Views from Medina Road

Spent an hour or so listening in on the WSFS business meeting, as they debated splitting the Best Editor Hugo category into two, listening to speeches and counterarguments and motions that went on in great detail. There are good arguments on both sides.

I dipped in and out of panels moreso than previously. I heard most of a panel about whether Harry Potter is good or bad -- the books, and their influence, that is -- with Jane Yolen, Sharyn November, Graham Sleight, et al; heard part of a panel on Science Denial -- why do so many of the public believe weird things? -- with Paul McAuley et al. And a couple others. Bought a couple more books. Took a nap. Went for a walk.

Later I taxied out to the airport to meet my partner, who flew in from LA for the last day and a half of the con before we depart for a week on the continent. I finagled an invitation to the HarperCollins Voyager party on The Tall Ship downriver a couple blocks from the SECC, where eyepatches and scarves were handed out amidst wine and beer and canapes. Chatted with Geoff, Jane, David. Then a taxi to our dinner reservation, at a recommended restaurant called Ubiquitous Chip, where we ate pork cheeks, scallops, pigeon, some kind of fish called leith (?), and desert, and I tried a Single Malt Scotch in the range I like but had not previously tried -- Adberg, I think it was.