Giant Sherlockians.

One oft hears it said, in certain Sherlockian circles, that "there were giants in those days." People like to do a little hero-worship of their forebears, and giving them a metaphoric increase in physical size is a traditional way to do it. But they really don't mean they were giants.

The subconscious mind, however, works slightly differently.

Last night, I dreamed I went to a grand Sherlockian function, a mutant hybrid of the Sherlock Holmes Birthday Weekend in New York and 221B Con. It was a grand event, with hundreds of attendees in one large room, and eventually, some plucky souls said, "Hey, let's get a picture of everybody!"

In the dream, everyone crowded together to get in the picture, and suddenly I found myself surrounded by Sherlockians two to three feet taller than me, and I come in at a little over six feet tall. One of those nearby was apparently Chris Redmond, about whom I remember thinking, "He wasn't short the last time I saw him, but he had to have grown!"

Eventually Scott Monty saw the issue and rearranged everyone with the shorter people in front, where I wound up, and a second picture was taken.

As we near 221B Con, and all of the circumstances that have kept me from getting to Sherlockian functions in recent years are lining up to try to prevent me from attending this one as well, I guess my subconscious is making a pretty obvious statement on my feelings about being away from the community for so long, and existing solely in the Sherlockian world as an online spirit.

There weren't just giants back in those days, apparently there are quite a few out there now. At least my subconscious thinks so.