All of the convention parties are in the Sheraton. It is several blocks walk from the convention center. There is a Hyatt across the road from the convention center with a decent bar in it. Of an evening, most of the fans are in the Sheraton grazing the parties, and most of the pros are in the bar at the Hyatt. I have been in the bar with Chris Roberson, so it is now a proper convention.

Actually the geographic issues are worse than that, because the filk, gaming and anime are in the Sheraton, and the readings are in another hotel (one of the Hyatts, I’m not sure which). And yet we look lost in the vastness of the convention center. I guess there must be a reason for it – such as having to buy function space in the hotels in order to get decent room rates.

It turns out that I adopted the right tactics about Registration. I went back in the afternoon and there was no queue at all for my line. I still haven’t got to the bottom of what went wrong, but it seems clear that the Reg staff made some daft decisions about splitting lines without taking into account which letters of the alphabet were most popular for beginning names. Also they may have been slowed down by lots of people being surprised and/or offended that they were required to present photo ID to attend a Worldcon. It was a graphic demonstration of how far Security Theater has become embedded in the psyche of anyone running an event.

The convention center is huge, and membership is pretty low (I have heard suggestions of 3,500) so the convention looks lost. I would love to be able to stage Finncon here, but Worldcon looks very thinly spread. This isn’t helped by the fact that the Exhibits people don’t appear to have anything much except the standard traveling Worldcon exhibits. The one exception to this is the Technology of Reading exhibit where Colin Hinz has done a magnificent job of providing examples of mimeo technology and printing. The actual mimeograph appears to be in good condition, so I’m very hopeful for Sunday.

My best laid plans of attending Opening Ceremonies were waylaid by getting invited out to dinner by the Locus folks. More of that in a separate post. They also sidetracked me from my intention to attend the Friendly Scandinavians party, though Gary Wolfe made up for that by offering me a sample from his bottle of Akavit, which turned out to be very nice.

Kathryn Cramer has posted photos of Peter and Elizabeth having fun at Summer Camp. It looks like a very good excuse for not being here.

The program is pretty uninspired so I have been spending the morning blogging. This is just as well as it has proved to be a very busy day on SF Awards Watch. And we have the Chesley Awards to come tonight as well.

There are some things about Worldcon that ought to be solved problems. Registration is one of them. Since ConFrancisco in ’93 ever Worldcon committee has been determined to avoid long lines. Except, apparently, Denver. The waiting time appears to be at least half an hour, probably longer. I have better things to do with my life.

So I have been wandering around talking to people. There are lots of people here that I know. And even more people here who know me. I am mastering the art of glancing quickly at people’s badges when they hail me because (I am pleased to note) the names on the badges are nice and large. So there I was talking Frank Wu into coming to the mimeo demo and trying to draw on a stencil (which he has given a provisional “yes” to) when some guy taps me on the shoulder. I blank for a few seconds. “I’m John Scalzi,” he says, “remember me?” *mega blush* I swear last time I saw him he was wearing a tiara and he looked totally different.

I’ve also taken advantage of the time to pop back to the hotel. I’d forgotten to put on a watch, and also I had forgotten all of my rules about hot weather. So I have blistered a toe, and I had forgotten to use Nalo Hopkinson’s secret remedy for sticky thighs. I will now head back out fortified against the heat.

The Colorado Convention Center is slap in the middle of Downtown Denver. This is very convenient. Within a couple of blocks walk I have found Starbucks, Subway, Jamba Juice, Bubba Gump’s, Hard Rock Cafe, Johnny Rockets, and whole host of other places to eat and drink. I suspect that the Corner Bakery may become the regular venue for breakfast. I’ve also run into John Picacio and Alan Beatts – carrying a suspicious heavy box; Evil Kevin, Andy and the Pettingers – who reminded me that I have an article in the program book; Peggy Rae and John Sapienza – on their way to sample a nice-looking Italian restaurant; and Alan Stewart – who told me how to find the not-secret-but-well-hidden Australia in 2010 party. I am now going to check out his directions.

I’ve now had a chance to go through the Worldcon program in detail. When I said on the questionnaire that I didn’t want to be on any more “electronic fanzines, threat or menace?” panels I figured I was being over-cautious, but I see that they have two of them. I won’t be attending either.

On the awards front I see there is also a Golden Ducks ceremony. That is scheduled against the Sunday Business Meeting, which is where the Melbourne folks will be announcing their GoHs, but the two panels seem to be next door to each other so I may manage to hit bits of both. There is also a Friday panel on the history of the Campbell which I might get along to.

Talking of the Business Meeting, Saturday could be quite busy. In addition to the motions mentioned by Mike Glyer (to kill off the Semiprozine category and add a Graphic Novel category) there should also be a report from the Digital Wilderness Committee that will (finally) put forward proposals for clearing up any doubt as to whether electronic publications are eligible for the Hugos.

The one panel that I definitely want to hit is on Thursday at 4:00pm. It is called “Fandom and SF outside the English-speaking world” and it features Christian Sauvé of Fractal Framboise, Rani Graff from Israel, Alvaro Zinos Amaro from Spain and Sarah Hoyt, who is originally from Portugal. If I get a chance to put in a good word for Finland then I shall do so.