Thursday
So, Thursday morning started out pretty low-key: we had breakfast at Muffin Plus, a lovely café that does tons of differently-flavoured muffins (and they had plenty of kinds of tea, too). Then we followed on to a second breakfast with fellow Codexian Jenny Rappaport (as in, an extra set of drinks, not a second helping of muffins. That would have been bad). We also met fellow Codexian Matt Rotundo in the lobby, where he was checking in.
Traci and I went looking for a fleece in downtown Montreal, and scouted out the important places (ie, the Indigo bookstore, for future use).

Then it was time to show up at the con. I checked in at Ops, and picked up my programme package, which included a Hugo Nominee ribbon and pin (apparently, there was a little bit of a miscommunication: I later discovered that Campbell nominees were supposed to have a special ribbon and a special pin–being totally ignorant, I went around the con for the following four hours proudly wearing my rocket ship pinned to my badge. I’m viewing this as a chance to feel all important and powerful 🙂 )
The rocket pin did get me grabbed by John Scalzi as I entered the Dealers’ Room, though, and I’m glad I met him and his wife (he’s awesome fun).

I just had one panel in the afternoon, a Writing 101 for teenagers. I’d been listed as moderator, but things got reshuffled a bit, and I’m very glad Derek Kunsken (whom I later identified as the author of the excellent “Beneath Sunlit Shallows” in Asimov’s, one of the most impressive stories I’d read there in 2008) stepped up to the plate and did an impressive job of running the entire workshop.

Afternoon was then followed by some hanging-out at the SFWA table in the Dealers’ Room (including grabbing fellow Angry Robot Author Colin Harvey for a drink), and some book-checking-out.

We had dinner in a lovely Thai/Vietnamese restaurant with Ellen Kushner, Delia Sherman, Lucas Moreno (editor of French SF podcast Utopod), his wife Stephanie, and Lionel Davoust (whom Delia is publishing in Interfictions 2). Along the way, I also ran into Sheila Williams (who was having dinner at the same restaurant, and whom Ellen Kushner introduced me to).

Afterwards, it was party time. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect, never having been at a worldcon: all I know is that we hit the SFWA suite, talked a bit with Lawrence M Schoen, Laura Anne Gilman and a few other SFWAns, and that John A. Pitts then disclosed to us the location of the Tor party, somewhere on the 28th floor.
Which turned out to be not only the party to be seen at, but also one of the most crowded events I’d ever been at (I didn’t yet know about Friday’s parties), in a narrow suite reconverted into a party room: stifling, noisy and generally overcrowded.

Fun fact #N: you might have heard of the cocktail party effect, which is essentially your ability to filter background noise to focus on the conversation you’re having. Well, guess what? I’ve never managed to get it to work in English. I can’t filter out background conversations, probably because I was formatted to try and understand everything as a student. It makes parties like this a little extra difficult…
But I still managed to bluff my way through the evening, getting introduced to a couple more people on the way (John Joseph Adams, Rob, Sandra and Howard Tayler). Around midnight, my ears and internal body clock both collapsed, and I decided to beat a prudent retreat back to my hotel room.
That’s all for today. Coming up next: my first French panel, the robot, and the Big Bust (and there will be pictures this time).