Polaris 23: The Not-So-Short Report
Yes, for me, the Polaris 23 experience began on Thursday with the arrival of seanchaidh and travellingone at the train station. I greeted them with the awesometastic mango green tea matcha smoothie that my local organic coffee house makes. The drive up was uneventful, but pretty as I chose to take Highway 7, not the 407, which avoids tolls and takes us through a bunch of little pretty hamlets.
The Sheridan is beautiful. From the second we arrived, the staff couldn't have been more accommodating, particularly one waiter named Sri. The room was also spectacular and fit the needs of the three of us. It also provided me with a boatload of jokes to send seanchaidh 's French Canadian Rhys, since I was sharing a bed with her. All of which I will send to him, someday.
The three of us roamed around the food court and shops beneath the hotel. Even though the shops have nothing to do with the hotel, they were, by far the most disappointing part of the location. I wouldn't send my worst enemy to eat as some of the kiosks. Instead, we ate in the hotel restaurant, while I texted elysium1996 , who I texted well before she even crossed the border.
In fact, the EOL and Mr. Ely didn't arrive until alter in the evening when it was discovered her GPS, like many American things, had no knowledge of Canadian geography, and sent them to the middle of a field. Thus, my only plan was to buy them drinks, although my supersecret plan to get them drunk and then take pictures for blackmail, epically failed. It probably did so because I publicly announced it, destroying the whole secrecy thing.
We also watched Day Four of COE. I have already posted my thoughts on that subject, but I still don't like my buttons pushed. Fortunately, seanchaidh was tolerant enough to hold my hand for the last 15 minutes of the episode, since we'd already been spoiled.
Thus, we went to bed at a stupid hour, considering the con hadn't even begun.
We all crawled out of bed, fairly late, only to be spoiled rotten by the hotel's breakfast buffet. I want the omelette chef to come and live at my house.
The afternoon slipped by, with the only notable event being the event that resulted in the fruit basket of injury. I find it odd the fruit basket of injury is now residing in my house.
After check-in, we went through out panelist info. I was the only one who didn't have a panel they didn't sign up for. Although, bubbleslayer was relieved to find she wasn't on a panel that would interfere with a talk she wanted to go to. At least, we figured she wasn't on it, since she didn't have a sheet. In fact, we weren't sure that panel was even running. We found out later that it did, but only had one panelist. Despite this, I'm pretty sure BB was happy not to be on it, even though the topic was something she probably would've enjoyed discussing.
seanchaidh , bubbleslayer (who we kept housed until her roomie arrived several hours later), the Elys, & C, the Elys friend, planned to go eat at Jack Astors. Well, we couldn't find it. (It was found after dinner.) I had to be back at the main room for things to do with the opening ceremonies by 5, so I don't think I've ever eaten a meal faster.
I'm going to skip the opening ceremonies. Really, all I'd like to say about that is that I thought I had written it. It turns out I didn't. I would like to make it clear that my not talking about it does not take away from any of the wonderful volunteers' efforts (like assetic or the kid who played 11). Those I will talk about and they were awesome. I would also like to add that I propose boywhocantsayno sing the opening ceremonies. Even if the rest of Concom may have heard it all before, speaking as an outsider, I haven't and it was hilarious.
After the event that shall no longer be named, and very few people, except the ones I went to the dealer room with, realizing I found it anything but hilarious, it was off to the dealers' room. For the ten minutes we were in there, I think we all learned that it is possible for several people to share the same space at the same time. Who knew Polaris would disprove some of the basic laws of physics, as I understand them. I mention this because it was great to see that many people there. Now, if only the dealers would bring trinkets like fridge magnets, I would be a truly happy Spy. It really doesn't take much.
One important detail to add is that a major player this weekend was Bones, from the ST movie. He will be featured in this review.
seanchaidh had her first panel at 7pm, "The Children of Time Shall Gather," about the great companions. I have to admit, like every first panel I'm just an attendee of, I'm less than my verbose self. I wanted to defend Rose, who is often dismissed by the fandom. On the other hand, the Doctor Who cosplay girls were there and brought up Frobisher. A penguin companion has to make the top ten just because of the pengiun aspect. (I'm expecting an extended universe tale called "March of the Frobisher!") I would also like to add that while I do not know the Doctor Who cosplay girls personally, they always make my day when I see them. If you know who they are, would you mind terribly telling them so?
