I absolutely slept like warmed over death Friday Night. We were in a room with two Full size beds. Ann and I share a King at home, so I kept waking up over and over, with some elbonium here, the exhaust from her CPAP blowing on me there, etc.
I woke up late, and with a KILLER headache, and I’m not entirely sure why (though it may have been a touch of dehydration – I was hydrated when I left work, but didn’t drink anything after about 4 pm). Even Bruce asked me if I was all right, as I looked pretty haggard.
I missed another panel I’d wanted to see, thanks to the horrible headache from hell.
Side note: The panel was Steampunk Fashion (T. Deeney, C. Gearheart, J McCurdy, S. Powell) I’m really pretty bummed that I missed it.
Ann and I did, however, make it to Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Authors You Should Be Reading (D. Bell, E. Bryant, T Hutcheson, A. Meyer, S. Megibow). That was a pretty decent panel – which talked rather less about authors you should be reading, and rather more about where to find the authors that you should be reading (as compared to reading the same stuff by the same authors over and over). An interesting question was posed by one of the members – where are the Robert Heinleins of today? My thought is that the Robert Heinleins and Arthur C. Clarkes and Isaac Asimovs are who they are primarily because they were active authors for 40 or 50 years. In order to find the new RAH and ACC, you’re just going to have to wait and see – The Rolling Stones or The Roads Must Roll or The Man Who Sold The Moon were certainly not amazing pieces of fiction – and they certainly aren’t the same caliber as Stranger in a Strange Land, or 2001 or I, Robot.
Conversely, some books are award winning, but fade from memory quickly, while others (who perhaps should have won initially) stay in the collective conciousness for a long time thereafter (I’m thinking specifically of Rite of Passage by Alexei Panshin, which beat Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep by Philip K. Dick in 1968. One later was found to be interesting enough to find its way to Hollywood, while the other did not.
All in all, it was a good panel, and I find it interesting the ‘filters’ that Sara Megibow talked about regarding taking the reason you’re reading into account – If you’re reading to improve your writing, read award winning books, even if you hate them, you’ll learn something from them. If you’re reading exclusively for pleasure, however, just read what you like – and if you find you’re not enjoying a book in short order, set it aside and pick something else up – it’s not as though there’s a shortage of reading material out there to be had.
Another point that was mentioned is the preponderance of people who read series by the same author, and how that has guided the publishing industry toward multi-book deals for authors. There’s a lot of competition for shelf space. An insight that I had, but did not get a chance to share, is that just as there is limited shelf space, there is also a finite number of New Book Buying Dollars in the market. If a buyer is presented with a sample of 8 books on a retail shelf, and 4 of those books are(Not Series Related) books by the same author, which book is that buyer most likely to purchase? I can only speak to my own purchasing choices – in my eyes, if you’ve got 4 books on the shelf, the fact that you’ve got ANY books on the shelf is much less likely to be a fluke. I’ve definitely learned through hard purchased experience that if you’ve only got one book on the shelf, that may be the only book you ever have a chance to get on the shelf – because your (quite frankly, and only in my opinion perhaps) writing sucks.
At noon, Ann (and Cece and Christine and Thor) attended Dr. Who Legacy. She summed it up as “Dr. Who, Past and Present, and where ‘we’ think it’s going to go in the future”.
I, on the other hand, attended Foundations of Costuming (M. Bethards, C. Kimball, J. Smith), as I feel more than a little behind the curve when I’m in company of people like Ann and Bruce and Christine and Tres and Star. I *used* to have quite a collection of costuming bits (Renaissance, and when I was playing Airsoft earlier in the decade, Historical Military stuff), but that’s…long ago. These days, even coming up with something for Halloween is a challenge. The panel was really quite excellent, even though there was the ever present gender bias that says “Silly Rabbit, costuming is for girls”. All in all, that’s not terribly surprising, since that gender bias really is present – many of the men that I know that have killer costumes also have wives and girlfriends who are killers with a sewing machine. There were some good tips for women’s costuming – but the Panel ran out of time before getting around to the men’s stuff – again, not surprising, since a lot of men’s costuming can be adapted from off the rack purchases (unless you’re doing Klangon…). The panel did a really excellent job of imparting their experiences and tips in an engaging manner. Meghan Bethards was charming, entertaining, and had some good (and by good, I mean hillarious) anecdotes. She got her start the same way I did, costuming for the SCA. Carol Kimball has been at the top of her game for a while, and it showed in the wealth of information she had. Likewise Janet Smith, who was the quietest of the three, but who would jump in with super insight at key moments. All in all, I think I enjoyed this panel the most.
A bit later in the day, I attended Invented Languages (R. Stikman, L. Reeve, P. Bacigalupi, R. Lickiss, T. Newton). There was some really good discussion as to where using invented languages are appropriate, how they can serve as a guide to a culture, or equally as a roadblock used to demonstrate the ‘alien-ness’ of the thing at hand. Each of the panelists certainly had opinions on how others had used invented languages in their work, and there seemed to be quite a bit of agreement that using inventions is wonderful for expressing things for which there is not English equivalent (like ‘je ne sais qua‘, or ‘satori), while making up a word for which there is a perfectly usable construct (i.e. ‘table’) and then using that word in place of the English is just…annoying. Just say ‘table’. Save the fancy inventions for fancy invented concept. There was more discussion on dictionaries and glossaries, and where might they fit into the overall structure of the book (the printed, bound finished product, not ‘the book’ as in the story contained therein). I left a little bit after the halfway mark, as I’d forgotten that it was Klingon Chocolate Time.
I made my way to the ConSuite, where I got to see Tres and Star and Bruce and Christine in their Klangon (sic) stuff. Christine handed me a ginormous piece of chocolate cake, and I got to sit with Ann for a while. That was a decadent happy-making combination. =)
Thor and I fetched dinner, and Panera was had, and it was delicious.
Ann and Cece and Thor and I brought dinner down to Bruce and Christine and the girl-child, as they were hands full with helping get the Masquerade flowing smoothly. Ann and I helped sort contestant sheets. It was truly pandemonium. I briefly thought that the staffperson running the show was going to either cry, or spontaneously combust. Note to self: Do not get involved with the Masquerade.
That said, I saw some pretty quick and easy ways to make the Masquerade flow MUCH more smoothly.
For example:
Each contestant has their photo taken. It is printed out immediately on a photo printer, and that print is paper-clipped to the entry form. After the Masquerade is over, the photo is unclipped and given to the entrant.
Leaving a blank space directly on the entry forms for a photo to be printed would cut down the paperwork angle quite a bit. The entrant gets to the front of the line, has their picture taken while their entry form is placed in a color inkjet printer. The photo and contestant number are printed directly on their form, and those forms go to the judges, while their “souvenir” photo is also printed out on the photo printer, and handed to them on the spot.
But I’m not going anywhere near that. No way.
After the craziness of the preparation, and the actual Masquerade itself, Ann and I had some downtime in the suite. That was awesome.
Later on in the evening, Thor and Cece and Christine and Bruce had some friends up to the suite – Ron and Bobbie and Vern (Veronica). It turns out that they (almost) live within walking distance of us, and are very cool people who just moved (back) to Denver from Tucson. I stayed up and chatted with them all, while Ann slept.
And thus concluded our programming for Day 2. =)