stormdog | Entries tagged with convention

Turns out there is a fannish media-con happening in Regina today with an attendance of around 10,000. Shows how much I know about what's going on around here! But I haven't had a lot of motivation to keep track since I couldn't go to anything indoors.

Since I haven't gotten quantitative fit testing on an elastomeric mask done yet, I still can't go to this one. But it's really nice to think that, in the foreseeable future, this is something I will be able to do. I haven't been to a convention since before I moved to the Netherlands, which makes it at least four years. Maybe five. I do miss looking at board games for sale and playing them with people, among other things.

Folks talking about an upcoming convention remind of my mixed feelings about them. I loved going to them with my parents when I was small. As an adult, I really wanted to love them, and I did have some happy times at them, but I also felt a lot of anxiety about them. I was too socially anxious to do a lot of the social things people do there. Even things like talking to sellers in the vendors' room, or artists in the artists' room made me feel nervous and I tried to stay back from them so they wouldn't think I wanted to talk.

I really think it would be different now, if I'm ever able to go to one.

I spent a while in therapy on the topic of conventions. (Here referring to sci-if/fantasy conventions of the sort I grew up going to with my parents and that I've attended sporadically on my own as an adult.)

I talked about why the programming feels frustrating and how room parties are usually loud and noisy enough to be scary and how I don't know how to meet anyone there I don't already know, and how I don't know if the people I already know who go to them are interested in doing things with me anyway.

"Maybe," they said, "and this is just an idea, you don't actually like conventions?"

What an odd thought. It's actually contrary to some of my self-identity. As a kid, I didn't fit in anywhere except with my family and at conventions where, not coincidentally, I was with my family. I could look around at all the people in costume or carrying bags of gaming stuff and feel like these were people like me. I grew up thinking that those events would be a big part of my social life. Being happy somewhere as a kid, though, doesn't mean you'll fit in there as an adult. Like queer people in very small towns.

A lot of my experiences at cons with my ex were negative. And even without her, being alone at them makes me feel awkward and anxious. Maybe I could alleviate that through working at them and having a sense of purpose. But I don't know if it's what I really want.

What I really want is to be in environments where I can be around just a small group of people and have more intimate conversations than I know how to have at cons. If I knew a group of people to go with it might be different. Maybe that will happen in the future.

So I'm going to look for that and let cons be for now. I feel a mix of negative feelings about them; regret, frustration, anger, sadness. I don't need that. I need something new.

I'm going to try local, recurring, small-scale stuff. I'm planning on a crafting and cuddle event on the 22nd, and a poly meet-up at a restaurant/pub this coming Monday.

My anxiety instills a lot of fear in me that if I don't do everything just right with a new group of people that I will end up alienating them all and losing my chance to get to know them. This is silly and I don't think it will keep me from going.

Another significant barrier is that when it comes time to go somewhere, I never seem to actually want to get dressed and leave the condo. It's actually *really* hard to overcome that inertia. I don't know how to deal with that other than by just somehow forcing myself to do it.

Current Mood: hopeful
Crossposts: https://stormdog.livejournal.com/1261361.html

I think that I often have a question for people at the end of my posts because I want there to be some context and backstory, and that because of that my question gets missed. So I'll lead (if you can call the end of the first paragraph a lead) with a question: do I know anyone who has info about working with one department or another at Midwest Furfest? [This is more likely to garner responses on Facebook where I think I know folks who work the convention.] I'd like to do that. (If not, maybe I'll sign up through the website to be a volunteer, if it's not too late.)

I *think* I'd like to go to a convention again. It's been years. I really feel like I don't even know what to do at a convention. After I split up with my ex I was having really positive experiences socializing at such things. Then school, grad school, and depression consumed my life for, at this point, seven or eight years. I don't even know what I'd do there anymore. I imagine my first experiences at conventions when I started going without my parents, just awkwardly walking around the hallways, panels, and dealers' room all day and going home without talking to anyone. If I had the structure of working or volunteering, maybe I could meet people.

There are other things I'd like to go to, but it seems that timing is not great right now.

