I think I’m about four naps shy of recovering from Balticon 57, but I’m home and back at work.

Welcome back to Morgan’s Writing Tips and Writerly musings, with writing tips from the pros, and of course, my own writerly musings. I’m your host Morgan Hazelwood and today I’m here with my Balticon 57 recap!

Last weekend I spent shopping for all the supplies I was going to need, not only for the convention but because I decided I needed to throw a room party. The party scene was a little sad last year, although I know a lot of that was hesitation having food, etc, and unmasking as we exited the acute stage of the pandemic.

Wednesday evening I printed out the handouts for my workshop, packed, and of course, worked on my blog/video post.

Thursday
I woke up, finished packing, then reviewed the schedule to see what sort of things I should be promoting. I managed to schedule posts for our featured scientists. Plus, finished coordinating the memorial for our Ghost of Honor, Daphne Arthur.

Our photographer/my friend Sako arrived a little after 1:00pm, and I was only halfway through packing my car. By the time I got everything into the car, there was hardly any space left for her stuff. So we shifted things around and gave up on having any visibility out of the rearview. Since we’d packed my tiny hatchback to the roof, and slid a few bags in by her feet, we even had room to throw in some balloons I’d rescued from a work event, because my back view wasn’t going to get any better anyway.

We hit a fair amount of traffic on the way up. I’d planned to help offload the con truck, but because the convention truck got there on the early side of the 3-hour arrival window, by the time we got to the hotel and got settled in they did not need any more help. We did go find a porter because I knew there was no way we could handle as much stuff as the car held by ourselves. He was certain he would be able to fit everything onto one cart on one trip, even after we opened the trunk. Then, I slowly removed more, and more, and more items from the back seat. At some point, he had to concede that my luggage would be taking two trips.

I got my badge and checked in with the rest of the publicity committee, seeing what was needed and what was left to do. I unpacked all of my stuff and settled in for the long weekend.

I had made plans to have dinner with my friend Jenny and her friends. Sako was going to join us, but she wasn’t up for walking the full way, and coordination for a ride got tricky. I walked there with Happy and the rest drove over. While the food at the Ethiopian place was delicious, we were the only table upstairs and the service forgot us a few times. It was pushing 10pm by the time we made it back to the hotel.

Friday
Friday morning, despite my fatigue, my to-do list crowded into my head, and I was up by 7:00 a.m. With registration not scheduled to open until 1:00 p.m., I decided to see how many social media posts could get scheduled. I wanted featured items posted on Twitter and Facebook and Instagram — for both me and the convention. I’m not sure how, but I managed to take 5 hours to do this. Regularly checking all of the social media platforms and responding to comments and questions as they came in probably slowed my progress. If a question was asked, I answered it both in the thread and made its own post — like “how do I access the virtual side of the convention”, etc.

After tracking down lunch with Sako, I delivered the balloons to the fan table, hung all of my party signs, dropped off my supplies for the quiet room, and tracked down some glue because my phone was threatening to fall out of my case. Luckily, Team Medical Dragon had my back.

I only had one panel on Friday afternoon, “So, This Is Your First Balticon”, where I got to talk about some of the many activities and events we had planned. I joined this year’s Con Chair Kelly Pierce, Vice Chair Sam Lubell, and the discussion was moderated by Perrianne Lurie.

As I wandered the halls before my next item, Sam asked me where the Compton Crook certificate was. Well, we had some old drafts, but hadn’t printed anything yet! So, I rushed to my room, updated the certificate, checked for typos with Megan at Registration, (another publicity committee staffer), snagged the fancy paper from the Masquerade Table, and got it printed out with tens of minutes to spare.

Next up were the Opening Ceremonies! Where I spent an hour at the Baltimore Science Fiction Society’s fan table right across from the door to the ceremonies. I saw some cute hallway cosplay and several people signed up and/or expressed interest in becoming members.

Once freed from the table, I happily accepted my friend Doc’s invitation to join him, his friend Paul, and their family for dinner. It took over an hour to show up but was quite tasty.

After dinner, I checked out several room parties and chatted with people — some old friends, some new friends. At about 1:30am, my friend Marcia kept me company as I assembled two platters of ham biscuits and turkey biscuits in preparation for the “First Timers and Friends” meet-n-greet and tour the next morning. (well, later that morning). And by biscuits, I really mean “Hawaiian Sweet Rolls”. I don’t regret my choices.

Then — SLEEP!

Saturday
I was up by 8am to shower and get dressed up. I spent Saturday dressed as the “Mushroom Queen” and had a lot of fun with my brand-new costume. And by costume, I mean closet cosplay because it was not elaborate and all purchased items.

