My Convention Career: 1992
- Regency Assembly/Corflu 9, Los Angeles -- I didn't list the first Regency Assembly that I attended in 1991 as a legitimate "science fiction" convention despite the high number of fans in attendance. However, this Assembly occurred the same weekend and at the same hotel as Corflu 9, the fanzine convention, which I also attended, so I think this listing is justifiable. The hotel was an incredible dive but I got to see a lot of people I hadn't seen in years so I was glad I made the trip.
- Baycon, San Jose -- Running a bid party for worldcon at a local convention where very few people attend worldcons was an *ahem* interesting experience. Instead of explaining why people should vote for Atlanta, I first had to explain how the worldcon voting process works!
- Westercon, Phoenix -- The only notable occurrence at this con was the appearance of Vladimir, a black cat sitting on a small black casket dressed up in a vampire cape with natural fanged teeth and his owner, a spooky woman calling herself Vladimir's Human Love Slave, who sells photos, keychains, etc. on behalf of Vladimir. Just when I thought fandom was starting to get boring...
- Magicon, Orlando -- My first major job at a worldcon: running Program Operations. It was a lot of work before and during the con, but everything at the con itself went very smoothly (or at least the attendees didn't see any of the glitches we fixed behind the scenes). This was especially due to the almost seamless program given to me by Priscilla Olson, the woman who put the program together. Even the outrageous prices for food that the convention center was charging for the Green Room turned out to be less of a problem than we expected thanks to a last-minute boost in our budget (and the careful sneaking in of food past the convention center guards). The rest of the con reportedly went smoothly also but I didn't get to see any of it! Also the first con at which I had to wear a beeper.
- Loscon, Los Angeles
- SMOFcon, New Orleans -- The city of New Orleans means that any con held there will be fondly remembered, even the disasters, and this con was no disaster although it was pretty light on programming, as SMOFcons tend to be. Also as usual for New Orleans, we all ate extremely well. I took Priscilla Olson (and her husband and some other friends) out to dinner in thanks for giving me a problem-free program at Magicon and making Program Ops there much easier to run than it otherwise might have been. Dinner at Antoine's. *sigh*
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