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Corflu Valentine, held February 14-17 in Annapolis, Maryland was small but successful.
With an attendance of around 40, this was the second small Corflu in a row, but that didn't seem to bother any of the rather diverse group of fans who were there. There were close to a dozen Brits there, lending a transatlantic fannishness to the con. They included Eve and John Harvey, Peter Weston, Clair Briarly, Mark Plummer, Mike Scott, Debbi Kerr, Yvonne Rouse, Ian Sorenson and Max (who goes by that name alone in fandom).
And there was con chairman, Nic Farey - a transplanted Brit who has held onto his accent and his ties to UK fandom despite his ongoing sojourn in southern Maryland. Nic has perfected his act and carried it off splendidly at Corflu, but it was clearly obvious that the Blessed Bobbie deserved most of the behind-the-scenes credit, along with volunteers like Tracey Benton, Bill Bodden (by no coincidence next year's Corflu hosts), Jae Leslie Adams, and various others.
(I was sitting in the smoking consuite Sunday around 12:30 in the afternoon when a hotel guy stuck his head in the open door and said, "Hey, this room is supposed to be vacated now." It turned out that he was wrong - it was booked through the next day - but within only a few minutes the half-dozen people in the room had totally cleaned it up and packed up the remaining non-hotel items in the room. We were all volunteers when it served the purpose.)
The convention began on Thursday night in what would become the next day the non-smoking consuite (the smoking consuite directly above and convenient to a flight of stairs, would not open until Friday afternoon). The Brits were there and so were fans from San Francisco and Seattle. Fanzines were passed around and conversations quickly joined.
The convention was Officially Opened on Friday night with the traditional Drawing of the GoH from the Hat. Sheila Lightsey held the hat, into which at least theoretically all the attendees' names had been placed. (I offer the qualifier because in recent years a secondary tradition has sprung up: members may offer a bribe - now up to $20 - to have their name removed from the hat.) As usual, the Hat made an excellent choice: Moshe Feder.
The Saturday programming started in the morning, to my stunned amazement, but most of the program turned out to be skipable. Now, I know that many fans think that of most convention programming but Corflu's programs are supposed to be different. They're supposed to be Too Good To Be Skipped. As it happened, a good chunk of the British contingent spent the afternoon exploring Annapolis.
Fortunately, they were back in time for the evening program, because many of them were in that program. Past Corflus have occasionally featured plays by Andy Hooper, but this year Andy couldn't make it and Nic imported Ian Sorenson, whose musicals have been hits at British cons for years. The result was The Booze Brothers, rather loosely modeled on The Blues Brothers, and incorporating at one point a delightful skit based on Yes, Minister (starring a cherubic Mike Scott).
I think it was at Saturday night's party that Max told me, "I didn't come to Annapolis. I came to Corflu. I'm here for the convention, not the city." That sums up my own point of view as well. I was there for the convention, which meant the people, the parties - and the fanzines.
They started with the Corflu Program Book, which, if you believed Dave Hicks' title logo, was really NIC FAREY AND HIS HOWLING CONVENTION - Hicks did a great cover, which probably didn't hurt his standing in the FAAn Awards. There was Pete Young's Zoo Nation #1, Lilian Edwards' Floss!, Tony Keen's The Convertible Omnibus, Lilian Edwards' & Victor Gonzalez's Gloss #3 (Young, Edwards and Keen were, unfortunately, not at Corflu but were represented by their zines), Max's The Cosmic Hairdryer #2, Mike Scott's Plokta #25, a single-page Corflu Brain-Teaser from Pete Weston, Steve Stiles' Stallions Over the Pacific, Debbi Kerr's Long-Legged Tramp, Ian Sorenson's Snapshot ("The fanzine that asks the question 'Why don't Japanese cameras go Crick!'"), and Nic Farey's Yield It. A fair number of these fanzines - most of which are unnumbered - proclaim themselves to be published specifically for Corflu. It was impossible to read all these fanzines in the middle of the convention, and yet difficult not to at least egoscan a few of them, which made it all too easy to get sucked into reading a zine completely.
Sunday was the day of the banquet. We assembled at 1:00 p.m. and found plenty of both tables and food awaiting us. The buffet offered everything from breakfast fruit and food to several full-course dinners, including freshly-sliced roast beef. Topping off the food display was a carved watermelon. Standing on end, with part of it cut away, it had been lightly carved on its green skin to reveal the portrait of a beautiful southern lady of a century earlier. The style resembled scratchboard, with the lightly cut away portions showing a brighter green against the dark green of the uncarved skin. The artist turned out to be the meat carver. Several of the fanartists present went over to him to congratulate him on the piece and a number of fans took photos of it.
Nic had asked me, as Corflu's "Eminence Grise," to run the show at the banquet, so after everyone had eaten all they could hold, I introduced Nic, who Officially Thanked a large portion of the convention. I introduced Bill Bodden, who made a Special Presentation to GoH Feder - a remarkable red felt hat which resembled a Very Large Crab. Moshe gave a solid GoH speech (which is now online at the Corflu Valentine website, http://come.to/corflu). I conducted the nomination and voting for the Past President of the Fan Writers of America (fwa) - the Past Presidency for 2001 went by immediate acclamation to Eve and John Harvey. Victor Gonzalez - subbing for Andy Hooper - presented the FAAn Awards. They went to Lloyd Penney for Letterhack, Max for New Fanzine Fan, David Hicks for Fan Artist, Alison Freebairn for Fan Writer and Wabe for Fanzine.
With no competition, Madison, Wisconsin was awarded next year's Corflu, and Bill Bodden and Tracy Benton immediately began selling memberships.
When I left at 3:00 a.m., Monday morning, the party was still going and I didn't want to leave, but I had to be at work that afternoon. Good convention - as usual.
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