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vyvyanxSunday morning I coaxed G to get up in time to get Rex to Beyond Cyberdrome.
This involves watching home-made robots fight each other (or more commonly, wander around aimlessly bumping into each other, or even just sitting motionless in the arena) and is not _not_ Robotwars, since it started two years earlier, at the 1996 Eastercon (my first con, to which I was dragged by the lovely Helen Steele). At the "arena", Rex was handed over to the more animate Sprokkettes, and SMS enlisted G's help as hand-held cameraman for the event, which he seemed to thoroughly enjoy. Some of the robots this year were pretty good - there was a remarkably robust and successful tank built of lego, with a mini tank on board, which could be directed to disembark and follow the main tank around!
During the middle of the day, my memory becomes a little hazy, so I expect it consisted mainly of sitting in the bar. G and I went to eat in the hotel restaurant again, and found ourselves on the adjacent table to IWJ, C and OSD, who studiously ignored us. After that, we headed off to the main auditorium for the Masquerade. Again, SMS got G to film his own entry. The winning entry was "Cthulhu-puss" - a completely hilarious Bagpuss-intro take-off, complete with guitar chords, in which Marcus Streets, fetchingly attired as Emily, presented a lost "thing" (a bunny girl) to her god Cthulhu, who then woke up, sending everyone catatonic... Apparently the costume-makers had been stuffing tentacles for days :-)
After that, hung around in the lobby for a long time. Ran into Jill and Phil, a kinky couple I always see at Eastercons, and know from dodgy newsgroups also. They were accompanied by a cute boy in a collar. A guy called Chris also turned up, and the following few hours were then taken up with Phil and Chris half-jokingly trying to chat me up in front of G, using every dodgy line they could think of. It was most amusing, though eventually G seemed to get a little irritated and they stopped. Later in the evening, G went off to the bar to get some more drinks, and I went up to find him, but was suddenly accosted in the corridor by Mrs Stableford (who I'd met the previous night at the banquet). She said "Come with me!" and grabbed my arm, and began dragging me down the corridor away from the bar. I said, "I was looking for G!" (and indeed, he appeared out of the bar at that moment), but she said, "Never mind your boy, come with me!" and continued to drag me down the corridor. I shot G an alarmed look, and he hurried down the corridor after us. We reached another bar, where she plumped herself down with a group consisting of a dodgy-looking guy called Piers, the alarming Farah, and someone else. G and I sat down as well, rather uneasily. Mrs Stableford began snogging Piers, only breaking off to have a row with Farah about their previous affair, and how Brian felt about it. The row was terminated by Mrs Stableford and Farah getting off together. At this point G and I felt able to make our exit, and returned to the lobby and the comparative safety of Jill, Phil and Chris. I think I will have to get some of Brian Stableford's books now, just so I can tell people that his wife tried to seduce me :-)
We left a bit later, and were amusingly harrassed by a group of local youths who'd just been let out of a nightclub - they shouted "Trenchcoat Mafia! Guns 'n Roses!" and similar edifying things. What amused me was that they found our rather unremarkable coats more noteworthy than the lilac two-headed, three-armed teddybear covered in bondage tape that I was carrying.
So that was Sunday. On Monday, G and I napped for much of the morning, then I went off to the hotel for a panel discussion on Turning Points in History - whether history is mainly made by the actions of significant individuals, or by large-scale economic, political and social trends etc. The panellists were the three Guests of Honour: Brian Stableford, Harry Turtledove and Peter Weston, and also a random kook who the panel coordinator picked up in the Green Room and thought would be a good addition. Harry Turtledove waffled vaguely about nothing much; Peter Weston came across as quite objectionable, even jingoistic in his emphasis on the importance of West European vibrancy and innovation in determining the course of human history; the kook promoted his bizarre theory of the significance of tea-drinking on history; and Brian was reasonable and sensible and erudite, and managed not to be rude to the other participants :-) The panel coordinator also tried to get discussion going of Diamond's ideas in Guns, Germs and Steel, which is a fabulous book that I was almost entirely convinced by.
After that interesting item, there was the Closing Ceremony, which mirrored the opening ceremony in containing a show of stills taken at the con itself. G and I appeared in the background of several of them, but Rex got a picture to himself. Of course, it wasn't all over then - there was still the Dead Dog party to come in the evening. We met up with TM, JM and two other fans whose names I've forgotten, but who were very nice, and arranged to go out to eat that night in St Helier before the party. We went to a wonderful Chinese called Ming's Dynasty. While the others had duck in pancakes, I had vegetarian mock duck in pancakes, which was marvellous (there used to be a Chinese in Cambridge that did this dish - the Shao Tao - but it's unfortunately closed down now). JM is also vegetarian, so we shared main dishes. All very nice and extremely filling! Some of the others got a taxi back to the hotel, but G and I preferred to walk off the dinner a bit.
Hung around in the bar for a while, chatting a little, but was overcome by extreme sleepiness. G, who had got a lot more sleep over the weekend than me, due to not getting up for breakfast, was not sleepy, but eager to stay at the party until the bitter end, chatting to SMS and others. So I left him some money for drinks and came back to Surrey Lodge.
