Events at the 70th annual World Science Fiction Convention got underway at noon on Thursday. I attended an interesting panel discussion about digital media, featuring Christopher Kastensmidt, Nancy Fulda, and Tom Dowd.
Following that, I went to see the discussion of "Researching History That Never Happened" by Mary Robinette Kowal, Kenneth Hite, Adam Christopher, Martin Berman-Gorvine, and Nick DiChario. Through some oversight, the room assigned for the panel was locked and unready, so the ever-adaptable team of experts held court in the foyer area outside.
After quite a bit of searching for the room, I found my way to the panel "Sometimes Things Go Wrong in Space" -- a trio of aerospace engineers (Henry Spencer, Kent Nebergall, and Charles Justiz) sharing anecdotesa bout things that went wrong, or nearly went wrong, in satellite and Space Shuttle launches.
At 4:30 I served on a panel ably chaired by Brad Aiken about "What Is Next for Body Modification?" Despite the title, we weren't talking about freaky piercings but about cybernetic and biological modifications to the basic human form.
Then I rejoined my Crack Team of con-goers and went across the river to a Japanese barbecue restaurant for large quantities of meat. After that we boarded the shuttle bus down to the Adler Planetarium for the ChiCon evening reception. The youngest member of the Crack Team enjoyed the interactive space exhibits, while the older ones tried to get a glimpse of Saturn through the telescopes on the terrace, and talked about grown-up stuff with other grown-ups.*
After which we returned to the capacious Hyatt so that the junior Crack Team members could go to bed while the older ones toured the room parties put on by the Minneapolis, London, and Kansas City convention committees, vying to be picked for the next WorldCon site.
And so to bed.
*Grown-up stuff usually means talking about kids.
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