Balticon Day Two
Saturday started with me sleeping in til almost 10am - practically unheard of, even if it was somewhere between 1 and 2 AM when I left the filk room. Chris and I walked the half mile to an open air shopping center which has a Panera for a late breakfast. While it is a bit of a pain crossing a VERY large street (something like 5 lanes each way - but there is a walk/don't walk signal), it's really the perfect distance to stretch your legs and get out of the hotel for a bit. The shopping center has seven or eight food choices, ranging from sandwich shop to high brow, plus a grocery store, so it's rather convenient all in all.
I wanted to attend a panel on podcast hosting, so we didn't linger too long over brunch. But it turns out the panel was not about BEING the host of a podcast - as in the person talking. It was about the storage and downloading and delivery systems - as in being the computer and hosting service. Oops. Amazing how words can mean different things! The folks on the panel had lots of good info, but I left after 30 min because it was WAY too techie for me - my IT person at school deals with the miniscule demands for my itty bitty podcast.
Then I went to Bud Sparhawk's reading. I don't attend many readings, because I am a visual person and it is very difficult for me to pay attention aurally for more than 10 min or so when there's no visuals to which to link the audio. But Bud Sparhawk is one of my favorite Analog authors and even after I dropped my Analog subscription, if I see an issue on a newsstand with his name on the cover, I buy it. I met him for the first time at the Nebs in Tempe, and I'm afraid I did a bit of the fan girl gush. Most of his panels this weekend were at times when I had conflicts, so I made time for his reading, and I'm glad I did. It was something totally different for him - actually a futuristic Hamlet - but it was done very well and I actually paid attention the whole 50 minutes. Something of a miracle, and a testament to how good the story was and how much it captured my interest.
Then it was straight to Mary Crowell's GoH concert, which was fabulous. I'm not a gamer, but her Magic Missile song was fabulous. She did several others I hadn't heard before, and several old favorites, including ending with my all time favorite, Legolas (even if I drool over Aragorn when I watch the movies). The family in front of me were also great to watch - they clearly hadn't heard her before, and were also clearly gamers - and they were completely and totally hooked halfway through the first song.
Grabbed some food and a nap and then headed to dinner with Mary and Wesley Crowell - this was my first time to actually meet Wesley in person and I thoroughly enjoyed it - Steve Zeve, Dave Clement, and Anne didn't-get-her-last-name. We went to one of those Japanes steak houses where they cook in front of you, which was really cool but we were having such a good time talking we missed half the show.
Then it was off to Open Filk, which started as fun and ended as magical. The circle was off to a slow start, at least in terms of arrivals. At first it was some audience and the afore-mentioned female duo whose name I missed, and me. They had vocal training and proposed some warm ups which were terrifying to me as the total non-trained singer, so we ended up swapping songs from childhood which was a total riot. We had a blast, and when Gary and Sheryl arrived, I asked Gary for the Evil Overlord Rules song, which fit the mood really well. More singers drifted in, but there was a lot of reticence to jumping in, so the circle switched from chaos to bardic for a bit, and then went back to chaos when things got going. I did That T-Rex Sue (tto Johnny Cash's Boy Named Sue) and one I'd just finished called King of the Hacks (tto Devil Went Down to Georgia), and when Sheryl did one about con-running, I had to chime in with Be Our Pest. Gary also accompanied a new filker on a couple of really nice songs - I especially liked the one about the singularity. And there were several other really nice songs. Mary did Time Share Whorehouse for one, a song that always cracks me up.
But the magical part of the circle was listening to Steve Haug, Dave Clement, Mary Crowell and Robert Cooke trade songs and accompaniment and not only getting to enjoy their work, but also getting to watch the process of creation. In particular, Robert asked for help building an accompaniment for the a cappella Angel song I had liked so much at his concert. The stuff that Dave and Mary came up with fit so well and enhanced the song so much I had goosebumps by the time they were through. And the magic infected the whole circle, because no one disrupted the flow - those of us who had nothing to contribute to the process just sat back and let it flow over us, totally captivated. It was another late, but glorious night.
To be continued ...
I wanted to attend a panel on podcast hosting, so we didn't linger too long over brunch. But it turns out the panel was not about BEING the host of a podcast - as in the person talking. It was about the storage and downloading and delivery systems - as in being the computer and hosting service. Oops. Amazing how words can mean different things! The folks on the panel had lots of good info, but I left after 30 min because it was WAY too techie for me - my IT person at school deals with the miniscule demands for my itty bitty podcast.
Then I went to Bud Sparhawk's reading. I don't attend many readings, because I am a visual person and it is very difficult for me to pay attention aurally for more than 10 min or so when there's no visuals to which to link the audio. But Bud Sparhawk is one of my favorite Analog authors and even after I dropped my Analog subscription, if I see an issue on a newsstand with his name on the cover, I buy it. I met him for the first time at the Nebs in Tempe, and I'm afraid I did a bit of the fan girl gush. Most of his panels this weekend were at times when I had conflicts, so I made time for his reading, and I'm glad I did. It was something totally different for him - actually a futuristic Hamlet - but it was done very well and I actually paid attention the whole 50 minutes. Something of a miracle, and a testament to how good the story was and how much it captured my interest.
Then it was straight to Mary Crowell's GoH concert, which was fabulous. I'm not a gamer, but her Magic Missile song was fabulous. She did several others I hadn't heard before, and several old favorites, including ending with my all time favorite, Legolas (even if I drool over Aragorn when I watch the movies). The family in front of me were also great to watch - they clearly hadn't heard her before, and were also clearly gamers - and they were completely and totally hooked halfway through the first song.
Grabbed some food and a nap and then headed to dinner with Mary and Wesley Crowell - this was my first time to actually meet Wesley in person and I thoroughly enjoyed it - Steve Zeve, Dave Clement, and Anne didn't-get-her-last-name. We went to one of those Japanes steak houses where they cook in front of you, which was really cool but we were having such a good time talking we missed half the show.
Then it was off to Open Filk, which started as fun and ended as magical. The circle was off to a slow start, at least in terms of arrivals. At first it was some audience and the afore-mentioned female duo whose name I missed, and me. They had vocal training and proposed some warm ups which were terrifying to me as the total non-trained singer, so we ended up swapping songs from childhood which was a total riot. We had a blast, and when Gary and Sheryl arrived, I asked Gary for the Evil Overlord Rules song, which fit the mood really well. More singers drifted in, but there was a lot of reticence to jumping in, so the circle switched from chaos to bardic for a bit, and then went back to chaos when things got going. I did That T-Rex Sue (tto Johnny Cash's Boy Named Sue) and one I'd just finished called King of the Hacks (tto Devil Went Down to Georgia), and when Sheryl did one about con-running, I had to chime in with Be Our Pest. Gary also accompanied a new filker on a couple of really nice songs - I especially liked the one about the singularity. And there were several other really nice songs. Mary did Time Share Whorehouse for one, a song that always cracks me up.
But the magical part of the circle was listening to Steve Haug, Dave Clement, Mary Crowell and Robert Cooke trade songs and accompaniment and not only getting to enjoy their work, but also getting to watch the process of creation. In particular, Robert asked for help building an accompaniment for the a cappella Angel song I had liked so much at his concert. The stuff that Dave and Mary came up with fit so well and enhanced the song so much I had goosebumps by the time they were through. And the magic infected the whole circle, because no one disrupted the flow - those of us who had nothing to contribute to the process just sat back and let it flow over us, totally captivated. It was another late, but glorious night.
To be continued ...