Trekking in Riverside, Iowa-Another Quickie Trip
Did I mention that I’m a Trekker (okay, Trekkie, whatever)? I first started watching the original series in syndication in the early 1970s. In the early 1990s, I attended my first Star Trek convention in Tallahassee, Florida, while I was a grad student at Florida State University. While my personal collection of Trek mostly consists of books, my home office has its fair share of Trek memorabilia. Strangely, although it’s less than 80 miles away, I have previously visited Riverside, Iowa, only once before–for the 2009 TrekFest. It was their 25th anniversary celebration of the festival, and their special guests were George Takei, Nichelle Nichols, and Walter Koenig (who is, BTW, a Grinnell College alumnus). Unfortunately, I have no idea where the pictures I took, especially from the parade, are, but here’s more information at this TrekFest page. In case you are wondering how the small Iowa town became known…
These Are the Voyages-Florida Supercon (Day 2)
I thought Friday was busy, but Saturday was nearly overwhelming. Thankfully, I had received an email warning that tickets were sold out, so I knew big crowds were to be expected. I learned a new term: cosplay, short for costume roleplaying. (My roleplaying on the old Stargame pbem (playing by e-mail) was solely online, so we never needed costuming. The costumes at Supercon were amazing. Everytime I thought I saw one that was the most incredibly elaborate, another would surpass it a few minutes later. Still, this one has to be in the top ten: This was a late start, late finish day. Since my interest in the convention is solely Star Trek, the earliest event was William Shatner’s Q&A session at 3:00. I got there early, though, in the hope of getting a relatively close seat and got a pleasant surprise of hearing the Q&A with Henry Winkler…