It was a lovely convention. Almost as much as I enjoyed the guests (Wild Mercy, John Hall and
cadhla) and my fellow members, I enjoyed the hotel.Every convention should be held in a suites hotel. It was such a luxury to have a complete kitchen (two burner stove, convection/microwave, full sized fridge with ice maker, plus the utensils, pots, dishes and dishwasher we did not use) and a separate bedroom. It meant that I could bring my crockpot and we could have guests for Shabbat that felt like we were having guests for Shabbat as opposed to hanging out in a hotel room. It also meant that I could heat up my well-wrapped chicken in the oven and keep it warm over a blech improvised with a sheet of aluminum foil over the burners. We had warm chicken and warm green beans, and the other guests provided sides and salads. Guests were
batyatoon, sdelmonte, ladymondegreen, akawil, osewalrus, beckyfeld, their son Aaron, Lucy Schmeidler (no LJ) and Aaron (no LJ that I know of.) It was *nice*.Also, since I had my crockpot, Batya made a cholent, which was delicious. In fact,
jonbaker, who does not like cholent, took *seconds*. :)Otherwise - the performances were good, the filking at night was amazing and the people were, well, the folks we'd come out there to see.
Plus - Wedding!
starmalachite and stevemb decided that the best way for them to get married would be to hold the wedding on the Sunday night after the convention, and they were so very right. Much of the convention stayed for the wedding, plus they had other friends and relatives - including Crystal's grandfather - attending. There were a few amusing moments - at one point, while we were waiting, somoene made an announcement: "They are working on hair and makeup. Things will begin momentarily." Yeah, those two phrases work together. :)After the wedding came a bit more confusion from those of us who hadn't attended a non-Jewish wedding before. We knew what to do after the ceremony for the weddings we had attended - you go to the reception room, where you sit down and eat until the bride and groom come out of ritual seclusion and get the pictures done, and then you dance - separate for some Orthodox, mixed for everyone else, either as couples or circles. But this left us a tad lost. Finally, we asked other people and were told that there was a reception line - we were to leave the room, line up to greet the bride and groom and return to the room to line up for the dessert buffet (which turned out to be kosher dairy and delicious.)
After that, Clam Chowder performed, and those who could waltzed, or otherwise danced when the music called for it.
(And then it turned out to be Crystal's birthday, too. )
The trip home was pretty good - we only hit traffic on the Belt Parkway. There was one very cute moment - after a leisurely lunch in at a Maryland rest stop and missing the exit for the Delaware Memorial Bridge, so we had to turn around and find it again, we decided to stop at the first rest stop we came to in New Jersey. I pull into the parking lot, which was packed closer to the main building, so I decided to drive a tad further out, saying, "We can walk." Then I saw something. "Or we can park behind these people." I parked and honked my horn, and
batyatoon, sdelmonte, ladymondegreen and akawil (I'd recognized his long blond hair) turned around. I'd just been thinking that leaving a con on Monday reduces one's chances of meeting your friends on the road, too.
