Eastercon Diary – Easter Monday 28th March 2016 – El Rincon And Dead Dog

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This is the last of my 18 convention reports on the 2016 Mancunicon Eastercon convention. The convention was officially at an end but as in many years, fans stay around later to continue drinking and socializing. Those with long journeys usually stay for an extra night so an informal Dead Dog Party is laid on to cater to this. Generally this just means the hotel bar still opens for fans at convention discount rates, though sometimes food and entertainments are included. As usual there were a few hours between the formal convention closing and Dead Dog time so one of my friends, Ivan, booked several of us into a local tapas bar, El Rincon for a terrific meal involving lots of small portions. The service and food quality were lovely. We returned to the Beetham hotel where guests were leisurely drinking and reminiscing on the weekend, with some sad farewells as people left or went to prepare for journeys home, as attendees came from all over the World. The real ale bar had now run dry, though it had offered the finest choices I have seen at just about any convention. It was like having a full-on beer festival running parallel to the science fiction activity. The craft-beers bar remained active though and the choices there were also impressive. I left myself about 10.45 pm to catch a late bus home – the perks of the convention coming to my home city. My thanks now to everyone involved in the convention, its organizing committee, especially Manchester’s own Melica Smith. Thanks to my friends in the FONT science fiction group, to Smuzz, for a generous late birthday present by way of a book about the Flying Spaghetti Monster. Thanks to Ivan & Melinda for taxi-sharing and organizing the Tapas feast. Thanks to everyone who attended my own presentation, Wendigo Water, and the organizers of the Manchester Speculative Fiction group who critiqued some of my own writings. Thanks to the army of gophers, hotel staff and convention volunteers who were so invaluable to have around. Thanks to everyone who offered kind wishes knowing I was worried about my mother who is recovering from a severe heart attack from earlier this month. I am sure I’m forgetting lots of wonderful people here so a big THANK YOU all round. Now I start saving up for next year’s Eastercon convention in Birmingham. Arthur Chappell