Wasn't That a Party

[akirlu]

Back from 4th Street. Weeeehooo. I had a fine time.

Convention photography is tricky -- busy backgrounds, crappy lighting, lots of blocked sightlines -- and I'm not especially good at it, but I have posted a few of my less sucky pictures over at my Flickr account and you can find your way there by clicking through the picture above. (If you are featured in one of the pictures and would like me to take it down, please let me know -- I'm happy to do it.)



I think I've lost the art of con reporting, if indeed I ever had it. Let me give you an impressionistic schmoo, instead.

I am made of win because I knew of a cool-weird food thing that Singer didn't. Yay me. If it's distilled cloudberry vinegar, I must send him some. The finely-chopped ceviche-like, mango-and-lemon-and-fishy-bits sushi thing served on little lettuce leaves was possibly worth the entire trip, let alone the sushi expotition. My god. I thought I was full until that plate showed up. I've already forgotten the name of the Japanese mintoid thing that adds the last zip, but I will hunt it down and plant it in my yard.

There is at least one chord change in the chorus for "Air" without which it works less well. Rats. Need to prep the open source chorus better next time.

The mots bons were more or less endless. Wish I could remember some. Still, the criticism that the program was entirely Steve Brust's personal clique all the time was not, I think, a wholly unjust one. The upside to that monoculture was the reliable abundance of funny, clever, thoughtful people on all the panels. But they were exactly the same funny, clever, thoughtful people presented in a narrow band of permutations over and over again. Not for a moment do I want to suggest that the program should have been stuffed with tedious, tendentious, dull people, just, you know, let's not see the same hands all the time. In fairness, after the second or third time someone on the panel bemoaned that Lesley Hall really should be on the Food, Fashion & Fornication panel, and I used my outside voice to suggest, "Well, PUT her ON the panel," they did that thing. And I would not for a moment wish to suggest that anyone in Steve Brust's personal coterie is not funny, clever, or thoughtful enough to merit that much repetition.

While I'm on the subject of program: I think there was too much emphasis on the process and experience of writing fiction, and not nearly enough on reading, interpreting, and locating fantasy, given that it's a fantasy con. Me, I enjoyed the hell out of all that writers' workshoppy stuff -- it's just up my alley right now -- but I don't think it's what the convention purports to be about, or if so, I misunderstood.

Lessons learned: dehydrating in hotel air shaves IQ points off me like howdy. The aphasia goes way the hell up, and my ability to make rapid connections or compose coherent thoughts goes right through the floor. Milk is a surprisingly effective antidote, and so is getting the hell out of the hotel. At future cons: carry water, get outside for walks, bring own milk if it's not in the con suite. (We are Swede. We do not wot of this weenie Lactose Intolerance thingie.) On the other hand, once outside the hotel, my friends make me smarter. Lucky thing.

I was exceedingly tickled to meet and have a chance to chat with: TexAnne, boxofdelights, and of course mrissa. Also was pleased to find that avocadovpx was in attendance.

On the whole, I had fun, I had fabulous fun, including some fine meals and conversations and hot-and-cold running music parties, and I'm glad to know that there will be another one of these things next year. Even better, it's supposed to move to downtown Minneapolis, where the restaurants are. So kudos to everyone who made it happen; I'm glad there is 4th Street Fantasy once again.

Oh, and I still haven't been to The Mall of America. Go, me.

Comments

[apostle-of-eris.livejournal.com]

re programming -- the strategic objective was to revive Fourth Street. The consensus seems strong that that hes been very much accomplished. And a lot of people were taking notes toward next year's topics &c. So without necessarily disagreeing, I want to add that the quirk will have been transient.

As for the Mall, I have finally been there. It was like being inside of wallpaper.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

It's a fair point about the strategic objective, and I think the program rocked the house, in terms of the responses I've been seeing so far, so I think you're right that it did what it needed to do. I'm told that the original 4th Street program started out a bit inbred and broadened with time, so there's reason to hope for something more ecumenical in years to come.

[mjlayman.livejournal.com]

Mary Kay's wearing her corset thingie, isn't she?

Where's the water pictures? I've never seen that in Mpls, but then again, I'm there in the winter.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

That's the big multi-level fountain on the plaza by the music center / performance spce on Nickolette Mall. TexAnne wanted to go because she's just re-reading The War for the Oaks, and one of the pivotal scenes is set there.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

And yes, Mary Kay was indeed wearing her fabulous purple leather corset and looking fabu in it.

[fishbliss.livejournal.com]

Is the Japanese mintoid thing that adds the last zip perchance called "shiso"? *
I have some growing in my garden!











* of course, I know about it because of Singer.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Yes, that's it! I'm not surprised you know about it from Singer, I'm pretty sure your name was mentioned in the same breath at some point in that part of the conversation, maybe in the context of Singer's experience with growing it. I love that damn' stuff. Hajime-san at Mashiko uses it, too, with some things and it just took my head off the first time I had sushi with that added. Nom, nom, nom, as the lolkids say.

shiso

[chiefwirehead.livejournal.com]

You are growing Shiso in your garden, and didn't tell us?
OR offer a cutting? Donya will be chock full of wrath.
(after I tell her, that is)

We've tried to grow it & failed a couple of times.
Now we have a raised bed with drip irrigation, and we'd like to try for a shiso family again, if we could find the seeds. We looked during worldcon, but couldn't find them this time.

[wild-patience.livejournal.com]

Was there smoking inside the programming room? We went to one Fourth Street years ago and were miserable because of all the smoke. It seemed like it would have been a nice convention if we could have breathed within hearing distance.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

No, no smoking anywhere except the one smoking hospitality room, which I never went to. Minneapolis has gone to a no-smoking-in-restaurants law that it wouldn't surprise me to find also covers other public spaces.

4th St

[magscanner.livejournal.com]

Your comments on the program definitions and panel-staffing: spot on. Though the happy few were getting a bit long in tooth by the end of the event, they somehow managed to come up with fresh insights hour after hour. Kudos to them for their staying power! Next year, maybe we'll get more friends of friends up there. And, while the titles and subjects made it look like a fiction creator's guide to the inner life of the story, the actual discussions were widely ranging and of great interest to this consumer of fiction.

We stayed over Monday and took the light rail to Minnehaha Falls ... and the Mall of America. First time I went to the Falls it was frozen and we slid down the steps; today it ran full blast. And I have a couple hundred photos of architecural items from the MoA.

Mike

Re: 4th St

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Yes, you're right that the actual panels were far more wide-ranging than the initial descriptions would have led one to believe, and that, too, is very much credit to the panelists.

I would have liked to stay longer in Minnesota, myself, but maybe next year I can plan better.

[txanne.livejournal.com]

Hanging out with you was one of the highlights of my con, situational car-centered aphasia and all.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Well, the benefit of the aphasia being car-centered was that we were all in it together. Ar. Ar.

But yeah, me too, I enjoyed the hell out of our meandering conversation, dropped nouns and all, and look forward to picking it up again in all the usual places.