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BTW, there may be formatting problems because I tried something in LJ and it didn't work so I had to restore this from the word backup I made when finding out word cout.
:-)
We got in on Thursday night, about 6:00ish to the Hotel, checked in and then went out. :-) I liked the hotel. It had character. I also liked the way that it was three buildings, with bridges and stairs due to the architectural differences. I was happy with our room, and I checked out the spa, pool and sauna, and they were lovely. The pool was very very cute.
We messaged prk and amarillion and hit Lygon Street, apparently called Little Italy.First, they showed us the magnificent cake shop there; massive shop with amazing, amazing, cakes. I offered to buy one for the room party, but failed to do so in the end. Probably a good thing, or else we would have had to choose!! Strangely enough for Little Italy, we went to a Nepalese resturaunt called Ghurkas. :-) We got banquets, shared food, had a couple of bottles of wine, and had a great time. The food was really lovely, although I managed to spill curry on my top and my jeans, which was not good because John and I were travelling hand-luggae only, and I was expecting to alternate between my skirt and my jeans! Anyway, not a hassle, we enjoyed dinner, and then found a bottlo andbought some chartreuse and some baileys cream. Then, we apologized to prky and amarillion, and headed for bed.
Now, while we liked the hotel and the room, the bed had a mattress made of concrete. I didn't sleep well. It turns out some of the people leaving the nightclub near us tended to be yelling types. And that the bins get emptied at about 7:00 melbourne time. Which is five o clock our time. It was all hard. :-) John got less sleep than I, but I was pretty sleep deprived too. :-) He went for a walk while I got a bit more sleep and when I got up we went to a nearby bakery where we had chicken pie for breakfast. I love a bakery with yum cha all ready to go... :-) I needed some stockings, so we went looking for them in some sex shops, which completely failed us. Then we hit Myers and David Jones, who did actually help, and we noticed the propensity of melbourne shops to occur over several buildings, all with different architectural differences, aided (or hindered for us) by completely useless maps which not only did not include a "You Are Here" arrow, but also were just wrong. So, we head back to the hotel, wondering who else might have checked in by now.
At some point, the elevator opened to show liluri, evilpaul, and onyx_curtain. This was, shall we say, a surprise. I knew liluri and evilpaul were going to be there, but not that they were going to be sleeping in the same room as someone who wished I was dead. A bit of a surprise.
John and I went to the pool and spa, and had a little quiet time, and also made use of the sauna. That was nice. I liked the spa and pool and sauna. The pool was so cute!!! And the pool and spa were about the same temp, and the views from the spa were fantastic. Iliked the brick work on one of the buildings out there, and John liked one of the other buildings, which had a cool shape.
I think it was this afternoon that I saw Lil by herself for about 20 minutes. I'm not sure.
Anyway, it was getting close to contime, so I headed down stairs to see if any one I knew was there, and a couple of my friends were there. I met a first con-goer, Mark, he was really nice, and Chuck was there too. Igave him a huge hug, it was great to see him, so we adjourned from downstairs, and we all went upstairs to the pub for a goss. It was great in the pub too; we had Charles Stross (his name seemed familiar somehow), I think Simon? , Prky, Mark, Chuck and I. We hit the opening ceremony, which Mitch did, it was nice and quick. Then, liluri, dr_k, strangedave,prk,amarillion,cheshirenoir and me (was there any one at that table that did not have an LJ??) headed off to find food. We found a dodgy little resturaunt who hated us. :-) I think the problem was that they rarely have people who don't order the special, however we did, and they hated us. Rice came late, food took forever, water took forever, and we only had a set amount of time because we wanted to get dressed up for the Cocktail Party/Eidelon launch. We ended up leaving before the final dish came out (only vegetables anyway) and ran back to "get frocked up".
I wore my purple corset with the purple bra, I had matching knickers, but you know, sometimes .... anyway, enough about my underwear! So, we head downstairs for our free glass of champagne. I was up for a bit of drinking, and some partying, but then people had to go home, and the other people I wanted to party with vanished upstairs, never to be seen again. I'd been telling people about prk and amarillion's room party, but no one from Melbourne came! We ended up with vegetus and Simon, prky, amarillion, John and I! Anyway, it was getting kind of depressing talking about things, so we were very happy to see Simon and vegetus, oh, and kremmen too. Anyway, off to bed reasonably early (one o clockish) .
