Here, at last, is my post-WFC post in which I try to sum up the entire con.
This, of course, never actually works.
Still, I did want to mention a few things:
1) Travel to and from the con, while somewhat of a pain in the ass, wasn’t nearly as bad as what some people experienced.
2) I didn’t go to any panels (the only one I was even considering took place before my plane landed in Austin), but I did attend six readings. Or, more accurately, five and a half, since delays at O’Hare and then with the SuperShuttle meant that I missed the first half of jaylake‘s reading on Thursday. I did get to see full readings by Peter Beagle, Hal Duncan (geekshow), Graham Joyce, Patricia McKillip and Laura Anne Gilman (suricattus). Hal’s was probably the best of them, mainly because of the amount of passion he put into it, but Laura Anne’s is the one that actually got me to rush to the dealer’s room and buy something (Polyphony 6).
3) As mentioned previously, I got to wear the hat.
4) There were enough decently good restaurants (particularly Manuel’s and Z-Tejas) within walking distance that I was able to get some tasty food without needing to take a cab somewhere. I did not, however, experience any Texas BBQ. Oh, and on my first night there the hotel restaurant managed to serve very good food exceedingly slowly and at only lukewarm temperatures, which sort of spoiled the effect. I blame whoever was running the kitchen that night, not the waitstaff who carried the food or the head chef who came up with the recipes.
5) I was part of arcaedia‘s travelling virtual birthday party, as was everyone who had one of these candle stickers on their badge:
So if you were at WFC and wondered what those were, now you know.
6) In addition to the fine bunch of free stuff that came in my tote bag (or that I acquired at the trading table), I bought three books in the dealers’ room:
- In the Forest of Forgetting by Theodora Goss
- Magic for Beginners by Kelly Link
- Polyphony 6 edited by Deborah Layne and Jay Lake
[which I wanted the moment I saw it]
[which I’d been planning on buying, but it’s always better to buy it direct from the author]
[which I bought immediately after hearing suricattus read her story, “Fire Rising in the Moon”]
7) I got to meet mizkit, who is exceedingly delightful, as well as a bunch of other cool people.
8) I got to enjoy dinner with both jaylake and mizkit, though not at the same time.
9) I never did make it into downtown Austin, so I don’t really feel like I visited Austin at all.
10) I’m very much looking forward to WFC 2007 in Saratoga, since I can just drive up, rather than needing to fly.
[ETA:]
11) I forgot to mention the cheese! Thanks to katfeete and icedrake for sharing the delicious cheese they brought along from their own Meadow Creek Dairy. Yum.