Serene of the Oakland Serenes

I suppose I can stop saying I'm new to science-fiction cons now. I've been to three FOGcons, and now a Baycon. I wasn't planning to go; I had planned to go to Wiscon and see many awesome people, but plane fares ended up being prohibitive for me, and hitchhiker asked if I was up for doing Baycon on shortish notice, so I said sure, and we went. hitchhiker and I make pretty good con buddies—similar pace and desire to follow the music, to name a couple of things. It was fun.

Essentially, the whole weekend can be summed up as "hitchhiker and I followed each other around to panels and concerts, drove somewhere to get brunch and dinner every day, and got slightly lost several times a day." When we'd done FOGcon together last time, we found we both liked book panels, author interviews, and anything music-related. This time, we went for broke on all counts, and it worked out great.

That's the short con report. The longer one (or, rather, the rest of a longer one) is below, under the magical courtesy cuts.

( Friday )
( Ramblings about filk from a former filk virgin )
( Saturday )
( Sunday )

In case I haven't said it enough, I had a wonderful, wonderful time. Nearly a perfect weekend, even though I was surrounded by hundreds of strangers for hours at a time. I really think I've finally found a meatspace social setting I can thrive in. This is big for me. Potentially expensive, but big. :-)

A few more random thoughts about this con, and how it compares with FOGcon:

( Things I like better about FOGcon than Baycon, in no special order )
( Things I liked better about Baycon, in no special order )

And then I think the size thing was a wash. I like small social environments, but I also love big crowds (though the noise can get to me after a while) because I can people-watch in relative anonymity, and I can withdraw to my room without anyone (except those I'm traveling with) noticing.

Similarly, the hotel and the location were equally fine with me.

( The once and future swag )