So that was Swancon…
I am still a bit dazed at the fact that I flew across the entire darned continent for a long weekend, to go to a nerdfest, where I knew two people (at the start) and had met maybe two others. That seems weird. Doesn’t it seem weird? Whenever people asked my husband where I was for the weekend, and he explained, their immediate reaction (apparently) was to ask: do people wear capes??
Anyway, it was bloody brilliant. I enjoyed myself immensely… especially once I realised that I could do whatever the heck I liked, that there was very little expected of me and that I didn’t have to wait for permission to go to panels or whatever. That’s a fairly obvious thing, but sometimes I still get caught up in trying to please others when that’s not necessary, or being scared to do something a bit different. Hello!! It’s a nerdfest!!
Anyway#2 – I took copious notes, as is my wont; partly for my own sake, partly for my husband, and partly so as not to fall asleep during panels after too many late nights. Don’t worry, I don’t plan on putting it all online…
Thursday
I actually quite enjoyed my flight. The shuttle ride not to much – I was the last to be dropped off, and was getting quite impatient towards the end (why, I dunno; no one was expecting me!). The hotel had my name wrong, which led to a near-heart attack thinking I didn’t have a room (how would I host room parties?? was my first thought). It was very, very funny seeing the TARDIS in the foyer.
Went for a walk around Northbridge – scoped out potential places to run – it’s a lot like Richmond, I decided, with its proximity to the city (closer than Richmond, actually), and preponderance of Asian stores and restaurants.
Girliecon was in my room that night – Alisa’s scheme for getting all the best people in the one room at the same time. Of course, my room was tiny, but we still managed to fit about 30 people in there that night. With pink drinks and everything! A magnificent time was had – by me, anyway – got to meet Kathryn (finally!), and Dirk and Tehani; catch up with Ben and of course the inimitable Alisa… and a whole bunch of other people, too (sorry, all the parties are blurring together in my brain…). I think I even kicked out the Special Esteemed International Guest of Honour, Rob, when I made everyone leave at about 11pm because my body said it was 1am and wasn’t that time for sleep?
Back from the insanity…
and sleep-deprived place that is Swancon. Wahey! What fun. So much to say… but not right now. Because right now, much to the amusement of my friends at said con, I am about to spend a day at another conference! This one is on Feasting in the (ancient) Aegean. And I doubt there will be room-parties – not like mine, anyway. (And I won’t know, because even if there were, I think my body would break if I asked it to do another late night.)
However, if you’re interested, I am doing an online forum thingy tomorrow night, on my experiences at the con, for a dear friend of mine: it will be happening on RedBubble. I have no idea who will bother tuning in to ask questions, but if you want to come and be provocative you’ll have to sign up to RedBubble first (which doesn’t cost, and doesn’t spam, if you’re interested).
So much more to come… just not right now.
First race-type thing
Melbourne City Sports with the YMCA ran the Super Sunset Series this year, and I think for a few years before. The first was at the zoo – walking distance from here, but only two or so weeks after I started running. The second was at Princes Park, also walking distance, but I didn’t find out about it. Last night it was the Tan – around the Botanic Gardens – not quite walking distance (about 8km) but I did it anyway.
I did the 8km run, which is twice around – twice up a truly ball-breaking hill. I finished in about 54 minutes, which wasn’t last; I’m quite happy to have done 6 minute ks. It also included the furthest I’ve ever run in one stint to date (without a walking rest), so I’m happy with that.
I was fairly stuffed afterwards, though – especially since I decided on a whim to ‘sprint’ the last 20 or so metres – where sprinting is relative after 8km, of course, for me at least. But my love was there to congratulate me, which was wonderful, and to ride home with me in the gloaming, which was fortunate. So I rode 17km or so as well as the 8km run! Which explains why I am still in bed, on my day off, rather than out running before the day turns to high 30s and I become mush. No – I’ve declared today a rest day. So I can feel smug without groaning too much from sore muscles.
