Wis(tful)Con Report
May 29
So my lovelies, my darlings, my sweets; have you missed me as I've missed you?
I was in Madison, Wisconsin over the weekend, for WisCon, the annual feminist science fiction convention. This will be, I suppose, a Con report, in my usual idiosyncratic, monomaniacal, and highly personalized fashion.
The flight (with a layover in Detroit, City of Smoking, Oily Ugliness) was uneventful, accompanied by bad french fries at an airport and a decent bagel on the plane. It made me long to be rich enough to sit in first class, or for a return to those days when the accommodations in airplanes were more like those in comfortable train coaches than, say, Depression-era flophouses. But after about 7 hours of traveling, we arrived in Madison (half an hour late). Fair fabulous Karen picked us up and delivered us to the hotel (which is still, to date, the nicest hotel I've ever had a room in) (we bribed her to give us a ride by providing a videotape of the Buffy season finale; I love personalized currency!).
Karen went in search of her own entertainments while Heather and I stowed our bags, bounced on the bed a bit, and went to the abominable noodle place for dinner. There we encountered Mary Anne, Jed, and Candas Jane Dorsey (whose work I first read early in college, I think; I had a copy of Machine Dreams, the Women's Press version). I managed not to go all blithering fanboy on Candas (she's brilliant), though I didn't talk to her much, either; I was too stun-brained from traveling to engage in any discourse more complicated than "Want lo mein now."
Heather and I returned to the hotel and then attended opening ceremonies, which, of course, involved a skit; but it had funny moments, and the high point was Nalo dressed as the Midnight Robber, complete with feathered hat. I sat by Ted Chiang and told him I'd enjoyed his new story "Liking What You See", and that his collection was being reviewed in the June issue of A Certain Magazine, and so forth. He's a very nice guy.
Friday night was all about the parties, yo; I don't know that I've ever had so much fun in so few hours. We went to the Small Beer party, celebrating the release of Carol Emshwiller's two new books (Report to the Men's Club and Other Stories and The Mount; buy them). Heather and Susan and others and I set up the table display of Carol's books, including the imposingly monolithic centerpiece, Bookhenge. Saw Kelly & Gavin, which was nice, and Gavin was pleased to see me once he realized who I was.
We also went to the Ratbastards party, where I spent most of the evening, getting my drunk on with the help of Chris Barzak, who from a purely personal/experiential viewpoint is my favorite Ratbastard (though I met Barth and Alan only briefly, and Kristin not at all, it should be mentioned). Barzak made orange crushes, which consist of orange soda and Absolut Citron, and are downed like shots. [Correction: the drinks are actually made with Orange Hooch, not orange soda] It was like being in college again, in the best possible way (and Barzak is funny, talented, and altogether cool -- I don't just like him for giving out the booze).
(Aside: The Ratbastards have a chapbook, which was the reason for the party, called Rabid Transit, and it's very good. Buy it, too. I'm going to review it, I think, though I have so many books I want to review, I'm not sure when I'll be able to. I have lots to say about it, though, so I may well bump it to the front of the queue).
I also drank many Vanilla Cossacks (as Heather and I have dubbed vanilla vodka and coke, mmm), a drink to which I was introduced by the incredibly beautiful and talented Amy Beth Forbes of Turbocharged Fortune Cookie, a new 'zine which (yes!) you should buy. I talked to Amy a lot on Friday night, and I drank a lot, too; Heather suggests in her Con Report Entry that I drank to get up the courage to flirt with Amy, which is not, in fact, accurate. I drank because the drinks tasted yummy, though I will admit a slight correlation between the amount I drank and the intensity (not to say competence; I am ineffectual and incompetent at this regardless of my sobriety or lack thereof) of my flirting, which I hope never became unpleasant or overbearing or anything. Amy's just really very cool and lovely, and made a fabulous Friday night even more fabulous by chatting with me.
So. I went up to the room when the party suite began spinning, and had a bout of medicinal sickness (Heather sweetly tied my hair back); I'm told I'm not the only one for whom purging followed bingeing, which mollifies my embarrassment somewhat. Then a tumble-into-bed, and some cartoons, and the bed swirling around, and sleeping.
Rose lateish Saturday, missing the first panel I wanted to attend (will this be a WisCon tradition? I think so!). We went to a Clarion panel which was, well, a Clarion panel, but nice enough. Then to the Endicott Studio Living Room, with Terri Windling, Midori Snyder, Karen Joy Fowler, and others. I love this panel (though it's more of a sit-around-in-chairs-and-on-the-floor-and-talk-about-fairy-tales than a traditional people-behind-a-table kind of panel); at the end of it, last year and this year, I come away feeling that there's nothing more noble and wonderful one can be than a fantasy writer. Afterward I went up to introduce myself to Terri, who looked at me blankly, read my nametag, and visibly brightened. Then she hugged me, la, and told me that if I keep writing things like "Annabelle's" I'll go quite far indeed. (I presume she means challenging, emotionally dangerous fantasies, not alphabet-based stories about little girls and butterflies; if the former, I think I'm doing my best to keep writing things like that.) That was a high point of the Con for me. I'm quite an admirer of Terri's.