At 8pm, we travelled all the way to the Ninth Floor, to discuss "The Polarizing Effects of Gwen Cooper-Williams," I was modding, and part of my panel was bubbleslayer , and someone who hadn't seen any part of series three. This was good as a quick check of the room gave us a quorum, when it came to avoiding season three spoilers. I wasn't ready to talk about getting my buttons pushed the previous night, so this made the discussion much better.
This panel started a trend of the weekend: the invisible panelists. We had one on this one. I think it's a phenomenon that needs to be investigated by Mulder and Scully or, at least, the people from Fringe.
As the panel progressed, seanchaidh took notes on the good-Gwen, bad-Gwen and meh-Gwen. I record them for posterity here.
By the end of the panel, we came to the following two conclusions: 1) the fandom can be split but still very civil an have great and intelligent conversation 2) Rhys is too good for Gwen. The votes are recorded in the photos.
We took a two hour break from panel discussion, although, after hearing rave reviews from nexstarman and indefatigable42 , I wish I'd gone to watch Doctor Who at the Proms in the video room.
I did room counts at 10 with travellingone , and I have to say, overhearing snippets from the "Origami Kama Sutra" panel, is not good for anyone. This is definitely a panel that needed context, and another table. That one travellingone and I could solve, as we stole one from the dealers' hallway area, although I think it was actually a Polaris info table, but I could be wrong. Personally, I would've liked it better if that panel had promised to leave a note saying what they made on that table before returning it. How cool would that have been?
At 11 was "The Women Behind the Men" formerly the "Why Good Girls Like Slash" panel. It was run by , marita_c and enkanowen , and we had fun. We talked about all sorts of things, and it was good. Best answer of the night though, "because two men together is hot."
At midnight, seanchaidh had the fanfic panel "In Character, In Bed," panel, (modded by Bones) while I had the Primeval panel (which I modded). We all had a great chat about my little, now canceled dinosaur show, despite the one person who kept trying to get us all to use the scientific definition of dinosaur. Sorry, my definition is something lizard-like that has claws and may eat / stomp on my head, from a prehistoric era. I was on the panel with an anglophile, so that made life easy.
There was another invisible panelist at this panel. Again, who has Fox Mulder's number?
bubbleslayer , CH (BB's roommate) elysium1996 , seanchaidh , travellingone and myself headed upstairs to our room to watch the last part of Children of Earth and eat pizza. Since I've already posted my initial impressions on that, I will add that I would like to apologize to the Doctor Who cosplay girls, some of whom had the room next to us. Six women cheering for PC Andy at 2:30 in the morning, was probably a little loud. It was an even later start, since seanchaidh and I stayed up even later whispering our thoughts to each other about COE, trying not to wake travellingone . How she managed to get up in the morning, I don't know.
Anyway, after yet another breakfast in the hotel, I realized I'd missed one of the panels I wanted to see, so my first of the day was the Chuck panel. elysium1996 and I were not amused. One should not have to hear panelists talking about how little they know about the subject before the panel starts. Please note there isn't a cone of silence over your head prior to the panel starting, panelists!
Since I don't have anything nice to say about the Chuck panel, let me move on. I tried to nap between 2-3:30, as I wanted to be really awake for what, I think, was the best panel of the weekend: "Donna Noble: Still Made of Awesome." At first, I didn't think that many people would show up, or that all the panelists would appear (one escaped the invisible issue about 5 minutes after the start) and the hike to the room seemed more like instructions the Doctor would give someone to find an obscure room in the TARDIS.
Before we even began, the room was packed. We had the Doctor Who cosplay girls, which made me smile as they always have something great to say. Despite this, they were not my favourite set of costumes in the room. Nope, we had 2 Tens and a Donna Noble.
(We also had a Femme Jack, in the form of enkanowen . I don't think it's possible for the to be a better Femme Jack out there.)
We all bonded over the noise from the squash game across the way, channeling our inner Donna Noble and projecting. People were supportive, and funny, and it was great to share the Donna love with a room full of such amazing people.
One of the panelists also helped out with the charity auction, which not only required me to donate in the name of the TARDIS, but also to go and drool over the Primeval Episode 5 signed script, that I knew I could never afford. yellow_freshia had to pry it out of my hands.
The large group of us went for dinner, and I was moving so slowly, I missed the Top Gear panel, so I met author Lesley Livingston instead. I read her book Wondrous Strange, pre-pub, so I was excited and got my own copy, signed.