Once again, a bad night's sleep. John was panelling while I was sleeping, so I got up and out, well sleep deprived and a teensy bit hungover, and went to a cafe where I had coffee and rang my Mum to see how the boy was going. Apparently, completely charmingly. I also stressed over a few things bothering me, and I'm glad Vinnie was asleep because if I'd talked (giggle) to him on the phone I probably would have cried. I was that sleep deprived and a bit stressed. :-)
He's so beautiful. There's pics of him opening his presents yesterday that I can't wait to upload, but right now it's all too hard. Later.
I think we went to yum-cha with prk and amarillion which was nice, but oddly bland. It's fun checking out the differences in the same dish. We even had a beef based sui mai style dumpling. (Sui mai is my favourite.) It was interesting.
I think I went to a panel. Someone started ranting about local politics, and would NOT shut up, until finally Charles leaned forward, grabbed the microphone and told him "Eat Shit. Three hundred million flies can't be wrong." That finally seemed to shut them up. :-) I was very very very tired. I decided to hit the spa, with some pleasant company. Calli-con did indeed occur; the topic was "Depth in Shallowness" but then it got all serious and ended up talking about taxation strategies of Australia and America. :-)
I missed my chance for a nap, so then John and I tried to round up some people for dinner, but it seems every one ate some food at the c0ck launch, and turned us down, however knowing that the Saturday night is usually a big n ight, John and I wanted to eat properly, so Mark, John and I went for a steak. We went to some cafe which has been there a million years, and did indeed have steak. Then, frocking up! Which did require help because it's so much easier to get stockings to sit properly if someone else attaches them to the suspender straps. This dress rocks. :-)
The Maskabolo was awesome. vanilla_extreme was handing out glasses which were sooooo coooool! They broke light into pretty rainbows, i completely forgot I was wearing them for a while, they were fantastic! I had a great time talking to all sorts of people. The music was surprisingly good, for the limitations put onto Chuck, but I'm still unsure about the banjo music, although people had a great dance to that. Weird, but true. :-) The Maskabolo came to an end, so we all got chucked out and sent upstairs. So we hit the pub. John sneaked upostairs and grabbed the chartreuse for me; I had scored a shot glass somewhere so I was handing out shots o any one standing still logn enough. recumbenteer was lighting his, I took the lighter off him eventually though. No wonder he can't remember anything after he started the chartreuse shots. Mark made some very lucid and intelligent suggestions about going to a club, but I said rude and arrogan things like "no one will move unless wehave to, no, it's too far, blah blahblah and I'm embarrassed about how much reistance I put up, especially since we later went to the club *grin* I think he was also sober. I ranted at various people about things like love. They actually listened, until finally I stpped and said "Why are you listening? " at which point they all laughed at me and said they had been enjoying the ranting. We went through half a bottle of chartreuse, although I can't remember who I gavesome too. And then, the pub closed and we got kicked out, so we went to the club.
It was a GIN club. Staggering distance. We'd walked past it numerous times, and not even noticed. GIN CLUB. I pooled my money andbought a cigar. John bought me a lemonade. I sat with Mark, Ben, and I think Donald? while I smoked. I think I ranted a little. :-) But not too much. Eventually, we tumbled into bed at about 4:00ish. A much more acceptable time than one-ish! LOL
I was EXTREMELY seedy. I took aspro clear and went to bed. I woke up, took some more aspro clear and went back tobed. I woke up, and felt well enough to try getting out of bed. I think it was twelvish when I got down stairs, and found John or he found me in the room or something and we had Japanese for lunch. It wasvery salty, and quite unlike any other gyudon/rice beef bowl I have ever had. But we did have peking duck sushi, and that was pretty awesome. We head back to the con, and ended up going out to lunch. I was so seedy, I could not even face a coffee, and the smell of food was getting to me,.... in a bad way .... but it was a great lunch anyway. On the way back to the con someone had a fruit juice drink and OH MY GOD I WAS GOING TO DIE UNLESS I HAD ONE TOO and this led to what felt like an excruitating four hours in the line smelling THE FRUIT JUICE THE FRUIT JUICE I NEEDED IT NOW NOW NOW NOW NOW NOWNOW! but in reality was probably less than 10 minutes. I made it back in time for Blankety Blanks, which was funny! prky, did you win? There's some long and involved stories about this panel, but I know I'm past the 1800 word mark by now, so you'll just have to ask, but the icons... THE ICONS! I'll be a soapy monkey! :-) mondy needed sleep. A lot.
