Eating Muffins in an Agitated Manner

Swimming Guest of Honour

Posted by jukkahoo

No, not really. No swimming GoH's, at least yet. If on the other hand Åcon-superhero and thoroughly Fucking Brilliant Hal Duncan isn't going to be allowed into an airplane in the future, he says that "he'll be back to  Scandinavia somewhere and somewhen" even if he has to swim in order to do so.

But what an amazing convention! Good people, great friends (old and new), great performances, excellent Guests (even if the Book-one suffered from unprofessional organising, sorry about that) and allround FUCKING BRILLIANT atmosphere! Youse guys råck.

This has been a long, really loooong dream-come-true and wouldn't have happened without the work of so many people, that it feels somehow a bit unfair to point out only few names, but the THANKS go to all deserving. Åcon was originally a brainfart of Ben and myself, largely made closer to reality by Tero and finally turned into reality by Eemeli, whose work and enthusiasm was the Real Deal behind it all. If only you hadn't had the need to stick your penis into places which would spell L-u-m-i and P-a-p-u in nine months could've been there!

"Jaast kidding!", of course. All the best for the kids and especially Saija. We seriously want to have you four there the next time (if there is a next time... and why not?).

This wouldn't have been the same without our glorious Guest Hal Duncan, who selflessly sacrificed his (and mine and Sari's) night sleep, in order to party with the Nordic fandom all thru the night. BTW, Hal: I don't think I heard all of the musical/opera at 5AM, so if you could possibly send me a recording that'd be effing brilliant; you see, I have these neighbours...

Huge round of applause from these here hands go also to those fen who always answered positively when asked to participate to the programming. I don't think that anybody said "no" to me. Fancy if that would happen with Finncon...?

And what about our location? Adlon was not only accomodating, they were VERY accomodating, not to mention embarassingly polite and hard at hearing. I could think of several establishments where such ruckus as ours would've been followed by stern lecturing about silence during the night and likely ending of customer/seller partnership. "AND STAY OUT!"

So yeah, Candy. It was truly fucking brilliant and well worth every single moment of sleeplesness and blood, sweat and tears, and other pop groups. I'd do it again.

And I think we will too. Stay tuned for Åcon 2.

Some personal observations, almost in order

After all of the preparations, my con really started, when we (that's Sari and I) managed to find our way to Pasila station and met Hal, Mekku and Eemeli half an hour before our Wednesday train trip to Turku. Hal seemed likeable, Mekku enthusiastic and Eemeli slightly bleary-eyed and tired. Must've been the spring and all that pollen, methinks.

We talked two hours on the train, followed by couple more at Ben's place, where Tero was also driving us, possibly showing off his shiny car. It seemed like Hal was this very nice, somewhat tired Scott, who drank tea and ate hot cheese sandwiches. Little did we know.

The following morning rose far too early, but we managed to find ourselves to Ölcon, the un-Official precon of Åcon. Gadzoiks! Tax-free bheer and Finns. What could possibly happen? Well, you figure that out yourself, my Dear Reader.

Adlon was really just a stone-throw away from terminal, "unfortunately" the terminal in question was Birka Line terminal and not the main Silja/Viking-one. Though to be fair, I guess there are several people in this world who could've thrown the stone from the Silja coming from Stockholm and hit our hotel. It was only a three-minute walk from the ferry terminal after all.

After the check-in, most of my memories are a bit blurred. I do remember traveling back to Helsinki via Turku with Aleksi the Amazing Underwear-Guy! There was lots of programming, but I think that's mostly due to the fact that I actually partcipated in far too many of them. Let's see... Ghaps, I was on nine program items. No wonder I thought there was a bit too much programming. If I could've somehow managed to keep myself away, say about half of those, I might have mustered energy to join the room parties and power drinking. Must remember this next time. I think Eemeli can do nine items then.

Actually, I enjoyed all of the programs I saw and participated in. I had treaded some items beforehand (mainly quizzes) but overall I thought they went well'ish. Some I hadn't planned beforehand at all. Like Alternative Histories or Guilty Pleasures (that's two program items), which I think were both wonderfully entertaining, even if not ambitiously inventive.

