Worldcon is over. Alas. Part I: Saturday.
Sep. 7th, 2004 04:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
xiphiasI had a fantastic time, as might be expected, it being a Worldcon and all.
Let's see. . . where to start? Well, I posted about stuff through Friday night, so I guess I'll start at Saturday. We got to the con around 10ish or so, and there were lots of panels I'd wanted to see. There was a panel of the physics of ground transportation for use in science fiction, one on how to build a space elevator, one on science fiction from the third world. The Higgins Armory Sword Guild was doing demos from 10 until 12:30, but I see those every con I go to, so I figured I could skip them this time.
Well, maybe I'd just stick my head in for five minutes, maybe. Just to see if they were doing anything different. And then I'd go to the other panels.
Maybe fifteen minutes.
Well, at 11, I wanted to go to a panel on Really Alien Languages, or maybe one on "Fantasy of Manners", which had lots of good people on it, or maybe something on . . . oooh -- more pointy swords.
Anyway, I'd missed the Medieval Dagger demonstration, and came in during Renaissance Rapier and Dagger. They did their Medieval Combat demonstration, which includes a recap of dagger, then falchion (which was new), halberd (which they've now started demonstrating mass formation tactics with -- that's cool), and sword and buckler. From then, they went into a new demonstration, called "Swordplay through the Ages", which came off of the sword and buckler, went into longsword, then rapier and dagger (from a different manual than the first one, so you could see different styles), smallsword (which really starts looking a lot like modern sport fencing), and then cavalry saber of the American Civil War period, which is about as late as swords were really ever used on the battlefield. They finished off with a demonstration of armored combat. That took me up to 12:30.
Lis and I hung out for about an hour or so, and I don't remember exactly what we were doing -- probably dealer room, or hanging out in the ConCourse, or con suite, or maybe getting lunch. Don't quite remember precisely what. At 1:30, I went to Jordin T. Kare's "Fifty Ways to Leave the Planet."
Which was a half-hour panel. Apparently, this is a condensed form of a demonstration he does other places, which normally takes two hours. As it is, he only got through thirty methods of leaving the gravity well, but that's not too shabby for thirty minutes.
At 2, I went to a panel called "If Rome Never Fell...", which was interesting, but, unlike Lis, I don't take notes at panels, so I am unfortunately not able to remember WHY it was interesting, or what interesting things were said. Perhaps I should start taking nots at panels.
At three, I went to a panel which I loved. It was the "Alternate History Challenge Match".
Members of the audience would call out a possible alternate history. Toni Weisskopf would chose one, or more, of the suggestions, and then Michael Dobson, Mitchell Freedman, Evelyn Leeper, and S.M. Stirling had to come up with as-plausable-as-they-could-get scenarios that would lead to that alternate present. They started out trying to explain why "Uganda rules the world", (it was decided that any explanation which started with "time-travelling South Africans" was cheating), went on to explain why "Only women have the vote and then only if they passed calculus" (this started out with "Joan of Arc is not executed. Instead, she starts a military order, open to women. But, since women tend to have less upper body strength, this military order quickly becomes the first to adopt new technologies, and they become known for their artilery, so everyone in the order is required to know ballistics. . . ")
It wasn't hard for S. M. Stirling to explain why "the great freedom-loving democracies of the Middle East are under attack by fundamentalists based in the United States" ("After the Baha'u'lah realized that his pacifist methods were very slow, and his followers used the sword to force peace and equality on the Middle East. . . "). But the absolute best one was the explanation of why "Trade and travel are paralyzed as hundreds of millions of people around the world await the Second Coming of the Great Pumpkin."
The best answer for that one. . . "Seneca the Younger wrote a brilliant satire on the deification of Emperor Claudius, which he called the 'Pumpkinization'. This was so well written and recieved that, after only a few decades, it began to be taken seriously, taking gourds as a fertility symbol, and worshipping Claudius as 'The Great Pumpkin'. . . "
At 4:30, we went to a panel on "Elizabethan English as a Second Language", giving a brief overview of period grammar and pronounciation. At 5, Lis went to a meeting of the Secret Librarians of Fandom, which I didn't go to, not being a librarian. Turns out I could have, but I went to see what people were doing in the game rooms, instead.
The Hugo awards were at 8, and, instead of going to try to fit in the hall, we went to the Mended Drum (a spot they'd set up with beer and a stage and a Big-Ole-Projection Screen, to watch it there, which was cool. We only really watched Neil Gaiman's opening speech, and then headed out party hopping.
Umm. . . I don't remember everything else all that clearly. I'd made a decision to attempt to drink my way through a number of the parties on Saturday night. I started off with a Pan-Galactic Gargle Blaster, which was blue and smoked.
As far as I can tell, the ingredients were dry ice, Everclear, Windex, and Lemon Pledge. I only had one. And I couldn't feel my lips afterwards.
I followed that up with two shots of single malt scotch, two different scotches. We then went to another party, where I had some wine, and a third, where I had some punch which involved vodka, beer, and frozen lemonade concentrate. And then, at another party, I had a gin and tonic.
We stopped into Arisia 2004.5, which was a party thrown by Arisia, which was a one-room mini-Arisia. It was incredibly cool. And we ran into Dr. "Respectful of Otters" Rivka.
