, surrounded by her dozens of wonderful children's' books was a lovely of "Pose Please" in the original box. This, by itself, would amuse me....the naked woman frolicking among the children's books. What pushed it completely over the top, and Susan *swears* it was unintentional, is her placement at the bottom left of a lovely copy of "Somebody's Pussies" (click on the image to blow it up). I tried to convince her that moving the copy of "Wee Willie Winkie" and other appropriately tawdry titles around "Pose Please" would be great fun but Susan is a much more proper and presentable human than I (and much the better for it). [N.B. She did give me permission to post this wonderfully prurient image.]

I spent a fair bit of time at the Armory and did find several good thing to pick up for stock and clients. This weekend in NY is unlike any other for a book lover. There is simply no other place where you can see so much, from so many genres, in one place. I feel badly for those who loose their ability to be taken aback from the sheer volume and scope of what can be seen and examined at these shows.

I just received a check from a client on the west coast in a big envelope. Why the big envelope you ask...to hold the lovely bag of nuts and such she sent. Money and a nice snack. Life is good.

We had great empanadas here!

I want to end my Chile journal with a view of the rocks in Coquimbo. Not far from here was the Escuela de Juan Pablo Segunda and the homes of its students.

People keep asking me about Chile. The strangest question was: Do Chileans sleep in beds? Duh.

Chile is TEMPERATE with little humidity, which as Californians we really appreciate. The country is striving toward modernity and is a first world nation in many aspects. In Santiago, we were told there's an effort to create medical facilities that equal Johns Hopkins. (Will everyone be able to use them? No. Does everyone get to go to Johns Hopkins in the United States?)

We just explored the north on this trip, as it was winter. As I'm sure you know, Chile extends far to the south where the terrain and climate match that of Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia. Easter Island and Robinson Caruso Island far out into the Pacific also belongs to Chile. The Argentinians may disagree, but Chile claims the most southern city in the world, Punta Arenas. The country even has authority over a wedge of Antarctica!

Once again, I'll refer to what my husband says about the country: Chile is experiencing it's springtime as a nation. There are challenges, and I'm sure if we take the plunge and move we'll have many of our own. I'd like to thank my friend Debbie Southworth for writing, "You may be giving up things, but think of what you'll be gaining!"

Please come to visit when we're official residents of the southern hemisphere and discover for Chile for yourself.

Here is a view from the harbor in Coquimbo, looking across the bay to La Serena. If you squint, you can see the condos on the far shore. A lot of condos in Chile are in Soviet style, but a few, like those in Vina Del Mar, have more architectural flare.

So, this is where the pirate children live, the corsarios. Coquimbo has a Valpo feel, more frenetic than La Serena, a little more edge. Near the harbor, there's a section of town called El Barrio Ingles (sorry for no accent) where we were told great music was to be had.