Then, closing ceremony, which included a standing ovation to Danny. I have my own Danny story to tell. My first full Swancon (I don't count the two or so hours at Gainmancon as the first one) Danny was Fan Guest of Honour, and was doing the Welcome to Your First Con panel, and on the way to that I had a bit of a tiff with someone, and when I got there I was hell pissed off and spent the initial 20 minutes staring out the window in a foul mood. I've always wondered if he saw that and thought I was excrutiatingly shy. :-) But anyway, from then on, he always seemed tof find me underfoot. That was the con with the ButterGnomes, the evacuation, stealing the elmo pic (it wasn;t me but I felt guilty at the time) skinny dipping in a pool which happened to be directly under the main con room, I won some awards at the Masquerade.... at the end of the con, exhausted but happy, we had the closing ceremony, and I remember Danny getting a little speech, and it went something like this.
"Um, er, there's a girl here, it's her first con, and everwhere I turn, she seems to be there and getting into things whole heartedly and having a fantastic time. I asked the committee if we had anything we could give her, just as a bit of a present, for getting out there and being there and stuff, and her name is ... um.. Sarah ...er....Shendon?" to which the entire room says "Sarah Sheridan" and I'm going OMG and why the fuck do so many people know my last name?? I was amazed and just shocked and that's probably the very nicest thing any one has ever done for me (although my baby shower was amazing and equally important in my heart) and now you all know you can blame Danny for everything I now do. ESPECIALLY the stuff behind closed doors. hee hee hee. So when Mondy and Mitch gave thanks to Danny at the con, I cried. :-) I'm crying now, for fuck's sake. I should really practice this sleeping thing more.
Sunday night we had dinner with dr_k,liluri and evilpaul which involved a lot of numbly staring at the walls due to exhaustion, and then we went and had a quiet drink at the hotel and chatted with fans and friends who were all comingdown. Basically, it was a dead dog party just in the pub.
I failed to sleep at all on Sunday night, but did get 90 mins or so on the plane. (How long is MI3? That's how long I slept.) Came home, and have been trying to catch up on sleep, understand that my BABY, who I only had YESTERDAY I swear, is now one, and get back into the groove of normallife. I have the usual post con blues, which is manifesting as wandering the internet looking for conreports, and missing the sight of various people (especially ones with blue eyes. Go figure.) I have managed to damage me knees; my dr thinks it is because I have no stairs in my life and then I spent a couple of days bouncing up and down some... deep heat and ibupofen for me! It doesn't hurt, just feels all swollen inside the joint.
So. Now home. Vinnie went through three sets of baby sitters, and was an absolute gem. He saw me, and instantly wanted his Nanna. Hmmmm.
:-)
BTW, ICON LOVE! Thanks to babalon_93 for the icons! :-)
:-)
We got in on Thursday night, about 6:00ish to the Hotel, checked in and then went out. :-) I liked the hotel. It had character. I also liked the way that it was three buildings, with bridges and stairs due to the architectural differences. I was happy with our room, and I checked out the spa, pool and sauna, and they were lovely. The pool was very very cute.
We messaged prk and amarillion and hit Lygon Street, apparently called Little Italy.First, they showed us the magnificent cake shop there; massive shop with amazing, amazing, cakes. I offered to buy one for the room party, but failed to do so in the end. Probably a good thing, or else we would have had to choose!! Strangely enough for Little Italy, we went to a Nepalese resturaunt called Ghurkas. :-) We got banquets, shared food, had a couple of bottles of wine, and had a great time. The food was really lovely, although I managed to spill curry on my top and my jeans, which was not good because John and I were travelling hand-luggae only, and I was expecting to alternate between my skirt and my jeans! Anyway, not a hassle, we enjoyed dinner, and then found a bottlo andbought some chartreuse and some baileys cream. Then, we apologized to prky and amarillion, and headed for bed.
