SMOFCon in Portland

F.A.C.T. sent me to SMOFcon in Portland over the weekend. I was part of a number of folks from F.A.C.T. who were in attendance: Kimm, Karen, Kurt, Renee and Bill were also there. It was an educational and entertaining weekend.

I left Houston on Southwest, landing in Phoenix en route to Portland. My companion on the flight was Curt Triggs, a farmer from Mississippi of about 65 years of age. He was flying to Oregon to look at '59 Cadillac for sale by the original owner. He had once had said vehicle and was hoping to bring back some memories with the purchase. His companion on the flight was the the youngest brother of a friend of his. The friend is 30 years older than his youngest brother. Curt is also always on the lookout for cats to bring to his farm, he usually picks up one on each of his trips out of state.

Curt didn't manage to sit next to me on the second leg of the flight, I don't know who did. I was enjoying the emegency exit row and its accompanying leg room too much to care.

Arrival in Portland was quick and the ride on the light rail was easy as pie. the weather was a little chilly, however. Renee loooooooves Portland. Ask her about it. And her niece.

I didn't make in time for the first panel at 2pm, so the 3 pm panel on "Lessons learned from This Year's Worldcon" was the first of the weekend. Vince Docherty got up and let loose about problems/cool things about the Worldcon. My brain was apparently still in baggage because nothing sticks in my mind from that panel.

Next up: "Laying out space...." Based on a "hypothetical" convention in Anaheim, layout of the hotels and convention center were discussed. Ideas from the panel included eliminating the need for meeting space in one of the hotels and incorporating the pedestrian mall separating the CC and the hotels into the convention space and making use of it for outdoor events.

Next up: Dinner. At Newport Seafood Grill with Kimm, Renee and Karen. Renee flirted shamelessly with the waiter all night. Good food accentuated by a cold walk to and from.

After dinner was the Icebreaker. Patty Wells led it. She was on the committee for Orycon when their hotel was abducted by aliens. She had to find a new hotel after 17 years of working with the now-vanished one. She grouped the room into groups of 10. We were charged with taking the brochures from all of the hotels she canvassed (cleverly disguised by creative writing) and deciding on which hotel to use. A very entertaining and enlightening panel.

The next morning I walked a good distance to the Cadillac Cafe for breakfast. A great spot, and not nearly as crowded as the restaurant guide led me to believe (it would be a different story on Sunday). There was a little boy across the aisle whom I kept smiling by making silly faces at him while I was eating. His dad thanked me for that as they left the restaurant.

First Panel: "Managing in Times of Change..." dealt with personnel issues of con committees

Second panel: Keynote speaker on hotel contracts. Tyra Hilliard presented some sample contract language that she'd seen and asked for comments. The comments on most of the samples were: "Throw all of it out" A good presentation with handouts of bad and corrected contract language.

Third panel: "Promotions and PR..." dealt with how to get the word out. A bit of a difficult panel. One of the panelists was having trouble staying focused. They talked about flyers, parties, and how to generate word-of-mouth interest.

Fourth panel: "Flyers" (at the closed bar). A survey of a variety of flyers: what is wrong with them, what is right. Armadillocon 19 flyers were among those reviewed.

Fifth panel: "LACon open meeting". A presentation by the concom, who needs people (everyone), etc.

Next stop: The Portland Ale festival. Lots of beer, a little food, tons of people. Kimm, Renee and I took the light rail to this event. Too many people at this time of day to be able to sample many beers.

Last panel: Fannish Inquisition. All sorts of folks bidding on conventions got up and talked for 3 hours. At one point there were more people at the front of the room than in the audience. The audience had around 50 people in it.

Last event of the evening: No Limit Texas Hold 'em. My first, in-person, contact with this game. I did ok, finishing 6th out of 18. Out of the money.

Sunday morning was breakfast at the Cadillac Cafe. If I hadn't been by myself I would have had to wait a while to get a seat.

First panel: "Running multiple cons effectively". Karen was on this panel, so you get details from her.

Next: Crafts festival in the convention center with Renee and Kimm. They wanted to do some shopping and wanted someone along to carry the bags. Renee looooooooooves Portland. Ask her about it. And her niece.

Final panel: "Wrap up".

I managed to get some input from Sharon Sbarsky about ribbons for Art Show awards. We do so few that costs can be prohibitive.

Dinner was at Olea's. Great! Thanks, Kurt!

I stuck around until the next morning and caught an early flight home. I made it to Houston around 3:30 pm

Thanks, F.A.C.T.!