I was also late for the Dollhouse panel, because I got cornered and told how WRONG I was about my opinion for COE, by someone not involved in the conversation. Because I was late, I missed elysium1996 , and I wish I'd done what she did and left.
I went back up to my room to discover something truly terrifying: action figure porn. For posterity, let me say that seanchaidh and enkanowen should not be left alone with action figures. Captain Jack Harkness and his twisty thighs (I am not making this up) had his way with Bones. There are pictures, lots of pictures, and even video. For those who are curious, the doll designers even put washboard abs under Bones's removable plastic shirt.
It was certainly a girly getting ready for the dance with seanchaidh , enkanowen , elysium1996 , and myself getting all made up. I even wore gold eyeliner. Anyone who knows me IRL, knows that was a big step for me. If I have enkanowen 's mad skillz at make-up, I would be a much, much more glittery person.
At 10pm was the "Research for Fanwriters" and my inner librarian came out, with all the databases and use of the public library. seanchaidh recorded the full list, which I'm linking to here.
bubbleslayer , and I, went to go entertain Mr. Ely, including getting the now traditional picture of all the ladies, dressed up for the dance, surrounding Mr. Ely. I don't think he suffered, through any of the multiple takes.
What can I say about the dance? The DJs were good, and it was nice having a crowd out on the dance floor. We even provided our own entertainment during the slow songs when two of the invisible boyfriends started dancing with each other. (Don't ask.) Unfortunately, we couldn't stay at the dance long because we all had a panel we were attending at 1am.
Now onto the panel. Initially, I'd posted about my goal of having this the best attended panel being the best attended panel ever, but I'd been dreading it all day for the "art versus emotion" element. My fears were totally unfounded. People who loved it, and those who didn't like element of it, had a great discussion, defending their side, without offending the other. While the official panel ended at 2, since it was the last one at night, the last group of 9 of us, trickled out at 3:30. How cool is that? Polaris attendees are the best.
I think seanchaidh and I got up after we could reasonably call it morning, and found ourselves schlepping to the Tims for breakfast. Not a great idea. Everything in the hotel was good. The Tims, not so much -- and that is hard for me to say as a Canadian.
The first panel we attended (but were not on) was the "British-US Crossovers: Epic Fail." Again, we were not amused when it drifted way off topic. Oh well, it was Sunday and the discussion was flowing, so I won't fault it too much, except for the outright rude dismissal of seanchaidh 's one and only comment in the panel.
Finally, I saw my first talk of the weekend, the David Squared talk. Yes, David Hewlett and David Nykl fanboying each other. Originally, I was sitting with seanchaidh , but Mr. Ely joined us when the highly insensitive photographer dropped his equipment on Mr Ely's chair, when Mr. Ely got up for a minute, doing the polite thing and talking on his cell outside the main room. While I was happy for the company, bad photographer, no cookie -- particularly since he offended the best cookie maker in the world.
My last panel of the weekend was "The Fandom Myth of Tolerance," that travellingone moderated, and believe me, we discovered how intolerant fandom was. We could've just limited the topic to wank and talked another hour. It makes me sad because we can have amazing moments like the Donna Noble panel, yet be so mean to each other.
Afterward, I made another trip to the dealers' room. I'd already bought some Torchwood books featuring my fictional Welsh boyfriend, but had yet to buy a button. Anyone who has ever attended Polaris knows the button guy. I got a button, ask did enkanowen and her roomie. We also managed to barter a "I survived the Polaris 22 inferno" shirt for enkanowen .
While I'm not too sure we can call it a panel, I had been informed that David, someone I met at last year's Polaris, was in the geek-off final, and since the originally scheduled showing in the video room wasn't what was planned, I went to the geek-off final. I think I've found my new Polaris tradition as it was a blast. Also, David kicked geek ass, to become the supreme geek. Yay, David! Woot!
(I might -- I say might, enter myself in the Who geek-off in the future because I got all the questions save one from the Whoniverse.)I would, on the other hand, be slaughtered in the final geek-off.
Finally, the closing ceremonies, which were brief, and off we went to dinner, all except for travellingone , who had the annual Concom party, where there's a rumour going around about someone being hit in the head with a drumstick. Methinks Concom must hold good parties. After drunstick throwing, all they needed to do was move up to guitar smashing. That should be next year's goal.
After dinner, a bunch of us headed back to the Elys' room to watch the Doctor Who Easter Special, which, besides being far superior to the Christmas special, was the perfect way to end Polaris.