Then we went to a bad panel, and left, and did I don't remember what until dinner time, which Heather and I had alone at a little Italian place, where we had dinner last year. WisCon is an emotional thing for us, since so much of our first flush of love (carnal and otherwise) took place there last year, and it was nice to have a good meal and reconnect.
Then, to the auction, where Ellen Klages was in fine form. Strange things were sold, including Neil Gaiman's beard hair, harvested at ICFA (it turns out Gaiman was at WisCon for a bit on Saturday, but I didn't see him, alas). We left the auction to see Ted Chiang and Lyda Morehouse read. Later, we went to the insane Tor party (as people in the hall remarked, "They've got all the free booze"). I talked to Lyda, there, who complained about how disgustingly fast I write (we were in a novel dare together back in '99); I pointed out that, although I had written a novel in a month once a long time ago, she had since published two novels and, thus, any envy between us should be flowing the other way. (I hope that didn't sound like we had a bad conversation; it was very nice, funny; I like Lyda).
Mostly I trailed up and down the hall after Susan, who was deliciously hyperkinetic and led us many times into fun (Justine Larbalestier & Emily Pohl-Weary's party was a blessed respite from the madness of Tor). I drank a bit, didn't dance (I often don't dance). Went up to the room later for more cartoons and frolicking and some sleep.
Sunday, went to the SFPA poetry reading, which ruled. Laurel Winter, Mark Rudolph, John Rezmerski, Sandy Lindow, Heather, me, and others -- the quality of work was simply outstanding, and there were even a handful of non-poets (including Trey) who just came to listen. If we hadn't had such a crappy time slot, I think we would've had an even better turnout.
Then to a Buffy panel, which was boring, then interesting, then boring. Heather and I had brunch, mmm. Sunday brunch. Mountains of bacon and eggs. A sundae bar. Delicious pastries. My kind of heaven.
The afternoon was mostly given to the Strange Horizons tea party (which also included the presence of Tot! and Pär and Karen). I drank lots of tea, ate lots of sandwiches, wandered away, came back, and etc. Had a really nice chat with Jim Munroe, who's something of a hero of mine, author of Flyboy Action Figure Comes with Gasmask and Angry Young Spaceman, a culture-jammer and DIY-publisher extraordinaire. We talked about 'zine culture as opposed to SF culture, and about self-publishing, and stuff like that, and Emily Pohl-Weary joined us for more chat, and la. So nice; another high point of the Con. Later talked with Midori Snyder at some length about fantasy, the difference between novels and short stories, and stuff like that... she's very smart and cool (which rather understates the case, actually; but I'm running low on adjectives). Her daughter may send me some poetry to consider for Star*Line...
Hmm. Heather and Karen and I ordered room service, and ate (I ate far, far too much on Sunday; even my tummy thought so). Then Heather and I went to the dessert thing, at which I was pretty miserable, I must say -- I wasn't hungry, I was tired and cranky, Heather was off in the bathroom or getting water for much of it, leaving me to sit with strangers and try not to glower at the world. But then the Guest of Honor speeches started, and they were quite good, Nalo Hopkinson and Nina Hoffman saying very different things exceedingly well. After that, Heather and I went back to the room to rest up a bit before going to more parties, but I was stricken by horrid nausea (I'd assumed it was from overeating; now seems likely it was the flu, which has hit Heather now and also still lingers with me). I watched cartoons (Cartoon Network, la) and tried to sleep, and missed the big last-night-fun, though I'm told it was rather subdued, so I guess that's okay. Well, not really, but I make myself feel better however I can.
Woke bleary, had no breakfast, said hurried farewells, talked to Barth Anderson (who complimented my work, and though I've read and liked his writing, I was too woozy-brained to reciprocate; he, however, was the very picture of composure and coolness. How I envy those Ratbastards, in so very many ways). Heather and I wandered in Madison. We went to the university and sat by the water; I read Galveston, which is good, though I don't like it as well as Mockingbird. It was nice to unwind, though sad, too -- the end of a very small era, alas. We went back to the lobby to wait for the airport shuttle, and I finally got to talk to Jim Frenkel (we'd corresponded a bit in the previous months, and had meant to get together at the Con, though we didn't have a chance), which was nice.
The flight back was pretty hellish; the less said of it, the better. We got back to Oakland a bit after midnight. Bleah. Had to get up the next morning to go to work, too. Bleah again.
Oh, and at some point I got laryngitis. And I still have a bit of the flu. Those aren't nice things... but you know, in a few weeks, I won't remember the bad things at all. The good things will stand out.
There were lots of good things. I'm even leaving some of them out, because I'm tired of typing.
Words written since February 1, 2002: 75,520
Words written since last entry: 1,100 (last night, on Rangergirl)
Send me a time machine, so I can go back and do all the things I didn't get to do at WisCon.
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