The Drink Tank 025 (2005).pdf

The Drink Tank

So, this is the irst big post BayCon issue. I’m excitied. I’ve got my 3.5K words review

this time, plus Frank Wu weighs in, and a bunch of great stuff overall from the best

damn BayCon ever! This issue will pretty much be all BayCon, so if you have no interest,

you might want to skip it. Next week will be other folks’ view of the event. If you’re still

with me, sally forth, gentle readers, sally forth. Photos are by Danny Low in the review.

BayCon: What’s With The

Purple Fez?

I’m exhausted. To

the depth of my bones, I am

far more tired than I’ve ever

been, and I’ve played in last

man standing poker games.

Usually, I’m tired and it’s an

exhaustion that lasts until

the beginning of July, when

it’s time for WesterCon.

BayCon, the convention

that I’ve always identiied

as my home convention,

chose to have me as their

Toastmaster this year. I’ve

never felt anywhere near

this honoured in my life.

I showed up on Friday

morning ready to work (Toastmaster is a real working job) and got into my room where it

instantly hit me: I’m terriied.

I’ve done dozens of events where I have to talk in front of a great many people

(sometimes up to a few thousand) and it rarely frightens me. I realized that the folks who

would be seeing me perform at BayCon were far more important to me than any other

audience I’ve worked in front of, and so I was terriied beyond belief. Arriving and getting

checked in, there were a few things I needed to do, like put out issues of Nth Degree and

special low-rent versions of Claims

Department. We then headed for food at

the centrally located Coffee Garden.

Anyone who hasn’t been to the

DoubleTree San Jose might not know

that it’s just about the perfect hotel for

a convention. The small programming

rooms are on the South side, all on the

same level right where the Fan Tables

are. There’s ample bathroomage right

there, too. As to head towards the

Dealer Room and Art Show, there’s the

Kitty (BayCon 06 Chair), Jay Lake and Frank Wu

Issue Two Bits

“wow, you really do a fanzine. how quaint.” neil zawacki

Kevin Roche, Andy Trembley and ME!

The Very Table We Ate At

were the folks I see every year, like Schwa and Ralph Lacy, and there was a nice surprise.

In 1990, my pal Scott Moore was working the Green Room at Timecon, a ifteen-years dead

con that focused on SF media. He had recruited my pal Andy to work with him, but Andy

ended up being unable to come. I, without permission from my Mom, agreed to take his

place and work the Green Room. This was the only time I ever served on staff of a con, but

it was also the irst con I had attended since my Pops had stopped taking me with the 1984

WorldCon. Scott and I had a little time to catch up (we hadn’t spoken for at least twelve

years) and he was working the Green Room again, which was a nice recall to the olde days.

At that point, I met up with Jay Lake, who was wearing a purple fez, and Ruth

Nestvold, who was also wearing a purple fez. Frank Wu showed up, complete with Purple

Fez, as did Andy Trembley and Kevin Roche, the fan guests, wearing a pair of purple fezzes.

I was presented with a purple fez and told that it was Jay’s idea and a few of his local

friends had actually gone about making them from purple carpet material. My head was

much bigger than most, but they had made an extra just in case a giant of some form had

become a GoH. I began wearing my fez all over and everyone kept asking “what’s up with

the fez?” I always delected the question.

After dinner, I headed upstairs and got changed. The theme of the BayCon was The

Con You Can’t Refuse, which was a Godfather theme. I decided that I’d go with a classic

Mob look: Black Suit, Black shirt and white tie. I headed to the Meet The Guests. Meet

large Coffee Garden with it’s standard food and average

service, but it’s the prefect place to sit and wait for friends

to walk by. On the second loor is the large ballroom which

is often partitioned off into smaller room, but still manage

to have excellent sound separation from one another. They

use it as one big ballroom for Meet the Guests and the

Masquarade. There’s a small elevator right there next to

the Ballroom, which is convenient for those ever-growing

number of fen who rely on Rascals to get around cons. The

set-up is just about perfect, and the hotel knows us fans

too, so we have a lot of leeway.

There was a theme to Friday night for me: running

into folks from good ole Santa Clara High School. There

The Guests is very

different on the West

Coast than the Meet

the Pros events are

Back East. Basically,

a lot (500 or so) of the

attendees gather in a

room where there is

a light buffet of fruit

and the like, followed

by the Chairman

giving a few words

and then the Guests

of Honour introducing

themselves and having

a bit of fun. I got to be

the head guy in charge

of the event, and I

The Whacking of Don Michael Saladi, led by Godfather Wu

did a pretty good job. I cracked a few jokes, which

actually managed to get over with the crowd. I got a

few good laughs for a Sonny Corleone at the tollbooth

gag. I said that the folks on the dais were the

members of the Loyal Order of the Blinking Purple

Fez and then introed Andy and Kevin with their

large martini glasses. The pair had been “married”

in a wedding-like event on Thursday and the entire

con was more or less a giant reception for the two of

them.

Prior to the con, there had been a lot of

discussion of BayCon having a lack of star power.

