LibertyCon 2018 AAR

It's interesting how space shapes human interactions. For example, take 750 people, at least 500 of whom are introverts, and put them in a hotel designed in Modern Hotel Awful with small rooms, a sparse cluster of uncomfortable chairs put in the center of the lobby, and a convention center designed on Big And Open For Huge Masses Of  People... and watch 500 people try to find a corner. And not be able to. Corners were not only at a high premium, the design of all niches and private rooms was so small that any group or gathering of introverts promptly felt overcrowded and had to explode out into the open spaces.

The con, as a result, had a rather frenetic feeling to it, and conversations were rushed, hurried, and half-done when people had to move on. There were no good areas other than where the smokers' roost outside to just sit and chat, but we made do. Also, the usual problems that come with ignoring tens of thousands of years of ergonomic design and making everything including shower faucets sharp-angled and rectangular... I'm still finding bruises from all the sharp-cornered things I encountered.

That said, the people themselves were definitely the reason I was there, not the hotel. And the people were awesome. We made the decision not to plan this year out, but go with the flow... except for two author dinners, a wedding reception, and a Christening. And the panels Peter and I were on. Which ends up being pretty scheduled anyway, but... I felt no guilt or "I gotta be there!" about missing panels, and indeed barely made it to any at all. But I found a lot of people, got and gave a lot of hugs, met a lot more people, learned a few things, had really interesting conversations, promised to go to the Tennessee Valley Interstellar Workshop next year. (Seriously. When you find yourself in a conversion with Douglas Loss and Les Johnson, and they say we should go? We should go!)

And Peter had a nice chat with another author about collaborating on a book. More on that later...

Minor personal notes: a year of weightlifting has paid off. Not just in the ability to walk all this without a cane, but also when a nurse friend waves at my torso and says "Your spinal curvature is so much better! Your carriage has improved!" Thanks, Amanda.

And I got a delivery from ACME, via an awesome minotaur courier. Given the first thing I saw him deliver, several cons ago, was a pair of fuzzy pink handcuffs to Sarah Hoyt (very long story, hilarious, but required knowing the jokes her fans were making), I was expecting something off the wall and hilarious. Peter got a book on medieval torture, which made for a lot of laughter. Ian got a bag of 3/8" nuts marked for "quarternutitis", and then had to explain why he was so utterly delighted - the story is best described here: https://thelawdogfiles.blogspot.com/2007/04/its-dead-jim_25.html
So I was a little worried when I opened mine at what I'd find... and found a bottle of Hennessy. Either I'm hard to get joke gifts for, or someone really likes me!

It did not survive the night unopened. :-)

And best of all, what really made our whole con? Was when this nice couple told us that when they'd come to our indie workshop several LibertyCons ago, we told them they ought to go ahead and publish... what did they have to lose?
They did, and they've sold over 17,000 books since then, and it's really helped their income and life.

That right there makes everything worth it.