I did get to ask David Bennett about putting the robots into my novels, and the answer was a polite version of, "Thanks but no thanks, you can't do it because legal difficulties."
Which is a slight pain in my arse because I have to track down everywhere I mentioned them and finesse something else in to cover those words. I was very careful to make my beloved automatons' appearance not important in any way to the story in the first place. And the only pain is keeping the word count up.
The robots of Steam Powered Giraffe will have to stay in my Instants, because there is no way in this wide green earth that I would expect to make a profit from my Instants.
They exist in my pet universe. I will not alter that. But they're just not allowed to exist in the novels. I may re-negotiate once we both make it big ;)
Meanwhile, I have rediscovered a punk Steampunk band called The Men Who Will Not Be Blamed For Nothing. They're lovely chaps, and funny... their live music hurts my ears, alas. I shall be trying to find where their booth is so I can get Mayhem at least one of their albums.
I got stopped a lot, yesterday. People love my heart in the dark areas and my makeup in the light. Which means that I will be missing out on seeing any Tea Duelling [and I still don't know what that is] because the costume parade conflicts with it and so does Steam Powered Giraffe.
And since I am one of the nerdier fanbots, I can't miss a single instant of sharing air with SPG.
...fate has conspired against me O woe, O agony...
I got autographs from most of the band... and I got to hug most of the band, too. I will be attempting to complete my collection later today.
And something that looks like a tummy bug hath strick, but hath not strick me down. Hell, I would probably attend this last day if I was in full-on, rat-faced zombie mode. [Which is probably how the Con Bug gets around. Humans are silly, silly creatures]
And I owe housekeeping a tip because they came in and re-organised my makeup junk from a spread around the sink to a nice little square, and cleaned up the fine patina of shed makeup that my rushed best efforts couldn't shift.
I also owe my new friends some petrol money. That will be taken care of ASAP.
I have loved every minute of this long weekend, through sleep dep and panda-eyes and multiple blisters and incipient ur-lurgi... [The truth has revealed itself. I might be sick because I am swallowing some of my makeup. I don't even know how that's happening. Especially with such apparently copious amounts of verdegris teal]
I've used all my data on my phone, so it has to stay in airplane mode for the rest of my week away. Tomorrow, I will be sleeping off the con, packing, and trying to focus on my book. Keyword: trying.
I have no doubts at all that the following long weekend will be full of me writing a thousand words a day until I catch up with my schedule.
But probably not the Thursday that I return to my wide brown homeland... That will be spent in as many hugs as I can get and as much napping as I can get away with.
I've had an incredibly fun long weekend off. It's only fitting that I spend another long weekend catching up on work.
[Shown here: some blur of the dress just after it arrived]