And I agree with many, that the panel on Book Collecting was waaa-ay funnier and interesting that the title says. One of the best panels I've been in. It is a fascinating subject (at least for me and I dare to say, to all panellists, maybe even Sari... then again, maybe not) which gives ample opportunities to just be funny ha-ha as well as thoughtful.

Adlon was, as said, very accomodating and just the right size for this kind of con. Åcon could be slightly larger, but not that much. 80 to 100 would be just right, the latter in order to fill up the whole of hotel and thus giving us the free reins to do there whatever We want and not worry about other customers. Which we actually didn't, really. There were few saucer-eyed people, who had no idea where they had landed and why, but in reality we saw very little of other hotel customers. There was that group of about hundred little kids who came to eat at the restaurant, though, but other than that, it was mainly just us.

And the conference-room was OK, too. Could've been bigger, but not that much (maybe then, if we'd be more than hundred in all). The biggest flaw was the AC, which made the place somewhat discomforting after 30-40 minutes. I think we almost lost people during Hal's GoH speech, which lasted for hours (OK - or as we say in Åcon, "ÅC!" - hour and a half). This is something we have to think about in the future. Next time we might think of using more technology. Somehow it was sweet to see in the Pixellated Techno Peasantry -panel, how the panellists were all aching to tap the all powerful innernets and show its sekrets. And all they had was a whiteboard and some third-rate felt pens. Try to be techno-savvy with that equipment!

I personally think that there was about the right amount of programming. Proper free "morning", few hours of programming followed by a decent break and then a number of serious and less serious items, all  well and truly doused with bheer. Now this is what I call a con: good-humoured participation, loose timetables (which still follow some kind of order and schedule), beer/drinks readily available and possible to take to your con-room, relaxed atmosphere and a mix of fun and games with thought-provoking ideas. A meeting of friends and fellow enthusiastics. Fan-stuff. Fandom. Cheers!

So, yes, I think that I'd like to organise another Åcon. With some brilliant GoH and all you wonderful people. You are The Best!

NaFaWriMo

Posted by jukkahoo   

Time flies when you're not feeling too good.

I've been somewhat depressed and down these past two months after Finncon. Multiple reasons and I'm not going to go into them, nothing health-wise, though. Next check-up will be in September 2007.

I'm trying to get over this slump (of creativity and of gigantic proportions) with new regime. First in order of things: I'm calling November the National Fanzine Writing Month. At the end of this month I'll have material for three fanzines: Arimoniitti #4 (my long-suffering FAPA-zine), Legolas 4/2006 (the Finnish Tolkien Society's fantasy magazine, with special theme-issue honoring Robert E. Howard - and his century) and the slightly hush-hush fanzine for something I'll be talking a LOT soon(ish).

Same rules apply as with the regular NaNoWriMO, but this is not a novel (evidently!) but material for fanzine(s). 50 000 words. I'm expecting to write a fair deal about Finncon, as well as Swecon and various other little meetings (Kirjamessut etc). Åcon, for sure (hey, Hal Duncan!). We may even soon have a place to have the con. Could you believe that Åland hotels are bidding over us? More info ASAWGI.

Talking about Finncon: our gracious GoH, Mr. Jeff VanderMeer has started doing a new column -  called Dispatches From Smaragdine - for the SF-Site and what is that fungi... erm, fun guy talking about in his first piece? Here is the evidence, pardon if I'll go and demonstrate the colour of a fire truck to little Myy.

And why didn't nobody told me that Propaganda actually a good band and not just the odd German one with that one good song (Duel).

More soon.

"Ethshar!" - "Bless you!"

Posted by jukkahoo

I have seldom read a lot of fiction from the screen. I guess a palm or some such could be a different matter, since the little I have managed to browse with various people's PDA's kinda showed me that it could work. Now I have this conundrum.

Just the other day Ellen Datlow's amazingly well-received (numerous awards, including two Hugo's only last August) SCI FICTION met with a decisive "thank you for playing, but we're now going to continue serving people with more of the mindless visual gimmickry they so obviously want!" service announcement from the Sci-Fi Channel. No worries there, as it is their site, but as SCI FICTION has been pretty much the only service of it's kind I've been using, it was a bum news though not that great.

