Wis Con was pretty glorious this year.  I mean, I had a severe head cold and bronchitis, while back at home my beloved was suffering through a kidney stone–which cranked my guilt factor tremendously high–but I went anyway and had an incredible and amazing time.

Head cold 0 — WisCon 3. I love these guys. Elijah and J Dubb.

The panels were full of chewy speculative fiction goodness. The rainbow of genders inspires me. There’s so much to love: I see people at Wis Con that I adore.  We hug whenever we meet.   The work that panelists do in envisioning what a POC positive, disability-inclusive society could look like makes me verklempt. People are friendly, and yet very cool–a challenging mix, in my experience.

I really like Madison as well–esp. vegan-friendly places like Monty’s Diner.

Vegan chocolate-peanut butter-banana shake! Just sayin’.

And there were moments that I thought were really funny.

FIRST GLORIOUS MOMENT AT WIS-CON: This year I was in a reading called EVEN LONELIER MONSTERS.  Karen Joy Fowler came.  But I didn’t know that.  And I’m glad I didn’t know until after the reading, cause my involuntary reaction was like: 

RISK TAKING AT WIS-CON: I was on a panel at Wis Con about sex in fairytales.  I happened to have two princess crowns on me (a friend was going to throw them out) when I decided to see if the panelists for the fairy-tale panel would want to wear them at the panel.

But would they? This is Wis-Con–You could get punched in the nose offering someone a princess crown.

So we all met, and I said, “Um, I happen to have….these…crowns…if you–” They totally snatched them up. Gimme those crowns. Like that.  And they looked FABULOUS in them of course.

Ariela Housman & Emily Cataneo rocking the princess crowns at our “Wait This is about Sex?” panel at Wis Con.

ANOTHER FUN MOMENT AT WISCON:

Friday night, the night before our fairy tale panel, Nisi Shawl had a party where people could make decorative crowns for their head. So I made myself one and wore it the next morning at our panel. The panel was at 8:30 am on Saturday morning (I know) and by 10:00pm on Saturday night I was talking this guy at a party who had been to the panel that morning. He’s going on and on about how interesting and great it was, (!) but then started telling me all the questions I asked and topics blow-by-blow.  I finally had to say, You know I moderated that panel, right? Turns out he hadn’t recognized me — without the crown.

Not man-spaining.  Just a totally iconic look.  #hippyearthgoddess ; >

FINAL FUNNY MOMENT AT WISCON:

The Concourse Hotel is great–love the lobby, love the con rooms and my hotel room.  One of the hotel maids named Anne and I had a deep discussion on the first day about tipping and after that I exchanged fun little notes with the maid Pam who cleaned my room every day. I think she must have known I had a bad cold from all the sudafed packets lying about and the tissues in the waste basket.  She left me two extra boxes of tissues. (!)

Meanwhile, at the end of Wis-Con there’s a Sunday night dessert awards ceremony.  As usual the Honorary Guests  give speeches while we all eat fancy desserts.  (I cried through a few speeches last year.) But the line for the dessert ceremony is looooong.  So while my Wis-Con besties and I were hanging out in a clutch I asked this guy in line behind me if he could take a picture of us all with my phone. He wasn’t enthusiastic to say the least, but on the other hand he didn’t say no.  He quickly took two pictures of us all together and handed me back my phone.  Which was great. Except…

Something’s missing from this group shot of us all…hmmmm.

I asked if he could take the picture again. He frowned like he didn’t get why. I explained I wanted to be in the picture. With my friends. Sorry if I hadn’t made that part clear before. My fault. It’s not like he rolled his eyes at me–but yeah, he was totally rolling his eyes.  Anyway, he was very kind and took another picture.  ; >

Please Sir, may I be in the picture? Jenni Moody, Jeremy Sim, Alisa Alering, Kodiak Julian, and me.

And, that about wraps it up.  I came away inspired by people on the panels, got to deepen some friendships, and maybe for the first time ever in my life went to four parties in a row–a miracle in itself–and actually enjoyed each and every one of them.

On the way home, I had an airport layover in Atlanta.  I was walking by a cafe stand and this woman who worked there said, “You don’t look too good, hon. Come here.” I told her I had a cold and this beautiful woman just gave me a giant disposable cup full of herbal tea–for free.  She said it was called ‘medicine ball’ and all the employees came to her for it when they were sick and had to work. I have no idea what was in it, but I would just like to thank you, dear airport lady, because that tea made me sweat a little just like you said it would, and made me feel SO much better on the flight home.  I feel very touched by these people in the service industry who take care of us all when we travel. Very grateful, too.  I tip like mad everywhere I go, because I know how poorly they’re paid for backbreaking work, and I know how much your feet ache after standing for hours and hours.

About an hour after I was back at home and on my couch the medicine ball wore off and I was sick as a dog for the next few days. I’m still thinking I shouldn’t have gone with my sweetie in such pain — but, seriously, because it was Wis Con, it was worth it.