Swancon 2013
This is not so much a con report for Swancon 2013 as a memory dump, so we'll just see what comes out.
Even though this year's con started on the Friday morning I still booked my room at the Ibis Styles for Thursday night onwards so I'd have access to it during the day on Friday. I'm glad I took the option to check in on Thursday night, juggling with a Husband gig in Northbridge because it gave me a chance to catch my breath after the fuss of packing and moving. It was nice to legitimately hide out in my room all night after arriving, rather than ramping up for another big effort at the end of the day. There were plenty of people about but I chose spoon preservation.
The hotel had kindly supplied a microwave oven on request, so I didn't have to schlepp in my own. Heavy little suckers. There was a bit of excitement as I was unpacking my supplies when the shelf in the kitchenette collapsed, spilling tins and bouncing off glassware. Fortunately for all the glass ware was sturdy and only one finger got in the way, scarring only my freshly-applied shiny gold nail polish. I decided to wear that scar with pride.
Friday
Did not feel great on Friday morning for the start of the con, but let's face it, I start at a pretty low baseline at the best of times. I find the Ibis/Four Seasons/ex-Telecom building tiring by design, and felt this pretty much straight away. All conversations had to be shouted on delivery and strained on listening. There was almost no seating in the lobby area so I ended up standing (leaning on the stick) more than was sensible, but when I did sit it was really lovely that people came up to say hello. My apologies if I seemed unenthused!
Registration was extremely painless, with the usual bottleneck of personalised con badge printing done away with in favour of optional and DIY name-tagging. No cursing the laminating machine this year. I was also happy to not be immediately laden with free books, so I didn't have to make an extra trip up to my room to offload them. The strike rate for readability for these freebies is usually very low, so I was happy to not have them thrust upon me. The free books instead were on a self-service Free Books table, so if any had looked promising I would have woo-ed them into my clutches. But 'twas not to be.
I never got around to entering the door prize draws so escaped this Swancon with exactly zero free books. Bought a handful though, of mostly voluntary tomes. More on that later, perhaps.
The Opening Ceremony was amusing and informative, and had the usual fun vibe of anticipation.
My first real panel was by the folks at The Artifactory, doing a show and tell of what they'd been up to recently. Interesting stuff. Cool toys. Endless project ideas. Power tools. Lasers! Mmmmmm.
Crashed in room.
Next panel on the resurgence of Fairy Tales was also very interesting, and my first look at GoH Charles Stross, although he was not in his natural element. Some interesting discussions about the Darwinian nature of folk tales communicated orally - only the interesting and memorable ones survive. (If only fanfic was communicated the same way...).
Crashed in room. Escaped with difficulty.
Arrived late to The Disney Renaissance but just in time for the audio to be sorted so I didn't actually miss much in the way of content. Great presentation by Grant as always, with some fascinating stats, technical info, and behind the scenes machinations. I really should get around to watching The Little Mermaid one day.
Crashed in room. I think this was when I discovered that the fridge in my room was definitely not cool, and while it was plugged in and turned on at the wall, the thermostat was set to zero. As soon as I moved the dial, the fridge sprung into life. Sadly I had to toss many perishables that had indeed perished (cheese isn't supposed to bulge, is it?) and called on fabulous wonderful Husband to shop for replacements and bring them to me the next day. Made several attempts to discuss the problem with hotel staff and try to arrange reimbursement, but never managed to talk to an actual manager. Husband could not produce a receipt because he'd used a self checkout that had run out of paper. It was only about $15 dollars worth, but a bit of a hassle. I'll report it again in feedback but probably won't pursue it. By the time I checked out I just wanted to be OUT.
Headed out to my favourite event, the Iron Brain competition. Read appalling texts out loud, accompanied by suitable actions. Some of the fanfic on offer lacked opportunities for gesturing, but from somewhere in the depths of my subconscious I pulled out a horrible whiny teenager voice, complete with upward inflection *cringe*. Alas I was to come a gallant second, but did better than last year because I sensibly avoided the twin poisons on offer of caffeine and alcohol. One day I may reclaim my crown!
Had planned to go on to a panel about writing realism in science fiction but ended up having a lovely long chat with redbraids in her room, which was one of the highlights of the whole event. Discovered though that redbraids' perishables had suffered the same fate as mine, but at greater cost to her :-(
So Friday was definitely the most action-packed of the con, with a slow start but a really amazing afternoon and evening as I got used to the idea of being around people.
Some time that night as I was settling in with my pre-sleep ritual of sudoku, some lucky people nearby had noisy sex. My reactions to that were complex, but not generally happy.
Saturday
Saturday started with the setup of the Art Show in the first floor foyer. Things seemed very calm and well organised, and I hung my Pretty Rock pictures in a good spot, with only the usual faffing about trying to get them level. Velcro has some disadvantages, but otherwise did the job. It was quite a squeeze in the art show area, with some dealer's tables out as well. I generally approve of mixing the two to encourage more passing trade, but it was a shame there wasn't more space. I like to hang around the dealers and art show areas to chat to publishers, booksellers, artists, and just plain folks, but without somewhere to sit I couldn't do this very effectively. Still, had some nice chats with dealers, bought some books I'd planned to get, and picked up a discounted copy of a self-published work by an author I'd met the previous year who happened to have a table next to my artwork. See? Networking.