Semi-gratuitous post
… because I am utterly, utterly astonished at being nominated for the Ditmars!
I was going to mention which ones, but… I think I won’t. This is partly because it really would be gratuitous, but also for a small amount of anonymity to be retained here. I don’t imagine my students would find this – I’ve never said where my school is, and there’s nothing here to link me to my name (yet) – but still, I feel more comfortable knowing they can’t randomly google me and find this! So, I must say that since I’ve read most of the stuff nominated this year (except a couple of the novels… oops), I think it’s a strong list!
I was going to post the list here, too, but… that would come close to defeating the anonymity principle.
Amazing
The back story:
I experienced asthma as a kid, although never badly; it seemed to disappear in my teens. When I moved to Melbourne, I got wheezy in winter when I got the sniffles. Then, about 5 years ago, it came back with a vengeance: one time I didn’t think I’d make it from uni to home. That was, oh, about 300m. Maybe 500. Anyway, it was scary, and I’ve since got paranoid about carrying ventolin (my husband would say not paranoid enough).
The actual story:
Last night we were at a BBQ at a friend’s place around the corner (literally; we cross no roads to get there. So cool). We left just as the Aussies were coming on to bat in the Twenty20 match.* I jogged home – in my thongs – knowing that I would regret doing so, because a month ago that would have had me reaching for the ventolin when I got back.
No ventolin! No wheezing! Lungs acting like they ought, instead of trying to murder their owner! This is pretty small stuff, I know, but I am so excited. It must be because of the jogging I’ve done over the last few weeks – this is an unexpected, and quite wonderful, side effect.
* BORING. What and average game that was!
Fuzzy little yellow balls
or,
When Too Much Tennis just Isn’t Enough
Ah, sport. The two sports I claim to prove that I’m not entirely a bookworm who never comes out of a book are tennis and cricket, on which – it being summer – I have been able to glut recently.
I am, though, not a true fan.
My brother will watch any cricket game he can possibly get close to; probably even U12s. My mother will stay up til the wee smalls to watch tennis. Me, I watch cricket when Australia is playing – impossibly jingoistic, I know, but there you have it (I do at least enjoy the five-day form, and am not simply a 50-over slut). The tennis I primarily watch is what we just had over the last fortnight.*
A few years ago, Mum suddenly realised that I lived in Melbourne, and there’s tennis in Melbourne! So we’ve started a tradition of her coming over for three days of tennis – we get tix to a stadium each day, and decide on the day who we’re going to watch and if we can bothered slumming it with the plebs on the outer courts (answer: yes, if there’s an Aussie who promises to put up a fight, and it doesn’t clash with someone awesome in our stadium). (And when I was in the UK last year, she still came over for the tennis, and had a jolly fine time without me.)
We went for three days in the first week, and saw some pretty good matches. The two that stand out were Dellaqua beating Schnyder – very exciting – and Luczak taking it to Nalbandian; didn’t leave the place until 8pm that evening, because it went to four fairly long sets. We saw a couple of other Aussies, as well as some games where one person was just getting smacked around the place. Didn’t see any doubles at all for the whole Open, which I was a bit sad about – I love watching them up at the net.
As for this past week – I was so glad Federer** beat Tipsarevic, because we saw him playing an Aussie (Siriani) on a show court and he was being really snooty. I was also the only person (out of four) barracking for Djokovic last night; I think he’s pretty cool (saw him beat a poor Italian man, in the second round). Sharapova looked gratifyingly excited and amazed when she won, of which I approve.
And now, I go back to watching basically tennis for the next 11.5 months – not having cable tv – and, today at least, I think of my brother and mother both at the fifth day of the test.
* That said, when I was at college I got up after only a few hours of sleep and watch the Poo and then Rafter in consecutive semis, which they both won – it was the US Open, I think? in 1998. And then went to inter-college rowing all day… ah, fun times.
