Convention Preparedness Planning

Convention checklist prepared by Robert Callaway

1. Membership: either preregister or have the money put aside for at the door weekend price ($40) or single day (Friday-$10; Saturday-$25; Sunday-$10).
   
2. Hotel room is booked (and you mentioned OSFest to get the cheaper rate), or crash site arranged with friends/strangers, or designed driver set up. If you think I'm crazy enough to drive myself home after the room parties your craziness just beat mine.
   
3. Dealers' room: bring money, lots of money, (note to self: Insurance is due August 1^st, put the sword back).
   
4. Art show: BRING MONEY, LOTS AND LOTS OF MONEY (There is no wall space, none! No you can't hang artwork on your closet doors. Why not? Because you… Oh I give up, just buy it).
   
5. Room parties: a chance to find a real life human being who gets the joke: "A Ferengi, a Klingon, and an Orion slave girl go into a bar……..". Plus someone who you can speak intelligently to about HOT JUPITERS,
   
6. Panels: try to remember good questions. The colors of an anime girls panties means you're as weird as the Japanese who made it. Also try to remember he/she wrote it so he/she should know what they meant by it.
   
7. HITTING the John's with BOPO weapons is a public service to keep their egos under control.
   
8. Getting legitimate time off from work. Calling in sick is a bad idea especially if someone who works with you sees you at the con. Management simply refuses to understand why they have to work your shifts this weekend, instead of taking their kids to the movies
   
9. Gaming: finding someone who doesn't know your tricks or you his/hers. This is a true test of your skills.
   
10. Filking: a chance to inflict your voice on someone other than your family pets, and relations.
    
11. FUN: A convention is about having fun, meeting new people who share your interests, seeing old friends, learning something new or teaching someone something. A chance to find something you want or discover something you never knew you needed until you saw it in the art show/dealers room.
    
12. Choose wisely, it's your convention.