Michael's Meanderings

So yesterday evening the convention started. An the fist item I attended was Playing Rapunzel in the Filk track. Mitch and Marilisa are excellent on their own now they have teamed up they are awesome. I must remember to rip their cd to my MP3 player.

I followed this with Henry Gee's GoH talk about Nature as a publisher of short SF.

Some time in the evening I had a cookie with smarties on it, with a half of real cider. I can't now remember exactly when this occurred but....

I'm afraid that I crashed fairly early, I'm getting old and can't stay awake at the weekend for 16+ hours any more ;-(

Saturday morning up for breakfast at 8:00, cereal, full english breakfast, toast and tea. After this I went for a walk around the grounds.

I caught most of Armchair Futurology, where questions about what would Cambridge be like in 100 years, were asked. The answer probably exactly like now but more so!

This was followed by a panel on New Myths for old, which could be for fantasy writer a "Where do you get your ideas from?" type question.

Probably the program entry that when I read about it, I most wanted NOT to miss. "Miles, dice and PCs" where GURPS Vorkosigan was discussed and GoH Sean Punch gave some background from the GURPS PoV.

After this was time for lunch and I had steak with mini onions and mushroom gravy, with new potatoes and leeks, with green soup to start and carrot cake to finish. It was more expensive than expected. Not quite as expensive as hotel food, but probably the same ball park figure as a reasonable take away.

Steph Swainstone GoH talk, has made me determined to find my copy of The Year of Our War and if I can't find it order a copy from Amazon. With the addition of her other work (and not being fooled by the change in title of the third one)

A discussion on what makes a classic? did get side tracked on what kind of classic popular or critical. Tiger Tiger, Dune, Flowers for Algernon were all mentioned.

[To be continued]

So last weekend I ordered a bike form ASDA for £75 inc delivery and it was delivered last Tuesday. D put it together for me, and i tried it out last night. I was a bit wobbly as it must be 25 years since i was last on a bike. The bike I rode then only had 4 gears, my new one has 18! I suspect it will take a while to figure out how to use them properly.

When I got home yesterday C and his family were cutting down the tree at the front of the house. He promised to do this months ago, and then turns up just before we had alternative arrangements in place. So there is now light in the kitchen and the bathroom.

Yesterday at work I had to had over the laptop encryption and keyfob rollout projects. It was a bit hectic getting everything finished before the end of the day, but nice to know it's in good hands, and that I've got 2 weeks off!

This morning i wasn't up quite as early as normal, and after packing a new backpack (sized for weekend travel) caught the 10:23 Thameslink to St Pancras International. Walked across the road to Kings Cross and caught the 12:15 express to Cambridge. Arriving just after 13:00, I got a taxi to Murray Edwards College, (previously New Hall) collected registration materials, paid for my room, got the key and then got to room K8 by 13:30.

Wired Internet is available in my room, though I did have a little bit of trouble getting my eeepc to connect at first. but as you can see perseverance paid off.

Later:
Since the con doesn't officially start until 18:30 I decided to walk into town and have a look around. On my way in, the Cambridge and County Folk Museum caught my eye. So I went in, paid my £3.50 entry fee, and spent over an hour wandering it's 3 floors. The building dates from 1600AD and for 300 years was the White Horse Inn. It became a museum in 1936. It reminded me a bit of 18 Folgate Street, probably due to age and twisty stairs.

I then continued into town and almost got persuaded into a punt on the river, but decided not to.

I did get something to eat at Tatties though, before returning to the con.

Got home from the US on Thursday 9, left for Redemption, at Cambridge, New Hall on Friday. I really don't want to do consecutive weekends at conventions either side of the Atlantic again.

The combination of Unicon / Harmuni worked very well. (I didn't visit the gaming stream) You could slip into whichever stream you wanted. I was mostly in the Unicon stream, but did pop in for some filking, especially in the evening.

Guests were Jo Walton and Ian Wastson, (Unicon guests) Franklin Gunkelmann (Harmuni guest)