(Will finish off later; need a cup of tea.)
This involves watching home-made robots fight each other (or more commonly, wander around aimlessly bumping into each other, or even just sitting motionless in the arena) and is not _not_ Robotwars, since it started two years earlier, at the 1996 Eastercon (my first con, to which I was dragged by the lovely Helen Steele). At the "arena", Rex was handed over to the more animate Sprokkettes, and SMS enlisted G's help as hand-held cameraman for the event, which he seemed to thoroughly enjoy. Some of the robots this year were pretty good - there was a remarkably robust and successful tank built of lego, with a mini tank on board, which could be directed to disembark and follow the main tank around!
During the middle of the day, my memory becomes a little hazy, so I expect it consisted mainly of sitting in the bar. G and I went to eat in the hotel restaurant again, and found ourselves on the adjacent table to IWJ, C and OSD, who studiously ignored us. After that, we headed off to the main auditorium for the Masquerade. Again, SMS got G to film his own entry. The winning entry was "Cthulhu-puss" - a completely hilarious Bagpuss-intro take-off, complete with guitar chords, in which Marcus Streets, fetchingly attired as Emily, presented a lost "thing" (a bunny girl) to her god Cthulhu, who then woke up, sending everyone catatonic... Apparently the costume-makers had been stuffing tentacles for days :-)
After that, hung around in the lobby for a long time. Ran into Jill and Phil, a kinky couple I always see at Eastercons, and know from dodgy newsgroups also. They were accompanied by a cute boy in a collar. A guy called Chris also turned up, and the following few hours were then taken up with Phil and Chris half-jokingly trying to chat me up in front of G, using every dodgy line they could think of. It was most amusing, though eventually G seemed to get a little irritated and they stopped. Later in the evening, G went off to the bar to get some more drinks, and I went up to find him, but was suddenly accosted in the corridor by Mrs Stableford (who I'd met the previous night at the banquet). She said "Come with me!" and grabbed my arm, and began dragging me down the corridor away from the bar. I said, "I was looking for G!" (and indeed, he appeared out of the bar at that moment), but she said, "Never mind your boy, come with me!" and continued to drag me down the corridor. I shot G an alarmed look, and he hurried down the corridor after us. We reached another bar, where she plumped herself down with a group consisting of a dodgy-looking guy called Piers, the alarming Farah, and someone else. G and I sat down as well, rather uneasily. Mrs Stableford began snogging Piers, only breaking off to have a row with Farah about their previous affair, and how Brian felt about it. The row was terminated by Mrs Stableford and Farah getting off together. At this point G and I felt able to make our exit, and returned to the lobby and the comparative safety of Jill, Phil and Chris. I think I will have to get some of Brian Stableford's books now, just so I can tell people that his wife tried to seduce me :-)
We left a bit later, and were amusingly harrassed by a group of local youths who'd just been let out of a nightclub - they shouted "Trenchcoat Mafia! Guns 'n Roses!" and similar edifying things. What amused me was that they found our rather unremarkable coats more noteworthy than the lilac two-headed, three-armed teddybear covered in bondage tape that I was carrying.
So that was Sunday. On Monday, G and I napped for much of the morning, then I went off to the hotel for a panel discussion on Turning Points in History - whether history is mainly made by the actions of significant individuals, or by large-scale economic, political and social trends etc. The panellists were the three Guests of Honour: Brian Stableford, Harry Turtledove and Peter Weston, and also a random kook who the panel coordinator picked up in the Green Room and thought would be a good addition. Harry Turtledove waffled vaguely about nothing much; Peter Weston came across as quite objectionable, even jingoistic in his emphasis on the importance of West European vibrancy and innovation in determining the course of human history; the kook promoted his bizarre theory of the significance of tea-drinking on history; and Brian was reasonable and sensible and erudite, and managed not to be rude to the other participants :-) The panel coordinator also tried to get discussion going of Diamond's ideas in Guns, Germs and Steel, which is a fabulous book that I was almost entirely convinced by.
After that interesting item, there was the Closing Ceremony, which mirrored the opening ceremony in containing a show of stills taken at the con itself. G and I appeared in the background of several of them, but Rex got a picture to himself. Of course, it wasn't all over then - there was still the Dead Dog party to come in the evening. We met up with TM, JM and two other fans whose names I've forgotten, but who were very nice, and arranged to go out to eat that night in St Helier before the party. We went to a wonderful Chinese called Ming's Dynasty. While the others had duck in pancakes, I had vegetarian mock duck in pancakes, which was marvellous (there used to be a Chinese in Cambridge that did this dish - the Shao Tao - but it's unfortunately closed down now). JM is also vegetarian, so we shared main dishes. All very nice and extremely filling! Some of the others got a taxi back to the hotel, but G and I preferred to walk off the dinner a bit.
Hung around in the bar for a while, chatting a little, but was overcome by extreme sleepiness. G, who had got a lot more sleep over the weekend than me, due to not getting up for breakfast, was not sleepy, but eager to stay at the party until the bitter end, chatting to SMS and others. So I left him some money for drinks and came back to Surrey Lodge.
(Will finish off later; need a cup of tea.)
