Worldcon and Glasgow

[readsalot]

We took a train from London to Glasgow. The one we picked turned out to be run by Virgin, and it was very well-run indeed--clean, and fast, and non-smoking! (People in London smoke more than people in Boston. Not always a lot, but it just reminds me of about 20 years ago, when restaurants had non-smoking sections that smoke always drifted into anyway.)

And then we got to Central Station in Glasgow, and it was much smokier than London. We got out onto the sidewalk and started walking toward our hotel, which looked like it should be only a few blocks away, and it was, but it was uphill, at a fairly steep angle, and I got out of breath almost immediately. Fortunately, aleph_1 noticed my struggles, and offered to tow my suitcase as well as carrying his own bags, which helped a lot. Once we got to the hotel and checked in, I flung myself onto the bed to try to relieve the pain in my legs. After a few minutes, I got up, and unpacked a little, and then made sure I had my envelope from the last Progress Report (needed for quick check-in at the con), and we went downstairs to ask the hotel people how to find Alderston station, allegedly closer to the hotel than Central, and also on the line that goes to the SECC (Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre). The hotel person insisted that we didn't want Alderston, so I gave up and went back to Central. aleph_1 went off to try to find Alderston--I don't remember now if he was successful or if he just gave up and walked to the SECC. At Central, I eventually found someone who could tell me how to get a train to the SECC (they'd been cleverly hidden on a lower platform), and did that, and then had my first experience of the covered walkway from the train station to the SECC. Which is very long, and I supposed it was really only uphill for half the way, but was still tiring. On later days I was to discover that it also produced a sort of greenhouse effect on hot days; merrylg pointed out that for most of the year, that's probably desirable.

Anyway, the SECC was good, and then I discovered that the giant hallway that runs the length of the building and which you must use to get to all of the function rooms is considered to be a public area, and therefore was a free smoking zone. That was irritating for the whole convention. I registered, and found my way to Program Ops (oops--I mean Programme Ops) to let smofbabe know that I was there, and available to work the next morning, and then I went off and found aleph_1 and tyg WNOLJ and headed out for dinner. Which was, unfortunately, another very long walk away, and my legs were hurting again by the time we found a very nice Italian restaurant, with very nice food and somebody inside who was smoking heavily the entire time we were there. Sigh. I finished eating, and announced that I was thinking about just giving my friends some money and fleeing, but they were done and wanted to flee too. When we told the waiter we wanted to flee, he asked if it was anything he'd done, and we explained the smoke issue. He agreed that it was irritating, and got us the check. And then I took a taxi to the hotel, because my legs hurt too much for anything else.

The next morning, I handed out Programme Participant packets, and signed up for more hours of Programme Ops work, and saw the Dealer's room, and went to a couple of panels, and then went back to the city center to find dinner. I found a lovely dinner, but it was somewhat raining, and I'd left my raincoat in my hotel room, so I spent a lot of time walking around getting wet, which may have led to later problems. On Friday, I went to the WSFS Business Meeting, which was fun as usual (for certain meanings of fun), and then did another shift of handing out packets, and then realized that the nagging sore throat I'd had all day wasn't getting any better, so I went to the NESFA table to cancel the hours that I'd planned to work (and, bless their hearts, everyone there immediately told me to go back to my hotel and rest), and went to my hotel room and collapsed for a couple of hours. I then went out for dinner, and came back to the room to collapse again. I didn't emerge again (except on brief food runs) until Sunday afternoon, when the awful sinus problems had mostly evolved into awful bronchitis (which I actually find much easier to cope with.) Everyone was happy to see me still alive, but I was pretty much incapable of doing any useful work. I did at least see the Hugo ceremony, which was fun, and I saw some panels, and was slightly social. But it was a much less interesting Worldcon for me than many.

On Monday, I got to some panels discussing the 2007 Worldcon, which will be in Yokohama, and finally decided to upgrade my Supporting membership for that one to Attending. Now I'll have to go look for a place where I can take Japanese lessons, so that I won't be totally lost when I get there.

After leaving the convention, I found an internet cafe, and got mostly caught up on mail and lj. The next day, we took a train back to London.

Comments

[theodosia.livejournal.com]

Ack! I'm sorry you got caught by a cold. All the smoke couldn't have helped!