What really has now picked my interest, is the finalization of Lawrence Watt-Evans' new Ethshar-novel. Those of you who have no idea of what I'm talking about: Lawrence Watt-Evans is one of my guilty pleasures, a a fairly humdrum-reputated speculative fiction author whose works I have enjoyed a great deal all these years. He has several series, of which the Ethshar is his most well-known to most (who know of his works). It's a very low-key fantasy setting with stories that do not necessarily involve the high and mighty, but most of the times the little people, the salt of the earth, the mundanes, the regular folk. You get the picture. His latest published Ethshar-novel Ithnalin's Restoration was (as I understand it) a qualified non-success and thus his publisher (Tor) pulled the plug on the series, thought they did continue with his Obsidian Chronicles and future works.

Waah, no more Ethshar, or...?

Possibly due to his rather fervent fan-base on the net or some other dubious idea, Watt-Evans decided to have a go and try the not so well-regarded Stephen King Approach and started posting his next proposed Ethshar-story Spriggan Mirror to his website, a chapter at a time. He promised to write and publish a chapter of such and such lenght each week, provided he'd get a sum of $100 each week to his account (via various means). This continued all the way up until few days ago when the novel was finally finished! There is a now brand new Ethshar-novel available for all the people to read for free. A full-length novel! Duh, where is a palm or a cost-effective way of printing this monster? Apparently Watt-Evans will get this polished and edited into a proper book one of these days, which sounds like a grand idea in my (er...) book.

So, I now have the option to either wait for a new book to be released ghud knows when, from roscoe knows where from, or I could just go to the website and read it from there. Or print it, or... I don't know.

In other news: Risto Isomäki is the Finnish GoH of Finncon 2006.

[edit]: Stop the PRESS! Risto Isomäki's new book Saraswatin hiekkaa is on the shortlist for Finlandia award. Congrats!
 

Finncon 2006 on tulossa (oikeasti)

Posted by jukkahoo

Liikettä tapahtuu koko ajan. Nyt on viimeistään aika varata ensi vuoden elokuun kolmas viikonloppu sf-harrastuksen parissa viihtymiseen. Lisäinfoa on TULOSSA niin nettisivuille, kuin myös vuorovaikutteisesti ja ajan henkeen sopivasti verkkopäiväkirjan sivuille. Käykää katsomassa, kommentoikaa, ehdottakaa ja levittäkää sanaa. Kiitos.

Finncon 2006 is a-coming. Apologies for the lack of decent English material at present, more and better is expected to be available RSN :) Both the website and the Livejournal will have proper info in the near future. Spread the word, ask questions and make comments. Thank you.

A Good Book Fair

Posted by jukkahoo

As book fairs go, this year's Helsinki one was OK, maybe even good. Lots to see (and far, FAR too much of the good thing ie. books to buy), especially people. Perhaps not as many as a month ago in Turku (that was fun, but then again, I was there for mere three [3] hours!), but good nevertheless.

As expected, SciFi-Sunday was the Place To Be for any discerning fan. The programming was fast-paced and over before you noticed. I'm supposed to be writing a longer summary of this for Alienisti but here are some thoughts of mine:

I saw Jonathan Carroll at 1PM at Helsngin Sanomat stage, where he was interviewd by Jukka Petäjä. I had heard earlier that Carroll's previous interview had been real stinker and though Petäjä's wasn't in any way bad, it wasn't very good either. Carroll was never really comfortable with the questions and in some cases he actually had some dry answers which veered close to being obnoxious and/or rude. On the whole, "ihan kiva".

The REAL SciFi-Sunday started at 2PM, when Vesa Sisättö lead his entourage of fourty-two (or some such horribly large crowd) people on stage to talk about SF/F magazines and forums. A good show with some minor quibbles. Perhaps a bit more livelier performance by the panelists could've generated a modicum of response from the audience? Ben took home the first blood with his callous commentry, but it was really Toni Jerrman Show from there onward: statesman-like answers, sir!

And then it was Carroll, again. And apparently the same interviewer as few days before or so I was told. She had some good questions at first, but when it started to go wrong, it took a nosedive. Ipa had told me to ask a question at some point ("have them [as in many!] ready", she whispered), but when she finally run out of her own questions(?), she turned into the astonished audience, desperately looking for help.

If only.

