I'm going to take this opportunity to tell you all I wasn't that into Dungeons & Dragons. My friends and I preferred the more freeform flow of the Tunnels & Trolls system. Some of you reading this probably think I made T&T up. Some of you know better. I started an RPG club in my high school and I was Treasurer of Science Fiction Club in college and I founded my university's Strategic Games Club which was a school-funded excuse for LARPing and shooting each other with ingeniously modified water guns.

I always used to go to town with my costuming. Anything from a school spirit theme day to a science fiction con to of course Halloween was all the reason I needed to put on extreme and barely street legal clothing. The thing I loved most about both RPGs and costuming was the way they allowed me to explore who I wanted to be before I had to commit. I remember the first Halloween where I dressed up and went into Georgetown

to celebrate with friends and it was okay but nothing special. In a way, I was disappointed. In a way, I was thrilled that I was finally who I wanted to be 24/7/365. I got to be me all the time and not just for special occasions.

Blue Blood contributors have been guests and panelists and exhibitors at every important SF/fantasy convention in the U.S. and many abroad. Shariann Lewitt, one of the first women to write hard SF, contributed fiction to the very first issue of Blue Blood in print.

I will always have a soft spot for armor and swords and sleek black business suits and implausible weapons and the Mad Max/Tank Girl stuff which falls in between. One of my favorite cinematic love scenes is the opener for Excalibur. William Gibson remains the only celebrity I have ever choked upon meeting.