** I remember the first time I saw Federer on the tv. I misread his name, and thought it said Fedora; ever since then he has been Johnny Fedora to me, thanks to a Golden Book (remember them?) I loved as a kid, about two hats: Johnny Fedora and Alice Blue Bonnet. That story had it all: romance, adventure, tragedy, a happy ending….
DOA; or, How to Watch Unexpected Movies
Oh. My. Goodness.
When out shopping today, I decided to act on impulse and visit JB to finally buy The Mummy, because I only have this taped off TV. I expected that I would be able to get it as a double with The Mummy Returns, which I was fine with. Turned out that I could only get it as a trilogy, with The Scorpion King. OK, I figured – haven’t seen the latter, I’ll deal with it; it was $4 more than The Mummy by itself. Plus, it was 20% off all DVDs, which was even better. For that reason, we had a look around the store for anything else that caught our eye, which is how we ended up with the Blade trilogy as well. Then, on the way out, my darling saw the stall where they have the multiple-movies-in-one-case. There was one with The Mummy, The Mummy Returns, Scorpion King, Van Helsing (I can’t believe we didn’t already own this!) and The Hulk (meh): back went the trilogy I’d picked up, because this 5-set cost less than it did! And while we were there, we got a second: Doom (not seen… not sure), Pitch Black (love it; love Claudia Black!), Chonicles of Riddick (same; plus Judi Dench in such a cool, out-there role), Serenity (do already have it, but you know – it’s Serenity!)… and DOA.
I’d never heard of DOA: Dead or Alive, and my question is this: did it ever appear in Australian cinemas? Because it’s the sort of thing I certainly would have thought about going to see, although perhaps not busting a gut to get to; but I’d never heard of it before I saw it on this DVD cover. And heck, it has Holly Valance in it! Clearly, it was going to be (as my love says) qualitah.
What it turned out to be was a fairly cool 75 minutes of fun fighting choreography. There is a plot in there – somewhere – but it was fairly transparent, not to mention flimsy, and in many ways was essentially facilitating bikini-clad women fighting either blokes who knew not what hit them, or each other. It really was very cool choreography, though, and there was barely a 5-minute block without a fight scene. And Holly Valance’s opening scene had me in absolute hysterics; never has a woman putting on a bra been quite so hilarious. I’m not sure I’ll watch it again – except maybe with friends who will appreciate the gloriously insane and kitsch nature of the film – but it’s definitely one to loan out and wait for the reaction from.
On women being published and such
So a friend of mine started a ginormous interwebs feud the other day, discussing the lack of women being published in speculative fiction. A lot of people responded; some very well, others (mostly men) extremely poorly. There was mud-flinging and name-calling and misrepresentations… all very interesting.
In response, and to get her own thoughts on the subject very clear and mused-through, the wonderful Tansy has linked to the debates and offered a coherent, sustained, and fascinating take on the whole topic. Sans mud-slinging!
Cyclones
My bro lives in Darwin. Bad sister that I am, I had no idea that there was a cyclone anywhere near him – as this shows. (Innit cool? I love BOM.) Of course, a cyclone isn’t something that was going to panic him, for numerous reasons – he’s a boy who doesn’t like to show emotion, we lived through one as kids as well as a number of warnings. His unit would have been fine to see it through should it actually have got closer to Darwin, with just one problem – they’re very close to the sea, and hence the flood zone. But it’s Darwin, and there are lots of contingencies: houses are built cyclone-coded, which means most have a suitable shelter, and if you’re really worried there are lots of public places – like schools – you can shelter in.
Anyway – it’s gone south of Darwin, and drenched Adelaide River – which is funny only because Adelaide River is where the panickers generally head when there’s a cyclone alert. It’s now just a low, but the problem will be if it manages to hit the coast again and either turns around or crosses the Qld coast. Not that it can pick up that much strength in such a short stretch of water, but you never know.
Randomly Yours, Alex 