WisCon 29, Day One

This morning I was clever enough to check the programming schedule for WisCon to see that the con didn't really open until around 1 pm, and there wasn't a whole lot going on until 5 pm. So I split the difference and decided to go over around 3 pm, and hang out in the Gathering room, which as you might imagine is basically a big ol' room with tables and chairs for people to hang around and catch up with each other before the con.

The hotel supplied coffee and some munchies. The coffee came with those yummy flavored creamer packs. Mmmm, flavored coffee...

I haven't talked much about WisCon in a while, so for the benefit of my readers who aren't con-going fans: It bills itself as "the world's leading feminist science fiction convention" (I think a couple more have popped up in recent years; it used to be the "world's only..."), and as you can guess there have been 29 of them, held annually. I don't have a whole lot of interest in the feminist content; I'm mainly there for the company and for the science fiction content. I catch up with old friends, and attend panels on science fictional ideas, novels, writing, and publishing. WisCon, fortunately, is noted for its large number of panels - relative to its size - so there's almost always something I want to attend.

WisCon is held in the Concourse Hotel, which is right in downtown. About 10 years ago it moved from being held in Feburary to being held over Memorial Day weekend. This is a great time to hold the convention, since the local university (UW-Madison) has let out for the summer, temperatures are moderate, and the humidity and mosquitos haven't arrived. The hotel is sort of entering middle age, but it's still a good venue and it's been getting upgraded in recent years, it seems (new elevators, for instance). And there're lots of local restaurants for meal outings.

So that's WisCon generally.

I bumped into a few folks I know - Jeanne and Scott - right off the bat when I registered. (I'm mostly omitting last names unless I know they have a Web presence. Readers who know these folks will know who I mean.) At the Gathering I was corralled quickly by Tracy, who is a former cow-orker of mine. So I mostly spent the Gathering time catching up with her and saying hi to a few others who walked by. And going through the program book and picking out what I wanted to see.

At some point I ran into Cliff, who is also a WisCon regular, and I went to dinner with him, a couple of his friends, and a couple of their friends. We went to a pretty good Nepali restaurant (although it was pretty darned expensive for Madison). On the way there we noticed a rainbow over the state capitol building, which looked like this:

On this walk I came to see just how much Madison really has changed: Two of my favorite used bookstores have gone out of business. The best art supply store in town appears to be long gone. The Civic Center has been torn apart and is being replaced by a controversial auditorium called the Overture Center. It's really rather eerie. I guess I've been gone from the Boston area long enough to have mostly made my peace with the changes to my hometown there, but six years after leaving Wisconsin I'm only now seeing just how much the city is evolving.

After we got back we went to opening ceremonies. WisCon traditionally features some early official business followed by a skit, sketch or other fannish comedy piece. This year a group of fans put on "How To Succeed in Fandom (Without Really Trying)", which was pretty funny. The "fannish inquisition" joke got a big laugh, whether or not it was obvious. As you might guess, it's about a young neo-fan rising through the ranks of WisCon. ("Rising through the ranks of WisCon" is itself a rather hilarious notion.) A good time was had by all.

I don't clearly remember what I did during the evening. Not due to too much alcohol (I didn't drink at all), I think I just went to a few parties and to the con suite and chatted with some friends. (Admittedly I'm writing these entries after the con has ended, so it's been a few days.) I set up some tentative plans for the rest of the con, and headed home to go to bed before it got too late.

Which would have worked, too, if I hadn't spent an hour playing Katamari Damacy with Charlie when I got back...

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