The next two cuddle events in Chicago are focused on women and gender-minority folks and I feel uncomfortable going. (I did contact the organizer to ask about the events, and though they did not say I shouldn't attend, I feel better right now not doing so.) The one after that will happen while I'm in Canada with Danae, so that puts things into January. There's another group of folks who have a monthly get-together, but the regular fourth Thursday time is Thanksgiving this month, and they can't do the week after because the organizer will be at Midwest Furfest.

My past experiences with trying to be a part of the social world of fandom is tainted by a lot of negative stuff related to my relationship with my ex and my own inability to establish connections even with people whose periphery I've been in for ten or fifteen years. It makes me feel sad and fatalistic. In a way, the idea of Danae finding a job elsewhere and giving me a chance to start completely over is really appealing. But there must be people in Chicago who would like me and who I'd enjoy spending time with. Maybe I can still find them.

Relatedly, I was just approved to join the Chicago Polyamory group here on Facebook. Maybe on Friday I can do my introductory post and start being social there with folks who there's a potential of actually meeting in real life.

Current Mood: pensive
Crossposts: https://stormdog.livejournal.com/1256821.html

So much to write about! I chopped it up into LJ-cut sections just to make it easier to jump to things that may interest you if you don't want to read it all.

( Piper )

( board gaming )

( cooking )

( electroncs )

So that's basically what I've been up to.

Current Mood: hopeful

I'm really glad to have gone with Posi to CrossingsCon. I enjoyed the road trip itself; driving to new places and seeing new things makes me happy. Apart from that though, the convention reminded me that the underlying basis of science-fiction and fantasy fandom has always been literature. I didn't talk to a lot of people, but the two or three times I did end up in a conversation, at least part of it was centered on Diane Duane and her various books. This makes sense, as that was the motivation of the convention. I realized how good it is to talk to people about books that mean something to me, and about how they connect with the real world. I haven't felt that in the Chicago area in a long time.

I don't know why that seems to be missing in Chicago. Maybe I'm not talking to the right events, or talking to the right people there. Maybe I'm being too antisocial and withdrawn. Maybe I don't really know how to be social. I came back with the idea of starting an in-person book club. We'd read a sci-fi or fantasy novel, and have a face to face meeting once a month with some snacks and talk about the book. At least some, though not all, of the conversation about be about socio-political meaning and how it relates to our society and the world, either concretely or abstractly. I think we'd start with something that won the James Tiptree Jr. award for exploration of gender in sci-fi and fantasy. I emailed a few people and got a little bit of interest, but I'm not sure if it's going to be enough to make that happen. Maybe I don't have the mental energy to put it together right now. I dunno; maybe it will come together some day. It's nice to think about.

And in general, I wish Danae and I could meet more interesting, local people. Neither of us seems to really know how to do it anymore. My world feels awfully small lately, especially in terms of real-life companionship, and I haven't been very good at making it bigger.

Current Mood: thoughtful

Yes, I am now dreaming about Factorio. A Facebook friend wanted me to make sure the machines were getting enough sleep. *grins*

I had trouble getting to sleep and am up an hour earlier than I expected, so I'm doing some last-minute packing. I'm about to leave for New Jersey with Posi, who's picking us up around nine. I'm so excited to be out of my routine for a few days! I may not be here much during that span; be well!

Current Mood: excited

My brain is not together enough tonight to engage in a coherent discussion with the person elsewhere who is implying that maybe a convention should be ok with someone marching in a parade wearing a Confederate-flag themed fursuit, accompanied by someone carrying said flag.

But in general, I'm getting pretty tired of this crap. Total permissiveness is not ok. I wouldn't be ok with someone in a blackface-esque fursuit modeled on a minstrel show character either. Not everyone will agree on where to draw the line, but there must be a line somewhere, and I'm ok with where they drew it. I haven't heard confirmation that MFF actually prohibited this person from marching in the fursuit parade, but if they did, then thank you Midwest FurFest! Thank you for this decision!

Current Mood: annoyed

Danae and I went to Midwinter Gaming Convention in Milwaukee this weekend. We'd been there a few years back, and the giant game library (provided by MilCoG) and lots of board-gaming space made it a great time. We were hoping for a similar experience again.