I had realised earlier, that I really didn't need to know anything more about Jonathan Carroll the Man,  "Just the books, Ma'am", as Joe Friday was fond of saying (in paraphrasing). I'm told over and over again, that he's not a people-person, doesn't like large crowds and more or less isn't comfortable in public. OK, fine. Let the man be in peace, fercrissakes!

The following interview was nothing like the one before. I was truly sorry to miss most of this one, since both the interviewer (whose name escapes me at the moment, but she is superbly funny in Stan Staanila's show... erm, ditto)and the author, Johanna Hildebradt, were excellent. I even managed to get her Norwegian! But I really had to rush to an appointment and to be Frank and Ernest, I find the idea of paleofiction not a cup of my tea. I did like Björn Kurtén somewhat, but I have never been interested in this particular brach of speculative fiction. My bad. The small portion I heared was very good interview-wise. More this!

Hiltunen-free Praedor session with Ville Vuorela was a good show. Not only was Ville good, so was Aleksi Kuutio as the interviewer. Twenty minutes went by in a hurry, with nice info acquired by the audience. Perhaps Ville could've been a bit more verbose, but this was not a serious drawback in any way. He did put his feet way up his mouth though and he is sorry, too. I didn't mind terribly, as I do realise the Flame Mountain productions are an effort of enthusiastic spirit of having fun, more than a serious attempt at creating memorable movie magic, but still I was a bit taken a back by the abruptness of Ville's comment. Which he apparently didn't mean to. Consider yourself forgiven, I'm certain Petri won't bear grudge. A finger will do.

I cannot really comment on the next interview too much, I think this'll have to suffice.

Marko had some problems with Anu Holopainen. He didn't seem to be all that comfortable with the subject and it was clear to see that he had couple of really arkward moments when he seemed to lose his train of thought, which lead to stammering and a loss of words. Holopainen seems like a very nice person and I guess I'll just have to read one of her newer books. I read her first book and more or less savaged it in Tähtivaeltaja (in 1996). I just had to introduce myself to her and she didn't seem to mind meeting her Nemesis of Old!

Stendec Blommila was supreme, as usual. Risto Isomäki had interesting and thoughtful things to say, whereas Hauta showed why he is simply the BEST sf-interviewer in the whole wide world.

Addenda: Kuvastaja-palkinto (Mirrormere) was once more awarded by the Finnish Tolkien Society. This year the wildly oscillating bust went to Ilkka Auer and his first novel,  Lumen ja jään maa: Sysilouhien sukua. I have had the book now for about six months and apparently I really should read the thing! Congrats!

The last panel was about publishing and a very good panel it could've been too, if only they would have had more time or a more determined moderator. Unkind as this seems, but Marko was again a bit off-pace. He was way better than with Holopainen, but still there was a lot he should and could've done in order to make this one a memorable one. A good crowd, with representation from Kirjava, Karisto, Loki and Like. Patricia McKillip in Finnish, hooray!

All in all, a very nice programming. A nice boost of scientifictioness to warm the proverbial cuckoldes of the heart, while the world turns white or the colour slush and there really isn't all that much to do. Next year, again?

In other news: Monta apuraha-anomusta Finncon 2006:n nimissä lähti tänään liikkeelle. Toivottavasti rahaa on tulossa, muuten voi vielä käydä ohrasesti ja jäädä homma tekemättä. Sanotaanko että muutama kymmenen tuhatta euroa ei esiinny ainakaan meikäläisen takataskussa.

I'm OK, you're OK(?), we're all OK!

Posted by jukkahoo

Once more I have visited the hotsipal and once more my doctor has told me I'm OK. Blood, CAT and all that jazz were good. Hurrah and huzzah!

And as it has now been almost two years since the implantation of my veinal gate (laskimoportti), it is due to be removed. Should happen the 10th of Oktober. Sigh! Goodbye my sweet cyborg appliance, who remainded silent thru the Kittilä airport security check, the Seutula one and mightily beeped at the Brusselleux International, thus giving an excuse for that Belgian to frisk me. Farewell!

I'm taking this as a good sign, and so should you too. I wonder if they let me have the thing? Could it be turned into some kind of a pendant? I think I'll have to ask.

Other news: I have been watching the new Galactica. It isn't half bad. I just said today, that I think it is the best sf-series since DS9. Then Teemu (or was it Marko?) asked whether it is better than Firefly. I have to admit it is a close call, but galactica has better premise and no stupid sooooooooooo out of place element.

