Day in the Life of an Idiot

A lot of people make the case that in-person cons mean more.... everything, I guess? 

What's funny is that, for me, I probably participated more during Virtual WisCON than I did at this year's in-person CONvergence. I was on panels at neither, but I did go to some programming at both. I maybe hit nearly a half-dozen panels at Virtual WisCON? I went to ONE at CONvergence. Well, okay, one and a main stage performance. 

So, how did it all go?

The above might sound like a complaint, but it really isn't. I had a lovely time. I just didn't DO very much at con. I ended up meeting up with naomikritzer on the light rail (it goes right past the end of my block) and we made our way to the convention center. After getting our badges and discovering that CONvergence no longer requires proof of vaccination (though they did require masking in most places,) I followed Naomi to her first panel, "The Big I."

"The Big I" was a panel about using the first person... so, and no shade on Naomi or her fellow panelists, but not exactly a contentious or dynamic subject matter.  Nevertheless, I wanted to scream at one point. Actually, at several points. I had to sit on my hands. I had to distract myself on my phone because I had made a conscious decision not to derail the panel, for the sake of my dear friend. However, I nearly died when I heard panelists say things like, "Well, you could never tell the Murderbot stories in third person, because all you'd have are the actions," and "Of course, in third person you can't get into people's heads."

I'M SORRY, WHAT? 

I ended up writing a furious string of texts to my wife at home. Because someone needed to know that the panelists seemed to be confusing point of view (1st, 3rd) with narrative voice. FFS, you absolutely can "get into people's heads" in 3rd person, it's called close and/or limited 3rd person.  You don't have to do this (which is the fun flexibility of 3rd person), but you absolutely can use the main character's "voice" in 3rd to describe scenes or people. You are not required to write like a newspaper article. "He wore a tie." Instead, you can say, "The tie Frank wore was hideous. Bob hated it. It reminded him of his late father-in-law." Or whatever the fuck. You can use long, rambling sentences in third person to imply that's how the character thinks. You can use shorter sentences and chose words that sound militarist to imply, in 3rd person, that's how your character sees the world.  

It is, without a doubt, EASIER to do this sort of thing in 1st person, but it's not, by any stretch of the imagination, impossible in 3rd. (or 2nd for that matter.) 

I never went to another panel after that. 

This is why, in fact, I rarely sit and listen to panels. I have OPINONS. I feel feelings very strongly about things that really don't matter, like verbs, and narrative voice and whether or not the ending of Bleach sucked rocks (Spoiler: yes.)  I'm kind of argumentative? But, I'm totally sitting, very sincerely at that booth that also says, "I Believe a Thing: Change my mind," because one of my favorite things in life is a spirited debate. My mind can be changed! So, like, maybe I'm wrong about p.o.v. and narrative voice, but I'll tell you what. If I'd been on that panel it would have been hella exciting!

But, anyway, after that panel I don't entirely remember what else I did? I may have headed home because I'd sort of spontaneously decided to join Naomi and didn't have good plans for dinner. She'd offered to go somewhere with me, but I would have had to hang out quite a bit longer and I wasn't up for it. Not when I was feeling all my narrative voice FEELS.

I did go back on Friday evening, however. I ate dinner at home and then hopped the light rail again. I will tell you that taking the light rail always makes me feel so grown-up, like a grown-up who lives in a City. I'm also always fascinated to watch people living their lives and there are always a lot of characters on public transportation, you know. My friend Barth Anderson used to write-up some of the random conversations he'd had or overheard on the bus and I thought of him a lot as I listened to a guy very sincerely explain to his friend on the other side of the phone that you should never buy a Mercedes Benz; Always buy Honda. 

I discovered during the long walk down Nicolet Mall that there's a group of citizens who are patrolling as violence disruptors. I ended up accidentally pacing them on one of my walks to the convention hotel, but it was fascinating to overhear their conversations, as well. 