Now, while we liked the hotel and the room, the bed had a mattress made of concrete. I didn't sleep well. It turns out some of the people leaving the nightclub near us tended to be yelling types. And that the bins get emptied at about 7:00 melbourne time. Which is five o clock our time. It was all hard. :-) John got less sleep than I, but I was pretty sleep deprived too. :-) He went for a walk while I got a bit more sleep and when I got up we went to a nearby bakery where we had chicken pie for breakfast. I love a bakery with yum cha all ready to go... :-) I needed some stockings, so we went looking for them in some sex shops, which completely failed us. Then we hit Myers and David Jones, who did actually help, and we noticed the propensity of melbourne shops to occur over several buildings, all with different architectural differences, aided (or hindered for us) by completely useless maps which not only did not include a "You Are Here" arrow, but also were just wrong. So, we head back to the hotel, wondering who else might have checked in by now.
At some point, the elevator opened to show liluri, evilpaul, and onyx_curtain. This was, shall we say, a surprise. I knew liluri and evilpaul were going to be there, but not that they were going to be sleeping in the same room as someone who wished I was dead. A bit of a surprise.
John and I went to the pool and spa, and had a little quiet time, and also made use of the sauna. That was nice. I liked the spa and pool and sauna. The pool was so cute!!! And the pool and spa were about the same temp, and the views from the spa were fantastic. Iliked the brick work on one of the buildings out there, and John liked one of the other buildings, which had a cool shape.
I think it was this afternoon that I saw Lil by herself for about 20 minutes. I'm not sure.
Anyway, it was getting close to contime, so I headed down stairs to see if any one I knew was there, and a couple of my friends were there. I met a first con-goer, Mark, he was really nice, and Chuck was there too. Igave him a huge hug, it was great to see him, so we adjourned from downstairs, and we all went upstairs to the pub for a goss. It was great in the pub too; we had Charles Stross (his name seemed familiar somehow), I think Simon? , Prky, Mark, Chuck and I. We hit the opening ceremony, which Mitch did, it was nice and quick. Then, liluri, dr_k, strangedave,prk,amarillion,cheshirenoir and me (was there any one at that table that did not have an LJ??) headed off to find food. We found a dodgy little resturaunt who hated us. :-) I think the problem was that they rarely have people who don't order the special, however we did, and they hated us. Rice came late, food took forever, water took forever, and we only had a set amount of time because we wanted to get dressed up for the Cocktail Party/Eidelon launch. We ended up leaving before the final dish came out (only vegetables anyway) and ran back to "get frocked up".
I wore my purple corset with the purple bra, I had matching knickers, but you know, sometimes .... anyway, enough about my underwear! So, we head downstairs for our free glass of champagne. I was up for a bit of drinking, and some partying, but then people had to go home, and the other people I wanted to party with vanished upstairs, never to be seen again. I'd been telling people about prk and amarillion's room party, but no one from Melbourne came! We ended up with vegetus and Simon, prky, amarillion, John and I! Anyway, it was getting kind of depressing talking about things, so we were very happy to see Simon and vegetus, oh, and kremmen too. Anyway, off to bed reasonably early (one o clockish) .
Once again, a bad night's sleep. John was panelling while I was sleeping, so I got up and out, well sleep deprived and a teensy bit hungover, and went to a cafe where I had coffee and rang my Mum to see how the boy was going. Apparently, completely charmingly. I also stressed over a few things bothering me, and I'm glad Vinnie was asleep because if I'd talked (giggle) to him on the phone I probably would have cried. I was that sleep deprived and a bit stressed. :-)
He's so beautiful. There's pics of him opening his presents yesterday that I can't wait to upload, but right now it's all too hard. Later.
I think we went to yum-cha with prk and amarillion which was nice, but oddly bland. It's fun checking out the differences in the same dish. We even had a beef based sui mai style dumpling. (Sui mai is my favourite.) It was interesting.
