WisCon38: A Summary
May. 27th, 2014 09:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jhameiaThursday:
- had to catch a 2am shuttle for a 6am flight. Decided that I'm never wearing jeans again for travel because I was so fucking carsick by the time we got to the airport.
- The flight in was otherwise uneventful which, phew.lovepeaceohana got in just fine, as did Roomie #3.
- Ropedlovepeaceohana and phi into dinner at Takara and they indulged me in going to look for a pharmacy so I could buy eyeliner.
- Was late to Nisi's SFRA reading as a result, because I decided I had to buy popcorn. Roomie #3 called me a couple of times because she thought we were at the Concourse, not Inn at the Park, but we got that sorted.
- Went to a piano bar withdmp and her friend.
Friday:
- Woke up at an ungodly hour to attend a paper on steampunk, breakfast at Michaelangelo's, where I discovered their salami and provolone baguette sandwiches are terrific. Was fully prepped to laugh out loud at the presenter for using "superculture" in his abstract but when I asked him to defend it, he very gracefully said, "I can't" and afterwards we had a good discussion.
- I don't remember what happened after that, I probably ran around trying to find Gretchen so I could get a keycard for the Safer Space, but I was late to the panel on feminist utopias, and missed the paper I wanted to see as a result. But it's cool, I ran into Dr. Vint and Dr. Ransom (who I first met at my first ever academic conference, and she remembered me at the Eaton).
- There was lunch with ROomie #3,dmp, her co-worker Marko, an author David, and Jabberwocky agent Lisa. I got a slice of pizza to go. Roomie #3 and I left the others to go eat in the Concourse lobby, where we parked ourselves in front of the elevators waving to people.
- The Gathering was pretty nifty. I got a t-shirt that says "steampunk angel" (hahahah) and a jacket which had previously belonged todmp for my reading that night. But it wasn't that great pickings. I bought some galleys, had my hair braided, and hung out with Emily Jiang, Kat Okopnik and someone else while Emily got her hair braided. John was very nice about it!! He told us about how hair braiding is so gendered, and how he learned it through oral transmission and practice. Then he showed me how to do a chain braid.
- I went shopping with Emily at Ragstock because I was convinced that I could find a thing for the night's reading. It did not happen.
- The first WisCon dinner was the POC Dinner which we were late to and thus there was no food left. I betook myself to the Con Suite for a hot dog. There were a LOT of new faces this year! I wanted to do introductions but everyone else was like "nah, it would take too long" and next year I am going to insist on this point, because I couldn't tell who knew who, who needed a friend, who could've benefitted from being talked to about WisCon a bit more, so on, so forth. But I did get to make my announcement about the Safer Space and whatnot.
- I went to the Safer Space to practice my reading.
- I went to the reading. KJENRKJWEBHHGDFBLWETPIUBWehPSDVNDSGBEPIYREWICANTBELIEVEIOPENEDFORHIROMIGOTOOMGGGGGGGGGGG.
- Hit up the Carl Brandon party for a while and went to bed early because I had a morning panel.
- Met roomie #4, Sheree Renee Thomas, which, SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!
Saturday:
- All four of us roomies went to the farmer's market. I'd never gone this early, and the greatest impression upon my memory of it was the amount of asparagus I saw.
- Got around to my panel on time. I wasn't really prepared because Kat wasn't terribly prepared. I had a lot of things to share but only did maybe a sliver of it. And can I just say that being on a panel about non-Western appropriation and still having to talk about the US was not really my cup of tea. I understand diaspora feels and all, but still, it was super frustrating. There is a difference between appropriation and assimilation. And while the signification of things do transform over time, I HATE having that conversation in front of white people because time and again I've only seen it result in them thinking they have implicit permission to Do The Annoying Thing, followed by Asking Me If It's OK. CAN I ALSO SAY I found it really frustrating that of course the straight American male gets to field a lot of the questions. I get that he's very good at writing 101 things, very good at being visible, but really now.
- We did get a question about Panda Express and I invited the guy to the Safer Space to ask us about it later.
