Back from ChiCon (WorldCon). I had a blast. First of all, I love Chicago, it’s such a great city. You can move around downtown and feel reasonably safe and there is no end of things to do. This time around, I didn’t get out too much because of the convention, but I did manage to show a friend Millennium Park and went and got lunch at Gino’s East (Chicago style deep dish pizza. I could live on it.)
As for the convention, wow! First impression: huge! It was in the Hyatt which itself takes up two buildings. The convention pretty much commandeered the bottom five floors. Lots of people, many of them in costumes, all of them happily geeking out on all the writing and sci-fi centered material.
I walked within touching distance of both Patrick Rothfuss and George R. R. Martin and managed to stay composed enough not to grab them in a bear hug. I hung out at a party with Kij Johnson and traded jokes with her, the night before she won a Hugo.
The panels were good. There were so many that there was always something interesting. They weren’t quite as educational perhaps as those at ReaderCon, but this convention is geared a little more toward entertainment whereas ReaderCon is perhaps a little more serious, so that wasn’t a huge surprise. There was still some interesting conversations and good material. I took lots of notes.
I got to see two of Neil Gaiman’s short stories acted out on stage which was a real treat. I hung out with a few of my Odyssey classmates who also attended and quite a few other Odyssey alums that I met. And, I participated in a flashmob for Odyssey in front of the line waiting to get into the Hugo awards. We did the Tom Bombadil rap. Here’s a video. I’m the guy you can’t see dancing behind the guy holding up the speaker.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRU51PH26y8
All in all a good time. Next up, World Fantasy Con at the beginning of November in Toronto. Maybe I’ll see you there.
Now, back to figuring out this writing and revising thing…
