Shore Leave report

I spent the past weekend at Shore Leave, a wonderfully relaxing convention with a heavy emphasis on Star Trek and other media. I was a last minute addition to the guest roster, taking the place of fellow Mixer Bob Greenberger who had a sudden family emergency.

Among other things, this meant that I took over Bob’s traditional "Trailer Park" panel, giving a rundown of various upcoming movies. The roster of films (and one TV show) in more or less chronological order:

• Sunshine
• Skinwalkers
• The Simpsons Movie
• The Bourne Ultimatum (a.k.a. Bourne 3, as 3 as the wind blows)
• Rush Hour 3
• Stardust
• The Invasion
• Fido
• DOA: Dead or Alive
• Resident Evil: Extinction
• Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles
• Shoot ‘Em Up (which wins the Snakes On A Plane award for most descriptive title)
• Martian Child (because all SF writers look like John Cusack and hang with women who look like Amanda Peet– wait, she married the guy who’s writing the Wolverine movie; maybe it can happen)
• The Golden Compass
• I Am Legend
• 1-18-08
• Vantage Point
• 5-25-77

I also got to see the masquerade, where writer of stuff Peter David, wife Kathleen, daughter Ariel, and friend Marina Olsen won best of show for the above presentation, "Beauty and the Beast(s)". I got to spend time with a number of writers and enthusiastic fans. And I capped off the convention by appearing with Peter and Keith DeCandido in the infamous "Mystery Trekkie Theater 3000" where we proceeded to dissect the TNG episode "Conspiracy".

All in all, a very enjoyable convention, right up until the point Sunday night when my hard drive directory got erased, and I spent the next 36 hours recovering it– which is why this recap is two days after I expected it to be done. The gods just don’t want me to really relax…