First, I have to say I am AWESOME. In the real sense of the word, Awe. I pulled off something that didn’t look like it was going to happen and used about every erg of energy and ability I have to do it. And it came off great. Less than I would have liked but still something special.

I was brought onboard to Baycon Staff as the Head of Theater Tech 6 weeks out from the con. I was able to handle getting all the information I needed, designing the lighting set up, renting the equipment and doings what I think was really good paperwork for smoothing the light hang. I arrived at the con at 9pm and started off running hoping to speed through the set up so we could finish before 2am. I didn’t stop running until at least 5:30am. I then continued walking until 10am with no stopping. We ran into a number of problems that stopped me from doing my job and really messed us up. This included being short one staff member, not having the right connections to the power, lousy communication between me and the people that should have been supporting me, misunderstandings of exact job descriptions, etc. I spent all my time putting out fires and my crew did my job and theirs. One of them wants ribbons that say “Gofer Slayer” because we wore out three sets of Gofers. By the end of Friday, we were only 50% done with what I felt needed to be done and lucky to be that far.

On Sat, I woke up and checked in at 4pm and as far as I could tell, everything was exactly the same as it was went to sleep 5 hours earlier. I raised bloody hell and told many people that there was going to be no lighting for the masquerade because I have done everything in my power to make it work and the issues beyond my power were not solved. Others knew about them when I went to bed and they should have been fixed. Things started moving. The outstanding problems were solved, I got the bodies I needed, things started moving at break neck speed. At 7pm, I finally felt that we might be able to pull it off after all. We had reached the point I felt should have been reached Friday night. I am so amazed that Theater Tech was finished an out of the way at 8:06pm. I am not pleased that Tech was part of the problem with a delayed start time to the masquerade but to be only 6 minutes over when we were 50% behind and had to fix problems on the fly when the design didn’t work…that is AWESOME.

Those that worked with and for me were great. My Theater Tech staff had very little specific knowledge and they picked things up quickly and worked independently for the most part and did an incredible job. My Gofers, and especially the Foliage Minions, did above and beyond my expectations. The hotel staff I had to deal with were very accommodating and a pleasure to work with even though many times they couldn’t actually get done what needed to get done. It wasn’t their fault. My stage manager/tech monkey, with the exception of her job being all confused and her being overextended, did a really good job when she was able to do a job. I am glad we got things worked out so she could do what she needed to and do it well. The people that I looked to for support didn’t do a good job and I was pissed at them for half the con. After a lot of talking with different parties late Sat night and Sunday, it turned out to be more an issue of communication than lack of support. There were real communication issues that needed to be worked on.

Sunday was easier than Friday and Saturday but still stressful and last minute. Monday was a breeze. I think everyone that I had working for me was working at the level we had needed to work and we had something that went the way it was suppose to. We did our strike in 45 minutes instead of the 2.5 hours I allotted and the 4 hours I was expecting. Again, We Were Awesome!

There were things I did wrong. There were things I would do differently if I had to do them again. But for the most part, I really pulled it together and made it work.

Out of the 250+ staff at Baycon, they gave out 25 Hero awards. I got one of them. I am very happy to have one and have the recognition from Baycon. I am not happy that I deserved one. That was quite the event and effort.

I learned a lot of life lessons and I am very pleased about that. I have things to ponder on and chew over for weeks if not months. I am sure some of them will be forgotten in the flood that was the weekend.

I am please to see the results of being pushed to the edge. I have the education to see more of how my internal processes work so I got a lot more info that I want about things.

I am not pleased that I couldn’t even stop to say hi to friends until after the dance started on Sat. I could barely acknowledge their existence and had to brush past them. This does not make me happy in the least.

I am not happy that I basically missed Baycon. That I didn’t get to see the people I wanted to see as much as I planned to and that the job I took on sucked up more than it should have so I couldn’t put energy into the other things I had planned. I am very sorry that I wasn’t able to put energy into the bachorette party I had a hand in planning. I tried to delegate and cut it free from me in case the con ate my life but I think that there were issues with me not being able to be there for it and I am sorry about that.

I am not happy for the feelings I hurt when I barked at people. There was absolutely nothing personal in it at all. I just had absolutely no spare braincells that I could dedicate to social niceties like taking into account someone’s feelings or being polite when they ask if I am doing ok, etc. Any interruption was a problem and only worth it if there was something that would come out of it. People staring at me waiting for a moment to talk to me really started to bug me. They were trying to be nice and it was getting in my way because I had to interrupt myself to see what they needed or wanted so I could prioritize issues. I finally worked out with my minions a pose for them to strike that showed me they were free and ready to work and I could get around to them when I was ready for them. They looked like street walkers after that (this was on Monday when we had enough room in our brains to come up with solutions and fun stuff while running at full speed).

Questions like “how are you doing” and “can I help” were real issues because I have a lot of people that care for me and want to help so there were a lot of these interruptions. I can acknowledge now the positive effort behind these and appreciate them but at the time, those things were requiring effort from me that I didn’t have available no matter how small the effort needed was. The swearing showed up on Saturday and I didn’t have the resources to even stop that stuff from coming out. I was barely holding it together and had strip everything to the bare minimum just to keep things afloat. I was not a nice person and I didn’t care. That was how it needed to be.

I am so appreciative of my friend Bert who came up from LA to be my second. He would be a smart ass and I would cut him down for it. It got to a point where I would hack him off at the knees yelling at him, “No now!” and “Back off!” And he took it. He knew there was nothing personal behind it. He knew what he was doing was not appropriate at that moment no matter what I seemed like I could take the moment before. I wasn’t mad at him. I didn’t need to explain anything. I was doing what I needed to do to take care of me and the job I was doing. He stopped goofing off and kicked ass on the things I assigned him. I was able to tell him later how much I appreciated the fact that he didn’t require any extra energy from me when we were working and he said he was already aware of it.

I hate being like that but accept that sometimes, that is the way it needed to be and that is ok. I try to avoid situations like that. I really appreciate the people in my life that are strong enough to handle it and know how I feel about them so they don’t take it personally. When I had the time and the energy, I just gushed my appreciation to my minions and about my minions to anyone that would listen. It wasn’t payback for being mean, it was just how I felt and I shared it.

I feel really badly about someone that should have been informed beforehand (by someone else) what was up but found out how bad everything what when he checked in with me on Saturday and I told him if he couldn’t go up a ladder I had no use for him and go the f**k away. Quite the shock when you think you are getting an update on something that should be going well because you haven’t been told otherwise. I don’t think I did anything wrong because it was one more interruption that wouldn’t produce anything positive and it wasn’t my job to keep him informed. But I do feel really badly that he had that experience. I can feel sorry for him and still not feel like it was my fault. I wish I could have acted more appropriately but I couldn’t at the time. It turned out very well once I found out there was a problem between us and I had time and energy to deal with it after the deadline. I barely remembered the incident and had to be reminded about the details. After that, a lot of communication issues were worked out with the staff that needed to be involved and things were so much better. In so many ways.

So, to wrap up. I did not have fun this weekend. I did have an incredible learning experience and I am very grateful for that. I took damage and I am afraid I dealt some damage. I will be recovering from all this for at least a week if not for a month (hopefully more on that in another post). There is the possibility of some wonderful things coming out of this weekend. I got a huge dose for my growth work. Hopefully I will find a way to touch base with all the people I missed at the con.

I kept checking in with tsgeisel to make sure he was having fun for me since he was the one that got my membership. And it turned out to be a good con for my badge.