Brighton by Train

[kevin_standlee]

I got to Brighton on Thursday by way of Portsmouth Harbor, where I had about 20 minutes to walk around and look at things and say, "This might be worth coming back again someday when I have more time to look at stuff."

Arriving in Brighton and the Metropole for World Fantasy Con, my first impression was, "They held a Worldcon in this place?" It doesn't seem anywhere near big enough for the over 4,000 people who attended ConSpiracy '87.

Being part of the Seditious Halloween Conspiracy of WFC, I got into the only costume I currently have that still fits, that being my Chicon Ground Crew jumpsuit. (Photo is from Chicon 7 with me, Lisa, and Kuma Bear; I will post a photo of me in it here in Brighton when I get a chance.) I managed to register at WFC and hang around the bar for a while without being thrown out by the super-stuffy convention management that sneeringly admitted that costumes on Halloween are vaguely permitted, but not at any other time. I even managed to go out to dinner and have BBQ chicken and ribs without getting any of it on me, which is something of a miracle.

We went into some of the more interesting parts of Brighton on the evening, where people in costumes of all sorts were having a good time, dampened (literally) at times by rain that at one point more or less trapped us in a club. Around midnight I managed to make it back to the hotel room (which is huge), check e-mail, and exchange messages with Lisa before falling into bed. Fortunately, on Friday I don't have commitments that run so late.

Comments

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

I did get to go to the Pavilion this afternoon. Remarkable place.

[delosharriman]

Not long ago, it was mistaken for a mosque by the BNP yobs. Apparently nobody had thought to inform them that the reason there are all these Brown People with their Suspicious Foreign Ways in England is that there was a period when the British conquered them all, & it was the fashion to adopt elements of their culture, such as pyjamas & the verandah. George IIII, having little in the way of either taste or sense, out-heroded Herod in that respect, resulting in a fantastic (in the root sense of the word) confection of the Mughal style.