Anyway, me likes. It's not the best thing since sliced bread, but a very good sci-fi tv-series. I must admit I was more than a bit sceptic about the modernisation of an old and definitely camp series, but Ronald D. Moore has done a very nice job with combining the original idea and characters with today's perspective. Good casting, though I cannot see the sultriness of that Jessica Simpson -lookalike. Baltar, Starbuck, Adama, Tigh and president; great choices. Not too sure about Apollo, and very uncertain about Boomer. And the human cylons. Too much this "what am I?", "what is love?" and "gee willikins, I can have sex!". And some other things, but as that would really need getting into details, I think I'll pass. Check it out, though. Jukkahoo says: "verra nizza!"

What isn't very nice, is another childhood/teenage love: "Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy". Oh, for f**k sake what a piece of c**p! Laugh-free near two hours, with decent choices as characters, but utterly dismal script and staggeringly fun-free dialogue. How the frag can they manage to distill Adams' radio-play/books void of anything funny? C'mon, the dialogue was there already! How can you possibly take out all the humour? What kind of a sick joke is this movie? How could that brainless twat at the showing snicker and giggle thoughout the entire movie? How is it possible, that I actually paid good money to see this... travesty? I could've just burned the tenner, or wipe my nose with it. Must have been both funnier and less painful that way.

New Galactica = Good. HHGG-movie = Bad. Health = Good.

Summa summarum = doubleplusgood. I can live with that.

Going around, part 2 - Jyväskylä Kesä

Posted by jukkahoo

Last Thursday was just another day in the life of jukkahoo. I woke up, read the paper and the post (it arrives around 8AM) and got myself ready to go and meet yet another famous sf-author. This time I had been invited to a lunch-meeting with Harry Harrison (thanks to LIKE). Arriving a bit early, I had the chance to realise that modern folk art is pretty much as good as modern art as a whole.

By popular demand (don't know about the popularity per se, but there was some pushing) I seated next to HH and managed to please him by giving him a nice promo t-shirt of Finncon2006 (soon to be on the net, too...).

HH is already 80+ and his walking is a bit twonky, but as an interesting conversationalist, he is still very much up there with the best. Amusing and entertaing anecdote after another spew forth from his mouth, with eager heads/ears to assimilate it all. All in all, it was a nice occasion, while the food was surprisingly bland and uninteresting (Sanomatalo Namaskaar lunch).

I had heard earlier, that Jyväskylän Kesä has not been able to provide HH with a caretaker ie. train-companion. As it turned out, they still hadn't anyone for the job. As this was somewhat embarrassing and well, akward really, I wasn't that difficult to persuade into taking this job. We went to check out HH's luggage's from the hotel. We run into bit of a problem, when the block of Sokos had a power failure. Finally we got the bags out and headed for the nearby terrace in order to drink something cold. Which didn't happen since the bar was also out of power. Finally we (that being me, HH, Otto Mäkelä and Toni Jerrman at this point) managed to find the cool location of Oort (or something to that effect, Orvert? Ooburt?).

HH and I took the train at 3.30PM and headed straight to the restaurant, never to actually sit on our seats. The 3 and half hour trip went by very smoothly, as we talked about, well... everything, really. How he wrote his only tie-in novel for the Saint, about the life and living in the US (of which I had some knowledge as well), fandom as a whole and in various countries (HH was there when the fandom was born in USA, Ireland and Finland!).

I haven't read HH's novels in a long time, but after this experience, I turned to my shelves and dug out his last book the first book of the Stars and Stripes trilogy (and probably his last fictional work, as he thinks that he has no more tales to tell, yet he would like to write couple of non-fiction books - maybe about his early years and life,  wholeheartedly agreed by this fan here!), Stars and Stripes Forever. I read couple of first chapters of this Alternate history, where the idea is: "What if the United States and Britain had gone to war in 1862? What if the American Civil War had not run its course and, instead, the two armies of North and South had combined against a common enemy: Britain?" I was pleasantly surprised by the fluid storyline, while maybe less enchanted by some of the infodumping. I'm going to continue with this as it looks like a fairly entertaining story. I did like his Hammer and the Cross trilogy (co-written with John Holm Aka. Tom Shippey!), where the basic premise is that there is not just a Christian God, but powerful Nordic gods as well, and the vikings are thus able to defend their way of living and even conquer Britain.

