DisCon III, Day 0
Dec. 14th, 2021 09:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
goobergunchI woke up at 5:00 this morning—a time I usually try to pretend doesn’t exist—and drove off, through the rain, to SFO. It was time for the first in-person Worldcon in two and a half years.
My flight seemed to take forever to get going—I’m not sure whether that’s a me thing (especially since I, for once, didn’t show up to the airport right as the flight was boarding) or was actually an issue with the flight. The airplane was a big 787, and was pretty full but not entirely packed. I managed to score an aisle seat with nobody in the middle, so my ride was pretty comfortable. (I spent it solving the flight magazine’s crossword and reading Kurt Vonnegut’s The Sirens of Titan.)
I arrived at Dulles around sunset, and spent the next couple hours negotiating transit to my hotel. Since I was last in the District (June or July, 2010—has it really been over a decade?) the Silver Line was added to the Metro, so the fastest route from Dulles now involves grabbing the $5 bus from the airport to Wiehle—Reston East and proceeding from there. I took the Silver Line to Metro Center, then the Red Line to Van Ness—UDC, right near the Days Inn at which I’ll be staying until Sunday. (It’s significantly cheaper than the convention hotel.)
After divesting myself of luggage and reading Shana Worthen’s lovely “Twas the Night Before DisCon” poem, I took a brisk walk down to the Omni Shoreham, home of the convention. It’s about a half an hour walk, or a two-stop Metro ride. I was hoping to beat the registration rush, but registration wasn’t open yet, with a sign saying that it would start at 8:00 tomorrow. Then I wandered around the function room areas a bit to attempt to familiarize myself with the layout. I’m still totally going to forget where everything is when it’s time for the program, but I did get a pretty solid handle on the Palladian Ballroom, which is where the Business Meeting is going to be held. I also figured out where snacks could be purchases, although I suspect I’ll be getting a lot of my food from nearby stores.
After hanging out in the lobby for a while and chatting, I walked back to my hotel, grabbing some food on the way. I don’t know that I’ll want to walk back and forth all the time, but the walk really felt good after all of the transit.
Tomorrow: Highpointing, and the opening of the convention.
My flight seemed to take forever to get going—I’m not sure whether that’s a me thing (especially since I, for once, didn’t show up to the airport right as the flight was boarding) or was actually an issue with the flight. The airplane was a big 787, and was pretty full but not entirely packed. I managed to score an aisle seat with nobody in the middle, so my ride was pretty comfortable. (I spent it solving the flight magazine’s crossword and reading Kurt Vonnegut’s The Sirens of Titan.)
I arrived at Dulles around sunset, and spent the next couple hours negotiating transit to my hotel. Since I was last in the District (June or July, 2010—has it really been over a decade?) the Silver Line was added to the Metro, so the fastest route from Dulles now involves grabbing the $5 bus from the airport to Wiehle—Reston East and proceeding from there. I took the Silver Line to Metro Center, then the Red Line to Van Ness—UDC, right near the Days Inn at which I’ll be staying until Sunday. (It’s significantly cheaper than the convention hotel.)
After divesting myself of luggage and reading Shana Worthen’s lovely “Twas the Night Before DisCon” poem, I took a brisk walk down to the Omni Shoreham, home of the convention. It’s about a half an hour walk, or a two-stop Metro ride. I was hoping to beat the registration rush, but registration wasn’t open yet, with a sign saying that it would start at 8:00 tomorrow. Then I wandered around the function room areas a bit to attempt to familiarize myself with the layout. I’m still totally going to forget where everything is when it’s time for the program, but I did get a pretty solid handle on the Palladian Ballroom, which is where the Business Meeting is going to be held. I also figured out where snacks could be purchases, although I suspect I’ll be getting a lot of my food from nearby stores.
After hanging out in the lobby for a while and chatting, I walked back to my hotel, grabbing some food on the way. I don’t know that I’ll want to walk back and forth all the time, but the walk really felt good after all of the transit.
Tomorrow: Highpointing, and the opening of the convention.