And then we went home.
Let's see. . . where to start? Well, I posted about stuff through Friday night, so I guess I'll start at Saturday. We got to the con around 10ish or so, and there were lots of panels I'd wanted to see. There was a panel of the physics of ground transportation for use in science fiction, one on how to build a space elevator, one on science fiction from the third world. The Higgins Armory Sword Guild was doing demos from 10 until 12:30, but I see those every con I go to, so I figured I could skip them this time.
Well, maybe I'd just stick my head in for five minutes, maybe. Just to see if they were doing anything different. And then I'd go to the other panels.
Maybe fifteen minutes.
Well, at 11, I wanted to go to a panel on Really Alien Languages, or maybe one on "Fantasy of Manners", which had lots of good people on it, or maybe something on . . . oooh -- more pointy swords.
Anyway, I'd missed the Medieval Dagger demonstration, and came in during Renaissance Rapier and Dagger. They did their Medieval Combat demonstration, which includes a recap of dagger, then falchion (which was new), halberd (which they've now started demonstrating mass formation tactics with -- that's cool), and sword and buckler. From then, they went into a new demonstration, called "Swordplay through the Ages", which came off of the sword and buckler, went into longsword, then rapier and dagger (from a different manual than the first one, so you could see different styles), smallsword (which really starts looking a lot like modern sport fencing), and then cavalry saber of the American Civil War period, which is about as late as swords were really ever used on the battlefield. They finished off with a demonstration of armored combat. That took me up to 12:30.
Lis and I hung out for about an hour or so, and I don't remember exactly what we were doing -- probably dealer room, or hanging out in the ConCourse, or con suite, or maybe getting lunch. Don't quite remember precisely what. At 1:30, I went to Jordin T. Kare's "Fifty Ways to Leave the Planet."
Which was a half-hour panel. Apparently, this is a condensed form of a demonstration he does other places, which normally takes two hours. As it is, he only got through thirty methods of leaving the gravity well, but that's not too shabby for thirty minutes.
At 2, I went to a panel called "If Rome Never Fell...", which was interesting, but, unlike Lis, I don't take notes at panels, so I am unfortunately not able to remember WHY it was interesting, or what interesting things were said. Perhaps I should start taking nots at panels.
At three, I went to a panel which I loved. It was the "Alternate History Challenge Match".
Members of the audience would call out a possible alternate history. Toni Weisskopf would chose one, or more, of the suggestions, and then Michael Dobson, Mitchell Freedman, Evelyn Leeper, and S.M. Stirling had to come up with as-plausable-as-they-could-get scenarios that would lead to that alternate present. They started out trying to explain why "Uganda rules the world", (it was decided that any explanation which started with "time-travelling South Africans" was cheating), went on to explain why "Only women have the vote and then only if they passed calculus" (this started out with "Joan of Arc is not executed. Instead, she starts a military order, open to women. But, since women tend to have less upper body strength, this military order quickly becomes the first to adopt new technologies, and they become known for their artilery, so everyone in the order is required to know ballistics. . . ")
It wasn't hard for S. M. Stirling to explain why "the great freedom-loving democracies of the Middle East are under attack by fundamentalists based in the United States" ("After the Baha'u'lah realized that his pacifist methods were very slow, and his followers used the sword to force peace and equality on the Middle East. . . "). But the absolute best one was the explanation of why "Trade and travel are paralyzed as hundreds of millions of people around the world await the Second Coming of the Great Pumpkin."
The best answer for that one. . . "Seneca the Younger wrote a brilliant satire on the deification of Emperor Claudius, which he called the 'Pumpkinization'. This was so well written and recieved that, after only a few decades, it began to be taken seriously, taking gourds as a fertility symbol, and worshipping Claudius as 'The Great Pumpkin'. . . "
At 4:30, we went to a panel on "Elizabethan English as a Second Language", giving a brief overview of period grammar and pronounciation. At 5, Lis went to a meeting of the Secret Librarians of Fandom, which I didn't go to, not being a librarian. Turns out I could have, but I went to see what people were doing in the game rooms, instead.
The Hugo awards were at 8, and, instead of going to try to fit in the hall, we went to the Mended Drum (a spot they'd set up with beer and a stage and a Big-Ole-Projection Screen, to watch it there, which was cool. We only really watched Neil Gaiman's opening speech, and then headed out party hopping.
Umm. . . I don't remember everything else all that clearly. I'd made a decision to attempt to drink my way through a number of the parties on Saturday night. I started off with a Pan-Galactic Gargle Blaster, which was blue and smoked.
As far as I can tell, the ingredients were dry ice, Everclear, Windex, and Lemon Pledge. I only had one. And I couldn't feel my lips afterwards.
I followed that up with two shots of single malt scotch, two different scotches. We then went to another party, where I had some wine, and a third, where I had some punch which involved vodka, beer, and frozen lemonade concentrate. And then, at another party, I had a gin and tonic.
We stopped into Arisia 2004.5, which was a party thrown by Arisia, which was a one-room mini-Arisia. It was incredibly cool. And we ran into Dr. "Respectful of Otters" Rivka.
And then we went home.