Good news! The toes can stay

Had fun climbing with friends last night. I climbed a really fun 5.7 that had lousy handholds but pretty good footholds, forcing me to work on balance and foot position and other good things. Then I spent the rest of the evening flailing around on the lower reaches of various 5.7's and 5.8's.

The shoe situation was much better - I've learned that if I work on consciously curling my toes, and take the shoes off when I'm not climbing (yay, velcro!), I don't hurt nearly as much. My feet were still sore by the end of the evening, but only in proportion to how much everything else hurt. (One night i was climbing at PG, and overhead the following exchange between the two climbers on the next rope: Girl 1: How come you can't get your boyfriend to climb? Girl 2: He doesn't really like pain.)

FOGcon 3 schedule is up

The FOGcon 3 schedule is up. (Actually, it's been up for a little while.)

I'm going to be on the "Favorite Non-SF/F Mystery Authors" panel. I'm hoping to come away with some good recommendations, and I hope I'll be able to share some books and authors that people will enjoy that they might not otherwise have come across.

A few more of the panels I'm looking forward to:

Historical Crime Fighters
Thief-takers, Bow Street Runners, Pinkerton detectives...What was solving crime like in the bad old days?

Copyright, Copyleft
Intellectual property law is at the center of much recent debate. What's the current state of copyright for writers, artists, filmmakers? How does Creative Commons work? Does DRM solve more problems than it causes? Are fanworks legally protected creative expression, or unauthorized derivative works that must be stopped? How do we navigate these sometimes treacherous legal waters?

How Do I Fix This?
It's very easy to sit around and complain. How do we in fandom step up and fix the things which are wrong with our culture? The panel will discuss how individual fannish activists have identified and addressed problems - as well as the price they paid for speaking up.

And then there are the honored guest panels - Q&A with Susan R. Matthews! Radio plays with Terry Bisson! And the Liar's Panel, and the Self-Defense Workshop, and all kinds of other good stuff.

Come down and join us! And if you can't come down and join us, spread the word: Tell a friend or two about us, or share this post. We're still a new con, and we know that there are lots of folks who would enjoy FOGcon who just haven't heard about us yet.