kevin_standlee | Brighton by Train

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.