I think I went to a panel. Someone started ranting about local politics, and would NOT shut up, until finally Charles leaned forward, grabbed the microphone and told him "Eat Shit. Three hundred million flies can't be wrong." That finally seemed to shut them up. :-) I was very very very tired. I decided to hit the spa, with some pleasant company. Calli-con did indeed occur; the topic was "Depth in Shallowness" but then it got all serious and ended up talking about taxation strategies of Australia and America. :-)
I missed my chance for a nap, so then John and I tried to round up some people for dinner, but it seems every one ate some food at the c0ck launch, and turned us down, however knowing that the Saturday night is usually a big n ight, John and I wanted to eat properly, so Mark, John and I went for a steak. We went to some cafe which has been there a million years, and did indeed have steak. Then, frocking up! Which did require help because it's so much easier to get stockings to sit properly if someone else attaches them to the suspender straps. This dress rocks. :-)
The Maskabolo was awesome. vanilla_extreme was handing out glasses which were sooooo coooool! They broke light into pretty rainbows, i completely forgot I was wearing them for a while, they were fantastic! I had a great time talking to all sorts of people. The music was surprisingly good, for the limitations put onto Chuck, but I'm still unsure about the banjo music, although people had a great dance to that. Weird, but true. :-) The Maskabolo came to an end, so we all got chucked out and sent upstairs. So we hit the pub. John sneaked upostairs and grabbed the chartreuse for me; I had scored a shot glass somewhere so I was handing out shots o any one standing still logn enough. recumbenteer was lighting his, I took the lighter off him eventually though. No wonder he can't remember anything after he started the chartreuse shots. Mark made some very lucid and intelligent suggestions about going to a club, but I said rude and arrogan things like "no one will move unless wehave to, no, it's too far, blah blahblah and I'm embarrassed about how much reistance I put up, especially since we later went to the club *grin* I think he was also sober. I ranted at various people about things like love. They actually listened, until finally I stpped and said "Why are you listening? " at which point they all laughed at me and said they had been enjoying the ranting. We went through half a bottle of chartreuse, although I can't remember who I gavesome too. And then, the pub closed and we got kicked out, so we went to the club.
It was a GIN club. Staggering distance. We'd walked past it numerous times, and not even noticed. GIN CLUB. I pooled my money andbought a cigar. John bought me a lemonade. I sat with Mark, Ben, and I think Donald? while I smoked. I think I ranted a little. :-) But not too much. Eventually, we tumbled into bed at about 4:00ish. A much more acceptable time than one-ish! LOL
I was EXTREMELY seedy. I took aspro clear and went to bed. I woke up, took some more aspro clear and went back tobed. I woke up, and felt well enough to try getting out of bed. I think it was twelvish when I got down stairs, and found John or he found me in the room or something and we had Japanese for lunch. It wasvery salty, and quite unlike any other gyudon/rice beef bowl I have ever had. But we did have peking duck sushi, and that was pretty awesome. We head back to the con, and ended up going out to lunch. I was so seedy, I could not even face a coffee, and the smell of food was getting to me,.... in a bad way .... but it was a great lunch anyway. On the way back to the con someone had a fruit juice drink and OH MY GOD I WAS GOING TO DIE UNLESS I HAD ONE TOO and this led to what felt like an excruitating four hours in the line smelling THE FRUIT JUICE THE FRUIT JUICE I NEEDED IT NOW NOW NOW NOW NOW NOWNOW! but in reality was probably less than 10 minutes. I made it back in time for Blankety Blanks, which was funny! prky, did you win? There's some long and involved stories about this panel, but I know I'm past the 1800 word mark by now, so you'll just have to ask, but the icons... THE ICONS! I'll be a soapy monkey! :-) mondy needed sleep. A lot.
