Most of our lost and found items from SiWC2009 have already been happily reunited with their owners, but four weeks out, three forlorn, lonely items still remain unclaimed, watching sadly out the window waiting for someone to come back for them. All three are paper-related, and, since we’re writers, we know just how significant those notes could be. So we couldn’t recycle them without making a public appeal to find their owners. Are they yours?

Item one is a small, Bayer CropScience spiral-bound notebook with a black pen through the spirals. A quick glance inside suggests this notebook may live in Calgary with someone who takes a physics class.

Item two is a yellow notepad with very neat notes from Hallie Ephron’s workshop and pieces cut out of the cardboard backing.

Item three is a letter-sized file folder held closed with a bull clip, filled with printed MS pages.

If any of these belongs to you, please email me to arrange either reunion or recycling. Thanks! kathychung@siwc.ca

Kathy

So...it turns out that the week after the conference is ALMOST as nutso as the week before. So much to do -- so many thanks to share, waves goodbye to flutter, kisses to blow -- well, you get the picture.

Kathy Chung has taken the reins of the position of coordinator, and you will see her around here a lot more, very soon. But don't think you've gotten rid of me completely -- no sirree. I'll still be around like a bad penny, turning up when you least expect it. I've accepted a position on the Board, and as the biggest resident geek in the place, I'll still be hovering around the blog, of course.

For today, I'd like to give you a taste of what some of the attendees have to say about SiWC 2009 on line. Didn't make it this year? Have a read of some of these blog posts, and get a feel for what you missed. 

Registration for SiWC 2010 is a mere 6 or 7 months away! But don't take MY word for how great it is...

Here are some reasons why you shouldn't miss NEXT year's festivities:

Gemma and Teresa LOVE the SiWC!

A Contest Winner Shares the Glow.

A Novel Woman Sees SiWC as a sign...

Photographer Don Denton shares a visual peek into the conference.

Cheryl wishes she'd stayed longer...

Well.

Here we are. Mid-April already!

I certainly have lots to report -- where to begin, where to begin...?

We have almost got our presenter roster in place for 2009. A few tweaks, a twiddle here and there, and it will be ready. This may seem early, but actually I am much later getting to this than I have in the past...mostly because I am also juggling the arrival of my new book. (If you haven't checked it out, you can read about it HERE.)

But all is not only well, but ahead of schedule, in some ways. For the first time, we are going to open registration early this year. As soon as I have a firm date, I'll post it here. 

Why are we doing this, you ask?

Well, mostly because we can. Last year we tried out a prototype registration gateway, and to our delight -- it worked very well. So we have our registration infrastructure in place much earlier than we did last year, and we'd like to take advantage.

We also have to acknowledge that with the state of the economy, we want to give our attendees a chance to save money by booking their registration early to take advantage of our early-bird discount.

Right now I am working on the 2009 schedule, and when this is in place and we have the final okay from all our presenters, it will be full speed ahead.   Make sure you are on our mailing list, get this blog onto your RSS feeder, and you'll have all the info as soon as it is available!

~kc

also blogging as leftwriter