And that is all for this year. If I've forgotten something, or was unaware of some awesomeness somewhere, please, feel free to mention it in the comments.
The Sheridan is beautiful. From the second we arrived, the staff couldn't have been more accommodating, particularly one waiter named Sri. The room was also spectacular and fit the needs of the three of us. It also provided me with a boatload of jokes to send seanchaidh 's French Canadian Rhys, since I was sharing a bed with her. All of which I will send to him, someday.
The three of us roamed around the food court and shops beneath the hotel. Even though the shops have nothing to do with the hotel, they were, by far the most disappointing part of the location. I wouldn't send my worst enemy to eat as some of the kiosks. Instead, we ate in the hotel restaurant, while I texted elysium1996 , who I texted well before she even crossed the border.
In fact, the EOL and Mr. Ely didn't arrive until alter in the evening when it was discovered her GPS, like many American things, had no knowledge of Canadian geography, and sent them to the middle of a field. Thus, my only plan was to buy them drinks, although my supersecret plan to get them drunk and then take pictures for blackmail, epically failed. It probably did so because I publicly announced it, destroying the whole secrecy thing.
We also watched Day Four of COE. I have already posted my thoughts on that subject, but I still don't like my buttons pushed. Fortunately, seanchaidh was tolerant enough to hold my hand for the last 15 minutes of the episode, since we'd already been spoiled.
Thus, we went to bed at a stupid hour, considering the con hadn't even begun.
We all crawled out of bed, fairly late, only to be spoiled rotten by the hotel's breakfast buffet. I want the omelette chef to come and live at my house.
The afternoon slipped by, with the only notable event being the event that resulted in the fruit basket of injury. I find it odd the fruit basket of injury is now residing in my house.
After check-in, we went through out panelist info. I was the only one who didn't have a panel they didn't sign up for. Although, bubbleslayer was relieved to find she wasn't on a panel that would interfere with a talk she wanted to go to. At least, we figured she wasn't on it, since she didn't have a sheet. In fact, we weren't sure that panel was even running. We found out later that it did, but only had one panelist. Despite this, I'm pretty sure BB was happy not to be on it, even though the topic was something she probably would've enjoyed discussing.
seanchaidh , bubbleslayer (who we kept housed until her roomie arrived several hours later), the Elys, & C, the Elys friend, planned to go eat at Jack Astors. Well, we couldn't find it. (It was found after dinner.) I had to be back at the main room for things to do with the opening ceremonies by 5, so I don't think I've ever eaten a meal faster.
I'm going to skip the opening ceremonies. Really, all I'd like to say about that is that I thought I had written it. It turns out I didn't. I would like to make it clear that my not talking about it does not take away from any of the wonderful volunteers' efforts (like assetic or the kid who played 11). Those I will talk about and they were awesome. I would also like to add that I propose boywhocantsayno sing the opening ceremonies. Even if the rest of Concom may have heard it all before, speaking as an outsider, I haven't and it was hilarious.
After the event that shall no longer be named, and very few people, except the ones I went to the dealer room with, realizing I found it anything but hilarious, it was off to the dealers' room. For the ten minutes we were in there, I think we all learned that it is possible for several people to share the same space at the same time. Who knew Polaris would disprove some of the basic laws of physics, as I understand them. I mention this because it was great to see that many people there. Now, if only the dealers would bring trinkets like fridge magnets, I would be a truly happy Spy. It really doesn't take much.
One important detail to add is that a major player this weekend was Bones, from the ST movie. He will be featured in this review.
seanchaidh had her first panel at 7pm, "The Children of Time Shall Gather," about the great companions. I have to admit, like every first panel I'm just an attendee of, I'm less than my verbose self. I wanted to defend Rose, who is often dismissed by the fandom. On the other hand, the Doctor Who cosplay girls were there and brought up Frobisher. A penguin companion has to make the top ten just because of the pengiun aspect. (I'm expecting an extended universe tale called "March of the Frobisher!") I would also like to add that while I do not know the Doctor Who cosplay girls personally, they always make my day when I see them. If you know who they are, would you mind terribly telling them so?
At 8pm, we travelled all the way to the Ninth Floor, to discuss "The Polarizing Effects of Gwen Cooper-Williams," I was modding, and part of my panel was bubbleslayer , and someone who hadn't seen any part of series three. This was good as a quick check of the room gave us a quorum, when it came to avoiding season three spoilers. I wasn't ready to talk about getting my buttons pushed the previous night, so this made the discussion much better.