- I went for lunch with Emily, Will Alexander (a white-passing Latino), Keffy and Tempest. We went to Fugu, shared three dishes and got back in time for their 1pm panels. I went to my hotel to nap. Felt awful upon waking up. Got up anyway to go to a panel on Octavia Butler at SFRA.
- The panel on POC in Steampunk, Historical Fiction and Fantasy went well, I think. It was nice to be able to quote Syed Hussein Alatas.
-dmp and I betook ourselves to the Safer Space where we had dinner. It was raucous and fun a lot of people hung out and we ate and it was great. Panda Express Guy came later, too, and Kat and I talked to him about stuff.
- I went to the Chromatic Book Launch which, I was pleased to see people, but was kinda weirded out by the white group in the middle playing their game. Daniel and Bart and Sandy were also hanging out and I was like "wait, where are YOUR books?" but turned out, they had brought ONLY ONE HUNDRED COPIES GOOD GRIEF WHO ONLY BRINGS ONLY A HUNDRED COPIES OF A HIGHLY-PUBLICIZED ANTHOLOGY TO A CON ONE THOUSAND STRONG "but ebooks!" I DONT CARE. So I made Bart announce that and then we all got to applaud Emily andphi for their own books.
- And then I remembered there was supposed to be a POC Speakeasy which was I guess supposed to be in the Safer Space and oooops (seeing as I left food out in case other people wanted to eat). So I went upstairs to check and ther was already a line in front of a Spontaneous Programming Room and housekeeping clearing the Safer Space and Karnythia was all "the place had food all over (well duh), it reeked (pizza smells delicious, do not lie), and it was stuffy because someone had turned the airconditioning off (and that would be me because everybody was complaining about it being FREEZING in there)." So I guess the Speakeasy did not happen in the Safer Space, which is just as well, seeing as there were beds and she wanted dancing anyways. I felt a bit bad about it because Piglet got involved and was apologizing to the staff for the mess, but the more I think about it, the less terrible I feel. I'll clear with the concom exactly what my responsibilities should be for next year.
Sunday:
- I had no panels this day and wasn't feeling up to people, so I spent most of my time in the Safer Space. Went to the Poets of Color reading. Along the way I ran into the mod for my Monday panel and she was also a WisCon newbie so I dragged her along. The reading was terrific!
- There were FIVE panels in the 2.30 slot I really wanted to go to, but I ended up at the Not Another Race Panel. Which, my God, at one point I literally had to slump to the floor laughing.
- I went to have coffee with Dr. Vint and my UCR friend, Pelin. I've never coffee'd with Dr. Vint before so that was pretty cool.
- At 5pm, I went to LobbyCon and waited for a sizable number of people to catherd downtown for food. We were 11 strong:phi, lovepeaceohana, troisroyaumes, yeloson, inkstone, Alberto, Emily Jiang, Lisa, Zora and emilytheslayer. We squeezed into a corner together. It was great. At one point I realized that it was a pretty big group of Asians and by no means the only Asians at the con! That felt weird... I'm so used to there being fewer Asians, so it really does feel like we're gaining some critical mass here!
- Went back to the hotel to get prettified for the GOH speeches. Arrived a bit late for Hiromi's, but NK Jemisin's speech was THUNDEROUS.
- I spent most of the rest of the night in the Safer Space, where Sheree came to hang out, and wow we were there for a loooooooong time. I had to tell people that closing hour was 2am. It was intense!!!phi and dmp made plans to join the former in the Governer's Club for breakfast and I don't turn down a free breakfast.
- All four of us walked back together, and packed together. It was nice.
Monday:
- Woke up at 7am, got to the Concourse by 7.30am as planned, but alasphi could not join us, so Diana and I went to breakfast at the Dayton Grill instead, with someone from the local steampunk community (who said something odd about the all-WOC panels being "segregated" because, well, if it is a panel about WOC issues, it's pretty natural to have an all-WOC panel to me).
- "Worlds Beyond Whiteness" also went fairly well, I thought, even though two of my co-panelists were pretty new at this kind of discourse; I felt the same way a few years ago. I guess "bag of centipedes" is a thing now.
