Minicon 44!

Every Easter weekend for the last 15 years, I have met up with Gail and we head over to the Cities for our annual science fiction convention: Minicon. The weekend usually goes like this:

Friday - knitting store (or spice store, or kitchen store, or bookstore...) and lunch. Usually it has been the Yarnery in St. Paul, but Gail found the 3 Kittens Needle Arts in Mendota Heights so we arranged to meet there. What a delightful store! The needlepoint canvas's were incredible - so crisp with beautiful bright colors. I stuck to knitting and picked up 2 skeins of eyelash yarn for a couple of scarves, #3 bamboo needles and a skein of cascade yarn for socks.

Then it was off to lunch! We went to Da Afghan in Bloomington (1/8th mile west of REI in the industrial park for those of you familiar with area). It was so-so. Gail chose the buffet and I went with the menu. Gail noted that the buffet items were rather on the dry side. I had a stewed eggplant and tomato dish with basmati rice that was actually pretty good. We both had chai tea which was excellent and finished the meal with a dessert - baklava for me (yum!) and a puff pastry and ice cream dish for her (looked yum!).

The convention doesn't get started until late afternoon/evening, so we had some time to kill. A walk around Beaver Brook Field (Hwy 100 and American Blvd W) helped with digestion, before heading to the Sheraton. Plus I don't get so fidgity if I've moved around a bit.

It was a good convention this year - the GoH was Karl Schroder; I haven't read his books but I may have to check one out now. The Science GoH was Seth Shotack, an astronomer with SETI. He was really cool to listen to. The Artist GoH wasn't able to make it, but I ended up buying two of his prints and one of his books. Amazing artwork. We usually stay through Sunday, but a family conflict this year had me traveling home Saturday night.

Here's the panels I went to:
Opening Ceremonies
Worlds of Bladerunner - movies influenced by this cult classic movie.
Humor with an Edge - Humor in SF and Fantasy
Which Singularity? - a discussion about the Singularity Event in SF
Steampunk - why does the Victorian age facinate SF&F writers/readers?
Science Fiction Westerns - briefly. I bailed and went to:
SETI Fact & Fiction

As always, I am already looking forward to next year! Though this year I'm going to Worldcon in Montreal and I'm really looking forward to that too.