Right, so WisCon is less of a sprint and more of a marathon as it starts Thursday in bits and continues to mid-day Monday. I skipped Thursday’s meet-n-greet and didn’t actually head up to the convention until Friday night about six, when I went out to dinner. See two posts ago to get a recap from Friday, but I met Eileen Gunn (who was super nice) and Patrick Swenson, editor of Talebones Magazine. I made home around 2:00.
Saturday I slept in a bit and did some things around the house before heading up to WisCon around 1:00. I’m not big on the panels because they’re so hit or miss, and I didn’t do a good enough job researching the readings to know who was reading when. From 1:30 to around 4:30, I hung out at the Prime Books table, talking with people who stopped by. I autographed a few copies of Weird Tales #344, including one for my next door neighbor. The funniest part of the day was when I was introduced to someone and he asked if I had a LiveJournal handle, to which I said yes: burnt_njal. Both Nick Mamatas and Hannah Bowen, who I was sitting with, simultaneously said, “That’s you?” (which is better than, say, “Oh, so you’re that idiot…”) Nick is currently in a low-residency MFA program and Hannah talked about her troubled time in Emerson college’s MFA program, and I got to tell them of the unparalleled delights and blissful nirvana that is my UW-M program…
After that I got a late lunch/early dinner at Nick’s Cafe with Rebecca and Tenea, followed by coffee and a good, long conversation with Tenea. A guy in the coffee shop (who turned out to be an English professor) overheard us, and the three of us started talking about Ursula LeGuin, Sam Delany, and Kelly Link. Only at WisCon. That night was more party suites, and hanging out with Blake Charlton, Rajan Khannan, Erin Cashier, and JJA, and I also got to meet Scott Janssens (who works the slush for Escape Pod) and his lovely partner Deborah Green. I stayed out till 3:30 and was happy to hear WisCon would pick up my cab ride.
By Sunday it’s all becoming a blur. My wife and I went to lunch with Tenea, Rebecca, and Kelly Link, which was wonderful. Kelly’s surrounded by people wanting a piece of her at all of these conventions and it’s ten times worse when she’s a Guest of Honor. But it gave us all a moment to catch up and hear what’s going on in each other’s lives, both in writing and out. And I’m glad Amy finally got to meet these people, since they’ve heard so much about each other.
Sunday afternoon was the Strange Horizons Tea Party where I cornered Alan DeNiro and asked him if he’d be interested in coming to UW-M for a reading and a talk, which he seemed enthusiastic about. I went to dinner with JJA, Erin, Raj, and Stephen Segal and Sean Wallace of Prime Books, and later Blake rejoined us as we crashed on some couches and talked about every sci-fi movie ever made and lots and lots of fiction. Another highlight of the weekend. Sunday night was really very mellow and everyone was beginning to crash. The parties were muted, but happily I was able to finally meet Mary Rickert and talked to both her and Rick Bowes for a nice long time. She was also good enough to introduce me to Chris Barzak, who is super nice, and I got him and Catheryn Valente excited about the prospect of coming to UW-M in the future as well. I was home by 12:30.
Monday, I had a panel at 10:00 on “Teaching SF/F” and I think it went really well. I brought a syllabus for every class I’d taken at UW-Madison as an undergrad and at UW-Milwaukee as a grad student with sf/f content, and I think people really liked looking at it. The discussion went very well (even through the Monday WisCon haze) and I got a chance to talk a little more with Pat Rothfuss, who has a lot of great ideas about teaching at the university level. After that, I said my goodbyes to everyone I could find and was home by 12:30.
If WisCon was twice a year, it would kill me; but I had to get my fill this time around because next year we’re planning to be in Spain over Memorial Day so I’ll miss it. I guess I switch off between WisCon and the Iberian Peninsula. In 2005 it was WisCon, 2006 we were in Portugal, 2007 at WisCon, 2008 we’ll be in Spain. I can live with that schedule.
Current Mood: Still Pooped | 