Apa L is up for grabs. Any takers?

I am resigning the Official Collatorship, effective two weeks from tonight. The decision comes hard to me, but it's influenced by two major factors. In the first place, the race for the '68 WorldCon is beginning to pick up steam. Some of you may recall that I stated some time ago, when asked if I was getting tired of running Apa L,, that I planned to stay on until the Pan-Pacificon bid got really active. That time is now. With the bidding Committee no longer living in one central area, a lot of my stencil-typing time is going into correspondence each week. This, plus the second factor - a night course in German Reading that I'll be beginning in another week - means that something is going to have to get cut, and I'm afraid that something is Apa L.

This doesn't mean that I'm dropping Apa L completely. I'll continue to put out issues of RR as often as I can. It's just that I've made the decision to give up my record of never missing a Dist'n, no matter what else I have to give up to get a couple of stencils typed and run. Similarly, if I should get behind on homework or correspondence, I may feel it advisable to skip LASFS now and then. It's because I no longer want to have to attend every Meeting that I'm surrendering the OC-ship of Apa L.

I don't quite know how to work this. Give the OC-ship to the first reliable-looking LASFan who asks for it? Draw straws? Let the club vote on the new OC? I'm open to suggestions. At any rate, I would like the Meeting of the 16th, in two weeks, to be the last one at which I officiate over Apa L. At the end of that Meeting, I'll give the new OC whatever paraphernalia belongs to Apa L. I hope there's somebody else out there who won't mind lugging a typewriter to every Meeting to type the Table o f Contents, or missing part of a Meeting if need be to get the Dist'n finished by ten o'clock. (Incidentally, my typewriter and the LASFS stapler do not go with the OC-ship, though I imagine that Don Fitch's hekto will. And will the new OC be prepared to supply Apa L with a cover each week? Published at his expense, unless he passed the hat for expense money more often than I've ever done.)

I think I can still keep on agenting for those Outsiders who contribute to Apa L through me. I am planning to keep on attending LASFS Meetings regularly (I just no longer want to have to), and I expect that any week that I don't attend, I'll have made my decision early enough to get any contributions I have to someone else to be brought to the club. However, if any of my out-of-towners want to play safe and get a new Los Angeles agent, that's fine by me.

-- BEING COMMENTS ON LAST WEEK'S DISTRIBUTION

Howard Thurlow - I'm afraid my opinion of fogs will remain closely aligned with my opinions of rain and snow. They may be fascinating to look out upon from inside a nice, dry, warm home, but I wouldn't care to venture out into 'em. They're a bit too wild & cold for my tastes, to enjoy walking through them for pleasure. As most of the LASFS used to say about five years ago, "Down with FOG!"

Bĵo Trimble - It's nice to hear that your residence in the Bay Area has started out on a pleasant note. Let's take that as a good omen. ## If you've got warm rain, that might not be so bad. I've heard of warm and even hot rain in the tropics, but I'm surprised to learn of it up in northern California. How are temperatures overall as compared to southern California - or is it still too early for you to've formed any impressions yet? ## Since Felice hasn't had the chance to tell us about any of the Bay Area's goings-on in a couple of months (except for a CALI or two), I hope you can keep us filled in on the fanac up there.

Tom Digby - Yes, that Comic Book Universe seems to creep into all sorts of places, including a surprising amount of regular science-fiction. You tend to learn to steer clear of certain authors, or publishers. I wouldn't be at all surprised if every rule of the Comic Book Universe you cite here could be shown to exist in some "straight" s-f story or other, including the one about the stars being little five-pointed objects. In fact, I can even think of a couple of cases when these rules were used deliberately, to make some point or other.

Fred Hollander - I don't mind being out in a mist, or when it's "just barely raining". In fact, I wonder if we're all using the terms to mean different things. (If everybody's through defining "friendship", we can work on "rain" now.) Through personal experience, I tend to define rain as something that gets me cold and wet and miserable. If it doesn't do this, then it's something "other" than rain. A light, warm drizzle doesn't count. I suppose I must've been out in a steady, genuine rain that was warm at some time in my life, but I can't remember any occasions. Another definition I have is that if it's wet enough to blur my glasses so I can't see, it's rain, while if it's lighter than that, it's something less than rain.

Dian Pelz - I just got through laying out about $75 in repairs for my car, too. There wasn't anything really wrong with it,, but I hadn't had it serviced since before going on my TriCon trip, and I thought it was high time to have it generally lubed and tuned up. The mechanics said that the brakes were on the verge of wearing out, so I took their word for it and had them completely relined, rotated, and everything else that gets done to brakes. I've had my car for a year this month, and it's just gone over 20,000 miles. It sounded logical that I could use a new set of brakes after 20,000 miles.

Jack Harness - Very funny. I wish you were contributing regularly again. I hope you do go on with LABYRINTH OF GRINSTEAD until you leave, at least.

Sally Crayne - Tom Gilbert is a great train fan, and keeps up to date on all the special excursions. I recommend that you contact him; I think he'd like to know about a fellow train fan in fandom.