Dirac Angestun Gesept

I had a pretty good time at Arisia, while I was there. I wasn’t there enough, didn’t get to see all the people/panels/events/etc I would have liked to see, and can think of things that I might have done differently, or better. There are also things I couldn’t have changed, like the weather, the folks who were at Confusion instead (not helped by Arisia’s date move this year), or the obligatory work crisis Friday morning. (Confusion sounds like it was lots of fun, too, but lacking bilocation I couldn’t do both, and Arisia’s local.)

As with my USENIX and Worldcon experiences, I’ve had more thoughts about the wisdom or otherwise of commuting to cons. The Snowpocalyptic Event this time around clearly gives these thoughts some new strength, since it meant missing an entire day of the con.

Several folks who were local stayed at the hotel anyway, and seemed to have the best of both worlds (modulo the cost of the room, of course); they could get home relatively easily even though the airport was closed, but had a room to go back to during the con and therefore no parking/T issues.

On the other hand, it’s unlikely that I’ll change my plans for either of the local cons coming up in the next few weeks. Vericon has no hotel, and Boskone’s hotel rate is Bostonian enough to be way too high to justify a room, even if it weren’t already past the hotel reservation deadline. The “Standard Single” that the Park Plaza has for Arisia may work for next year, though; a couple nights of that will obviously raise the cost of the con by a factor of five or so compared to commuting…but had I done that this year, I would have had something like 40% more con time (later nights and all of Sunday). Something to think about for next year, I suppose.

That said, there are other cons to think about. If I’m willing to pay for a hotel, Readercon starts looking quite good; the hotel rate isn’t too bad, I can get out there and back on the MBTA’s 350 bus from Alewife for free (other than the time it takes) since I already have a combo T pass, and last year’s program looks really, really tempting.

Out-of-town cons, too, are a possibility; next year’s Confusion has Vernor Vinge as GoH.

I could, just possibly, even make it to a con that isn’t in Massachusetts this year. Heh, heh, heh…watch this space.

So, I heard the mail arrive (I had shoveled the front steps and a path to the curb already, so the whole “rain nor snow nor glom of nit” issue was out of the way) and headed downstairs to get it.

Then I realized that I was really cold.

The setback thermostat had done its job perfectly, turning the heat down during the day when I’m at work. Except that I’m working from home today. Oops.

I still have to dig out the dryer vent so I can do laundry without risking CO problems (gas dryer).

EDIT: the vent wasn’t drifted over, so I only had to dig out the back door enough to see that it was okay. Hooray!

I got up early enough to get a reasonable set of snow gear together, figuring that some snow had been predicted and I might have to walk from the T, or even from the hotel if I stayed late enough. Based on past experience with Boston weather forecasters (”oh no it’s SNOWPOCALYPSE we’re DOOMED there will be TEN FEET of snow” means “expect 3-6 inches in town”) I thought it wouldn’t be too bad. (And my “reasonable set of snow gear” is good for fairly low temps and wind, since I have walked the Mass Ave bridge coming home from Boskone before.)

Well, I wasn’t actually wrong, or I wouldn’t have been if I’d left when I looked out the windows at 9pm to see how the street looked, instead of 1am when it had been falling for four more hours and the T had stopped running.

I’m getting ahead of myself somewhat.

So. Out the door, to the T, to the hotel, to the con. (By rocket to the moon, by airplane to the rocket, by taxi to the airport, by front door to the taxi….)

I got there and went to the one! actual! panel! that I managed to get to all con. (I did plan to spend most of my time in the gaming room, so this wasn’t a huge surprise, though there were some that sounded interesting that I missed because I was gaming, or that were scheduled for Sunday.)

Naturally, it was the obligatory LiveJournal/blogging panel (”The Very Examined Life”). Unlike the one at Boskone last year, it wound up being very LJ-focused (all the panelists and most of the audience were LJ users). Not a bad thing, as it led to discussion of neat things LJ allows, the whole “friends list” morass of issues, filters and multiple journals, and so forth. It also generated many wonderful lines like “your husband sounds like such a dork” (said by said husband), “I had a random thought, I must share that thought with the whole universe”, and “oh, you’re the one with the cat icon”. My contribution was “cut tags are love”.

After that, down to Urban Pain for a sandwich, and gaming. Gaming gaming gaming gaming gaming. With extra gaming. I then went to a birthday gathering, watching the masquerade on the snowy TV with no sound at intervals, did a bit of wandering around the party floor/con suite, then back down to gaming gaming gaming.

What I should have done is set an alarm to leave no later than 2359 so that I could get on the T and go home. I did not do this. When I looked up after a game of BANG! and realized that it was nearly 0100, I decided that it was time to leave anyway. I got to the lobby, and realized that the snow was really deep, the T had stopped running, it was probably too cold to wait outside for the Night Owl bus, and I didn’t think I had the energy to stay awake in the gaming room until the T started running again, since I had no crash space arranged. (I did consider it though.)

Other options were pretty meager, and boiled down to (in decreasing order of cost) “get a room for the night”, “try to get a cab or something back to at least the vicinity of home”, and “try to walk back home in very deep snow and high winds”.

