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walbournPanel Idea - "Why the hell do I keep coming to these things anyway?"
Spent the weekend at OryCon down in Portland. It was a bit off but otherwise a relaxing and social weekend. Normally I share a room with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
loree, but she was on on-call this weekend and couldn't attend. I stayed with jeliza, rubylou, and drakemonger instead, which was nice and social. The pattern of my Sci-Fi Convention experience for the past few years has basically become "drive X hours, stay in a hotel for the weekend, and hang out with the same 8-12 people I know from Seattle."
I'm getting pretty burned on the convention scene generally. I'm not really into the gaming, unless I'm going to a specific gaming convention and even then I'm reaching the end of my interest in the RPGA with recent shifts in the focus. The programming has been steadily less engaging to me as well. I looked through the entire programming guide Friday night, and found exactly one panel of real interest and even that I blew off by the time Sunday noon rolled around. I used to really like the dances, but it takes a certain level of energy to really make it work for me, and I've been disappointed the past few Norwescon years. My interest in costuming pretty much ran its course back in my SCA days. The art show and dealers room are fun to browse, but nothing that I feel like spending money on. As lovely asvixyish singing is to listen to, filk has never really been that much of a calling for me. I'm not really an 'aspiring writer' nor am I that keen on autograph collection. All that combined with my growing impatience with fandom generally, broken elevators, over-burdened service, and particular personality archetypes at these conventions.
At this point it feels like I should either get off my butt and actually get involved with the programming at the next convention, or I should consider just not going and finding other ways to hang out with my otherwise very busy friends.
On a more positive note, it was great to visit withrubylou, drakemonger, and others I only really see at cons or parties. I also had lunch with tara_firma who recently moved to Portland, and it was great to get a chance to visit. Browsed Powell's City of Books and more important the technical book branch store. They had a sale on math books, and while I didn't buy any or frankly even really understand half of them, I always enjoying browsing such things. Titles like "Hankel Operators and Their Applications", "Foundations of Hyperbolic Manifolds", and "Grobner Deformations of Hypergeometric Differential Equations" fascinate me. Read some prefaces and flipped through a number of them, but really I don't have any justified reason to actually digest that kind of material at this point in my career. Plenty of other things more practical I should be focused on anyhow.
Part of my attitude is colored by being in a bit of odd mood. Work is a bit uncertain and rough at the moment, although with the holidays growing close there will be extensive downtime to relax. Last Monday would have beenappleang's and I thirteenth anniversary. Instead I've been living alone the last 8 years and 10 months. This December will be the ten year mark since Kim gave up on us and drove off with What's-His-Face. I generally I'm not really all that angsty and I'm looking forward to the holiday trip back to Texas, but I feel weighed down at times.
Spent the weekend at OryCon down in Portland. It was a bit off but otherwise a relaxing and social weekend. Normally I share a room with
loree, but she was on on-call this weekend and couldn't attend. I stayed with jeliza, rubylou, and drakemonger instead, which was nice and social. The pattern of my Sci-Fi Convention experience for the past few years has basically become "drive X hours, stay in a hotel for the weekend, and hang out with the same 8-12 people I know from Seattle."I'm getting pretty burned on the convention scene generally. I'm not really into the gaming, unless I'm going to a specific gaming convention and even then I'm reaching the end of my interest in the RPGA with recent shifts in the focus. The programming has been steadily less engaging to me as well. I looked through the entire programming guide Friday night, and found exactly one panel of real interest and even that I blew off by the time Sunday noon rolled around. I used to really like the dances, but it takes a certain level of energy to really make it work for me, and I've been disappointed the past few Norwescon years. My interest in costuming pretty much ran its course back in my SCA days. The art show and dealers room are fun to browse, but nothing that I feel like spending money on. As lovely as
vixyish singing is to listen to, filk has never really been that much of a calling for me. I'm not really an 'aspiring writer' nor am I that keen on autograph collection. All that combined with my growing impatience with fandom generally, broken elevators, over-burdened service, and particular personality archetypes at these conventions.At this point it feels like I should either get off my butt and actually get involved with the programming at the next convention, or I should consider just not going and finding other ways to hang out with my otherwise very busy friends.
On a more positive note, it was great to visit with
rubylou, drakemonger, and others I only really see at cons or parties. I also had lunch with tara_firma who recently moved to Portland, and it was great to get a chance to visit. Browsed Powell's City of Books and more important the technical book branch store. They had a sale on math books, and while I didn't buy any or frankly even really understand half of them, I always enjoying browsing such things. Titles like "Hankel Operators and Their Applications", "Foundations of Hyperbolic Manifolds", and "Grobner Deformations of Hypergeometric Differential Equations" fascinate me. Read some prefaces and flipped through a number of them, but really I don't have any justified reason to actually digest that kind of material at this point in my career. Plenty of other things more practical I should be focused on anyhow.Part of my attitude is colored by being in a bit of odd mood. Work is a bit uncertain and rough at the moment, although with the holidays growing close there will be extensive downtime to relax. Last Monday would have been
appleang's and I thirteenth anniversary. Instead I've been living alone the last 8 years and 10 months. This December will be the ten year mark since Kim gave up on us and drove off with What's-His-Face. I generally I'm not really all that angsty and I'm looking forward to the holiday trip back to Texas, but I feel weighed down at times.
