Fcon.. counting down

Being. Very. Calm. 2 more days to go (well, technically, 3, but we leave for it on Thursday..) and should just be ready in time :-) If you're going, hi! If you're not, shame on you... :-P

Actually, as far as the actual event is concerned, we've all done everything that can be done in advance and taken delivery of everything that we need. It's the BFS AGM I get to worry about next (not just because I hate hate hate public speaking and my brain freezes up when peeps ask questions and blech...), what with having to do something sensible with the Publications accounts and try and remember membership stats that I sort of said I'd put together, but soooo haven't had the time to. So please don't ask for membership stats. Really. Ask something else that the other smarter committee peeps can answer instead. Ta muchly.

So Friday = manic day. Bag stuffing and set up until late afternoon then sitting behind the reg. desk for the rest of the evening signing people in. Oh, and the quiz! A chance to hear how many ways my mate Dave can heckle everyone in the room....
There's also a Write Fantastic panel thingy, Gail Nina Anderson is doing a slideshow talk with the fab title: "From Goddess to Dominatrix - a fantasy quest through art, archaeology and
some dodgy mags I got from Simon R. Green.", and Ramsey Campbell's doing a late night story session.

Then Saturday is the big panels day (and always the day I forget to eat), and of course, evening brings the Fabulous Fantasycon Raffle.
Panels then..... we've got a comics one, a scriptwriting improv session, a 'swords and sandals' one, a comedy/horror one, a writing for TV one (not to be confused with the scriptwriting thingy), a bunch of live interviews (and Ariel says his interview with Steven Erikson is going to be recorded and broadcast on his blog eventually so that'll be nice!) - as well as a huge book launch in the main bar - mainly with PS Publishing's joint BFS thingy Cinema Macabre, but also with Telos, Hadesgate Publishing and, I think, Gary Fry with Poe's Progeny, and a few other folks.
And if you're still awake after the raffle, there's a couple of storytelling sessions going on with Alison Davies and Joe Hill.

Oh, and there's the Editor appointments (John Jarrold dropped out because he can't come, Jo Fletcher stepped up to help, because she can!) , Simon Clark talk (for which you need to have booked in advance for), and the Indie film show (might be starting a little later then scheduled depending on how long the last Editor appointments go on... oh cripes, I've got to do the film program thingy for that yet..... oh no... knew there'd be something....)

Then Sunday is AGM (aaaggghhh!), banquet (which I never go to, being the ultimate fussy/faddy eater.... this week, if it's not a cheese, peanut butter & ketchup sandwich then forget about it!), for you regular eaters, the banquet menu's fairly harmless and the pudding sounds nice.
Then we've got the awards... according to my sources it's very very close this year, with a couple of unexpected leads. Gary, our awards admin chap, says he'd liked to have seen more people voting this year.

Oh, and last I heard, there's after dinner speeches from Steven Erikson & Mark Chadbourn; and Simon Clark and Graham Joyce are hosting the awards for us.

So it should be good, then!

And I'm very, very, calm.

Random rant
Argh! 1 week to Fcon and still shitloads to do..... staying very calm.... oh yes. And no venue for 2006 yet. Bloody hotels and their bloody extortinate rates.... bastards.

And just what about the, ahem, 'on-track for end of July' mag? Don't ask. August surprised me. (How it does this every year, I'll never know. And where's September gone, ey? I demand an answer...) So, we're looking at first week of October (ie. when Fcon is safely over) with Ish 8 in December.

More sensible things to follow when my brain gets off the ceiling.......