Walk Softly and Carry a Big Schtick

New Orleans in 2018 pre-bid party at Loscon, November 2011

Photos start here.

We served:
Jambalaya
Red Beans & Rice
Muffalatta dip with saltines. Next time make a half batch.

Soft drinks included a lot of fruit flavors. The only colas were in the diet section. If you wanted caffeine and sugar, you could have a Sunkist Orange, or try one of the other parties.

(Sunkist Orange, Cactus Cooler, Cherry Crush, Seven-Up, Welch's Strawberry, Squirt, Welch's Grape, Diet Pepsi, Diet Coke, Diet Coke Zero, Diet Mountain Dew.)

Snowballs. We had six flavors of syrup, we didn't go through much of any of them. (We could fill the “ketchup bottles” at home and not bring the gallon jugs to the hotel at all.) Next time only need one can of sweetened condensed milk.

We had a reasonably well-stocked bar as far as spirits go, anyway. We served slushy drinks. Margaritas were incredibly popular! Next year, split the snow in half for the bar and snowball station elsewhere. For transport, use the jumbo cooler to get the dry ice and keep the snow frozen and cooler closed on the drive back from Gardena.

Decorations included purple and gold lengths of fabric. Next year get green, too.

Things to add to New Orleans party at Loscon 2012:

Devilled eggs. Color them? Maybe black sprinkles for the Saints (Black & gold)?

King cake. Bake our own.

Small prepared muffalatta sandwiches.

Research sno-ball machines and recipes.

Things to consider:
Beignets
Some kind of po' boy sandiwch
shrimp & cocktail sauce in bowl over ice
New Orleans Barbecue, which is different from Kansas City
Bananas Foster
Red Velvet mini-cupcakes, bite-size, with white frosting

I would personally like to get some Abita Beer.

library_lynn and Maria enjoyed coloring the party signs. In addition to having full-color party signs, can we have ones that are even more suited for coloring?

Need menu signs for what's available. Make individual signs for everything we hope to serve.

Need high-resolution art images. Can we get a good, clear, square-on shot of a street sign that we can then manipulate ourselves?

missmea needs a spare bartender, and an assistant throughout the night. It was a long time to be on her feet. Stool for bartender!

Notes for pre-bid materials.

Lots of people asked "who's running the proto-bid." The flyer answered that question, a whole new group of people. Lots of enthusiasm for the project.

One fan copy-edited the flyers, catching a handful of typos. Another costumer still remembers the problem with the Masquerade's dressing rooms not being cleaned before the fans were to use them. And I was cautioned not to use the word "Nolacon" when talking about the proto-bid as it would be premature to use the Worldcon name.

In general there was a lot of good wishes for the New Orleans group.