With the con less than two weeks away, it's time to talk about NON-PANEL ACTIVITIES for a minute. As awesome as our panels are going to be, they're only going to take up four hours of each day. So here is some detail about some of the other options for whiling away your time in our little beige paradise.
Let's start with a note about "informal" activities (room parties, alterna-panels, Apples to Apples tournaments, etc.): feel free to plan them! Feel free to use the comm to plan them! As long as what you're planning is legal, won't get us in trouble with the hotel, and doesn't directly interfere with official activities (meaning it does not require the space or equipment that is reserved for those activities), GO FOR IT. This is your con, we want you to spend your time doing things you enjoy. If you're using the comm to plan an informal activity, we recommend you use the "informal events" tag to help your fellow partiers find it.
Aside from that, here's the scoop on some of the activities we have planned:
ONGOING ACTIVITIES (to take place in the Catterall room)
The Catterall will be open for general hanging-out from 8 a.m. - midnight on both Saturday and Sunday, with the exception of the vidshow/dance party on Saturday night.
The con library
The idea behind the con library is to provide a repository for fic, vids, and whatever else you feel like sharing for your fellow fen to enjoy throughout the con. However, the con library is only as bitchin' as you care to make it, so print up your fic, burn your vids to disc, print out your fanart, burn CDs or DVDs of other media you'd like to share (pimp your fandoms!), whatever strikes your fancy.
Whatever con library items are left on the table after 3 pm on Sunday will be free to a good home, so if you want to hold on to your own contributions, please make sure you remove them from the table before that deadline. Also, this is obviously a fabulous and good-natured group, but large numbers of people and sleep deprivation being what they are, PLEASE don't contribute anything to the con library that you couldn't bear to lose if it were to be misplaced.
The craft table
Our craft table actually tends to be MULTIPLE tables, festooned with glitter and glue and images of attractive people and various other tools to create your great fannish work of art. If you have items of a crafty nature (glitter, glue, images of attractive people, etc.) that you would be willing and able to share to help populate the table, please feel free to bring them!
The swap table
More precisely, this is the "giving stuff away" table, but that doesn't have quite the same ring to it. Got any fannish goodies lying around (old DVDs, zines, books, etc.) that you're willing to give away to a good home? Bring them to the swap table and make another fan's day!
PLEASE NOTE: Any items left on the swap table after the conclusion of the con will be thrown away/recycled.
OTHER GROUP ACTIVITIES
Times and locations of these activities are subject to change; check the schedule in your con packet for final confirmation.
Dante's Cove pilot viewing, Friday, 8 - 9:30 pm
What with this being the last Bitchin' Party, it seemed appropriate to end as we began, with the media that launched the con's nickname as well as so very many other extremely silly things: the pilot of Dante's Cove.
For anyone who is fortunate enough not to have heard of Dante's Cove, it is a gloriously bad show that somehow, incomprehensibly, against all odds, ran on the Logo channel for three seasons, detailing the adventures of a group of pretty, not-terribly-bright, over-oiled twentysomethings who reside at the Hotel Dante. There is witchcraft and mystery and intrigue, and bad acting exceeded only by bad dialogue, and there are horrible special effects and inexplicable cinematography choices and periodic appearances by Tracey Scoggins to chew the holy hell out of the scenery. There is also-in the pilot, anyway-quite a lot of softcore gay sex (m/m and f/f, though there is also a token het couple), often involving the random disappearance and reappearance of clothing. Really, it is an experience not to be missed, an intricate tapestry of wrongness that comes back around to being so very, very right. So. We very much encourage you to join us for this hilarious and traumatic experience.
Popcorn and soda will be provided; heckling (and quoting along) welcome.
Fannish pictionary, Saturday, 4 - 5:30 pm
Think you can draw "John Sheppard wakes up straight, and Rodney gets a sex change" in such a way that someone in a roomful of fen can figure out what the hell you're trying to communicate? Then fannish pictionary is the place for you! Join us as we discover that a stick figure with a giant cock usually means either Pete Wentz or David Bowie, and the first guess for an oval should probably be "Farscape." It's gonna be good times.
There will be a sign-up sheet available on Friday and Saturday, so we have an idea of how many people to expect.
NOTE: We absolutely encourage you to sign up to draw, since there is no game if no one draws, and then we just end up sitting quietly in the room and it's all awkward and many years from now, when you are on your deathbed, you're probably going to think, If only I had drawn in fannish pictionary! BUT if you are truly drawing-averse, you're welcome to come hang out and shout ideas anyway. But you should draw! It's fun, and no one is good at it, and I have many incomprehensibly hilarious flip-pad pages from previous cons to prove it. :D
Dance partay, Saturday, 9:15ish - 10:45ish pm (after the vidshow)
Because a party can't be truly bitchin' without daaaaaaaaaancing. Grab a drink from the bar and get down to a badass mix of music based on both your suggestions to
troyswann and her own dance-music-y genius.
Also: if you'd like, we encourage you to wear something that makes you happy for the vidshow/dance party! Wear something fancy, something funky, something slutty; wear a costume, wear your pajamas, wear jeans, wear the same thing you've been wearing all day-whatever makes you feel good.
Rec My Fandom panel, Sunday, 4 - 5 pm
Got a fandom that EVERYONE ELSE SHOULD ALSO LOVE? You get five minutes to rec it in whatever way you like: visual aids, interpretive dance, elegiac poem, whatever! We will not be able to provide audiovisual equipment for this panel (IMHO, it's more fun without it anyway!), but anything else goes. There will be a sign-up sheet available throughout the rest of the con, though if you are inspired at the last minute and we've still got time left in the schedule, feel free to volunteer during the panel itself.
Magic Mike XXL, Sunday, 7:30 - 9:30 pm
We always like to have a post-con movie to cheer everybody (i.e., me) up after the con is officially over. This year, Magic Mike XXL has been requested, and though I have never seen it, I am told that it is life-changingly delightful, and based on the cast and basically everything else about it I have no doubt of that, so. MAGIC OF THE DANCE. LET'S DO THIS.