The Mandelbear's Musings

For those on my friends list who want to know what I do on the weekends, and for the filkers on the list who just want to see a well-done segment on mainstream media, this article and video clip from Atlanta's public television station is worth a look. OK, maybe public television isn't exactly mainstream, but it's close. It was filmed at GAFilk this January; some people might recognize the old coot with a funny-looking guitar singing about robots.

(Seen on filk, quadrivium, and ladyat; Linux users may have to install some non-free codecs, but it does work.)

This morning was spent packing, eating breakfast in the hotel's buffet, checking out, and saying goodbye to friends. Grump. The shuttle bus was crammed most trips, apparently because of people who had missed connections yesterday due to the tornado warnings.

Ran into cflute and technoshaman in the airport, grabbing a bite to eat before picking up a rental car. Switched tables and hung out with billroper and others. Went to security and got redirected to the group W bench "special screening" line. Oops. But as it turned out, there were only about 5 people in front of me, and apart from a pat-down search and checking my shoes and laptop for explosives, the "special screening" was less thorough than what I got in the regular line. They didn't even look in my rolly.

Rolly fit under the seat in front of me with no problems this time, though I didn't try to stuff my bag into it, just put it under my seat behind my feet. Again, the Vic Firth headphones rocked. Best $50 I ever spent.

Mom's new place is gorgeous and she seems happy and busy -- she's running the library. Why am I not surprised?

... was wonderful! It would take a whole nother post to review the concerts, and by Monday I'll probably have forgotten details. For now I'll just say that Urban Tapestry were fantastic, as usual, and that Summer and Fall, the Innterfilk guests, were simply amazing. Mostly ose in four languages (German, Russian, French, and English -- they had a booklet with lyrics and translations on everybody's seat before the concert). They and UT had mutual tribute songs. Linda Melnick's Toastmaster concert was a blast from the past, with lots of old Technical Difficulties songs featuring TJ Burnside-Clapp and her daughter Jessie.

I didn't have a slot in the 2x10's, which were assigned by lottery. I'm pretty sure the audience was totally unprepared for burlesque; that needs to be a separate program item, preferably mixed with cabaret singing and the like. I'd hate to see it mixed with the bawdy song circle, though; I think the audience is different. But "Sex and Chocolate" as a strip-tease -- works for me...

The dinner/dance was a hoot. The House Band was great (especially the torch song set), and the people-watching was superb. I even danced -- once with the lovely jenkitty (after remarking what a treat it was to watch her on the dance floor), and the last waltz with cflute. I think the last time I did any ballroom dancing beyond faking a slow waltz was sixth grade. Need to learn -- it's good exercise. More conventions should have ballroom dancing. With Jen, neither of us really had any idea what we were doing, but we faked a couple of fancy moves and had fun, which after all is the idea.

After the Summer and Fall concert -- they were the Interfilk guests -- came the Interfilk auction, which was one of the most fun ones I've ever seen. My preorder package was snapped up, after a round of fast-and-furious wenching, by Kathleen Sloan for over $150. (It was made more exciting by the fact that Kathleen was one of the wenches!) Interfilk auctions are definitely a spectator sport. I bid for the Italian cookbook by (another) Kathleen Sloan, but after my bid of $150 was jumped to $250 I wisely dropped out. And there wasn't room in my luggage for chocolate, so I came out empty-handed.

After that I went to the back room for open filking. Same room as Friday and some of the same people, only bardic instead of chaos. Worked pretty well; though I usually prefer chaos, when everyone in the circle has a song to sing a bardic works. Let's see whether I can remember my songs... catsittingstill requested "Uncle Ernie's" when I came in. Then "World Inside the Crystal" and "Demon Lover" with cflute, Janis Ian's "The Last Train", and "Stuff that Dreams are Made Of" just as Callie was leaving.

After that I folded my tents a little before 3am, and hung out in the hallway for a little while, where my beard and hair were attacked by a slightly tipsy braider. I'd been wondering whether that would happen... It was still braided in the morning, despite a lack of elastic. I undid the beard, but I think I'll leave the hair braided until tomorrow.

I managed to squeeze in a short walk before noon, and two phonecalls home. The first one, during my walk, found the flower_cat and chaoswolf out at a Furcon meeting, so I had a nice chat with super_star_girl, which I don't get to do very often.

Well, here I am at GAFilk. I got up eight-ish local time, which is about 5-ish West Coast time, so I'm not doing too badly.

Not as well-prepared for this trip as I usually am -- need to work on that. This is the first con in 5 years that I've been to without my flower_cat. Grump. We need to get the kids to the point where they can take care of themselves for a couple of days.

The trip out was uneventful, which is just the way I like them. A longer-than-usual stretch of turbulence over Oklahoma, but what the heck. For the first time, I had a little trouble fitting Rolly under the seat in front of me -- I think I took too much stuff. Next time I'll have to check through all the cables and stuff, including the UA25, and not take food. I took a lot of dates and dried figs, knowing that it would be a long flight and that I wouldn't get fed. What I hadn't factored in was the fact that I had a big brunch just before leaving, and that we arrived at what would have been just dinner time on the West coast. Could have left the munchies at home.

The Vic Firth headphones, on the other hand, were a *major* win. They're not my most comfortable set, but they have about 30dB of isolation. Yeah! They're made for drummers.

After dinner (I just barely got in before the hotel restaurant closed at 10pm) I went up to the Ops suite, which is where everyone was hanging out. Many hugs ensued; I'm not even going to try to keep up with the LJ handles.

I am now going to go get some breakfast and see if I can chase down some sudafed or fake sudafed; I apparently left my less-used allergy meds at home. Dumb bear.