The winner of the 2023 bid will be officially announced Saturday
morning. But it may leak out the previous evening. It's sure to be
China unless nearly everyone at the con votes, which is unlikely.
I went to the Heinlein Society meetup. Or rather, the Heinlein
Society meetup came to me. I was sitting in the Ambassador ballroom,
as that was the only place eating was allowed, as it's very large and
well ventilated. As I was eating, Peter Glaskowsky, whom I've known
for 35 years, but hadn't seen for perhaps a decade, recognized me and
sat down to chat. After a while, someone who knew the meetup was
scheduled for somewhere in that immense room saw Peter, and knowing he
was a member of the Heinlein Society, sat down with us. More members
sat down until there were at least 30 people, including Joe Haldeman.
There was also a professional film crew who were making a documentary
about Heinlein.
The Heinlein Society also held a party in a sleeping room starting
at 6 pm, earlier than any other party. I tried going to it, but it
was crowded, in a small room, and literally nobody was wearing a
mask, so I left. Later I ran into Perianne Lurie, whom I know is
an epidemiologist, and I asked her just how dangerous that would be.
She said very dangerous, and went to report it to the concom, even
after I pointed out to her that the party wasn't part of the con
hence wasn't bound by its rules, and that I didn't want to make
trouble for anyone.
One of the dealers was asking people if they knew where the various
parties were and when they'd begin. I told him that there's a party
board, and I would show it to him if he would lead me to it. He said
that made no sense. I explained that it was right outside the dealer
room, which I still couldn't consistently find. Being a dealer, he
presumably knew where the dealer room was. But no, and the maps
made no sense. We finally found someone who knew where it was. The
hotel's layout is *very* confusing. At least the party board was
indeed right outside the dealer room, which was then closed. That's
better than the previous day, when the party board was inside the
locked dealer room.
Metro ran relatively smoothly, but being Metro of course *something*
had to go wrong. The card I was using the previous day, which had
more than $20 value on it, suddenly stopped working. The station
attendant checked it with his machine, and said it had been reported
as missing, which makes no sense. So I had do buy a new card. New
cards cost $2 in addition to the value on them. What a ripoff.
--
Keith F. Lynch -
http://keithlynch.net/
Please see
http://keithlynch.net/email.html before emailing me.
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