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Swancon is over! And I had a good time!
I wasn't sure I was going to go, until Emilly talked me in to it; now I am so glad I went. I had such a great weekend, met lots of new people and caught up with beloved friends. I networked/checked out stuff on both a work and a writery level, and had great adventures!
I spent a huge chunk of time just talking to people. I attended a record four (four!) panels on Friday (four is usually the amount of panels I attend over an entire con), and I was even on a panel at one point! and I purchased a lot of books (and some other things). But most of the time I was sitting in the bar/lounge, chatting with people. It was super awesome. (I do wish, though, that people would feel less entitled to ask certain types of questions; and take the hint when I don't want to talk to them)(interestingly, when I genuinely like the person but it's just an inconvenient time I can outright say 'I'm sorry but I can't talk to you right now, let's talk later' but when I just want to avoid the person I can't bring myself to be so blunt. hmm)
A list of books I purchased:
I became addicted to Twitter. Maybe there's an actual post in this, but I began regularly checking out the #swancon and #natcon tags on twitter, and I think it was Hespa who said it's such a different experience attending a con whilst using a smart phone. There's so much more to pay attention to! And now I keep checking the hashtag to see if there's anything left that anyone has posted.
A lot of the food I ate was in my room: Emilly and I had walked up to Fresh Provs and supplied ourselves with bread and this really delicious fruit spread and snacks and things, and I mostly ate sandwiches at lunch during the con. This proved a good advance preparation, as there was nothing but wedges and chips that I could eat at the hotel. Incidentally I really enjoyed staying in the con hotel, it's the first year that I did it and I really liked the flexibility it gave me in terms of attending things and veging and running up to my room for my tentacle pillow/my sketch book/to put my shoes on. The hotel itself was not great, there were mobility access issues and the hotel was woefully understaffed. And also single flush toilets everywhere!
Thursday: no actual Swancon things, though I did catch the train down to Murdoch and had dinner with Sheebapants (and gave her my con-bag copy of The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms).
Friday: I made it to one session in the Edustream, 'What TV did to me', 'Imagining better presents from worse tomorrows: using SF in sustainability studies' and the panel for the SF Bookclub, wherein they talked about The Windup Girl, which as you all may or may not know I loathe a lot (more on that later). I also ended up on the panel 'Cylons, Bajorans and the 5th Column: Terrorism, Freedom Fighters and Resistance Movements in SF.' There were heaps more panels I had planned to make it to on Friday, but I'm pretty sure I got distracted by sitting around and chatting with people, which was nice anyway.
There was only one panel I wanted to attend on Saturday (Dolls of Desire: Man's unnatural selection of the perfect women' which apparently was really good), but instead of doing that I went on a hunt for a new french-cuffs shirt (success) in Perth's CBD op shops, and then I went ice skating with C. And then for once I actually attended the masquerade, AND I looked fierce, AND I went to a room party! But we don't talk about room parties.
On Sunday I attended one panel on purpose (Steampunk Style and Substance) (several blog posts to follow, I'm not kidding) and one I sort of fell in to (a vid panel), and had lunch with my parents (at Lotus) and trekked out to the wilds of the Armadale line to visit the ex-laws. And then spent a lot of time drinking cocktails and getting hugs in the lounge. Also I had the shakes. Combination not enough sleep/too much caffeine?
Monday I played a lot of blokus and drank some tea, and Vi came to visit so we played some more blokus and she beat me! I managed to miss every panel I'd planned to attend.
After the con finished, I finally made it to Utopia for crispy mushrooms and salty fried (vegan) chicken and for once in my life, I had no one to fight with for the final spicy hou tou mushroom cashews.
I spent Tuesday morning hanging with Emilly at the hotel before my mum came and picked us up and dropped her off at the airport. I progressed up to the parental house, where I started going through boxes of my things, as my parents had requested of me. I have found a massive pile of stuff that I think I could sell at the Swancon auction, and I wish I had realised this earlier. Now my parents are going to have to put up with this stuff for one week less than another twelve months.
A sampling of wares I found in my parents' house:
ANYWAY SWANCON: GOOD TIMES. Panel summaries / rants / word rambles tomorrow.
IS THIS RAIN I HEAR?
ETA: swancon #2: steampunk style and substance (a panel)
I wasn't sure I was going to go, until Emilly talked me in to it; now I am so glad I went. I had such a great weekend, met lots of new people and caught up with beloved friends. I networked/checked out stuff on both a work and a writery level, and had great adventures!
