So, not two weeks ago, I wrote here joking about winning a Hugo in 2014. Would I like that? Oh, sure. Who wouldn’t? But that’s a huge dream and one I suspect might not happen at all.

But that’s not why I found my gast well and truly flabbed yesterday. It had started with my pal Ei dropping me off at my grandmother’s so I could hook up with my folks and my ride back to Sactown. While she was there, I made mention of a possible Baycon ribbon I was thinking about, and then had to explain to my grandmother what ribbons were and why I wanted to make them for something called Baycon, which led to me explaining in general terms about science fiction conventions, specifically Baycon and Worldcon. (Also, there was a digression on how con-commuting is a bit painful and the turn-around times and I were pulling in Denver last year.)

The conversation drifted, as conversations are wont to do, and at a lull I pulled out my phone and glanced at my email. There, I found an email from Peter Sullivan (). Now the two of us are friends and fellow eAPAeans, but generally we don’t exchange email. But it wasn’t the fact I got an email from him that had me staring at my phone in shock. No, it was his subject line: “Congratulations on your FAAn award win!”

Now, a bit of a digression here. The FAAn awards stand for “Fanzine Activity Achievement Awards”, and they are voted on by whomever in fandom chooses to participate, although in practice, it works out to being mostly fanzine fans. There’s several categories: best fanzine, best fanzine writer, best fanzine artist, best letterhack (person who writes letters of comment to fanzines), best online fanac site, and best new fan. They’re given out at Corflu every year, and this last weekend was Corflu Zed up Seattle way, simulcast on ustream so that us fans who couldn’t make the trip could hang out and watch the proceedings. Unfortunately, it was also the weekend of my grandmother’s seventieth birthday party, so I couldn’t spend as much time as I would have liked hanging out in the chat and watching the feed.

Which leads me back around to the email informing me I’d tied for first on best new fan with Jean Martin of SF/SF. Now see, I’d fully expected that if I was going to win it at all, it would have been next year, since I was planning to become more visible in the fanzine fandom this year instead of mainly writing my APAzines. So to find out I’d won this year — yeah, it completely came out of the blue.

Hopping on Twitter, I’d found that Peter had announced it there too, and then there was a followup from Chris Garcia, the man who runs the most excellent Baycon fanzine lounge as well as being a whirling dervish of fandom, saying much the same thing. So I guess this had actually happened, and I wasn’t dreaming. And after getting back into Sactown, I hopped back on the virtual con and had a couple people congratulate me there, too, which just went to make it all that more concrete.

So yeah. It may not be a rocket, but it’s a truly wonderful surprise nonetheless. I’m pleased as heck that the folks who voted for me in the awards thought highly enough of me to do so.

Yes. My gast is well and truly flabbed, even now on Monday morning.