Conreport: Philcon, December 10-12, 2004

Mark A. Mandel, The Filker With No Nickname

This is not much as con reports go. Many fen make reports that are witty and amusing and interesting and make you feel almost as though you had been there yourself. This is mostly a log of songs that I sang and heard during the con, and some notes of other things that I did. It also includes some of my own memos to myself, recommendations of things that I figured it wouldn't hurt to recommend to you, too.

I originally started logging the songs of my own that I sang at cons and housefilks so I wouldn't repeat them too soon unknowingly. Then I realized that if I logged all the songs I heard, I would have an easier time finding the words or the music or the author or whatever, and a while after that I thought, "Maybe some other filkers who were there, and maybe even some who weren't, would like to have this information too." So here it is.

I didn't remember to bring along a camera until Sunday.

Ben Newman organized this year's Philcon filk program. <ben, pIthlo'.> ("Ben, we thank you.") Many of his songs can be found on his web site.

Incorporating corrections and additions by: Ben Newman, Fax Paladin, Lee Gold, Gary Ehrlich

Abbreviations

Calendar
italics: non-filk events

FRIDAY, 2004.12.10

8 pm: THEME FILK: SEASONAL SONGS

It's dark. It's cold. It's December. Many cultures and traditions have winter songs. So does filk. Come share songs that have something to do with the season!

11pm: OPEN FILKING jip

~ 1:30am: Time for me to go. I have invited Ben to crash at our place, so he is leaving too. Lisa Padol has come in from the Eye of Argon reading & told us that my son Jeremy reached the semifinal, so we go there & hear the final. The winner, Lenny Provenzano, is awarded the prize: to perform, then & there, the very first public reading of the long-lost last page of the story (true!).

SATURDAY, 2004-12-11

2 pm: SASSAFRASS concert

Women's a cappella group from Bryn Mawr College. I love them. (Listen, Rene, dear, you know what I mean about a cappella music...)

2:25 pm: My concert

Some of the women of Sassafrass say that as classics students they especially enjoyed verse three of Lieder of the Banned.

3 pm: "Earthlings" movie.

A documentary about why people learn Klingon. Filmed at last year's qep'a' (annual convention of the Klingon Language Institute). When the filmmaker found out what I do for a living -- I'm a linguist, a language scientist -- he was eager to interview me, and since I was only coming to the opening banquet and not staying for the rest of the con, he arranged to do it on the spot, although the light available was dubious. I don't know if that made the final cut, since I was on the program for the filk sing-along and had to leave before the film was over.

4 pm: FILK SING-ALONG

Panelists will take turns leading the audience in easy-to-sing filk favorites. Lyrics will be displayed on a projection screen.

5 pm: Fantasy without fairies & wizards panel

Some book recommendations that I picked up there:

8 pm MASQUERADE

(starts ~8:25)

I arrive early for this event, way too early, as it appears, since I am the first. I guess my habits have been formed by the masquerade at Arisia, which is the major fannish masquerade on the East Coast if I recall correctly, or at least one of the big Costumers' Guild events. So I walk a few yards down the hall, find a convenient area, and do my t'ai chi ch'uan.

The masquerade is enjoyable but not nearly so large as at Arisia, which is not surprising and is nothing to fault it for. After all, if many of the top costumers in the Northeast are putting all their efforts into a major masquerade to be held next month, they're not going to be putting major effort into showing up here.

As at Arisia, the Junior Division (children) competitors come on first. To my surprise, though, unlike at Arisia (to the best of my recollection), they are not judged and awarded their prizes immediately after their part of the competition, but have to wait at least till the end of the costume presentations; writing this paragraph almost two weeks later, I don't remember whether they had to wait through the intermission and the judges' deliberations on the adult costumes as well. Since these are children, some of them quite small, I felt that it was unfair both to them and to their parents.

intermission: Voices Of A Distant Star, a fine anime that I had never heard of before (but I'm not an anime fan), but which impressed the hell out of me

11 p.m.: OPEN FILKING

Tonight Ariel is also staying with us, so there are more of us in the van. She has to get up early to lead a T'ai Chi session, so Ben tells her how to get to the trolley and the Convention Center, and I give her a transit token.

SUNDAY, 2004.12.12

Breakfast and the Muses' Blessing

By the time Ben and I are up for breakfast, Ariel is long gone. Jeremy has left word that he is "burned out" and does not want to be awakened, so Ben and I have a late breakfast. This time I remember that I want to bring along the camera, so I bring it downstairs to breakfast with me. And before leaving the table I notice the dangling drawstring of the package of paper napkins. I didn't do it. Nobody did it. I guess it's just having a lot of music in the house.

1:30 pm: Hanging out in the consuite

Conversation with JJ Brannon on Methodological naturalism and debating Creationists. Must go (re?)read Hume's essay on miracles.

2 pm: Dealers' room

I stop in at Nancy Lebovitz's table, just to visit, not to buy. Well, maybe one button... two... well, maybe this bumper sticker... ooh, I gotta have THAT one!...

Gazing at some jewelry and wishing I could buy some for Rene, I hear "Bujold listie!" from right in front of me. Looking up, I realize I am at the booth of some old friends and fellow Bujold listies, Kirsten and Wayne Houseknecht, aka Fabric Dragon:

3 p.m.: Dr. SETI's concert

Dr. SETI

3:30 pm: ONE-SHOTS

Songs:

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last modified 2004-12-28