ConFigures

Penguicon 2008 Overview

Due to unavoidable circumstances, I was unable to make it to the con (in Michigan) until Saturday night, but I did make it to the Giant Singing Tesla Coil and the Hampster Dance, and then was able to assist with the making of 6 liquid nitrogen ice cream flavors that night.   From midnight until past 2 am :

•  mint irish cream
• triple chocolate
• cinammon orange creamsicle
• vanilla raspberry
• another chocolate
• soda slushies

Sunday, the OLPC Roundtable and Fiction Genome panels I participated on went well; I’ll put more details in separate entries.  I got to see the liquid nitrogen splashdown in the pool, too.  I was disappointed that I didn’t actually get to attend anyone else’s technical panels, but it was important to me to get enough sleep to be alert for my panels.  Maybe the third time (next year) will work out better in that respect.

I didn’t make it to the game room except for 5 minutes once, but I did get to play euchre in the con suite Sunday night.  I like it because it’s a *team* card game.  I haven’t gotten to play it much since I  left upstate NY (Rochester).  My partner Bob and I did well at first, but Bill and Gerald caught up and beat us eventually.  It was a nice close game.

Penguicon has a very well-stocked consuite for food (fresh vegetables and sandwich makings, not just snack food), but I highly recommend these two restaurants within a short drive of Troy:

• Elie’s Mediterranean (Birmingham)  - the best of that cuisine I’ve ever had, in a lovely setting (cobalt blue hanging beads, rollaway glass garage door in the front of the store)
• The Inn Season Cafe (Royal Oak) – vegetarian and vegan; listed in Health Magazine’s top 6 US independent restaurants this month.