Usually with these con reports I struggle to recall exactly what happened during the con and when, but this year I tapped out a quick summary while we were still in the hotel and things were reasonably fresh in mind. I took the usual quantity of notes (lots) during the panels we attended, but those will have to wait for another entry, assuming I get my act together and type 'em up ;)

Day One

For some reason we couldn't be bothered to pack on Thursday night, so we ended up leaving the house later in the morning on Friday. We knew I-90 would be an absolute mess traffic-wise, with holiday travellers and roadwork, so we took the scenic route to Madison as we did last year. The journey took a shade over 2 hours, so we really didn't lose any time moseying through the country roads along the way.

Since we've been going to Wiscon, we usually spend the Friday seeing the Wisconsin sights before checking into the hotel in the afternoon. This year we visited the Olbrich Botanical Gardens in Madison, about 15 minutes drive from the hotel. After a picnic lunch outside, we had a look around the conservatory and wandered through the Botanical Gardens. It was all very picturesque and I took lots of photos. A sign near the entrance warned of nesting birds, and they weren't kidding! Carrie got attacked as we walked along a garden path atop a gorgeously landscaped hill. The only warning she had before the bird hit her on the back of the head was a brief squawk, but thankfully she didn't end up with any scratches or bruises. A motorcycle helmet might save future visitors from such disturbing confrontations....

After we'd had enough of walking through the heat (it was in the 90s and humid), we headed for the centre of town and checked into the hotel, followed by a visit to the registration desk to pick up our packets and name-tags. I gave the hotel wireless internet a try and was pleased to find it was fairly zippy, despite being on the 8th floor. Unfortunately it slowed to a crawl later in the weekend.

We had deep-dish pizzas for dinner at the Uno Chicago Grill a few blocks away. I had a tasty cheeseburger pizza which tasted, oddly enough, like cheeseburger. We took leftovers back to the hotel and stored them in our cooler, but turfed them the next day when we saw how unappetizing they looked.

The opening ceremony was jam-packed--they barely had enough chairs for everyone. After some technical glitches with the projector, the ceremony got underway. This year they had a slideshow presentation of previous guests of honour to the con since its inception 30 years ago. Quite a few of the previous GoHs were present this year. This was followed by the usual pun-ish (being full of puns, or painful, depending upon your perspective) play.

We made our way to the coffee shop down the street, Michelangelo's, for some readings. These were collectively entitled, "Words at Play: Speculative Poetry and Fiction." Jeannie Bergmann read her evocative tale, Pale Horse from the poetry mag, Rosebud, along with some poetry. Jay Lake read some poetic tales (currently unpublished, I believe), including one about boy and an old man living inside a beached shipwreck. Kelly McCullough read some of his poetry, along with an excerpt from his forthcoming novel, Webmage. The crowd was small, owing to competition with other readings and the karaoke, but everyone seemed to enjoy the readings. By the end we were getting pretty tired (long week!), so we peeked in at the karaoke party after the readings and headed back to our room.

More as I get it typed up!