Mecon was fun. Attendance was low, around 67, according to Con Chair Sinead Larkin, but Mecon's attendance rates have never been high. But I didn't go for the numbers. Quite the opposite actually. Mecon was a chance to relax, not have to do anything and get Peter F. Hamilon to sign some books.
The con started on Friday night with a pub quiz. Unfortunately despite having Pádraig Ó Méalóid, Deirdre Walsh, Gareth Kavanagh, Dave Lally and Angie McKeown on the team, we only came third, thus ending my winning streak. Fortunately, Deirdre, Padraig, Garret and myself had had a lovely meal in the Villa Italia on University street a few hours earlier so we weren't too disappointed.
Saturday started well and stayed that way. I took in a few a panel sessions. Unfortunately, since I've lost my programme sheet I can't remember what they were, but I do remember that I enjoyed them. One session I do remember was Peter Hamilton's Q&A session. I asked him if he really thought the Europe depicted in his novel Misspent Youth was likely. His answer was that while he didn't think Europe was as bad as many Eurosceptics make it out to be, it isn't as good as some of its champions make it out to be and if Europe continues to centralise power, it is inevitable that separatist organisations will spring up.
Dinner Saturday night was a visit, once again, to the Imperial City on Botanic Avenue. Padraig, Deirdre and I ate there last year accompanied by Nick Whyte, who also introduced us to Villa d'Italia. This year we decided to walk to the restaurant without taking a "short cut" through the Botanical Gardens. This meant we didn't get locked in said Gardens and have to find someone in the nurseries to let us out, but we managed. The meal was excellent and quite reasonably priced.
Sunday's high point was, apparently, James Bacon and Padraig metaphorically pummeling Dave Lally. Dave Lally is an Irish SF fan who lives in London. He is a leading member of the Six of One, the Prisoner Appreciation Society. It was he who had the idea that Octocon should host the 1997 Eurocon. I have no wish to discuss the events of 1997 any further. Anyway, Dave's latest proposal is that Belfast should play host to Eastercon, the British National SF Convention in 2008. This is a singularly bad idea. First of all, running a convention of that size requires an experienced cadre of con-runners. While the Mecon convention has been going for six years, the organisation skills required to run a 70 person convention have no relation to those required to run a 1000 person event. I would have liked to have been there to witness Padraig and James' deconstruction of the idea but I was far too tired. Later that afternoon, Padraig and I made up for our defeat at the Pub Quiz by leading a team to victory in the Family Fortunes Game.
All in all a good weekend. I learnt that Ian McDonald is finally going to India to research his new book which is due out later this year; Peter F. Hamilton is writing a new book called Pandora's Star set in the same universe as Misspent Youth and due out next year, with the sequel due in 2005 in time for Interaction; and I managed to read a big chunk of William Gibson's latest book Pattern Recognition.
11:25:56 PM  Google It!
|
|