Once at the con on Friday, I texted Naomi and discovered she was still at dinner. I decided to head to watch Ms. Shannon Paul do her comedy routine on the main stage. I am generally fond of comedy shows, and no one else in my family really is? So, it was a treat to watch her, although I really noticed the extent to which certain types of comedy require the audience to buy into certain kinds of normativity, most of which, I simply don't experience/never have.  Like, I apparently fail, "would you eat a pie that appeared on your porch that none of your friends claim to have sent you?" (My answer: pie!)  Long story, but Ms. Shannon was trying out a bit and explained that a mystery pie had been delivered to her house and she threw it away without ever opening the box because "of course." But, she wanted to know who in the audience would have tried the pie and which of us wanted to know what kind of pie it was. I wanted to know, and I wanted to try it. I am apparently a freak of nature. Not a lot of people agreed with me.  I will say that for the rest of her routine, I found myself thinking about whether or not the scenarios she presented were things I would do or not and it kind of changed the humor for me? Like I say above, I noticed the ways in which much of the humor required buy-in to a "normal," because for things to be funny they had to fall outside of it, you know?

Anyway.

Naomi and I ended up attempting to make a "bar con" at the CONvergence hotel by hanging out in the lobby. It worked? It took some time to gather some friends, but we did at least run into some folks I'd been hoping to see. This is a perennial problem for me at this "new" hotel because I just haven't figured out where people go. The conference rooms also go up in a central column, rather than being spread out flat, so there isn't as much "passing people in the halls" because people are going up and down different sets of escalators? 

The dealer's room was also surprisingly sparse. The main audience they seemed to be catering to was RPG gamers, which includes me, but like almost every booth seemed to have sets of dice for sale? Given that the con's focus this year was cosplay, I was a bit surprised to see ZERO clothiers in the dealer's room--no kimono, corset, boot, or steampunk hat/goggle makers/sellers.  It was kind of weird? There was one bookseller, though they didn't have a large selection (it was not Dreamhaven or Uncles.) I dunno. I did have some luck finding fun things to buy in artist's alley, however.

The con, of course, went on for two more days, but I didn't.

I still had fun? But, it was very low participation for me this year.  

I missed a lot of the excitement this weekend over WisCON's harassment subcommittee's decision because we were in a small, resort town in Wisconsin enjoying our friends' cabin at Crooked Lake.  I took some awesome photos, but the uploading thingie here on LJ is still being stubborn so I may have to point interested parties to another site.  The lake was ice cold, but Mason, being Mason, braved it anyway.  I ended up in the water, too, though initially under much duress.

But, because we were away from Twitterverse and the rest over the weekend, a lot of what needs saying abut WisCON's decision has already been said.  I have to admit that I'm far less invested in this, despite knowing Jim personally (he was my agent), because I haven't been a regular attendee at WisCON for nearly a decade.  It used to be one of my favorite cons.  The ratio of writer-to-fan was skewed heavily toward the writer end of the scale and, at a certain point in my career, WisCON was the place for me to meet colleagues, agents, and editors in a relaxed setting.  I suspect that's probably still true, but when I switched to being a romance writer I felt less welcome, though never explicitly so.

So, everything I have to say about this is as a complete outsider. My only point is one of comparison. This year at CONvergence, I had a programming issue come up.  I felt it was handled so professionally and swiftly that I don't even feel the need to rehash the details here, except to say that I wish that WisCON could learn and take notes.  The programming head responded to my complaint within hours of my issuing it (even though it was the day after the con and everyone had every right to be off-the-clock, as it were.)  Not only that, but they had a very clear and firm policy that was expressed in unambiguous language to all parties involved.  There was a clear electronic "paper trail." When it seemed we'd reached an understanding, the programming person basically said to me, "I feel from your previous communication that you consider this resolved, but please let me know if there is any part of this issue that you feel is not resolved.  If you feel it is resolved, we will consider this matter closed."

It was amazing.  It was so professionally handled that I almost wondered if the folks at CONvergence were all required to take conflict management courses.

Having a clear, unambiguous policy was paramount to my feeling satisfied by the concom's response to my issue.  The programming head was able to say, "CONvergence expects x of this kind of panel" and there was no, "but we will review this if y or z is involved."  The hammer came down hard.  In fact, it was so intense I was like, "Uh, I'm not sure..." to which I was given a polite, but firm, "Understood, but these are the rules and we're clear about them, full stop."

Granted, this is an entirely different issue than harassment. But, the fact that this was how a relatively minor programming issue was dealt with, it gives me the sense there are even more clear and firm policies in place for other infractions.  They have a well-thoughtout harassment policy written in their souvenir program, for instance, though I'm not sure how well it would work for WisCON's clientele.  That aside, JUST the way this was dealt with could be a lesson for the WisCON folks, you know?