None of the guests were overly well-known to fandom

at large. Jay, my twin brother from a different

mother (who I met and

she’s a lovely woman),

won the Campbell

last year but is still

kinda a rookie at the

Con GoH thing. Andy

and Kevin have been

all over the place and

are probably the best-

known costumers in

these parts. They also

throw the Evil Geniuses

Parties, which are ever

growing in popularity

around the country.

Frank is easily the most

popular guy out of the ive of us. Me? Well, I’m fairly certain

that I was invited because they thought I would do a halfway

decent job. Still, previous years had folks like Rudy Rucker,

John Shirley, Karen Anderson, and many more, but this

year a lot of that was missing. Meet the Guests served a very

important purpose: to prove that we were going to provide a

good time for everyone.

And we were damn entertaining.

Kevin and Andy got some laughs. Jay did one of his ‘Gimme a word and I’ll give you

a story’ bits to the words Aardvark and Heartburn. Frank, ever the schemer, handed out

a toy gun to each of us and we ‘whacked’ chairman, and Con Don, Michael Saladi. That

got a good reaction and was followed up by a performance from the lovely Chase Masterson

of DS9. The entire thing went great and led into the Swing Dancing and Charity Casino.

Jason Schachat and I have a long standing tradition of playing Blackjack with our

favourite dealer Vikki. Jay and Frank ended up joining us and we were rocking. When we

heard that we only had a few more hands, Jay started doubling up his winnings, letting

it ride ive hands in a row. That, combined with me and Jason playing big amounts,

ended up breaking the bank for the third year in a row. For every 25 fake dollars, you

got a ticket. Jason got 58, I had 93 and Jay had 348. We got to enter these in various

drawings and Jay ended up with a Frank Lurz painting while Jason got one of Jay’s books

and another painting and I got bupkiss. This year’s casino was better attended than last

I asked Frank Wu for a Special Message and

Here is His Response...

A Message about the con?

Hmmm....

Baycon was a blast. The staff treated

us all like royalty, kudos especially

to Michael Siladi, Elisa Sheets, Tycho,

Gary Bell, and everybody else. Kelly

Beuhler and Daniel Spector made fezzes

for the GOHs to wear, and then

the next day people went home and got

their own fezzes, eliciting the question

from puzzled congoers, “What’s up with

all the fezzes?” Maybe they felt like the

scientists who forgot to bring their ducks

in that Farside cartoon.

Another highlight for me was the

masquerade, starring two Toho giant

monsters. One was a weird cyborg-

rat-thing and one was Gezora, the

giant squid from “Yog, Monster from

Space” (a monster movie that features

several giant monsters, none of which

are named Yog). They started their

presentation howling and stomping like

giant monsters, and suddenly went into

the “Spongebob Squarepants” theme

and started dancing around. It was

hilarious, funniest thing I’ve seen in a

long time.

All in all, a fabulous, fabulous time!

Chase Belts A Keely Smith Tune

year’s, but still not as wonderful as the year before that when my crew ended up pulling in

tons of (fake) money and making a general fool of ourselves.

Saturday came around and, since I wasn’t on any panels until 2:30, I worked

around the various events. The irst panel I went to was one that I usually moderate called “Five

Dollars, A Time Machine, and a Dead Fish.” The panelists were writers Berry Kercheval and Madeleine

Robins, philosophy prof and wanna-be writer Martin Young, and gadly/Comic Book expert Tom Galloway.

I’ve done this one with Martin and Tom before, so it was a seasoned panel. I spoke up a fair bit, with strange

bits and pieces of concepts for how one might use a Dead Fish and ive bucks to change history. The audience

threw great questions of comedy at the panel and they answered in kind. Martin Young uttered the phrase

“Do dinosaurs have vomit relexes?” He also introduced us to a lovely young blonde physics professor who

asked the question, “What about ive dollars, a time machine and vous? Who would you want to take with

you through time?” to which Tom said “Well, for that question, I’m willing to answer you.” To which she

Masquarade Best In Show

responded “If you have a time machine, it’s a date.” Tom then

took off his watch and said “Here it is, it puts us forward at the

rate of one hour per hour.” This brought huge laughs and the two

did end up having lunch together. It ended with someone pointing

out that Hitler should have gone into fashion design (Welcome to

Hitler’s of Berlin, coming soon to Paris, London, Prague, Warsaw

and Vienna) and the possibility that Hitler would have gone to be a

star and that Pablo Picasso might have been the one to become the

maniac, which led to declare “The Spanish Reich will reign for a

thousand years!” That’s what closed the panel.

I spent the next hour and a half watching the in-room TV

network. They showed fan ilms (including The Chick Magnet,

various Dr. Who fan ilms, and Mystery Science Theatres by

my pals in Berkley) and various old movies (Invasion of the

Flying Saucers, The Day The Earth Stood Still and Starcrash)

plus interviews with the guests and the masquerade and other

BayCon events. I got prepared for the strangest panel of all, The

Rememberances of MonkeyCons Past.

