Eastercon! (Part I)

[vyvyanx]

So, we're back, several hundred pounds poorer, well-fed, well-tanked-up, slightly sleep-deprived, and with quantities of extra paperbacks and a purple beeblebear.
Horribly early on Thursday morning, dragged G out of bed and we went off to the coach stop to catch the Jetlink bus to Gatwick. I dozed all the way there, only waking up at the airport stops when the door opened and freezing air rushed in. Got to Gatwick, checked in without trouble, found smoking zone so G could relieve his craving after 4 hours of deprivation :-), found a McDonalds and got a bite to eat. (Surprisingly nice breakfast stuff they do, actually.) Went through security, boarded plane etc. Flight was short and uneventful. We arrived in Jersey airport in beautiful weather, and caught a bus to St Helier.
Oh, a piece of remarkable good luck. On the plane, I had realised that I'd left my better glasses in Cambridge, which was annoying, since there's various events at Eastercon for which it helps to see properly. So I decided to go that afternoon to a Vision Express in St Helier and get my eyes checked (for first time in a decade) and get New Improved Glasses (with nicer frames, since G's always complaining he dislikes my glasses frames). On arriving in the airport, was presented with a very useful little booklet on What's On in Jersey, which contained a special offer pertaining to Vision Express in St Helier: 10% off everything; £20 off new frames! And included maps of Jersey and St Helier, indicating how to get to Vision Express. In the afternoon, found the shop, went in and asked if they had any slots free that day. The woman said they were all booked up, but the person due to come in 10 minutes earlier still hadn't turned up, so she'd fit me in straight away instead!
All in all, I think Fate was conspiring to get me new glasses :-) So anyway, the first thing we did on arriving in St Helier was go and find the B&B - Surrey Lodge, not far from the con hotel. V. nice room (double bed! yay!). G felt very dishevelled, so went for a shower and smartened himself up a bit. We had planned to have a bit of a nap, but decided to have sex instead and then went out to the opticians. There, I had a series of unpleasant tests, including a hardcore eye-pressure check which required my eyeballs to be anaesthetised while a horrid instrument pressed the surface of the eyeball. Ick! My eyeliner ran all down my cheeks; it was very disagreeable. But necessary, I dare say. Also had long and detailed check for retinal tears, which are more likely to occur if you're as short-sighted as I am. Got new prescription, and went down to pick new frames. I drove G and two shop assistants mad by spending about an hour trying on dozens of different frames.
The assistants kept suggesting really expensive designer frames, or weird coloured frames, and I kept prevaricating and being difficult. In the end I abandoned the women's frames section and picked a pair from the men's section, which I'm now very happy with.
Then, G was gasping for a drink and something to eat, so we found a nice restaurant called the Lido and had food there while my glasses were being made up. The restaurant had noticeable French influence, we thought. Jersey generally seems to be a curious mixture of British and French features, though rather more British than French. There are also remarkable numbers of Scots there; we weren't entirely sure why.
Got new glasses and wandered around for a while in awe at the unnatural clarity of reality. It seems somehow wrong to be able to read a small sign on the wall twenty metres away! Then headed off up St Saviour's Road to find the Hotel de France, where the con was to take place. It's up a pretty long steep drive, but the hotel itself is lovely. In the lobby, discovered that con registration hadn't opened yet, but would do shortly. So headed upstairs to the con bar, which was already serving real ale at con prices (£2 a pint; not bad; unfortunately no cider so drank Director's all weekend). In bar, IWJ, C and OSD appeared briefly; we said hi, but they scarpered almost immediately. Unperturbed, we sat down, and very soon, people I know from other cons turned up and joined us - Tim Morley, GT and John Meredith. We saw a great deal of all three of them throughout the weekend (mostly in the bar). Caught up for a bit, and then heard that registration was open, so hurried off to register.
Glanced through the programme for the next day, then chatted for a while to nice guy called Blind Pew with lovely black labrador guide dog. At this point G and I were overcome by sleepiness and headed back to the B&B.

Comments

[wechsler.livejournal.com]

Oh, and the "eye pressure" test sounds bizarre to me... they never gave me that one at Vision Express here, for either specs or contacts.

Eye pressure test

[vyvyan.livejournal.com]

Apparently it's not normally done. The usual glaucoma risk test they do is with a machine that puffs air into your eyes. They did that to me first, and noted the pressure was quite high. But that test is not particularly sensitive, so the optician decided to do a further test to measure the pressure more accurately and see whether there was any danger. Having your eyeball anaesthetised is somewhat risky, as it doesn't wear off for a while, and you could damage your eye by rubbing it too hard without noticing, so they don't do the more accurate test as standard.
(Incidentally, my eye pressure is two standard deviations above average, which is borderline between OK and worrying.)

Eugh

[kaet.livejournal.com]

I had one done when I went to the opticians for the first time in a long time, a long time ago. It was boots, I'm pretty sure. Opticians keep on spending a long time uming and ahing over my eyes and usually give me all the tests and then decide that I don't need glasses after all (unless I want). I must be borderline, or something.

And the eye-pressure test is yucky.