forestofglory

I had great time at FOGcon, a small local convention in Walnut Creek, CA, last weekend. I was bit nervous going in because the last few years I've gone with my friend

owlmoose but this year she's on the JoCoCruise and so couldn't make it. So I was worried I was going to spend lots of time standing around awkwardly not talking to people. But if fact I talked to many awesome people.

On Friday afternoon I went out to Walnut Creek with R and the kid an we had lunch together before the con. Then I went to get checked in and register for the con. At reg they always have lots of stickers and pens so I wrote pronouns and "Forestofglory" (since my badge listed by legal name) and put some cute stickers on my badge.

Then I went to a panel on "Friends and Found Chosen" which was really interesting. The panelist talked about friendships changing over time, the line between a friend and chosen family member, why queer are more likely to form chosen families, and more.

Then it was time for my first panel of the con as panelist. It was panel on Mothers in SFF. No one was assigned by the con to be a moderator so I stepped up at the last minute to mod despite having never done that before. I think it went fine. If I had prepared more I guess we could have had a more focused panel, but the conversation was lively and flowed the whole time. I wish I could have taken notes though because so many interesting sounding books where rec'ed and I don't remember most of them!

Then there was gap in the programing for dinner. I ended up wandering into the lobby and finding some people I knew from a previous year and having dinner with them. It turn out to be my only meal outside the con hotel the whole convention. We went to Tender Greens which like a salad focused chain and I had falafel and veggies.

Then after dinner I was on another panel this one about life on spaceships. I was bit nervous because Becky Chambers was one the panel with me, but she was very nice and very smart. I got to babble about ecology including nitrogen cycles, the fact that American Indians manged their landscapes, and how plants are awesome. I do not get to talk about ecology very much in my daily life so that was a lot of fun.

Then it was latish so I went up to my room and read before bed. In the morning I just hung out in my hotel room and ate instant oatmeal (the fancy kind in a cup) and leftovers for breakfast while I read the internet and watched some TV.

Then I went in time for my panel at 10:30. The panel was on "Discovering Short Fiction" which another topic I can talk on for a long time. It was fun to talk with people who had different reading styles than I did. I wish we'd had time to rec more stories though, that's one of my favorite things to do and I didn't really rec any.

Then it was time for the Unawards Banquet which basically hotel buffet offer as part of the con. I sat with a different person I knew for last years con and he told me about his adventures sailing the Pacific which involved many many things going wrong.

Then after lunch I went up for my room for what thought would be a quick break but turn into a fairly long one and I missed the panel right after lunch. But I went to the panel after that about a Sense of Place which turn out to be about worldbuilding more broadly. Then I listened Becky Chambers' Honored Guest panel which was her giving a lecture about all the cool space science that NASA is doing. Space is so cool! Science is awesome!

Then it was dinner time. I ate in the bar with a friend who I've know since high school but just started coming to FOGcon this year. (I didn't know she was going) So it was nice to catch up with her. After dinner I went back to my room for more resting and went to bed early to try to beat the time change.

I got a reasonable amount of sleep but still felt a bit off in the morning. I had volunteered to go help out in the consuite at 9 so I did that. It was pretty quite most of the time but I got involved in cat picture swap and got to see many many pictures of very cute cats.

Then I went to a panel of female friendships and how we'd like to see more of them in fiction. The panelist talked about how we need more female character in the same stories so they can interact, an also how they'd like to see women with more then one friend and different kinds of friendships.

Then I had lunch with big group of people in the hotel bar and chatted about even more books.

After lunch I went to one last panel on archives in SFF which turned out to mostly be about archives as SFF and the tricky questions of what to preserve. It was fascinating. One of the panelist was an working on collection form Jones Town and so had lot of say about privacy verses preserving the record for the future.

After that I attended the very brief closing ceremonies and went to meet R who picked me up and brought me a cupcake!

So I had really good con. I talked to lots people, I think my panels went well. I'm looking forward to going again next year.