This panel started a trend of the weekend: the invisible panelists. We had one on this one. I think it's a phenomenon that needs to be investigated by Mulder and Scully or, at least, the people from Fringe.
As the panel progressed, seanchaidh took notes on the good-Gwen, bad-Gwen and meh-Gwen. I record them for posterity here.
By the end of the panel, we came to the following two conclusions: 1) the fandom can be split but still very civil an have great and intelligent conversation 2) Rhys is too good for Gwen. The votes are recorded in the photos.
We took a two hour break from panel discussion, although, after hearing rave reviews from nexstarman and indefatigable42 , I wish I'd gone to watch Doctor Who at the Proms in the video room.
I did room counts at 10 with travellingone , and I have to say, overhearing snippets from the "Origami Kama Sutra" panel, is not good for anyone. This is definitely a panel that needed context, and another table. That one travellingone and I could solve, as we stole one from the dealers' hallway area, although I think it was actually a Polaris info table, but I could be wrong. Personally, I would've liked it better if that panel had promised to leave a note saying what they made on that table before returning it. How cool would that have been?
At 11 was "The Women Behind the Men" formerly the "Why Good Girls Like Slash" panel. It was run by , marita_c and enkanowen , and we had fun. We talked about all sorts of things, and it was good. Best answer of the night though, "because two men together is hot."
At midnight, seanchaidh had the fanfic panel "In Character, In Bed," panel, (modded by Bones) while I had the Primeval panel (which I modded). We all had a great chat about my little, now canceled dinosaur show, despite the one person who kept trying to get us all to use the scientific definition of dinosaur. Sorry, my definition is something lizard-like that has claws and may eat / stomp on my head, from a prehistoric era. I was on the panel with an anglophile, so that made life easy.
There was another invisible panelist at this panel. Again, who has Fox Mulder's number?
bubbleslayer , CH (BB's roommate) elysium1996 , seanchaidh , travellingone and myself headed upstairs to our room to watch the last part of Children of Earth and eat pizza. Since I've already posted my initial impressions on that, I will add that I would like to apologize to the Doctor Who cosplay girls, some of whom had the room next to us. Six women cheering for PC Andy at 2:30 in the morning, was probably a little loud. It was an even later start, since seanchaidh and I stayed up even later whispering our thoughts to each other about COE, trying not to wake travellingone . How she managed to get up in the morning, I don't know.
Anyway, after yet another breakfast in the hotel, I realized I'd missed one of the panels I wanted to see, so my first of the day was the Chuck panel. elysium1996 and I were not amused. One should not have to hear panelists talking about how little they know about the subject before the panel starts. Please note there isn't a cone of silence over your head prior to the panel starting, panelists!
Since I don't have anything nice to say about the Chuck panel, let me move on. I tried to nap between 2-3:30, as I wanted to be really awake for what, I think, was the best panel of the weekend: "Donna Noble: Still Made of Awesome." At first, I didn't think that many people would show up, or that all the panelists would appear (one escaped the invisible issue about 5 minutes after the start) and the hike to the room seemed more like instructions the Doctor would give someone to find an obscure room in the TARDIS.
Before we even began, the room was packed. We had the Doctor Who cosplay girls, which made me smile as they always have something great to say. Despite this, they were not my favourite set of costumes in the room. Nope, we had 2 Tens and a Donna Noble.
(We also had a Femme Jack, in the form of enkanowen . I don't think it's possible for the to be a better Femme Jack out there.)
We all bonded over the noise from the squash game across the way, channeling our inner Donna Noble and projecting. People were supportive, and funny, and it was great to share the Donna love with a room full of such amazing people.
One of the panelists also helped out with the charity auction, which not only required me to donate in the name of the TARDIS, but also to go and drool over the Primeval Episode 5 signed script, that I knew I could never afford. yellow_freshia had to pry it out of my hands.
The large group of us went for dinner, and I was moving so slowly, I missed the Top Gear panel, so I met author Lesley Livingston instead. I read her book Wondrous Strange, pre-pub, so I was excited and got my own copy, signed.
I was also late for the Dollhouse panel, because I got cornered and told how WRONG I was about my opinion for COE, by someone not involved in the conversation. Because I was late, I missed elysium1996 , and I wish I'd done what she did and left.
