Thursday, August 06, 2009

Consider the damn bottle moved!

That's my WorldCon quote of the day from Neil Gaiman. Trust me, it was really, really funny.

Let's see, con-wise today the successes for me were:
1. Ningen-Senkan Sensuikan (aka human battleship)-- think of a cross between battleship and wizard's chess with blindfolds and lots of laughter
The weapons of the battleships--
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The "battleships" is process:
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2. "Ask Neil (Gaiman) a Question" which was a really nice panel, but then again with Neil along anything's fun, right?
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3. Conversation: Paul Krugman (Nobel Prize for Economics in 2008) and Charles Stross

Ok/fine:
1. "Evolution of Storytelling Values in Graphic Novels" mostly because I don't really get them. It was relatively interesting sans French advertising (if you were there, you know, if you weren't it doesn't really matter).
2. "That was the Noughties" -- discussion of hte best books of the first decade of the 21st century
3. Opening ceremonies

Waste of time:
1. "Handicapping the Hugos"

Wanna see how cool the conference center is again? Here's it from the outside on the front--
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And the pretty fountain in its square--
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Other quotes of the day:
Neil Gaiman -- "Terry [Pratchett] could say to me: 'I'll tell you that if you do this to that paragraph you'll make it 17% funnier.'"

Neil Gaiman on what he and Terry were thinking when Good Omens was getting ready for release: "We thought we'd have to hunt up Salman Rushdie and see if we could borrow his back bedroom. .... But what we got was nominations for religious fiction awards."

Neil Gaiman when asked what else he'd like to create: "I'd like to create a haunted house" -- can you just imagine the haunted house he'd create???

Charles Stross-- "It's well known that the first use of any successful technology is pornography."

Charles Stross -- "Back before the internet we had a special term for people who would buy one copy of a book and allow all their friends to read it. We called them 'librarians.'"

Paul Krugman -- "In the U.S. today there are fewer farmers than there are people playing World of Warcraft."

2 comments:

Carolyn NC said...

Looks like you're learning and having fun at the same time. What a gorgeous building!

Unknown said...

You're not on Voodoo Message Board, so I'm not sure how to get hold of you. Dani and I are meeting up at my hotel (Embassy Suites) for stitching after "dinner". 8? 9? Whenever.