Convivial 3

The programming page has the final version of the schedule of events on it.  Some things might be added to the schedule during the convention and of course there’s a slight chance other changes might be made– if so, they’ll be posted and announced at the con.  I’ll try to update the website too if I can find the time.

We’ve updated the directions page to list a route we’ve been using from south Minneapolis to the hotel which actually doesn’t involve a detour or any sort of road construction.  It’s a miracle!  That route is the first one listed on the page.

What to bring:  a look at the schedule reveals that you might want to bring craft supplies, blank t-shirts (or shoes or hats or bags) for embellishment, hiking gear, photography gear, a musical instrument, games, and/or fun pajamas. I recommend having a look at the schedule before you head to the con.

The con officially starts at 2 p.m. on Friday, which is when the consuite and gaming rooms open.  Registration will be available starting at 2 p.m. in the consuite.  The consuite and all of our function space is on the 13th floor.  See the schedule (as linked above) for full details.

If you are pre-registered, you should’ve received an informational email last night.  If you haven’t seen it, please check your spam folder for it.  If you can’t find it or somehow didn’t receive it, get in touch and we’ll send you another one.

The consuite will be open to some degree starting on Thursday afternoon and evening as we move stuff into the hotel and get things set up– if you’d like to help us, that’d be great!  Unfortunately the elevator to the 13th floor (where the consuite is) will be locked so you’ll need to tag along with someone who has a room key to get up there.  Watch for folks with the con in the lobby and go upstairs with them or call up to the Presidential Suite/Consuite (room 1321) to have someone come down to let you up there.  We’ll likely be busiest and need the most help between 5 p.m. and 9 p.m.  We can’t guarantee that someone will be around before 5 p.m. so it’s best that you make arrangements in advance if you’d like to show up earlier. (The elevators will be unlocked from Friday at 1 p.m. until at least Sunday at 4 p.m.)

Have any questions?  Get in touch with us today for the speediest response; as of Thursday afternoon we’ll be running here and there setting things up  and once Friday afternoon rolls around we’ll having fun at the con so won’t be checking email as often this weekend.   Once you’re at the con, you should have no trouble finding a committee member or other clueful person to talk to.

We’ve decided to let folks register online from now ’til Sunday, October 12th at the $40 at-the-door rate.  Why would anyone want to do this?  Some might find it easier to conduct the transaction online than to handle cash or checks at the con.  Another advantage of registering online is that you  wouldn’t have to deal with filling out a form at the convention and we’d have a pre-printed badge ready and waiting for you.  Plus it’s helpful to those of us putting on the con as we’ll known better who is showing up and can plan accordingly.  It’s good karma!   And if you act sooner rather than later, you can even still get in our big poll re what drinks to serve in the consuite, etc.

Thanks to everyone who has already pre-registered!   Please get in touch if you have any questions or want to help with anything.

Today is the deadline for room reservations; if you reserve a room after today you may not be able to get our rate.  It’s also possible the hotel may sell out at some point.  I’ll be stopping by the hotel this afternoon to see our function space, work out some more details, and make my own reservation.

I have a reminder for you as well as info about some issues we had with our room block.

The deadline to reserve a room for Convivial 3 is this Thursday, September 25th.   A room will run you $99/night or $124/night for a suite.  The suites include a separate sitting room  with microwave, mini fridge, desk, couch (that pulls out into a bed), and a second TV.

Reservations may be made by calling the hotel directly at 952-854-9000 or toll-free at 1-800-465-4329.  Be sure to mention you’re with the “Convivial Conference“.   We recommend you call to make your reservation rather than try to use the online reservation system. You should to be able to get our rate for Thursday (the 16th), Friday (the 17th), Saturday (the 18th), and/or Sunday (the 19th).

We think you’ll get a lot more out of the con if you stay at the hotel, but understand if it’s not possible for one reason or another or if you prefer to commute from your home.  If you’re looking for a roommate, you might try posting to the mnstf livejournal community or to the natter email list.

You can register online for the hotel’s preferred customer program; if you’re already a member of the Priority Club, remember to use your member number when you make your reservation or check in.

You can find out more about the hotel and how we’ll be using it in the hotel section of our website.

As a few of you know firsthand, there were some issues with the room block.  It turns out we’d been allotted X number of King rooms and X number of double rooms (and so on) and we’d run out of King rooms early on so some folks were quoted a higher rate for them or told they weren’t available in our block.  Oops!

That’s all fixed now.  If you were quoted a higher rate and told us about it, your reservation has been changed to get the appropriate Convivial room rate.

If you were told the block is full or that there weren’t rooms available of a certain type, you might want to call the hotel and try making your reservation again.  Or if you made a reservation and it’s not quite right and you didn’t tell us about it, please let us know and we’ll see that things are fixed.

Today is the last day you can pre-register for Convivial 3.  Online registration will be available ’til at least midnight, but I’ll be shutting it off for sure on Sunday morning.  You can also drop off your check and registration form at the Minn-StF meeting today (at the home of Linda Lounsbury, 4125 Dupont Ave S in Minneapolis).  Or put your check in the mail today so we get it first thing next week. 

There is a tentative schedule of events up on the website, please let us know if you’d like to help with any of the events or have suggestions for changes or additions to the schedule.

If you’re coming, please pre-register.  If you aren’t sure if you’re coming, let us know when/if you decide you’ll be coming so we can plan accordingly– you’ll still have to register at the door, but if we know you’re coming we can make a badge for you and give you useful info in advance of the con.  We can also better plan how much food and drink and supplies to buy.

I’ve sent out confirmation emails to everyone who is registered for Convivial 3.

If you didn’t receive an email and/or aren’t on the list on the website, you aren’t registered. (If you didn’t receive an email, it’s possible we don’t have an email address for you. Get in touch if you’d like to hear from us via email!)

We will accept registration forms (with checks) at the next Minn-StF meeting (on September 20th at the home of Linda Lounsbury) and will be sure there are forms and envelopes there. Technically it’s after the pre-registration deadline, so this will be your last chance to pre-register. It’s also likely we’ll leave online registration available through the 20th because we’re nice like that.

You can register online using a credit card, Paypal, etc. Or mail a check with your name/address to the Convivial/Minn-StF mailing address (that info is listed on the registration page).

The deadline for pre-registrations is September 17th, the room reservation deadline is September 26th (though the hotel has sold out in the past, we recommend making your reservation sooner rather than later).

If you are coming to Convivial, please pre-register as it makes things easier for everyone (we know how much food/drink to provide and have money to spend on that stuff, we can print a badge for you, you don’t have to take the time to fill out a form at the convention). We’ll also be asking those who are pre-registered for their food/drink preferences and other stuff so those who pre-register will have more say in what goes on at the con than those who don’t.

Convivial 3 will take place the weekend of October 17 - 19, 2008 at the Holiday Inn Select in Bloomington, Minnesota (same hotel as last year). We have a hotel contract and everything (we find that’s usually a good idea).

You can now pre-register for $30. Act now! Well, we appreciate it when people register early so we get a better idea of how many people are going to show up. Registration is now available via Paypal, we plan to have registration forms available at Minicon and on the website before too long.

There’s more info available on the shiny new website, though if a lot of it sounds familiar it’s because we copied a whole lot of stuff from the Convivial 2 website. Expect more updates to the site after Minicon.

Want to volunteer to help? Have some cool ideas for the convention? Talk to Laurel Krahn or use the contact form on the website. If you have programming ideas, talk to Dean Gahlon and/or Laura Krentz as they’ll be heading that up this year.