- I went back to the hotel, checked out, paid, grabbed my books to UPS them off.
- Lunch was, uh, I think it was Michaelangelo's. Withcoffeeandink!
- Got back to find Emily at the tail end of the SignOut.
- LobbyConned it, with much gossip, until it was time to catch the shuttle withlovepeaceohana.
- Met another UCR friend's dad in the shuttle, lol. I missed his panel and didn't see him around all weekend so that was ticklish.
- Flight was delayed, because United. Got re-routed thru Denver.
- Prime Time had no shuttles for me when I got home so I had to take a Super Shuttle. Got home around 2am.
Now I am nursing a sore throat (one of those IT FEELS VERY DRY AND I AM CONSTANTLY THIRSTY) today, SIGH.
Overall good:
- More new POC!! Yay! Got to meetyeloson, YAY!!
- The Safer Space was, for its room change, an unmitigated success. Lots of people used it, one side was packed full a lot of times but not on the other for quieter convos, which was great. I think we don't need catering at all in there; we just need a coffee pot, a couple of kettles and a microwave. I'll be coordinating with Victor Raymond next year on what to do, and LaShawn has offered to help too. They're Madison local, so I might grab them for a grocery run (I don't really like the Maruchan noodles available in the Con Suite).
- I feel that there was significant less fail this year for my panels than there have been in previous years. Then again, I didn't attend a lot of panels.
- Food! I made time for food and this was good. Meals with good friends are so important.
Overall bad:
- Jim Frenkel. What the shit?
- Bergmann. What the shit?
- All that fucking cold water. We only had two pots of hot water at any one time in the Safer Space, but like EIGHT pots of ICE water. There's already ice water in the coolers. I hate drinking ice water because it will eventually give me a sore throat, AND it's very jarring to my system. IDK what to do about this though, besides carry around a water bottle, and my bottles are prone to getting lost.
Also, my fern almost died because I forgot to water it right before I left D: It has one of those pots which collects water at the bottom, and so it can go a few days at a time without being watered, but still.
ANYWAY I MISS YOU ALL ALREADY!!!!!!!!!!
- had to catch a 2am shuttle for a 6am flight. Decided that I'm never wearing jeans again for travel because I was so fucking carsick by the time we got to the airport.
- The flight in was otherwise uneventful which, phew.
lovepeaceohana got in just fine, as did Roomie #3.- Roped
lovepeaceohana and phi into dinner at Takara and they indulged me in going to look for a pharmacy so I could buy eyeliner. - Was late to Nisi's SFRA reading as a result, because I decided I had to buy popcorn. Roomie #3 called me a couple of times because she thought we were at the Concourse, not Inn at the Park, but we got that sorted.
- Went to a piano bar with
dmp and her friend. Friday:
- Woke up at an ungodly hour to attend a paper on steampunk, breakfast at Michaelangelo's, where I discovered their salami and provolone baguette sandwiches are terrific. Was fully prepped to laugh out loud at the presenter for using "superculture" in his abstract but when I asked him to defend it, he very gracefully said, "I can't" and afterwards we had a good discussion.
- I don't remember what happened after that, I probably ran around trying to find Gretchen so I could get a keycard for the Safer Space, but I was late to the panel on feminist utopias, and missed the paper I wanted to see as a result. But it's cool, I ran into Dr. Vint and Dr. Ransom (who I first met at my first ever academic conference, and she remembered me at the Eaton).
- There was lunch with ROomie #3,
dmp, her co-worker Marko, an author David, and Jabberwocky agent Lisa. I got a slice of pizza to go. Roomie #3 and I left the others to go eat in the Concourse lobby, where we parked ourselves in front of the elevators waving to people. - The Gathering was pretty nifty. I got a t-shirt that says "steampunk angel" (hahahah) and a jacket which had previously belonged to
dmp for my reading that night. But it wasn't that great pickings. I bought some galleys, had my hair braided, and hung out with Emily Jiang, Kat Okopnik and someone else while Emily got her hair braided. John was very nice about it!! He told us about how hair braiding is so gendered, and how he learned it through oral transmission and practice. Then he showed me how to do a chain braid.- I went shopping with Emily at Ragstock because I was convinced that I could find a thing for the night's reading. It did not happen.
