(That title sounded cleverer in my head. In any case…!)
I’ve never written a con summary before, so this may meander a bit.
Friday
After a bus ride across the aisle from two people who were still young enough to know everything and were telling each other about it[1], I got into Montreal on Friday and checked into the Hotel Victor. It was not the con hotel, but it was very affordable (small, slightly shabby, aggressively clean (which I do not mind in the slightest), decent WiFi connection, and a fourth-floor room in a hotel with no elevator) and only two halves of a block away. Due to both a very helpful posted schedule and regular smartphone communication, managed to find my way to where people were hanging out–juliette & chocolat, which I really do need to go back to. Ran into the friend I knew who’d told me about the con in the first place, who introduced me to the very cool family she was sitting with, and made sure I got my con badge and got over my “oh my god, room full of people much cooler than me” jitters.
Anyway. Wandered gently over to the Maison Kam Fung restaurant after a couple of hours, still talking to people. It turned from what I think is fairly common getting-to-know-you party talk[2] to a very connish conversation; a lot of turning to cultural touchstones, a lot of discussion of things read or seen and the occasional naming of the elusive. (You know the kind of thing. “Have you seen… Oh, drat, this British series I’ve been meaning to watch. It’s got a cop or a reporter and there’s something about a cover-up and nuclear power…” “Edge of Darkness?” “Yes! Thank you!”)
Amusingly enough, that was at the same restaurant I went to for Dim Sum brunch when I was in Montreal for the 2009 WorldCon. The food was amazing; a little slow to come, but once it got started, it was very good and there was tons. Conversation continued for a while, in that weird way that makes the world seem much smaller (“I think I know you from somewhere?” >comparing of notes< "Oh, okay, I once showed up to your friend's wife's birthday down in the Southern US."). I ran into another friend, and we wandered over to a different juliette & chocolat (there are three) to talk for a bit.
Went back to my room, got the connection working properly, and finally went to sleep just before 2 a.m. It is very hard to fully internalize it’s time to sleep when Angus is not headbutting my shoulder and purring at me. He has a bedtime routine.
I am close to falling over now–have not slept well recently–so will probably do Saturday and Sunday in a bit.
—
[1] You know that age at which you’re comfortable announcing that you don’t believe that anybody in Africa uses file-sharing torrents, that French is not spoken anyplace except in Quebec, and that obviously Swift’s “A Modest Proposal” makes no sense because “but, like, conservation of mass! Babies don’t just come outta nowhere, you know!”? Yes. That age.
…actually, to be fair, all of that came from one of the two.
[2] Don’t ask me how long it’s been since I had a light social conversation with a stranger at a party. The memories are hazy. But they match up with the “Where are you from?” “How do you know X?” “Heh, I feel awkward” thread of what I do remember. Although there was a side-order of “Is that pendant/necklace/pair of earrings by Elise? What’s its name?” which rather helped. I was wearing a couple of her pieces and since putting up that link I went to browse and oh my goodness do I ever want How To Summon A Superhero. However. “Wish in one hand, spit in the other, see which one fills up first” and all that.
(The photos really don’t do them justice.)