Writers in real life

[Andy]

Last week I met a fellow fantasy writer in my English class, and today he introduced me to another writer, a poet. Possibly one of the most fun conversations in my life. :)

Who else here has met other writers in real life?

And if you have, how did you meet them?

[Imelda]

I met a few people at the Nano meet up for my area in 2006. It was interesting to listen to, but they were all kind of overbearing so it wasn't really a 'conversation' on my part. :p

[Shaun]

I've taken a lot of writing classes, so obviously I've met a lot of like-minded individuals, but to be honest I find my relations with people online to be far more interesting in relation to 'meeting fellow writers'. Why? Because not only do I meet people who will read my work on a more frequent basis, but I also can talk with published writers. I've been having a dialogue with Tobias S. Buckell of late on biases in SF and it is really very interesting since we both have different ideas on the subject. I've done interviews with writers, been sent books by writers or publishers, and it's really wonderful. To put it simply: the Internet is a wonderful device that makes my life far easier to manage when it comes to the writing world.
As for meeting real published writers in real life, I've met a few, but nobody you would know by name or by their work, and nobody I would consider to be of significance. No offense to them, but they were sort of in the literary vein of things and weren't widespread and probably had little influence.
I have met the fellow who wrote Evangelion (he's the head of Gynax <--spelling?, and has done a LOAD of anime/manga work...and before Imelda scoffs, you need to realize that works like Evangelion are incredibly complex and influential...even the Gynax Man can't explain the ending of that show to American users because it is so complex and Japanese...). I've attended panels by him too, which is really very interesting. He did one on Samurai in history, which was really cool.
I do hope to meet some fellow SF/F writers soon, though. I'm really enjoying the world of writers, talking to them, etc. It's very fun.