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At the Worldcon Part 2
8 August. The Hoodoo is Broken!
I don't think Marianne Plumridge quite believed the protestations of
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satyapriya and myself that it wasn't that we didn't want to meet Robert Silverberg but that it wouldn't be safe - for any of us! Now that we've got through the meeting intact and not endangering Mr Silverberg either, she's even less convinced :-) Made it to morning programming - just - after Marianne P. took
satyapriya and self into the Green Room for a second breakfast. I met Robert Sawyer there and was reminded of the panel he would be on, together with Glenda Larke et al; "A World Made of Birds - What Would The Earth Be Like If The Dinosaurs Had Lived?" Well, fewer small annoying mammalian creatures, for one. Which reminds me that the Worldcon had a very good creche/kids programming stream set up. They must have; there was little disruption from babies and toddlers which was a welcome change from some cons!I did another stint at the 2010 table and made it to another panel, "Spaceships, Colonists and Castaways" which was good but could have used more speculation about futuristic models such as spacecraft rather than dwelling on real-life alternative communes.
In the evening I had dinner at the con suite - one really could eat free quite well here! - and then attended the Masquerade. This was a disappointment after the Noreascon spectacular; way too many fairy princesses who did no more than twirl on stage and off again. Most people left in the intermission.
9 August. Very tired now after several nights without much sleep. We tried yet again to change rooms but had no luck. Still managed to get to an 11.30am panel titled "Envisioning a Society Without Fossil Fuels: Fact and Fiction." This managed to stay on topic a bit better than the commune-dwellers, since it had Cynthia Felice, Mary Rosenblum and S.M. Stirling on the panel. [I have edited this post, having unintentionally given offence with a reference in this sentence.]
A Worldcon is most definitely an experience, a quite overwhelming one for a person used to cons of a size where 300 is average and 500 would be very large! 3500 fans in one's personal space can mess with your head! I'm not sure I want to do this again.
I wish I'd got to more filking. I did enjoy the filking circles I did get to, though I think if someone cannot remember the words OR the tune, the moderator should perhaps step in and move on to someone else! It is not a good sign.
10 August. A day for finishing things off, such as bestowing my toiletries upon the Con Suite for anybody not catching an international flight to take. I paid my membership to 2010, sorted out precisely what horrible hour I would need to catch the airport shuttle on Tuesday and did one last circuit of the dealers hall, somehow ending up with a very engaging rat puppet who wouldn't let me set it back down. [I carried it all the way home]. I attended one more panel on, "How Will The Future Remember the 20th Century?" Some interesting speculation about 1000 years hence, 200 years hence and so on. This panel featured Harry Turtledove, James Morrow and Nancy Kress. It might have been this panel where someone quoted Kurt Vonnegut, saying that SF was the only literature which encouraged people to think of themselves as members of a species and citizens of a planet.
I did attend the closing ceremony, as the only item on at that time, but it was rather anticlimactic. The people representing the Montreal Worldcon in 2009 were almost inaudible, even after they were informed of this by the populace. I hope their con is more successful than their presentation, which ended up being a rather confusing mime since we couldn't understand all that they said.
11 August. I spent this day also in Denver since I wasn't able to get a flight until the 12th. I posted a last package home and walked about the city. A last weirdness magnet attack happened to me in the post office, where another fan happened to be engaged in the same activity and looked over at the CDs I was packaging. One was Dr Jane Robinson's "Fossil Fever." "You know the performer is transitioning?" he asked. "It's Dr James now. It's hard to get used to the beard," the fan confided.
On the 12th, I headed home, rocketing some 15 hours into the future during the second leg of a blessedly half-empty Qantas flight.
This is the official end of my trip report, though I'll probably continue to mention stuff as it occurs to me. I'm now home with such exciting stuff as the vegetable garden to take care of, plus weeding, pond room service, rat care and even attempts to wake my brain and get back to writing. I'm also heavily involved in Green politics right now, doing leaflet distribution in my local area and have somehow found myself helping to look after a Greens How To Vote booth on election day next Saturday :-) Whoo-hoo.
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Whoa, I wonder if Dr James' voice has been changed - s/he had a lovely voice as a girl!
Good luck with your leaflets on Saturday! Did you see my post on how to stalk Senators?
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I did see your "senator stalking" post. Hm, how to choose? Can you be a mass or a serial stalker of senators?
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Both mass and serial! Stalk 'em all if you like! And it looks like they're going to extend it to all parts of the guvmint. It would be good if they did it for local Councils too, but that might be too big a project.
I think the City of Stirling would HATE it. :-)