It’s Tuesday. I’m ready for the weekend already, so I can make my plans, can’t I? Besides, I have great plans. Tremendous plans. I have the best plans. Also, next weekend is the greatest weekend, since we get Monday and Tuesday off for our Fall Break, so it’s a four day weekend for me. So here’s what I’m going to do.

• NerdCon: Stories is this weekend in Minneapolis. It’s a great little event with well-known writers (Scalzi will be there, also Mary Robinette Kowal, Saladin Ahmed, Nalo Hopkinson, Paolo Bacigalupi, etc.) doing weird creative things. It’s also far enough out of my comfort zone that I never feel guilty about not doing anything but enjoying myself as an audience member — you know that feeling, scientists. You shouldn’t be at the conference unless you can justify it by submitting an abstract. Also, it’s inspiring because it’s all about stoking the fires of creativity. You should go. We can enjoy it together.

• I’ll be working on a talk I am obligated to give for a different event — I’m speaking in Beijing at the end of the month. The title of that talk is “Five difficult concepts in evolutionary thinking…and how to address them”. What I’m going to say is all clear in my head, but I have to do the work to sort ’em out and organize them and figure out how to communicate them. You should go. We can enjoy authentic Chinese food together and take a day to see the sights.

• I am not formally speaking at Skepticon, but I am doing one of the Friday workshops, so I should start getting ready for that. My topic is “Bad Evolution”, and I’ll be preparing short, written examples of awful creationist logic and coaching people in how to handle them. It’ll be fun. You should go. I’ll be giving out prizes for good counterarguments — stickers you can put on your Skepticon badge.

• There will be grading. There is always grading. But I’m going to try to get all caught up before the weekend so there isn’t too much hanging over my head. You should come to my house and do it for me.

• My wife has been ambitiously cleaning up and throwing out two decades worth of accumulated junk. I hardly recognize our living room anymore, and I hear sounds from upstairs that tell me she’s tearing apart the boys’ bedrooms. I know I’ll be drafted to work on those projects. You should come help. We can lift things together and make trips to the dump.

• I intend to take some quiet time and do nothing all by myself. You are not welcome to join me in that. That would defeat the whole point!

See? It’s going to be a great weekend.

Now I just have to see about making it through the week.

P.S. Skepticon still needs donations.