The convention has changed hotels. Previously it had been a newer facility with a more open floorplan. This year, it was in the 1927-built Hilton Milwaukee City Center. The hotel is gorgeous. Coincidentally, it was also one of the hotels that my parents, friends, and I had stayed in when Gen Con was still in Milwaukee and they used to run the games library. The hotel and some of the area around it brought back flashes of memory from back then.

Anyway, the board game area was a bit smaller and more closed off. The floorplan was more closed off, and the single room devoted to board-gaming was crowded and loud during peak times. Some of the people I talked to agreed with my suspicion that the convention is starting to focus more on LARPers, primarily World of Darkness stuff, at the expense of things like board games and tabletop RPGs. As well, MilCoG, for reasons unclear, seems to have pulled out leaving some of the other planners to pull together a library of board games on short notice that was much, much smaller. So that was a little disappointing.

But that's definitely not to say we didn't have fun. In fact, I think we both had a great time. We played a number of new games from a cross-section of genres. A Study in Emerald, based on the Neil Gaiman Sherlock Holmes / Cthulhu crossover story, was quite good. I'd be interested in a copy, but it was a Kickstarter project, is out of print, and is selling for $160 and up. I'm not *that* interested in it. Others included a sort of choose-your-own-adventure-esque game called Arabian Knights, and a couple of worker placement games, Stone Age and Alien Frontier. I won't bore you with reviews. They were all worthwhile and we got to meet some new people while we played them.

We decided to stay in the hotel Friday night; there was still an open room on the convention room block so it was a good deal. Not having to drive back to Kenosha helped make it feel like a mini-vacation.

The dealer's room was fun. I looked at some clothing and costuming stuff; one vendor with kilts and boots, one with vintage suits and suit-jackets, and one selling lots of furry garb like ears and tails. All I ended up buying, though, were expansions for Coup and Gloom with a buy one get one half off deal. There was a large selection of board games on a buy one get one table too, but out of the hundred or so, I only recognized a handful. Probably part of why they were on discount.

Once we got back to Kenosha, we kept on in the same vein. We interspersed some productive work with games with my mother and brothers. Just a bit earlier today, my brother and Danae and I finished up the first complete game of Wizards I think I've ever played. It's an early cooperative game, copyright 1982 by Avalon Hill. When I was little, I was fascinated with concept of building the game map yourself out of hexagonal tiles that the players lay out as part of game setup. I really hadn't realized how long it runs though. I thought it would take a couple hours; instead it took about 6 or seven! It's a really fun game, but I don't know that it's fun enough to merit that kind of investment.

Anyway, now that the weekend is done, I'm feeling a little down. I guess it's post-con drop. Oh well; back to the real world tomorrow. I need to make a dental appointment and I can't find my Badgercare card, so that's one of the first things on my agenda....

Current Mood: okay

I guess I'm supposed to post old pictures on Thursday; I fail at throwback.

This is a picture of me that is twelve years old now, from the first convention I ever went to on my own, without my parents. I spent all of Friday and Saturday at Midwest Furfest 2002 being painfully shy, taking photos of fursuiters, and talking to not a single person except for Dana Simpson. She's an artist from whom I bought an original hand-inked comic strip from Ozzie and Mille. When she wrote before the con about the possibility of selling originals, I emailed her ask her to bring a particular strip, which was a huge feat of bravery for me. I have that strip, now framed, on the wall over to my left.

On Sunday, I finally got up the nerve to approach one person whose name I recognized from lurking on Livejournal. Though him, I kind of got started in being an independently social creature in Chicago furry fandom, and from there, a social creature in general. Though the process was a long and slow one.

This fursuiter had servomotors in the ears that let them move into different expressions. I thought that was so awesome. I still do! I don't know who this was; I don't suppose any of my readers do?

At that point in my life, I knew various members of my parents' social circle who I still consider to be friends, but I had not a single friend who I'd met in person on my own. I recognize parts of myself in that person, but I don't know if he'd recognize me.