BayCon: Saturday Afternoon

[kevin_standlee]

Lisa and I went for a walk through the Dealers' Room this afternoon, chatting along the way with many people and stopping to have our photo (and that of Kuma Bear in his BEAR-o-metric chamber) taken, and sometimes to explain the outfits. We stopped by lyzard13's table and collected the gift certificate (and later, the ad copy) for use with the Match Game.

I admit to being highly distracted by the corset-maker in the booth next to Liz. Raven O'Neill was coming by for an adjustment to the corset she was wearing under her Incredibles costume. Lisa indulgently did not whack me over the head for ogling Raven as she half-disrobed to get all cinched up. Raven and Lisa and I chatted for a bit, but then Raven was off to the face-painter to have her domino mask painted on -- it does make the Violet costume work well.

Moving on, we picked up the gift certificate from Cargo Cult, and reminded dinogrl that she needs to give us ad copy or she gets only minimal mention. Time is running out for her.

We then had a few minutes to look through the Art Show. I don't buy art that often, but I put in a bid for one of the limited edition prints of the cover art from the Interaction souvenir book, nicely framed and presented. Whether my minimum bid will hold up, only time will tell.

We couldn't hang about, because we had a 5:30 Match Game production meeting in the Fanzine Lounge.

What I need to remember is that, because I'm up on the sixth floor, I need to allow a lot more time to get back and forth to the room -- an absolute minimum of five minutes, and more is preferable. We went up and got the rolling luggage, which is currently full of game props, and headed back down to the Lounge. But then I realized that I'd left my briefcase, which had some of the game material, up in the room, and I had to make another trip upstairs. (Sorry to have made y'all cool your heels waiting for me to get my act together, folks.)

The panelists were doing what they were supposed to do -- getting to know each other when they did not already do so. We went through the game mechanics for this version and dealt with questions, then let them go. Then Lisa, Eric Larson, and I went through the more time-consuming part, which was getting the music and copy timing down, particularly on the opening titles, which are a PowerPoint build.

Firing up Lisa's replacement machine, I got -- again! -- the dreaded "no disk found" error. Arrgh! It would be okay in the long run -- that disk has a warranty, and everything is backed up on my machine -- but this is driving me crazy! Besides, I wanted to show it off for everyone. But my computer was still up in the room, and I didn't want to make people wait another five minutes while I waited for elevators.

After the panelists left, Eric loaned me his multi-function knife and I undid the screw that holds the hard drive into place. In a procedure that is regrettably becoming way too familiar to me, I pulled the drive out and reseated it, replaced the screw, and powered up the computer. As often seems to work, it recognized the drive and we were good to go again.

We spent about 45 minutes practicing with the computer and sound equipment. I do hope we get the full tech setup tomorrow -- it should be pretty nice.

It's a good thing we did the run-through, too: we worked out that we need to use the "plug" (commercial promo) music behind the closing titles, not the full title music, which fades out after about 40 seconds and is thus too short.

I do hope the Information Desk realizes by tomorrow where the Gateway Foyer is. I have been told that people have been coming by Info Desk asking about this place -- Match Game is not the only event taking place there -- and are being told, "We don't know."

I'm afraid we're skipping the Masquerade. In fact, we went back to the room and changed back into more casual clothes; I composed this and answered e-mail and Lisa played Locomotion on her (now working) computer. But I guess we'd better go get some dinner soon.

Comments

[kshandra]

I do hope the Information Desk realizes by tomorrow where the Gateway Foyer is. I have been told that people have been coming by Info Desk asking about this place -- Match Game is not the only event taking place there -- and are being told, "We don't know."

I'll throw something at cynan_poly the next time I see him, so he can properly chastise his underlings.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

A few years ago I had that experience: trying to find a locale listed in the Baycon program but identified neither there nor in the minds of anyone appointed to answer questions. You know, SF cons have been held in that hotel for nearly 25 years now, you'd think they'd have its geographic terminology nailed down.

[paradoox.livejournal.com]

Yes, imparting clues to the Info Desk is often hard. SMOZZ and I are at Balticon and their Info Desk seems to be mostly staffed by non-locals who think a good steak restaurant is Outback. (Of course, the hotel Conceriage didn't do much better. He steered us to a blue-hair place where we were close to 1/2 the average age of the rest of the patrons.)

Rumor has it (based on the yelling heard at Info Desk later), that they did a Restaurant Guide, but didn't get it printed up.

(This is the first year back in the Hunt Valley Marriott.)

Of course SMOZZ and I are biased having regularly run the Arisia and Boskone Info Desks the last couple of years as well as working several Worldcon Info Desks.