I went back up to my room to discover something truly terrifying: action figure porn. For posterity, let me say that seanchaidh and enkanowen should not be left alone with action figures. Captain Jack Harkness and his twisty thighs (I am not making this up) had his way with Bones. There are pictures, lots of pictures, and even video. For those who are curious, the doll designers even put washboard abs under Bones's removable plastic shirt.
It was certainly a girly getting ready for the dance with seanchaidh , enkanowen , elysium1996 , and myself getting all made up. I even wore gold eyeliner. Anyone who knows me IRL, knows that was a big step for me. If I have enkanowen 's mad skillz at make-up, I would be a much, much more glittery person.
At 10pm was the "Research for Fanwriters" and my inner librarian came out, with all the databases and use of the public library. seanchaidh recorded the full list, which I'm linking to here.
bubbleslayer , and I, went to go entertain Mr. Ely, including getting the now traditional picture of all the ladies, dressed up for the dance, surrounding Mr. Ely. I don't think he suffered, through any of the multiple takes.
What can I say about the dance? The DJs were good, and it was nice having a crowd out on the dance floor. We even provided our own entertainment during the slow songs when two of the invisible boyfriends started dancing with each other. (Don't ask.) Unfortunately, we couldn't stay at the dance long because we all had a panel we were attending at 1am.
Now onto the panel. Initially, I'd posted about my goal of having this the best attended panel being the best attended panel ever, but I'd been dreading it all day for the "art versus emotion" element. My fears were totally unfounded. People who loved it, and those who didn't like element of it, had a great discussion, defending their side, without offending the other. While the official panel ended at 2, since it was the last one at night, the last group of 9 of us, trickled out at 3:30. How cool is that? Polaris attendees are the best.
I think seanchaidh and I got up after we could reasonably call it morning, and found ourselves schlepping to the Tims for breakfast. Not a great idea. Everything in the hotel was good. The Tims, not so much -- and that is hard for me to say as a Canadian.
The first panel we attended (but were not on) was the "British-US Crossovers: Epic Fail." Again, we were not amused when it drifted way off topic. Oh well, it was Sunday and the discussion was flowing, so I won't fault it too much, except for the outright rude dismissal of seanchaidh 's one and only comment in the panel.
Finally, I saw my first talk of the weekend, the David Squared talk. Yes, David Hewlett and David Nykl fanboying each other. Originally, I was sitting with seanchaidh , but Mr. Ely joined us when the highly insensitive photographer dropped his equipment on Mr Ely's chair, when Mr. Ely got up for a minute, doing the polite thing and talking on his cell outside the main room. While I was happy for the company, bad photographer, no cookie -- particularly since he offended the best cookie maker in the world.
My last panel of the weekend was "The Fandom Myth of Tolerance," that travellingone moderated, and believe me, we discovered how intolerant fandom was. We could've just limited the topic to wank and talked another hour. It makes me sad because we can have amazing moments like the Donna Noble panel, yet be so mean to each other.
Afterward, I made another trip to the dealers' room. I'd already bought some Torchwood books featuring my fictional Welsh boyfriend, but had yet to buy a button. Anyone who has ever attended Polaris knows the button guy. I got a button, ask did enkanowen and her roomie. We also managed to barter a "I survived the Polaris 22 inferno" shirt for enkanowen .
While I'm not too sure we can call it a panel, I had been informed that David, someone I met at last year's Polaris, was in the geek-off final, and since the originally scheduled showing in the video room wasn't what was planned, I went to the geek-off final. I think I've found my new Polaris tradition as it was a blast. Also, David kicked geek ass, to become the supreme geek. Yay, David! Woot!
(I might -- I say might, enter myself in the Who geek-off in the future because I got all the questions save one from the Whoniverse.)I would, on the other hand, be slaughtered in the final geek-off.
Finally, the closing ceremonies, which were brief, and off we went to dinner, all except for travellingone , who had the annual Concom party, where there's a rumour going around about someone being hit in the head with a drumstick. Methinks Concom must hold good parties. After drunstick throwing, all they needed to do was move up to guitar smashing. That should be next year's goal.
After dinner, a bunch of us headed back to the Elys' room to watch the Doctor Who Easter Special, which, besides being far superior to the Christmas special, was the perfect way to end Polaris.
And that is all for this year. If I've forgotten something, or was unaware of some awesomeness somewhere, please, feel free to mention it in the comments.