CONvergence is much, much larger than WisCON.  Not only is it on a significantly larger scale, but CONvergence's mission is very different from that of WisCON.  However, I think that WisCON could take note.  If they survive this particular misstep (and I do have to wonder if they will), I think it could behoove them to talk to bigger, more professionally run cons.  I'm sure a con like CONvergence has to deal with police calls and all sorts of things that a small con might never have to, but I would think that, if anything, this whole sexual harassment issue should show WisCON that maybe being prepared for all future contingencies might be a plan, so that there are clear rules and consequences from the start... for the next problem that comes up, because there will be one.

So, that's my two cents.  There are a myriad of other issues involved that I'm not going to comment on because I'm very much removed from the WisCON community.

With luck, I can get some photos of our trip up somewhere.  

I don't have a smart phone, so I can't live tweet everything as it goes down at CONvergence, but I thought I would post today's schedule:

FRIDAY

12:30pm – 1:30pm
Atrium 6
Marvel Film Roundup
Thor: The Dark World and Captain America: The Winter Soldier have been out, and Agents of SHIELD, Guardians of the Galaxy, The Defenders, and Ant Man are on the horizon. How do they all compare? What do you want to see next? Panelists: Lyda Morehouse, Allyson Cygan, Shaun Duke, John Seavey,


5:00pm – 6:00pm
Atrium 7
Cyberpunk 101
Discuss the cyberpunk genre in books, film, and games; from Neuromancer and Snow Crash to Deus Ex and The Matrix. Panelists: Elizabeth Bear, Lyda Morehouse, Spencer Kennedy, Christoforo Pasquarette

If you were to use the nice app that shows you my schedule, however, you'd see me signed-up (?) or otherwise listed on "Ask a Librarian" and "10 Must-See Anime Movies." I'm not officially listed in the program as on those, however, so I'm not sure why they're showing up in my schedule. After last night I'm just has happy not to be on a panel with anime experts, but I'm kind of bummed not to be on the librarian panel. I'm NOT a librarian, but I work at a library and I thought it would be nice to let some interested parties know that you don't have to have a library degree to work with books.

So, about yesterday, let's see... parking was its usual nightmare. I did manage to get a spot in the old Sofiteil lot (it's now a Radisson, maybe?) At any rate, I booked it from there to my first panel about young adult novels and the dystopia genre. I tried to get a moderator rustled up from the people who were there, and I would have taken point myself, but for my voice. But, ultimately, the last person to walk in was the one we "volunteered." She did a fine job, though there was at least one panelist who maybe got three words in. If I'd learned the blue-haired young panelist's name earlier (Kethry), I would have jumped in (like I do) not just for myself, but to ask her opinion as well. Probably my favorite moment of that panel, however, was when a woman in the audience posed a fascinating sort of question comment about how it seems that a lot of the "revolutions" that happen in many of the current dystopia novels actually seem subversively conservative or reactionary. I had one of those "mind = blown" moments, but without my voice I couldn't catch hold of that thread and really explore it. Ultimately, I think the panel was good, but it was one of those that could have been better.

I ended up not going to the panel "Female Superhero Films: Why Can't We Have One?" because I wasn't listed in the actual program. I have plenty of panels otherwise, so it seemed wisest to stay off it. I mean, as you see above, I have a bunch other panels that seemed to have mysteriously attached themselves to my schedule. I'm going to treat that as some kind of glitch, especially since none of these "extra" panels are printed on the back of my badge, which comes directly from the programming/green room.

So, since I had no panel to scurry off to after the YA one, I hung out with my friend seanmmurphy. We connected up with matociquala and Sigrid Ellis at the bar. Once we were there we ran into haddayr and Adam Stemple (with his kids in tow)... so that was sort of a classic con moment. I bonded with Sigrid because she'd just had throat surgery, so neither one of us could talk much. Later in the hall I ran into naomikritzer and jiawen.

My final panel was "Into to Anime" but everyone there at the panel already knew a lot about anime. As I later told jiawen, it wasn't so much as an introduction as a 'hook-up.' But, I think there are only three anime panels in the whole con, so all the fans are going to all of them.

Anyway, today I'm going with Mason, who is dressed as kid Luffy. He looks adorable. I'm going to take a picture to post tomorrow. Okay, I have to run get dressed.