Worldcon 2019: Day 1
Aug. 20th, 2019 11:21 amMatthias and I got back from Dublin yesterday, having spent six days in the city enjoying our first ever Worldcon! I'm going to take a leaf out of ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
naye's book, and post mini recaps of each day (I'm in awe that she was able to do so while the convention was going on — that's dedication!). I'll list the panels I attended, followed by a few sentences in summary. If you want a more blow by blow, but less in-depth recap, I was tweeting a lot, over at ![[twitter.com profile]](https://p.dreamwidth.org/e0caa790ec10/-/twitter.com/favicon.ico)
ronnidolorosa.
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We arrived in Dublin on the Wednesday before the convention began, picked up our badges and checked into our very swish hotel, before heading off into the centre of town for a little bit of exploring, and to meet two sraffie friends of mine for dinner. Matthias hadn't been to Dublin since he was a toddler, so it was great that he was able to see a little bit of the town before the convention got going.
After that, it was panels, crowds, and so. much. queuing.
I will write the titles, panellists, and panel descriptions in plain text, and my own thoughts in italics.
( Panels on non-western fantasy, Regency SFF, and being a reviewer, and a reading by Ada Palmer )
I was able to meet up withschneefink for coffee (and in person for the first time) in the morning, and we then kept bumping into each other throughout the convention, and I met auroracloud in person for the first time, when we joined each other for the Regency panel and then had a chat over coffee afterwards.
In one of those bizarrely serendipitous moments that kept happening throughout the con, Matthias and I bumped intodoctorskuld and naye while we were grabbing a sandwich. And while we were sitting around on benches outside the convention centre, who should appear but Ada Palmer (along with Jo Walton and several other friends)? Now, by coincidence doctorskuld knows Ada Palmer from back in the day, and the two fell to chatting. This led to all of us being introduced, and being given loads of Terra Ignota swag, including stickers for our respective Hives. (For those of you who have read this series, I am absolutely, emphatically a Cousin, and could be nothing else.) Most amusingly, doctorskuld had been given no cutlery with which to eat lunch, leading to Ada Palmer loaning a pair of reusable steel chopsticks. This led to our quartet (doctorskuld, naye, Matthias and me) dubbing ourselves Team Ada Palmer's Reusable Chopsticks — and a better group of fellow first-time Worldcon attendees I could not have found! (See my Twitter thread about this rather bizarre encounter.)
We gave the chopsticks back after Ada Palmer's reading, and the four of us then went off to have dinner in a tapas place that brewed its own beer, recommended to me by sraffie friends who live in Dublin. After that we went our separate ways, and collapsed into bed, minds buzzing.
naye's book, and post mini recaps of each day (I'm in awe that she was able to do so while the convention was going on — that's dedication!). I'll list the panels I attended, followed by a few sentences in summary. If you want a more blow by blow, but less in-depth recap, I was tweeting a lot, over at We arrived in Dublin on the Wednesday before the convention began, picked up our badges and checked into our very swish hotel, before heading off into the centre of town for a little bit of exploring, and to meet two sraffie friends of mine for dinner. Matthias hadn't been to Dublin since he was a toddler, so it was great that he was able to see a little bit of the town before the convention got going.
After that, it was panels, crowds, and so. much. queuing.
I will write the titles, panellists, and panel descriptions in plain text, and my own thoughts in italics.
( Panels on non-western fantasy, Regency SFF, and being a reviewer, and a reading by Ada Palmer )
I was able to meet up with
schneefink for coffee (and in person for the first time) in the morning, and we then kept bumping into each other throughout the convention, and I met auroracloud in person for the first time, when we joined each other for the Regency panel and then had a chat over coffee afterwards.In one of those bizarrely serendipitous moments that kept happening throughout the con, Matthias and I bumped into
doctorskuld and naye while we were grabbing a sandwich. And while we were sitting around on benches outside the convention centre, who should appear but Ada Palmer (along with Jo Walton and several other friends)? Now, by coincidence doctorskuld knows Ada Palmer from back in the day, and the two fell to chatting. This led to all of us being introduced, and being given loads of Terra Ignota swag, including stickers for our respective Hives. (For those of you who have read this series, I am absolutely, emphatically a Cousin, and could be nothing else.) Most amusingly, doctorskuld had been given no cutlery with which to eat lunch, leading to Ada Palmer loaning a pair of reusable steel chopsticks. This led to our quartet (doctorskuld, naye, Matthias and me) dubbing ourselves Team Ada Palmer's Reusable Chopsticks — and a better group of fellow first-time Worldcon attendees I could not have found! (See my Twitter thread about this rather bizarre encounter.)We gave the chopsticks back after Ada Palmer's reading, and the four of us then went off to have dinner in a tapas place that brewed its own beer, recommended to me by sraffie friends who live in Dublin. After that we went our separate ways, and collapsed into bed, minds buzzing.