I managed to get an autograph for a copy of the old Kuoleman planeetta (first Deathworld book in Finnish). I must say I was a tad jealous of Toni, who got HH's autograph for his new printing of the Ruostumaton teräsrotta from LIKE, which looked very nice next to his old copy of the same book by John Books (from 1980, like my copy of Kuoleman planeetta), with an autograph of HH from the year 1982, when he was in Finland for the first time!

We met Mika and Ipa in Jyväskylä and escorted HH to his hotel room, for a brief repose before the 8PM dinner extravaganza at restaurant Figaro. Now, you need to eat well in Jyväskylä? You go to Figaro. Not only do they have a very good kitchen, they also have excellent service, and even at reasonable price, methinks.

Of course, I didn't have to worry about the money, since I was a guest there. And were we ever indulged? A full course meal with wining and dining, aperitifs and reperatifs (I mean drinks afterwards). So much so, that my fairly substantial belly was filled to the brim and i was already more than a bit sloshed. But so was everyone else, from Juha Hemanus to Outi Heiskanen, and HH, who mentioned that he cannot in all honesty understand what (if anything) goes on in monsieur Chirac's brains, when he disses Finnish cuisine. A lot is wrong with Finnish cuisine, but nothing with the food they serve at Figaro. Palate City!, says Jo-Bob Briggs.

We walked HH back to his hotel, said farewell's and departed for the night. In the morning, I had the pleasure of repeating a dining-experience with HH, when we ate a hearthy breakfast at Milton. Mine was heartier, since HH for some reason was feeling a bit woozy.... After that, it was unfortunately time to say goodbye's, as I was due to Helsinki and Finnish Western Society's annual Pukkujuhlat. I hope people were able to attend the Sunday picnic with HH in Jyväskylä. He is a class act, one of the Old Ones, which seem to be a dissapearing breed, soon wholly gone.

Going around, Part 1 - Conceive

Posted by jukkahoo

I've been around. Not in Viikinsaari, though, but I think whatever Sisatto says, goes.

Anyway.

This years Swecon was called Conceive. Held in fair city of Gothenburg (or Göteborg for some, or even Jööttepori for some), this must've been the most unorganised convention I've ever been to. It was a lot of fun, though.

As it apparently seems, Finnish interest in Swedish fandom is a bit lacklustre. I have now been to four Swecons (always with Ben, to whom this was his fifth) and every single time I've had great time. Swecon is totally different animal than Finncon, with usually around 100 participants, as opposed to thousands of visitors every Finncon gets.

As you might guess, this means quite a different kind of convention. Swecons are gatherings of friends, a bit like Finnish monthly pub-meetings, except with a designated GoH (or two) and arrainged programming. And cheaper beer. I believe a fair number of Finns would just love to attend a small, intimate convention, where you actually would get to meet the Guest. Not to mention all those dwellers from other cities you just might be able to catch a glimpse at Finncon.

And there would still be beer.

Tero had obviously seen through the startrekkish facade of last years Swecon in Stockholm, and as a trio, we headed to the other side of Sweden with Ben's car. We had asked from various people whether they'd be interested in attending this years Swecon and join our group, as we did have a place for a fouth one in our vehicle, but despite some quivering interest, alas!, we ended up without additional reinforcements.

After an uneventful traintrip from Helsinki to Turku, Ben and Tero managed to ruse me into running around the most of Turku harbour area with their obfuscating and weird guiding. This was insufficient enough to make me/us to miss the ferry, however. As usually is, the uneventfulness of a ferrytrip was as expected. We did manage to talk well past midnight with Tero, so that when the person responsible for waking up people at cabins came and rapped our door around 5AM (or some such ridiculous and ungodly  hour), we were truly nackered. Fortunately Ben, who had just been mysteriously ill for the previous week, had slept well enough to drive the car.

It took us some five hours to get to the west coast of Sweden. By that time the sun had gone AWOL, rain had started and we were getting a bit hungry. Due to Tero's uncanny ability to lead us thru Göteborg, we arrived at the locale couple of hourse before the alledged openings. There was no one around, nor nothing to indicate that a sf-con would happen during the weekend. Or, like Tero says: "Saw nobody at the con site, and no mention of a Swecon, so we knew we had to be in the right place." Right on.