Jay had the idea for Frank, Me, Nick Mamatas and himself to do a panel talking about a con that didn’t

exist. With my years of ComdeySportz training, I was completely ready to do this one. We got a little randy

(Nick made some great references to ‘piggy-back rides’ which were kinda darque) and I even made Jay sing the

MonkeyCon National Anthem. This was a strange panel, but we got the room laughing. At times, it seemed

that we were more interested in making each other laugh than the audience, which actually made the audience

laugh harder than if we were playing to them. I also got to do the one joke I had been holding on to for a while

which referred to my pal Jason as “Six time MonkeyCon Mini-Golf Masters Champion, Jennifer…I mean Jason

Schachat. You look great and I’m glad to see that the surgery was a complete success.” Jay kept calling Jason

Jennifer for the entire con.

I spent the rest of the day getting ready for MCing the

Masquarade. I was terriied on this one, because I had been

told that there were lot’s of Gaelic names to pronounce. Why

bother having a written language if you only pronounce half

the letters? I got things ready, met with the people with the

great costumes and made sure I had everything right. Once

things started, I went into my ‘Hey, I’m announcing’ voice and

everything went just about perfect…save for my announcing

Entrant 11 as Ave (rhymes with gave) instead of Ave (rhymes

with Agave, the stuff you make tequila with). I made a few

jokes, and introed Chase Masterson, who sang some standards

Maya: The Unbelievably Cute Mermaid

and then she came and sat on my lap for a moment during one of her songs. I

was speechless, and did the ‘hummana-hummana’ thing. The end of the night

was hitting the parties, which were great. BASFA, the club that Frank Wu

oficially paid my membership into, had a great party with amazing food.

Sunday started with Gen and The Little One coming and picking up

my car. I had an 11:30 panel that I was excited to see. My long-time pal Neil

Zawacki, the author of How To Be A Villain, was there with my friend Deirdre

and writer Edward Muller did a panel on Villainy for Fun and Proit. This was

slow starting, as this was only Neil’s third panel and he was moderating. Things

got rolling once someone asked for the panel to discuss the pros and cons of

a mechanical exoskeleton to allow you to roll over the masses on the way to

conquering the world. Discussions ran from the need for a great lair to the

reasons to blow-up the Earth (mineral rights, since all the good stuff is in the

centre of the Earth, much like a Twinkie) and who folks would like to have as

evil minions. It was a funny little panel and Neil did a good job.

I then did a panel on the History of Computing with Steve Savitsky,

Phillip Gust, Brett Glass, Barry Kercheval and Brit Justin Lloyd. This was

basically us going over our experiences and talking about weird moments. We

basically decided that the old days were fun with all the required tinkering, but

now you can actually get things done. It was sparsely attended, mostly due to

two other science panels (one on Spintronics with Kevin Roche), plus the Art

Show tour with Frank Wu and Jay Lake doing a reading with Ruth. Not an easy

time slot.

For my second lightly attended panel, Kathryn Daugherty and I did

Fanzine in an Hour. The top opposing programme items were the Charity Auction, Sex Toys of the Future

(which Alison Lonsdale illed me in on at the Conjecture fan table afterwards), plus there aren’t a lot of fanzine

fans around BayCon because there’s not a lot of fanzine programming. We had four people other than me and

Kathryn. I’ve decided that I’m going to try and run a fanzine lounge at BayCon next year and try and wrangle

up some fanzine programming. Basically, Kathryn did a lot of work on inDesign while I basically held court

talking with folks about the history of fanzines, the basics that you had to know about fanzine fandom and

other fun little topics. We introduced concepts like Carl Brandon, explained the Fan Funds, talked about zines

that everyone should try and get a hold of and so on. We ended up putting out BLT: The BayCon Literaryish

Thingie. It’s a brief little read and it’s a bit of fun and I’d love to try this again, but this time get a few more

people and a couple of more computers.

I needed a break and headed up to the room to shower and rest. I was originally asked to be on Frank

Wu’s Art Slide Show, but they had taken me off and not told Frank. I felt bad about missing his slide show, but

I needed the break. At 5:30, I had a panel on making The Chick Magnet, but we didn’t have a projector, so me

and Jason just talked about making it and about fan ilms in general. Spike Parsons and Tom Becker attended,

which was a surprise. We basically went through the motions and ended after forty or so minutes.

That night was a light one. Gen and Evelyn came by and we did a pass through the Dealers Room and

then up to the room to get some room service and watch my interview on the TV network. Evelyn was having a

rough time getting to sleep, but we got her down eventually. After she nodded off, we headed down to the party

loor and walked around a bit. I had a good time chatting folks up about this and that and delecting more and

more questions about the purple fez. When we got back, Gen was watching Death on the Nile. We settled in

and dozed as we watched it. I fell all the way asleep before I found out who the murderer was, though since it’s

Agatha Christy, I assume it was everybody.

Monday is always a day when I have a lot of panels. I was on from 11:30 until the closing ceremony.

Kathryn Daugherty and I did the Food Panel that we do every year. We basically talked about food and the

future of food. I had read a lot of research into generation ships and the food requirements before we did the

same type of panel with Richard Foss at Con Jose in 2002. The requirements are roughly 2 sqkm per 1000

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