Option 3 being too likely to result in bodily harm or death (though I would be pretty confident that there wouldn’t be anyone out in it looking to mug people), and there being a van outside the door that looked like it might take me somewhere, I opted for #2. A bunch of folks going a bunch of places were already on board, but there was a seat left and the driver was willing to take me to Cambridge for an amount of money that was, under the circumstances, probably cheaper than I deserved. As it turned out, the largest group was going to Comm Ave & Hereford, so I had the driver just drop me off at MIT (Lobby 7), rather than trying to get around to my house, not knowing which cross streets would have been plowed at that point, and not being too confident in the driver’s Cambridge navigation abilities. (Living near the Cambridge DPW on a main artery means always knowing your street will be plowed quickly.)

I walked through campus, taking advantage of tunnels and such as available, then slogged the last couple blocks home from the nearest tunnel-connected MIT building. Got inside, unwound a bit, and went to bed.

Boston’s Logan International Airport is basically closed. Their departure status page claims that some flights are on time, but if you check the airline’s web site, it will often show the flight as cancelled.

SmarTraveler is showing basically all roads in the Boston area as “Severe weather. Avoid travel.” including the Mass Pike (I-90).

Amtrak’s morning train to NYC is “Estimated arrival: 3 hours late”. Call or check their website for info on your train if you are traveling by train.

The MBTA transit updates page shows delays on all subway and commuter rail lines, and changes or cancellations to bus service. Buses will be using “main roadways” only and will not be following the established snow routes. No boat service to Quincy or the Charlestown Navy Yard.

“There’s no step 3.” - Jeff Goldblum in the old iMac ads

There’s no day 3. At least for me. (I will work on the longer day 2 report later.) Yes, even though I made it out and back each day of Boskone 33, from Cambridge to Framingham on the commuter rail, in the snow…it wasn’t this much snow.

That’s a lot of snow and it’s still falling. I will not be going any farther than the ends of my part of the sidewalk any time soon, and that will only be so that I can shovel it…and I won’t do that until it’s slowed down coming down a bit first. (It looks deep but fluffy, at least, so with luck it won’t be too hard to shovel out a path.)

SmarTraveler is listing the Mass Pike and most other local roads as “Severe weather. Avoid travel.” They are not kidding.

The Logan arrivals status page is amusing. Some flights are showing as “On Time” but that’s just because Massport doesn’t know they’re cancelled yet.

I was amused by a United flight that was marked as “On Time”, since by the flight number I knew it was one of the small regional jets…as if those would be landing when the 767s are cancelling. Basically, expect there to be no flights today into or out of BOS.

This may be Arisia’s version of the Boskone 40 (2003) “Snokone” after-con. I’m missing the con, which is the bad news, but I’m home, I still have heat and power and connectivity and books to read…I’m okay.

One panel (the obligatory LiveJournal panel), gaming, lunch, quick trips through Vendor’s Row and the Huckster’s Room, gaming, gaming, a non-party, gaming, and then home through the wow-that’s-sure-a-lot-of snow.

More later, time for sleep. There may not be a day 3 report given the snow situation, because I may not get back to the con.

Meant to sleep in a bit. Didn’t (pager, work stuff, sigh).

Got over to the Park Plaza, picked up my badge, wandered a bit, headed out to run an errand, came back, gamed, got dinner, gamed, gamed, gamed, left so I could catch the T rather than walking all the way home or paying for a cab (too cold for the first, cheaper than the second). BANG! is lots of fun with seven players.

I was coming back from an errand and therefore in the area, so I stopped by the Park Plaza to see what was going on. I wound up helping out at registration with a bit of testing and setup, then had to head out for food and such.

Since registration doesn’t open until 1400 tomorrow, I will probably go in to work for the morning and leave from there.

I’ve discovered a number of my favorite authors by finding them interesting, either as panelists at cons or participants in various online arenas. The latter dates back to my time on the FidoNet SF echo, followed by mailing lists, rec.arts.sf-lovers (I wasn’t around USENET when it was still net.sf-lovers), and the current crop of USENET groups, blogs, and the like.

John Scalzi’s Old Man’s War is sort of an odd hybrid of the two. I heard about the book first at a con (the Tor “upcoming stuff” session at Worldcon), liked the sound of it based on their description, and then started reading Whatever and By The Way…and I figured that anyone who can pump out that much blogging goodness on a daily basis and still keep it interesting could probably also manage a good book, especially with editors and whatnot involved.

I wasn’t disappointed.

Everyone compares it to Starship Troopers, including the author. It’s an homage, though, not a pastiche, and despite Scalzi’s not having read The Forever War, it’s also reminiscent of that, as Cory Doctorow’s blurb would have it. I also thought some of the background and attitude echoed James Alan Gardner’s League of Peoples books (which now need to go on my re-read stack). Nothing close, but the tone and feel were similar enough that if you like the Gardner, try this; if you liked this, try Expendable and see if you like Gardner.

I don’t generally buy hardcovers, for the form-factor issues more than the price, but I’ll be picking up Old Man’s War as soon as the mass-market paperback arrives, or an e-book in a format suitable for my Palm (that portability thing, y’know). Sadly, Tor seems to have had sufficiently low sales of the books they did make available electronically that they’ve stopped bothering; I can understand why, but I don’t have to like it.

Remember the “Harry and Louise” ads that helped kill health-care reform?

Why not bring the actors back for some more ads? They must be getting near retirement age, so a series of ads about how the Republicans want to gut Social Security and hand the money to their business cronies to manage would be perfect!

Michael Tomasky had a similar idea but I think bringing the original actors back is more likely to have the needed impact.