   Current Post On Trae’s Blog:
So I'm just going to come out and say it: My favorite episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation is "Conundrum." It's episode fourteen of season five, and I just deeply love it.
I don't know if it's because I literally just assumed Erich Anderson's Commander McDuff was a random Enterprise officer of the week (which we saw quite often during the show) when I watched it as a kid during the original run, so the twist actually worked on eleven year old me. I don't know if it's because I just like a good "everyone has amnesia" story. I don't even know if it's just because it's a good Ro Laren episode. I don't know if it's just because we learn that Starfleet doesn't give a crap about lasers.
I just like it. It's neat.
And I rewatched it last night, and feel that it holds up -- which is why I found it deeply weird that the folks who wrote the episode actually think it's not that good. My favorite episode of the entire seven season run of the show was a failure according to the folks who wrote it.
And maybe, as a writer and creator, I should remember that.
Like the hardest part of releasing creative works to the public is that often, after a while, I'll start to judge those things far more harshly than when I first made them. Or I'll compare it to the potential I thought an idea had in my head. And if I don't reach that potential, I'll think of it as "bad" -- when it might just be slightly different than that idea. I have one hundred percent published stories that I thought were just sort of okay and later had someone tell me how much it meant to them to read it.
*cough*I Hate November*cough*
So I should make sure I remember Conundrum. That one of my favorite things to rewatch is considered one of those failures by its creators. That the things I make might have value, just not in the way I originally thought they should.
It's just sort of how things work out.
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Oh look! It’s every convention I’ve ever attended at the Gaylord in DC!
there’s a typo, you have wekend instead of weeked unless you intended it that way.
It’s a typo. I’ll fix ot in a bit.
i see what you did there
One year at Diecon a gaming convention outside of St. Louis, MO, the monthly psychic readers meeting was scheduled the same weekend in one of the smaller halls. I always wondered if any of them got mixed messages with us fight our way through dungeons and the 50k tournament. I kind of hope someone walked away thinking there was a orc battle in their future.
MechaCon 6 (2010) in New Orleans was the same weekend as the National Lutheran Youth Conference. The Marriott (where MechaCon was held) was filled with “Green Baggers”* and it made for quite a few interesting situations and some not-very-christian-like behavior.
Bourbon Street was also packed with “Green Baggers”.
*we called them “Green Baggers” because the Conference gave all of them Lime Green bags that you could spot from blocks away.
GeekKon 2009 had a shared venue and I have this pic capturing some woman’s bewildered look at a very well-done Zelda cosplay.
https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7195/6873058831_38a603706c_z_d.jpg
P.S. I’m creating a character to explore this sort of theme for stand-up.. he’d be dropped into a con and the funny will be how he views the reality around him thru his lens of reference.
First year WonderCon was in Orange County/CA (very conservative politically and religiously) it shared the Anaheim Convention Center along with a high school girls volleyball tournament and a cheerleading competition. About 50k total. Everyone had to pass each other all day. So imagine girls of all ages in skimpy outfits along with cosplayers plus moms giving all geek girls and boys nasty looks for being too near the daughters.
When sub-cultures collide, there’s always some funny to be had.
I think it was the first year of animeland wasabi (colorado) They shared the hotel with a cat show. Otakus kept trying to submit catgirls for the cat show, it was hilarious!
Probably not to the people running the catshow 😛
Yea, they were less than thrilled 😛
I’ve been to a con sharing a hotel with a youth hockey tournament, it was SuperCon in Minnesota.
The first Anime Central shared the hotel with a Christian women’s leadership conference. I had an interesting elevator conversation with some of them. Later I realized I was wearing a t-shirt from Hades Project Zeorymer.
Hmm… reminds me of the year Geek.Kon shared with a fancy wedding! I still think the gift opening ceremony was kinda pretentious, never knew that was a thing. What was that, 2011?
2012 I think.
Let’s see..
Anthrocon: Baptist group (surprisingly chill), Wedding party (They dug us), Mensa (They all wanted to hang out at our con). and lots of incoming-overlap with engineering groups (Curious, polite)
Furfright: Wedding party (they dug us), Scrapbookers (They TOTALLY dug us), Miss Teen Connecticut (Mutual ‘who ARE these freaks’ staring).
And I haven’t been, but Further Confusion had to share their convention center with both a high school volleyball tournament AND HempCon (Exactly what you think) on the same weekend this year. Those poor convention center staff.
Wedding seem to intersect positively in general with furry cons, so long as there’s no bride or bride’s mother flipping out (Califur). People in tuxes and dresses love to get pictures with fursuiters.
I once herd of an incident at an Iowa con that shared space with an NFL team for something that same weekend.
One of the players paid and enjoyed part of the con but his buddies came in too. There was supposedly a sexual harassment incident that came out of this with NFL players hitting on and asking for sexual favors from some of the girls in the skimpier cosplays.
Most surreal one I’ve seen was the first year Daisho was at the Kalahari. Bunch of other groups, but the one that stuck out was seeing a couple people in band uniforms going through the convention, turning to my friends going “That’s neat, which show is that from” as an entire marching band rounded the corner.
Aquatifur decided to hold their first con (2017) at Kalahari.
They didn’t allow any fursuiters to leave the convention center way at the far end of the resort from the waterpark. Guess they didn’t want anyone confusing them for mascots.