I was going to write about current events on Fridays, but since I’m basically on vacation at a convention, I’m going to take a break from the news.\u00a0 Let’s talk about Con-Volution 2017!<\/p>\n
Melissa and I arrived pretty early, which was lucky.\u00a0 Apparently, we managed to skip a bunch of traffic.\u00a0 We showed up at the hotel a little after noon, checked in, put our bags away, and wandered around the hotel, learning the convention’s geography.<\/p>\n
The interesting thing about Con-Volution this year is that it’s in a new location.\u00a0 This year it’s in San Ramon, at the same Marriott that I used to travel to for Dundracon.\u00a0 Wandering the halls brought back a lot of memories.\u00a0 It’s a really great venue for a small convention.<\/p>\n
From what we can see this first day, Con-Volution 2017 is smaller than it has been in previous years.\u00a0 Though the opening ceremony isn’t the greatest gauge for the size of a con, I noticed that there were about as many guests of honor as there were people in the audience.<\/p>\n
Registration was okay.\u00a0 I would have preferred that they started at 1PM instead of 2PM, since the 2PM start time only gave them an hour before opening ceremony.\u00a0 But the line was short and moved fast enough for us.\u00a0 Melissa and I were pre-registered, so we got our badges very quickly.<\/p>\n
All of the programming is online.\u00a0 I went through and picked out everything that interested me.\u00a0 The selection seems thinner this year than previous years.\u00a0 Again, this gives me the impression that Con-Volution is smaller this year than previous years.<\/p>\n
An interesting change this year with the programming is that everything is workshops and round table discussions.\u00a0 The entire focus of the con is to be more engaging.\u00a0 Their mission is to teach and to inspire the community to do more with their creative talents.\u00a0 I think it’s a noble goal, and honestly, it’s a welcome change from the standard panels.<\/p>\n
After opening ceremony, Melissa and I went to a workshop lead by Michael.\u00a0 The workshop was all about helping writers find their voice.\u00a0 Michael gave us seeds for a story, then had us write in five minute bursts.\u00a0 Each time we wrote, the scenario was changed slightly, and we had to use different viewpoint and tense.\u00a0 The exercise forced us to really examine the voices we were using for our stories.\u00a0 It’s very effective.<\/p>\n
I want to take a moment to talk about Michael.\u00a0 I’m proud of him.\u00a0 When he runs a workshop, I can see the kind of teacher he could be once he gets his MFA.\u00a0 He’s truly in his element when he’s in front of people teaching.\u00a0 He does such a great job, and I’m glad I was able to participate.<\/p>\n
After the writing workshop, Melissa and I went to a round table discussion on rebellions.\u00a0 I wasn’t sure what to expect from it.\u00a0 I hadn’t read the notes on it that closely.\u00a0 It was an interesting discussion that started primarily with rebellion in science fiction, but quickly moved on to touch on historical revolutions, revolts, and some current events.\u00a0 The discussion actually deviated into other, non-rebellion topics (such as the latest Wonder Woman movie), but it all seemed very organic, and I think everyone had a pretty good time.<\/p>\n
After that, Melissa and I wandered off to get dinner.\u00a0 It wasn’t awesome, but it wasn’t bad, either.<\/p>\n
Back at the convention, we attended the meet the guests event.\u00a0 I did my best, but I’ve never felt particularly comfortable walking up to strangers and talking at them.\u00a0 I met a few of the guests, engaged them in conversation, and managed not to embarrass myself.\u00a0 And that was fine.<\/p>\n
When that event ended, Michael’s latest incarnation of his Bard for Life show took place in the same room.\u00a0 Again, he did a great job.\u00a0 I heard some material I hadn’t heard before as well as some I nearly have memorized at this point.\u00a0 The crowd was very receptive.\u00a0 After the show, two of the guests of honor tried to buy him a drink, but he wisely had David take the drink for him.\u00a0 This weekend, David is Michael’s Designated Drinker.<\/p>\n
And now I’m back in my room, scrambling to get my thoughts transposed out of my head.<\/p>\n
I think Melissa and I are going to have a good time this weekend.\u00a0 It doesn’t matter if the convention is small if everyone involved is having fun.\u00a0 And, honestly, I’m meeting some interesting people.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I was going to write about current events on Fridays, but since I’m basically on vacation at a convention, I’m going to take a break from the news.\u00a0 Let’s talk about Con-Volution 2017! Melissa and I arrived pretty early, which was lucky.\u00a0 Apparently, we managed to skip a bunch of traffic.\u00a0 We showed up at […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-906","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/briancebuhl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/906","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/briancebuhl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/briancebuhl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/briancebuhl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/briancebuhl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=906"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/briancebuhl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/906\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":907,"href":"https:\/\/briancebuhl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/906\/revisions\/907"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/briancebuhl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=906"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/briancebuhl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=906"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/briancebuhl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=906"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}