- The first WisCon dinner was the POC Dinner which we were late to and thus there was no food left. I betook myself to the Con Suite for a hot dog. There were a LOT of new faces this year! I wanted to do introductions but everyone else was like "nah, it would take too long" and next year I am going to insist on this point, because I couldn't tell who knew who, who needed a friend, who could've benefitted from being talked to about WisCon a bit more, so on, so forth. But I did get to make my announcement about the Safer Space and whatnot.
- I went to the Safer Space to practice my reading.
- I went to the reading. KJENRKJWEBHHGDFBLWETPIUBWehPSDVNDSGBEPIYREWICANTBELIEVEIOPENEDFORHIROMIGOTOOMGGGGGGGGGGG.
- Hit up the Carl Brandon party for a while and went to bed early because I had a morning panel.
- Met roomie #4, Sheree Renee Thomas, which, SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!
Saturday:
- All four of us roomies went to the farmer's market. I'd never gone this early, and the greatest impression upon my memory of it was the amount of asparagus I saw.
- Got around to my panel on time. I wasn't really prepared because Kat wasn't terribly prepared. I had a lot of things to share but only did maybe a sliver of it. And can I just say that being on a panel about non-Western appropriation and still having to talk about the US was not really my cup of tea. I understand diaspora feels and all, but still, it was super frustrating. There is a difference between appropriation and assimilation. And while the signification of things do transform over time, I HATE having that conversation in front of white people because time and again I've only seen it result in them thinking they have implicit permission to Do The Annoying Thing, followed by Asking Me If It's OK. CAN I ALSO SAY I found it really frustrating that of course the straight American male gets to field a lot of the questions. I get that he's very good at writing 101 things, very good at being visible, but really now.
- We did get a question about Panda Express and I invited the guy to the Safer Space to ask us about it later.
- I went for lunch with Emily, Will Alexander (a white-passing Latino), Keffy and Tempest. We went to Fugu, shared three dishes and got back in time for their 1pm panels. I went to my hotel to nap. Felt awful upon waking up. Got up anyway to go to a panel on Octavia Butler at SFRA.
- The panel on POC in Steampunk, Historical Fiction and Fantasy went well, I think. It was nice to be able to quote Syed Hussein Alatas.
-
dmp and I betook ourselves to the Safer Space where we had dinner. It was raucous and fun a lot of people hung out and we ate and it was great. Panda Express Guy came later, too, and Kat and I talked to him about stuff. - I went to the Chromatic Book Launch which, I was pleased to see people, but was kinda weirded out by the white group in the middle playing their game. Daniel and Bart and Sandy were also hanging out and I was like "wait, where are YOUR books?" but turned out, they had brought ONLY ONE HUNDRED COPIES GOOD GRIEF WHO ONLY BRINGS ONLY A HUNDRED COPIES OF A HIGHLY-PUBLICIZED ANTHOLOGY TO A CON ONE THOUSAND STRONG "but ebooks!" I DONT CARE. So I made Bart announce that and then we all got to applaud Emily and
phi for their own books. - And then I remembered there was supposed to be a POC Speakeasy which was I guess supposed to be in the Safer Space and oooops (seeing as I left food out in case other people wanted to eat). So I went upstairs to check and ther was already a line in front of a Spontaneous Programming Room and housekeeping clearing the Safer Space and Karnythia was all "the place had food all over (well duh), it reeked (pizza smells delicious, do not lie), and it was stuffy because someone had turned the airconditioning off (and that would be me because everybody was complaining about it being FREEZING in there)." So I guess the Speakeasy did not happen in the Safer Space, which is just as well, seeing as there were beds and she wanted dancing anyways. I felt a bit bad about it because Piglet got involved and was apologizing to the staff for the mess, but the more I think about it, the less terrible I feel. I'll clear with the concom exactly what my responsibilities should be for next year.
