Conventions are dangerous, exciting places. Sometimes you meet someone special, as described by The Redhead. Conventions – specifically, fan or hobby conventions, bring together people with mutual interests (and no, they're not all a bunch of online weirdos with no lives). People who enjoy sharing their love for a hobby or an obsession with others love getting together for a good time – and afterwards, they've got connections that they didn't have before. And this is a good basis for starting something – anything – between people.

All this reminds me of how David and I met. It was at a Highlander fan convention October 6th, 1994 in Denver. Jeebus!! That's 10 years ago this fall… so long ago that there's not a lot of places online anymore that have links to that first, primitive Gathering I. I see there have been a lot of subsequent Highlander cons I've missed, but I did hit several of the ones on this list. Going to cons was fun, but after I moved to Chicago (another post, that one) it got harder and harder to get away due to work and whatnot. I'm just lucky that David went to that first one, because he's not interested in going to any other SF conventions – even the big ones held here. Lucky, lucky, lucky that he agreed to be dragged along with Steve and some people from the old Windy City Chat room.

He was from the northwest burbclaves of Chicago and I was from Seattle. I still think it's funny that the best representation of my old neighborhood is somebody's pictures of the Fremont Giant and the statue of Lenin the Artist's Republic of Fremont folks (or people like them) bought for scrap. And David's best "neighborhead" representation is a tourist information center for a shopping mall. Somehow, we got here – it involved a LOT of IMs, high long distance charges, and an intense relationship with FedEx and the US Postal Service. Long distance relationships suck… BUT they can and do work out just fine. I found it helpful to put my hands over my ears and chant "I'm not listening! I'm not listening!" when people tried to warn me about the dangers of meeting those online weirdos.

Strangely, it's all because of these guys. I got online because of the damn show, went and found the other fans over in the old SF areas in AOL, and found out about the first convention in Denver. And met up with some people from Chicago that I had chatted with for months in member room "H I G H L A N D E R." Tagging along? David, who was really there for hiking after the con with Steve. I knew there was something going on when I came back from the vendor's room with a Japanese wooden practice sword, and David left his place waiting in line to go get one, too. We still have them – they're one of the more durable souveniers we have. Nearly 10 years now. Weird. Weird – but good. Very, very good.

I stopped by Television Without Pity to see if there was any news about the next season of The Amazing Race and found there were rumors flying in the “Spoilers” thread. The race is on!!

Or is it?

One rumor seemed really credible at first – people spotted running around in very TAR-like style in Vancouver, BC – but it there’s a chance that the sighting actually a fall event that has an “Amazing Race” theme.

Apparently there’s a company that runs task-based adventure/racing activities as team building exercises there. In the meantime, Canadians aren’t eligible to enter the Race according to current rules. Which seems hardly fair, since the show is very popular north of the border.

It’s not right!

Go, Canada! If American TV shows won’t let you enter their competitions, just build it yourself out of cast-off appicances and abandoned K-cars, and race around the Great White North your own bad toqued selves – and while you’re at it, you really should think about starting up a network to rival anything the Big American Networks could ever produce. Or maybe… infiltrate as you always have.
The other rumor may or may not pay off, but it’s intriguing. A former racer thinks his doctor may have some other patients in the upcoming class of TAR5 contestants… that is, if he wasn’t assuming it was The Amazing Race just because he already has one former Racer on the books. 😉

Either way, given the logistics of Racing, editing, and getting the episodes ready to air, the Race is either just about to begin, or has already started. That is, if they’re sticking to the rumored summertime premiere date. Oh, hope hope hope hope hope!

We watched the new Enterprise episode
“Proving Ground” the other night, and I have to say it was quite enjoyable, entertaining, and definitely not boring. Our old friend Shran showed up (you know, the guy that used to be Weyoun) and got to do a little roleplaying on the bridge of his own ship.

Shran obviously enjoyed pretending to be a goofy space prospector representing a fake mining company, and delivered the best line in the episode when he was sent packing by the Xindi ships: “The Andorian Mining Consortium runs from no one.” Heh. It seems the Enterprise has finally discovered a strange new lifeform: humor.

It’s always fun watching the way the Andorian antennae reflect mood and emotion – there was plenty of anger and inner conflict, judging from all the stalkwaggling going on.

And there was stuff blowin’ up and intrigue and inter-species close encounters of the slightly frisky kind (oh, that Malcom – he’s wired pretty tight, but help him with a weapons problem and even blue skin and antennae start looking good to him).

There was also a pretty good link back to a previous episode (again, one that didn’t suck). And a decent, if clandestine, “farewell present” after the Andorians’ attempt at betrayal (source of the stalkwaggling inner conflict, no doubt) was foiled by Archer’s Damn Fine Plan.

There was no appearance by Porthos, so no drinks for anybody except Archer and Shran, who shared a bottle of Andorian ale… or was it really Romulan ale?

I’m so confused. But it was a good episode nonetheless.