A Day Out Of Time

[browngirl]

I only attended Boskone for yesterday afternoon, and I have so much to write down that I'll surely forget details and people. I think it was the right amount of convention for me, at least for right now.

Some highlights/notes/whatnot:

• Tigerlily's dad very kindly drove us.
  
• The hotel is bigger than the convention! A map inside the Pocket Program might have been nice. It took Tigerlily and I a little searching to find the convention rooms, as there were whole wings of space not being used. The space being used was cozy and well-organized, though; I really liked the layout. And of course there's always that lovely feeling of walking into a room full of likeminded folk.
  
• I also really, really liked not having to check my bag / have my bag searched at the Art Show. I decided some years ago that I'm no longer going into Art Shows that would require I submit to the humiliation of being searched like a potential thief. I got enough of that as a teenager.
  
• Seeing friends, of course. *beams at people* Occasionally I had to glance at nametags to rematch names to faces, but that's what they're there for.
  
• Higgins Armory demos. I was really kind of surprised, though I shouldn't've been, at the clanky noise of armored knights fighting. What must a battlefield in 1400 have sounded like? The dagger fight was wonderfully informative, and the nifty blonde lady in doublet and hose let me look at her "giant icepick" of a dagger.
  
• I haven't written a list of people I saw because I don't want to inadvertently leave anyone off it, but I wanted to note that I met kate_nepvew! marydell was unsurprisingly right about Kate's niftiness. *beams at you both*
  
• It was really nice to be hugged by rysmiel. Can I take a trip to Montreal without my mother finding out and saying "you can go to Montreal but not Jamaica?" A question for another day.
  
• The Incluing Panel, featuring papersky the GOH, was wonderfully instructive -- I have pages of notes. I wish I'd gotten to say hi, but that's why I meant to arrive at 9 AM for her early events where she wouldn't be so swamped.
  
• I'm sorry I missed Jane Yolen, but I couldn't think of any gesture to make besides flinging myself at her feet worshipfully, so it's probably just as well.
  
• This is what I love about SF/F conventions: I complimented a man on his tall hat, spangled with stars and comets and planets, and after he told me about finding it he pulled a Vorpal Bunny out of it.
  
• The highlights of the Discoveries in Astronomy panel were sitting beside bercilakslady, meeting her Kiwi, and hearing that we've seen extrasolar planets orbiting their stars. The lowlight was how one of the speakers kept making me doze off.
  
• If I had returned today it would be to sit in the consuite and read in sociable peace. I finally read about a third of Winterfair Gifts that way.
  
• Dinner! I have met cattitude and finally seen adrian_turtle and redbird after three attempts, and eaten at Legal Test Kitchen, which was not bad at all.
  
• Oh, what the hell. If I accidentally leave you off this list, I loved seeing you, I'm just flakyminded. enegim and her D; ckd; V whose LJ name I can't recall; R the flautist filker; xiphias and cheshyre; issendai, who is great company to tour an Art Show with; ailsaek's daughter K whose LJ name I forget; T the Artist With The Lovely Braid; quezz; and everyone mentioned above.
  
• After dinner, I judged myself tired and went home (I was sorry to miss the Barrayaran Tam Lin, but I knew that I'd need to lie down pretty much afterwards), and even the twitly taxi driver could not dampen my lovely day.
  
• Not least since I had Winterfair Gifts for company. My word, it was idfic; can an author be said to have written fanfic of their own works? I say that with all fondness and appreciation, mind you.
  

If I had woken up cheerful this post would be shorter and have been made earlier and I'd be at the convention now. But I woke up grumpy and tired, so I guess I went to as much convention as I should have. Maybe next year I'll do more.