Then, closing ceremony, which included a standing ovation to Danny. I have my own Danny story to tell. My first full Swancon (I don't count the two or so hours at Gainmancon as the first one) Danny was Fan Guest of Honour, and was doing the Welcome to Your First Con panel, and on the way to that I had a bit of a tiff with someone, and when I got there I was hell pissed off and spent the initial 20 minutes staring out the window in a foul mood. I've always wondered if he saw that and thought I was excrutiatingly shy. :-) But anyway, from then on, he always seemed tof find me underfoot. That was the con with the ButterGnomes, the evacuation, stealing the elmo pic (it wasn;t me but I felt guilty at the time) skinny dipping in a pool which happened to be directly under the main con room, I won some awards at the Masquerade.... at the end of the con, exhausted but happy, we had the closing ceremony, and I remember Danny getting a little speech, and it went something like this.
"Um, er, there's a girl here, it's her first con, and everwhere I turn, she seems to be there and getting into things whole heartedly and having a fantastic time. I asked the committee if we had anything we could give her, just as a bit of a present, for getting out there and being there and stuff, and her name is ... um.. Sarah ...er....Shendon?" to which the entire room says "Sarah Sheridan" and I'm going OMG and why the fuck do so many people know my last name?? I was amazed and just shocked and that's probably the very nicest thing any one has ever done for me (although my baby shower was amazing and equally important in my heart) and now you all know you can blame Danny for everything I now do. ESPECIALLY the stuff behind closed doors. hee hee hee. So when Mondy and Mitch gave thanks to Danny at the con, I cried. :-) I'm crying now, for fuck's sake. I should really practice this sleeping thing more.
Sunday night we had dinner with dr_k,liluri and evilpaul which involved a lot of numbly staring at the walls due to exhaustion, and then we went and had a quiet drink at the hotel and chatted with fans and friends who were all comingdown. Basically, it was a dead dog party just in the pub.
I failed to sleep at all on Sunday night, but did get 90 mins or so on the plane. (How long is MI3? That's how long I slept.) Came home, and have been trying to catch up on sleep, understand that my BABY, who I only had YESTERDAY I swear, is now one, and get back into the groove of normallife. I have the usual post con blues, which is manifesting as wandering the internet looking for conreports, and missing the sight of various people (especially ones with blue eyes. Go figure.) I have managed to damage me knees; my dr thinks it is because I have no stairs in my life and then I spent a couple of days bouncing up and down some... deep heat and ibupofen for me! It doesn't hurt, just feels all swollen inside the joint.
So. Now home. Vinnie went through three sets of baby sitters, and was an absolute gem. He saw me, and instantly wanted his Nanna. Hmmmm.
:-)
BTW, ICON LOVE! Thanks to babalon_93 for the icons! :-)
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2006-08-10 09:14 am (UTC)From:BTW - "Simon" wasn't a loud voiced Kiwi by any chance?
no subject
Date: 2006-08-10 09:19 am (UTC)From::-)
Or the one in the pub the first time? I don't know. I don't know if that is his name or if I am mis-remembering. I never spoke to him again.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-10 09:22 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2006-08-10 09:30 am (UTC)From:So I assume you were not there? If you were, are you going to do a report?
no subject
Date: 2006-08-10 09:33 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2006-08-10 09:36 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2006-08-10 09:37 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2006-08-10 09:21 am (UTC)From:Wow, sounds like a fun time:) My family does yumcha in Melbourne a lot, I really should have asked them where they go, right? :)
no subject
Date: 2006-08-15 04:48 am (UTC)From:Must do that again soon sometime.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-10 02:50 pm (UTC)From:glad you had a fabulous time!
i love your Danny story :)
no subject
Date: 2006-08-10 02:58 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2006-08-15 04:51 am (UTC)From:By the way, what's this about "The music was surprisingly good, for the limitations put onto Chuck"? Is this technical limitations, or what? If there's something that could have been done better, I'd very much like to know, for next time I'm mad enough to organise a maskobalo.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-15 04:53 am (UTC)From:For my own wedding we had to lend about 10 CDs to the professional DJ company.
:-)
no subject
Date: 2006-08-15 04:55 am (UTC)From:I don't think I was invited to that party! And it's a little short, yes. But to cover everything else would have taken FOREVER!
:-)
When I think of the times I struggled to write a 1500 word essay.. these days, in my fucking SLEEP.
no subject
Date: 2007-01-22 03:59 am (UTC)From:Ribbons and beads what we put together to make the Maskobalo door hangings... I seem to recall you were there for that.