It was still raining. Tero and I had decided that coats and umbrellas are a form of "kikkailua" which meant that we got wet. Naturally, this was the only time it rained during the weekend. Our only chance to sample what the fair city had to offer. Oh well, maybe next time.

We had a quick pizza, or more precisely, thought of having a quick pizza at a nearby cheapo pizzeria. Apparently the four-five guys jabbing about the kitchen area had been left without a supervisor, since it took a looooong time for the pizzas to arrive. Besides the waiting, everything else was solid. Price was right, salad OK, drinks included and utensils clean. Well worth the 49 kroner.

Having made a connection with the Anglemarks from Uppsala, we knew that they were arriving a bit later, which probably meant that there'd be not that many people in time for the official openings. Exactly.

After we had returned to the Studenthouse where Conceive was taking place, we run into the mass of three Swedes, out of which two were the artist showcasing his art and his wife(?) and the third was one of the organisers, Siv. She had that look of "there's far too many things to do, so much so, that I can't really think of what to do first". She seemed happy to see fans, even if they seemed to whisper among themselves in another language. We took the matters to our own hands and started carrying tables and chairs around, thus in essence building up most of the site. (Later we saw how two Swedes carried couple of more chairs to the main audience area, but since there was never that many congoers around to even fill up all the chairs we had carried to the floor, it just made a mess of our carefully arrainged Code. IYHTA,YWNK.)

At some point we were introduced to Jim, the organiser in charge of the media-side of things (who managed to accomplish the impossible, as he run his program on time!). I'd love to have someone like Jim as a member of next year's Finncon committee... Then again, he did mention of being interested in coming. Hmmm.

And then the rest of the Swedes came. And something very peculiar happened. I talked about this with both Tero and Ben, and we all had the same feeling. Somehow, we seemed to be regarded as expected and welcomed friends. Not that we had been feeling any reluctance or distain before, or anything of the sort. THIS time however, WE felt like at home. Like one does at the local pub-meeting, or at Finncon, where you just automatically (after all this time) fit in. We fitted in! That alone was well worth the trip and the money spent, but then it got even better.

Now, we were travelling on a shoestring budget, with the cheapest ferry-tickets and all. We had also asked to be accommodated with local fen, in order to save money for the Interaction (what else?) We found out that Glenn (the main organiser and the chief of Göteborg's SF Bokhandeln) had graciously thought of providing the floorspace at his place. Where also the Anglemarks were also staying. And couple of other Uppsala-fen. And their baby. And Jonas from Linköping. And... they had cats.

As I am rather very allergic to cats, I had a wee problem. In the end, after various other possibilities, a local fan, Mats Pekkari, offered his place for me, and after Ben's quick thinking, for the rest of the Finns. Mats turned out to be the head of local Babylon 5 -club, but dispate that apparent handicap, he is one brilliant host and a very lovely chap. Not only was he willing to take three foreigners as houseguests in the middle of the night, he also provided us with breakfast - and even tried to pay for our carparking. And not only that, he also introduced us to the most brilliant sf-cartoon (probably ever): Invader Zim! Like Hard Waldrop is fond of sayin': "Che'ekidaou'ut!"

One of the reasons Tero was so eager to come to Conceive, was of course his mentor, guru and Master: Charles Stross. As a card-carrying member of the the Charles Stross man-bitch squadron, Tero was in fanboy heaven. And why not. Stross was a great Guest and he was wel-liked by a great number of Swe-fen. To me he seemed like a thoroughly nice dude, very intelligent, teller of great anecdotes who has a slightly peculiar sense of humour (which is only a bonus, of course) and a great deal of antagonism toward bureaucracy and governmental institutions. And he doesn't seem to be too impressed with fantasy.