I introduced myself to our fan guest of honor, Bellz Jordan, and let him know that I was the co-host. I sorted out the tables and set up the food and snacks for the event. We ended up sitting in a circle, so I think next time I’ll just go ahead and set that up when I get ready for the event. After some chatting and a half hour of mingling and eating sandwich biscuits, I took half of the group on a tour. I slowly shed people as they figured out where they were going and what they wanted to do, but those who made it all the way through the tour got a free temporary tattoo from the sales table.

When I went to clean up the event, the biscuits didn’t make it onto the con suite table before people snagged them. Definitely the right choice for an 11:30 am event.

I thought I had a few moments to check out the art show when I ran into my friend Greg. He asked what my next event was and when I went to check for my schedule, I realized I had laid down my phone at some point! Retracing my steps, I found it on the table in the Con Suite where I had applied my temporary tattoo.

Clearly, I cannot handle having more than one accessory. I believe having a mug decorated with mushrooms to coordinate with my costume was why I managed to lose my phone.

After darting back to my room to pick up supplies and start the meatballs for that night’s party, I headed back into the fray.

Next up was my first Balticon workshop, “Beta Reading: For Fun and (No) Profit” on the teen track. I think it needs a new name for next year because I don’t know that all teens and younger really know what beta reading is.

I had two people show up. When the first one realized he was the only one for an interactive event and it was aimed at teens, opted to head to Sarah Pinsker’s concert. A few other people showed up because the map for the club lounge had overlaid itself on the map for the 7th floor until Ops made a sign to redirect people. But I did end up with one very lovely lady who stayed for my entire presentation. It went really well and we had a great one-on-one discussion about beta reading techniques for both sides of the pen. With my attendee taking tons of notes!

I loaned an HTMI adapter to the next presenter and headed back to my room. That’s when I found my phone was blowing up, asking where I was, because my virtual panel was about to start. I had no clue what they were talking about, but the Zoom host sent me a screenshot of me listed on the schedule and I managed to log in before the other panelists had finished their introductions.

My surprise panel was: “Handling the Controversial in SF/Fantasy”, the other panelists were: Robert L. Slater, Adam Gaffen, October Santerelli,  and William Joseph Roberts, moderated by AD “Bunny” Boorman. The other panelists seemed to think my contributions were worthwhile — I think each of them had a transition of “…building off of what Morgan said…”. Plus, I made friends with at least one of the panelists.

I had a little time after that, so I swung by Program Ops to figure out what had happened. Looking at the schedule on my phone, my page had last been updated 30 minutes before the panel and I was not displayed as a panelist then, but I was definitely a panelist now. We determined she had been trying to message me and instead had inadvertently added me to the panel. Despite my brief prep window, I was very pleased that I’d managed to hit the ground running so well.

Next up was the “Broad Universe Rapid Fire Readings”, with Randee Dawn, Roberta Rogow, Christiane Knight, and T.H. Timpko. I really enjoyed their stories. As always, though, I started to second-guess my reading when I read it aloud. It seemed to go over well, but I’m worried my story starts too slow.

After that, in the same room was the “Youth Open Mic”. No one showed up. So I caught up on social media comments on my personal and the Balticon accounts and then recorded a TikTok.

Back in my room, it was time to set up for my party. That’s when I learned I had forgotten the power cable for my rice cooker. It was a new rice cooker and I didn’t realize when I was packing that it was not actually attached to the rice cooker. After checking with many people and many places where I found the right shape cable but with three prongs and not two prongs, I stole/borrowed a Crockpot from the Con Suite and set it up to cook rice, but it was going to take a while.

The meatballs went over great at my “Morgan’s Chillaxathon” party — but it wasn’t very chill for the best reason possible — it was super packed and very popular! I’d never thrown a con party before. There was so much alcohol left over though, I don’t know that people realized they should get into the coolers with the beer and cider.

I will definitely be throwing my party again. But maybe bringing less beer.

Of course, the rice was not the best because I’ve never made it in a crock pot before and that’s not the right tool for the job and it finished stupidly late. After the party wrapped, at 2 am, I had to get the borrowed crockpot cleaned out and returned to the consuite because there was no way I was going to be able to drop it off in the morning before my first panel.

Sunday
Sunday started off far too early but I made it on time to my 10am panel.

“Picking Your Plot” was moderated by the always amazing Aaron M Roth who inspires me to be a better moderator, along with TC Weber, and Alan Smale where I feel like Alan and I were definitely coming from a similar approach to writing.