There was less on the program to interest me on Saturday, but I was happy to have an opportunity to save spoons for the Masquerade that night. Did attend a cracker of a panel on Redesigning Super Heroes, with comic artist/writer GoH Gail Simone playing the part of evil and arbitrary editor with local artists Nancy and Emily doing the very impressive drawing to spec. It was nice to be in the same room as such perfect fangirl squee, and that was definitely one of the best moments of the con for me :-)
A moment of thanks here for the LiveCon app which put the con program on my trusty smartphone. It's a great reminder of what I did actually get to, and a very handy way of shortlisting program items and juggling conflicting schedules. While on phone love I felt inspired to track and download my first ever non-factory ringtone - a 56K modem handshake.
That ended up being the only panel I actually attended that day, with much of the day spent in a state of collapse in my room until it was time to get ready for the Masquerade.
Since I had art show entries I hadn't spent time on a costume for 2013 (and my hands don't let me sew much any more), but fortunately the theme of the night was Remix, so I was able to recycle some parts of here-is-one-I-prepared-earlier costumes. I'd grabbed an armful of likely candidates at literally the last minute of packing so had to pick and choose the actual combination on the night. I had a rough idea of Cyber Hippy (and ensured I could at least cover my nakedness - the first test of any costume), but unfortunately some of the Cyber bits would have drawn blood so I leaned more towards the Hippy.
The Masquerade is a strange kind of event, with the awkward promenading phase in the foyer where you see and be seen. I'm not really into extended versions of either of these activities. Then it's off to inspect the dance floor and the Masquerade room setup, and, well, here we are. Husband had come along for the night as he usually does, and paid for his $20 ticket which we wrote off as a donation, for he couldn't really be said to have got his money's worth. It was lovely to have him there though.
Managed a few shouted chats, many about corsetry. Found out who had sex the night before near my room. Tried but failed to chair or stick boogie to any of the music. Gave up before the announcements, but was pleased to find out later that the Steampunk Borg had won.
Saturday night is party night, and I was a little concerned to discover that a room party was scheduled to happen right next door, but it was very civilised and eventually found a new home, so noise wasn't a problem. Actually, lack of noise was almost a problem by this point, as I was starting to feel very frustrated at not being able to talk with people. I poked my nose into the party next door before it shifted, but it was completely packed with no chance of getting comfortable for a chat, and I was just too exhausted to wander out and find a conversation to join. Most of the people I'd normally converse with online were offline, physically close, but frustratingly unreachable.
Sunday
During the day on Sunday I only managed to go to one panel about Geeky music. Most of it was beyond me as I don't play video games or watch anime, but it was a fun enough way to spend an hour, although a trifle creepy when the whole room knew all the lyrics and sang along.
Much crashing in room. I'd marked many panels I would have been happy to attend if I could on both Saturday and Sunday, but just didn't have the spoons for them. The hotel chairs are excruciatingly uncomfortable for me, and though I brought along a towel to act as padding, just sitting causes me pain and is stupidly tiring.
Went to the Swancon 2014 Conjuration launch in the evening, which was the usual delayed crush. Lots of singing and theatrics in this one, but the highlight for me is always the reveal of the guests. With a heavy female/fantasy/magic themed set of Isobel Carmody, Ann Bishop, and Tamora Pierce I don't think I've read a word by any of them, but that's never a critical element of a con for me. Looks like a fun light-hearted event, but with the return of some of the more literary and academic elements not featured this year.
After dinner I went along to the Awards Ceremony where Pretty Rock pictures had been nominated for a Best Artist Tin Duck, which was won by the undeniably spectacular Stargate. No surprises there, although until I knew what the competition was like I really thought I'd had a chance this year. As usual I really enjoyed the awards for the quiet behind-the-scenes folk, who are also more likely to cry or turn interesting colours. Super glad to see Fe recognised for her work with the family program, but found the room very dusty during the presentation.
Was well and truly shattered by now, and retreated to my room to crash. Felt terribly disappointed that I'd not managed to win the Tin Duck this year, and found it difficult to take solace from the nomination. It's really not hard to get on the Tin Duck ballot, so the whole "it's an honour to be nominated" thing really didn't feel like much in the way of compensation. Let's be frank - I put myself there. I'd also just read one of the written works nominated for an award and it was astoundingly bad, so I didn't feel I was in particularly good company.
I had nothing left and my internal editor had fled so I tired-tweeted that I was sad I hadn't won, and really, that was not good form. I also blatantly begged for reassurance, like fishing for compliments with dynamite. No subtlety there at all, and normally I'd just go with that but oh I don't know. It seemed All Wrong and I was Bad.
Sunday night was miserable. I couldn't sleep, felt lonely as all hell, and the hotel room felt like a prison cell. If I'd been planning to catch a taxi home anyway I would have checked out at 4am, but I'd arranged a Cunning Plan with Husband the night before to juggle checkout times and seeing the much-anticipated panel Dangerous Things in Australia That Can Kill You (or words to that effect). But by the time dawn rolled around I had to get out, so bailed as soon as Husband could get there to rescue me.
I'd even failed to stick my nose in the gaming room at all, and I usually try to at least watch some game play and catch up with gamer folk. Failed again :-(
So a bit of a sad and disappointing end to my favourite annual event. The Ibis Styles doesn't really suit me, but I made a fundamental mistake in not trying to camp myself in the front cafe area where I would have had a better chance to talk to people. I was stuck in the Ibis-foyer-noisy-no-talky-plus-uncomfortable rut and failed to break out. I'm not overjoyed that we're back there next year (but absolutely understand why), but I'll make a better effort next time. Maybe I'll cough up for an extra night's accommodation so I can have crash space on Monday too. I miss the closing ceremonies.
But Friday was awesome! Yay Friday!
Membership for 2014 already purchased :-)