I spent a huge chunk of time just talking to people. I attended a record four (four!) panels on Friday (four is usually the amount of panels I attend over an entire con), and I was even on a panel at one point! and I purchased a lot of books (and some other things). But most of the time I was sitting in the bar/lounge, chatting with people. It was super awesome. (I do wish, though, that people would feel less entitled to ask certain types of questions; and take the hint when I don't want to talk to them)(interestingly, when I genuinely like the person but it's just an inconvenient time I can outright say 'I'm sorry but I can't talk to you right now, let's talk later' but when I just want to avoid the person I can't bring myself to be so blunt. hmm)
A list of books I purchased:
- Nightsiders, Sue Isle
- Love and Romanpunk, Tansy Rayner Roberts
- Eona, Alison Goodman
- Cold Magic, Kate Elliot
- Sprawl, ed Alisa Krasnostein <--so excited!
- and a super old-school illustrated copy of The Dream of the Red Chamber
I became addicted to Twitter. Maybe there's an actual post in this, but I began regularly checking out the #swancon and #natcon tags on twitter, and I think it was Hespa who said it's such a different experience attending a con whilst using a smart phone. There's so much more to pay attention to! And now I keep checking the hashtag to see if there's anything left that anyone has posted.
A lot of the food I ate was in my room: Emilly and I had walked up to Fresh Provs and supplied ourselves with bread and this really delicious fruit spread and snacks and things, and I mostly ate sandwiches at lunch during the con. This proved a good advance preparation, as there was nothing but wedges and chips that I could eat at the hotel. Incidentally I really enjoyed staying in the con hotel, it's the first year that I did it and I really liked the flexibility it gave me in terms of attending things and veging and running up to my room for my tentacle pillow/my sketch book/to put my shoes on. The hotel itself was not great, there were mobility access issues and the hotel was woefully understaffed. And also single flush toilets everywhere!
Thursday: no actual Swancon things, though I did catch the train down to Murdoch and had dinner with Sheebapants (and gave her my con-bag copy of The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms).
Friday: I made it to one session in the Edustream, 'What TV did to me', 'Imagining better presents from worse tomorrows: using SF in sustainability studies' and the panel for the SF Bookclub, wherein they talked about The Windup Girl, which as you all may or may not know I loathe a lot (more on that later). I also ended up on the panel 'Cylons, Bajorans and the 5th Column: Terrorism, Freedom Fighters and Resistance Movements in SF.' There were heaps more panels I had planned to make it to on Friday, but I'm pretty sure I got distracted by sitting around and chatting with people, which was nice anyway.
There was only one panel I wanted to attend on Saturday (Dolls of Desire: Man's unnatural selection of the perfect women' which apparently was really good), but instead of doing that I went on a hunt for a new french-cuffs shirt (success) in Perth's CBD op shops, and then I went ice skating with C. And then for once I actually attended the masquerade, AND I looked fierce, AND I went to a room party! But we don't talk about room parties.
On Sunday I attended one panel on purpose (Steampunk Style and Substance) (several blog posts to follow, I'm not kidding) and one I sort of fell in to (a vid panel), and had lunch with my parents (at Lotus) and trekked out to the wilds of the Armadale line to visit the ex-laws. And then spent a lot of time drinking cocktails and getting hugs in the lounge. Also I had the shakes. Combination not enough sleep/too much caffeine?
Monday I played a lot of blokus and drank some tea, and Vi came to visit so we played some more blokus and she beat me! I managed to miss every panel I'd planned to attend.
After the con finished, I finally made it to Utopia for crispy mushrooms and salty fried (vegan) chicken and for once in my life, I had no one to fight with for the final spicy hou tou mushroom cashews.
I spent Tuesday morning hanging with Emilly at the hotel before my mum came and picked us up and dropped her off at the airport. I progressed up to the parental house, where I started going through boxes of my things, as my parents had requested of me. I have found a massive pile of stuff that I think I could sell at the Swancon auction, and I wish I had realised this earlier. Now my parents are going to have to put up with this stuff for one week less than another twelve months.
A sampling of wares I found in my parents' house:
- a Star Wars Darth Vader Tie Fighter model kit
- a Dick Smith Electronic Kit
- a Buffy figurine with crossbow and bible (in package) (I would sell this for way less than this year's $15 average)
- hilarious kiddies battery operated 'Old Smokey' train set(AMAZING)
ANYWAY SWANCON: GOOD TIMES. Panel summaries / rants / word rambles tomorrow.
IS THIS RAIN I HEAR?
ETA: swancon #2: steampunk style and substance (a panel)
(no subject)
(no subject)
ALSO AS IT TURNS OUT I AM SURPRISINGLY EASY