I went looking for lunch next with Sako and Aaron, and after finding a line at the Cheesecake Factory, a diner/pub that stopped serving food at noon on a Sunday, we ended up at “The Halal Guys”. The place had limited seating so we brought our food back to the better-airconditioned hotel lobby. It was delicious.

Next up was my planned virtual panel, “Am I a Real Writer Now?”, where we defined “writer” with a lowercase and an uppercase “w”, and “author”. I got that beautiful external validation from the other panelists who assured me not only was I a “writer” with the lowercase “w” but also with an uppercase “W”. Although, I may not quite be an “author” yet.

I made myself cry talking about the dream. The dream of having someone I don’t know, who isn’t a friend of a friend, come up to me and tell me that my story meant something to them.

Someday.

After that was my “Better Beta Reading” panel, (as opposed to my earlier workshop), where I was the moderator. I tried to follow in Aaron’s footsteps and let the panelists do most of the talking, although I definitely interjected here and there. I felt I managed a much better balance than when I moderated a similar panel at Raven Con last month.

By then, it was Sunday, it was afternoon, and that meant it was time for my weekly “Lazy Sunday Afternoon ‘Productivity’ Stream”. Doc and Sako were with me and people joined us this year! I was super excited and it was lovely to have them — online regular Desdemona joined us in person! Plus, of course, all the online regulars. While packing up, I spotted a ‘thank you’ note and my HDMI cable. (Good thing or I’d’ve forgotten it!)

I’d intended, based on all of my leftovers from the night before, to host the “ghost of the chillaxathon” that night, but then I ran into the con chair. She was hosting a birthday party for Bellz, and her co-host — who had promised to arrange all the food — got sick at the last minute, leaving her with nothing. So, I donated my supplies to her. The thought was, now I could go to bed whenever I wanted. (hahahaha)

The roommate and I and Doc ordered Chinese. I took a lovely harborside walk to pick up our food and we ate in our room. The rest of the night I spent party hopping, including a short stint in the Filk Room during their “Songs of Hope” set. At about 1:30am, I wandered down to Ops to await the film festival votes tally! The Ops crowd is always super fun to hang out with, and we finally got the results a little after 3am.

Monday
I had no scheduled panels and I’d been up so late the night before, so I contemplated sleeping in. But, I also hadn’t had a chance to attend much of anything and John Scalzi was our special guest, having won the Heinlein award. Plus, I had my mom’s copy of Old Man’s War I’d borrowed from her during the early pandemic, which I’d offered to get signed.

So, I dragged my butt out of bed and made it there in time to get a good seat.

He was a great reader and graciously signed the book for me.

I was a bit disappointed that I’d completely missed the entire Art Show because of timing, so I made sure I fit in a circuit through the Dealers’ Rooms and the Artists Alley. I got one art print (and change so I could tip the cleaning staff). After signing my volunteer hours sheet and snagging a sandwich from Con Suite, I headed back to my room to pack.

I thought I had left plenty of time, but when the porter arrived, we were 10 minutes from the start of the “Improving Balticon” panel. I handed off my car keys and abandoned Sako to load the car, so I could hurry down. While I wasn’t technically on that panel, I thought I needed to be there. I ended up bringing the microphone to people and repeating the comments and concerns after our tech Robert relayed them from the stream. As “Improving Balticon” panels go, it wasn’t bad at all (they can get very heated). There were several things that were already on our list, only a few things we hadn’t been aware of, and a few very helpful suggestions. The panel definitely ran long, though. I would be microphone-woman again if asked.

The tech crew wasn’t quite ready for tear down. So, I swung through Program Ops to chat with people, and Rory, our con chair’s daughter, helped me record a video of counting all of the Con Chair’s found marbles. It was a bit our Con Chair Kelly had mentioned during Opening Ceremonies — because one must have lost their marbles to agree to Con Chair Balticon more than once. People had been returning marbles to her all weekend. Out of the 57 original marbles, she ended up with exactly 42, which sounds like a joke, but wasn’t.

Sako and I wanted to grab food next and my friend Abdul Hadi said something about heading off to Pho with Team Medical Dragon. They graciously let us invite ourselves. It was delicious… but 20 minutes away from the con in the wrong direction. By the time we made it back, most of tear down had happened and we were starting to fade. So, instead of sticking around for Dead Dog, (the afterparty) we headed home.

Traffic was much kinder on the way back. And a certain kitty managed to slip out the garage door when I got home.

Maybe I’ll finish unpacking tonight?