Sunday:
- I had no panels this day and wasn't feeling up to people, so I spent most of my time in the Safer Space. Went to the Poets of Color reading. Along the way I ran into the mod for my Monday panel and she was also a WisCon newbie so I dragged her along. The reading was terrific!
- There were FIVE panels in the 2.30 slot I really wanted to go to, but I ended up at the Not Another Race Panel. Which, my God, at one point I literally had to slump to the floor laughing.
- I went to have coffee with Dr. Vint and my UCR friend, Pelin. I've never coffee'd with Dr. Vint before so that was pretty cool.
- At 5pm, I went to LobbyCon and waited for a sizable number of people to catherd downtown for food. We were 11 strong:
phi, lovepeaceohana, troisroyaumes, yeloson, inkstone, Alberto, Emily Jiang, Lisa, Zora and emilytheslayer. We squeezed into a corner together. It was great. At one point I realized that it was a pretty big group of Asians and by no means the only Asians at the con! That felt weird... I'm so used to there being fewer Asians, so it really does feel like we're gaining some critical mass here!- Went back to the hotel to get prettified for the GOH speeches. Arrived a bit late for Hiromi's, but NK Jemisin's speech was THUNDEROUS.
- I spent most of the rest of the night in the Safer Space, where Sheree came to hang out, and wow we were there for a loooooooong time. I had to tell people that closing hour was 2am. It was intense!!!
phi and dmp made plans to join the former in the Governer's Club for breakfast and I don't turn down a free breakfast.- All four of us walked back together, and packed together. It was nice.
Monday:
- Woke up at 7am, got to the Concourse by 7.30am as planned, but alas
phi could not join us, so Diana and I went to breakfast at the Dayton Grill instead, with someone from the local steampunk community (who said something odd about the all-WOC panels being "segregated" because, well, if it is a panel about WOC issues, it's pretty natural to have an all-WOC panel to me). - "Worlds Beyond Whiteness" also went fairly well, I thought, even though two of my co-panelists were pretty new at this kind of discourse; I felt the same way a few years ago. I guess "bag of centipedes" is a thing now.
- I went back to the hotel, checked out, paid, grabbed my books to UPS them off.
- Lunch was, uh, I think it was Michaelangelo's. With
coffeeandink! - Got back to find Emily at the tail end of the SignOut.
- LobbyConned it, with much gossip, until it was time to catch the shuttle with
lovepeaceohana. - Met another UCR friend's dad in the shuttle, lol. I missed his panel and didn't see him around all weekend so that was ticklish.
- Flight was delayed, because United. Got re-routed thru Denver.
- Prime Time had no shuttles for me when I got home so I had to take a Super Shuttle. Got home around 2am.
Now I am nursing a sore throat (one of those IT FEELS VERY DRY AND I AM CONSTANTLY THIRSTY) today, SIGH.
Overall good:
- More new POC!! Yay! Got to meet
yeloson, YAY!!- The Safer Space was, for its room change, an unmitigated success. Lots of people used it, one side was packed full a lot of times but not on the other for quieter convos, which was great. I think we don't need catering at all in there; we just need a coffee pot, a couple of kettles and a microwave. I'll be coordinating with Victor Raymond next year on what to do, and LaShawn has offered to help too. They're Madison local, so I might grab them for a grocery run (I don't really like the Maruchan noodles available in the Con Suite).
- I feel that there was significant less fail this year for my panels than there have been in previous years. Then again, I didn't attend a lot of panels.
- Food! I made time for food and this was good. Meals with good friends are so important.
Overall bad:
- Jim Frenkel. What the shit?
- Bergmann. What the shit?
- All that fucking cold water. We only had two pots of hot water at any one time in the Safer Space, but like EIGHT pots of ICE water. There's already ice water in the coolers. I hate drinking ice water because it will eventually give me a sore throat, AND it's very jarring to my system. IDK what to do about this though, besides carry around a water bottle, and my bottles are prone to getting lost.
Also, my fern almost died because I forgot to water it right before I left D: It has one of those pots which collects water at the bottom, and so it can go a few days at a time without being watered, but still.
ANYWAY I MISS YOU ALL ALREADY!!!!!!!!!!