Con-Cept: Still Going Strong
I was at the Con-Cept convention in Montréal from Friday till Sunday and it was still pretty good, though it had its flaws.
The biggest irritation, as I mentioned earlier, had to do with the lack of a Con Suite. The Con Suite itself has been an issue in the past; the con claimed to have it open “24 hours”, but I went by it late on Friday evening (last year) and found it closed. This year, it was entirely missing; the new hotel management, which had changed the hotel’s name to L’Hotel Espresso, had apparently forbidden the sale of any food (even snack food) in the hotel other than its own (highly over-priced) restaurant stuff and that apparently was enough to make it vanish. Worse, the Program Book still referred to the Con Suite’s existence, so I deduce it was a last-minute change that had not been applied or documented in time. Oooops.
Other than that, the con itself went pretty well. [According to at least one rumor I heard, there actually was more attendance this year than last, though last year probably was a low point for most cons due to the ongoing damnable economic mess.] For once, filking was recognized by the con and we filkers had a related Guest: Denise Gendron from Massachusetts. She was delightful and very musical; she is also the first filker I have encountered (since pondside in Victoria, BC) to have brought a cello to an SF convention and played it at her performances. At a “Making Music” workshop on Saturday, she even let us play the cello briefly so as to hear how it sounded. There is no question; she was and is decidedly awesome. :-)
I also enjoyed the discussion panels, ranging from the usual doom-and-gloom about the near future to a “con-runners” panel which gave us some hints about running the revived Can-Con convention here in Ottawa in future years. The Dealers’ Room was small but busy, though there was no way I could afford either the cost or the storage space to buy any of the toys and other stuff on sale. [Being a Pack Rat is a very expensive occupation. :-)]
I wound up missing the Masquerade, but donnav went in my stead and took some pictures. Thanks, donnav, for helping me out on that. I would have liked to take a peek through the telescopes set up outside, but I had to go 2-3 blocks every so often to get food and that took a few chunks out of my day. [A dinner buffet at what price?!?! Good grief, no. I hope this con considers taking its business to another hotel next year.]
Only three room parties apparently occurred on Saturday night; popelaksmi and I threw one of them, announcing that Can-Con will be back for Sep. 2011. The party ran on till after midnight, but there was no filk session in the wee hours, so some of us managed to get some sleep. :-) Despite optimism, we still wound up with leftover food, some of which I got to take home. Many thanks.
What do others think? As always, this inquiring well-perched philosopher would like to know.