As one could gather from the fact that the organising-point was more or less a constant trapezee-act on the border between total chaos and lesser mayhem, the programming wasn't really that brilliant. Of what I saw (actually almost all of the English-speaking numbers) the level of interest rose or fell depending on how enhtusiastic Charlie Stross was at that time. Due to some incompetency with electrical appliances, there were no microphones. And when frustratingly many panelist/perfomer suffered from Whisperitis, you were forced to look for a frontseat place and still strain your earlobes to the fullest. And as it is with Swecon in general, there were lot of classically sweconish moments: the panels drifted way-away from the original header, Swedish panelists and members of the audience started their own intricate discussion about fine details in halting English, totally unrelated questions were asked and GoH had that befuddled look look of amazement and puzzlement, as in: "WTF...?"

But as always, also, this was not a major problem. You learns to deal with this with a wry smile, a shrug of shoulders and decide to go to the bar and have another beer later on. Which is always a good choice.

People are there mainly to gather around and meet friends, which for a small con like Swecon, really makes sense. To catch an occasional program is an added bonus, especially when they are good ones, like the GoH-interview or a heated debate on an interesting subject. And then you have the side-shows: I learned that my secret SF Alter Ego is Johanna Sinisalo (Tero was China Miéville and Ben was Wolf von Witting!!!).

One of the most competative sports in fandom nowadays, is techno-gadgetry. I haven't seen so many Palms, PDA's etc ever in my life. I felt like a relic with my fountain-pen and a pad, when great many fen just whisked their "pens" on that little screen. And when everyone had had their share of PDA-gazing, it was turn to pick up the small keyboards you can attach to them. And then the TREO's. And who-knows-what-else after that. Nobody seems to be even carrying a laptop anymore.

The fun highpoint of this year's Swecon was once more the Satruday-night evening party, with plenty of good beer and fun people. Not to mention the single most farout sf-series ever produced: Raumpatrouille Orion! This is something I need to must have.

Yes, it's German science fiction tv-serie from 1965. Seeing is believing.

But as always happens, everything has an end. It was soon Sunday and we needed to head to Sollentuna, where Tomas Cronholm had promised to put us up for the night, so that we'd be able to catch the day-ferry to Turku on Monday. We met with Mats and couple other Göteborg-fen, and ate a very nice Chinese Buffet at Ming. The food and company was too good, as we were still in Göteborg after 6PM, when we had sort-of-promised to be in Sollentuna around 10PM. Ben turned off his inhibitor-relay and turned into a proper Finnish driver, with an empty head and a heavy left foot. ZOOOOM, and we were back to Stockholm and barely minutes after 11PM, at the right location. My humility prohibits me to talk about my orienteering skills. Let's just say, that I challenge anyone to repeat it.

While we sailed the Baltic sea, where the sun was shining, sky was blue and ber cold, we talked about arrainging a small, cosy Finnish convention with an admittance fee. We're pretty certain it could and should be done, soon. Would you participate? Would you pay a small/mediocre amount of money to go to (perhaps) an interesting city, in order to really meet with the hardcore fen of the land, and maybe even really meet a GoH? Feel free to discuss about this, please!

"You like ice cream, you love it, your existence is meaningless without ice cream."

Posted by jukkahoo

No, not Invader Zim, nor a Swecon report. Yet. My computation machine has been highly cantankerous recently (after a brief lull of behaving good) again and I'm afraid some drastic measures are in order in the near future. That means that I haven't been able to pound my thoughts about Conceive 2005 into a decent reportage.

Short and sweet take on it, though: A GREAT con, but as has been more than once mentioned, miles ahead of any other convention when competing in the "Worst organisation" -category. Which in the end didn't matter diddly-squat, as people more or less just came in and had a con, despite the chaos taking place. By the time everybody was having their second beer, it was just as it should've been: a nice, cozy gathering of fen.

I must apologise for the quite-over-the-top percentage of jukkahoo material in latest ish of Tähtivaeltaja (2/2005). Not going to happen again soon. If ever. And truth to be told, the Waldrop article is at least 90 percent Jan's doing. (Unless you all think it's the bestest thing ever, or at least since the invention of sliced bread, in which case I'm going to claim at least 15 percent of the credit for me.) Order the magazine NOW or go and buy yourself a copy at the nearest shoppe that has a copy. It's good value for €5.90, be it this or any other issue. Tähtivaeltaja säännöt!

And do not forget the September 10th and the Tähtivaeltaja Day with M. John Harrison. A good, decent Finnish minicon with one of the most interesting sf-guests you could possibly think of.