Minutes: 9/13/01 Recorded by Cassia Martin Sent to hrsfa-announce, 14 Sep 2001 Yay! The first meeting of the year was pleasantly insane. We met in Ticknor Lounge, in Boylston (which has some *very* comfy chairs), and tried to cram Everything That Is HRSFA into one hour of introductions. I think we may have succeeded mildly. First, the officers introduced themselves (well, except for Ben, who introduced himself when he walked in late.) Bryn sent out an email earlier with officer information which I will not repeat, but up-to-date info on this can always be found by typing 'finger hrsfa@hcs' at your fas% prompt. The IgNobel Awards were introduced by way of some fascinating interprative art by Claudia. The Igs, which we help sponsor, is an annual awards ceremony created to honor those scientific achievements which "cannot or should not be reproduced." Ten awards are given out each year, by Nobel prize winning, Harvard professor types, in Sanders Theater, to a televised audience. My favorite winner from last year was the scientist who discovered that "biochemically, romantic love may be indistinguishable from obsessive-compulsive disorder." Many people took home some posters to distribute around campus; anyone who is interested in helping more extensively is asked to email bartlet@fas. The basic categories of things introduced herein are SIGs and HRSFA-wide events. SIGs, or Special Interest Groups, form the bulk of HRSFAs activities. Basically, whenever people decide that they want to do something, and find 8 other people who also want to do something, they become a SIG. (Actually, the "people" part is negotiable. The '8' part is, too...) New SIGs happen all the time, so if think something is cool, speak up. Or, as Bryn said, "Build it and they will come." So without further ado, HRSFA SIGs! Buffy SIG: (leader: Charles (cwood)) watches Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, which is harder this year because they are on separate dates. Charles will always send out mail about the showing to -announce on the Sunday before. He has reserved the Lowell JCR for the Buffy premiere on Oct. 2nd, and will find space soon for the Angel premier, which is on Sept. 24th. Also, if anyone is interesting in watching the opening of the following shows with him, email him: Alias, West Wing, Dark Angel, Enterprise. (Actually, only email him about Enterprise if you want to hear some vitriolic spewing; it's rather amusing, really.) B5 Sig: (leaders: Tony (avila) and Sean (kleind)) watches B5, which is an 5-year long space epic about light vs. dark. (Ask Sean for the schpiel, but the show is good. They won two dramatic HUGOs and have excellent everything.) This year, they'll be doing B5 II showing, which means that they'll show the most important bits of the first three seasons, and then show Seasons 4 and 5 in their entirety. Writer's SIG: (leader: Starr (starr)) Basically a writer's workshop for any speculative fiction, or anything close to that category. This is where you would go if you, say, wanted to perfect a piece that you had prepared for Fusion... Fusion: (Editor in Chief: Ben (bmmiller)) This is actually not a SIG at all, but the placement looked right. Fusion is the literary enformancement arm of the Harvard-Radcliffe Science Fiction Association. They want stuff! Writing, art, editing... If you'd like to help, talk to Ben and he'll love you forever. (Hmmm... Somewhere in between Fusion and Writer's SIG, there was a mention that elven orthography SIG isn't quite dead, yet, but there wasn't any further mention of how, so we'll just throw it in the wheelbarrow with the others for now.) Reader's Group: (leader: Dennis (dclark)) Dennis has decided that, as cochair of the Science Fiction Club, he doesn't read enough science fiction at Harvard. In fact, he decided that most people at Harvard just plain don't read enough. He's starting a new group to get together for dinner once a week, and discuss some speculative fiction short story. He's also hoping to attract some of the smart professors and writers that should be hanging around Harvard to come in and talk with us. Erin Larkspur (larkspur) also offers tape versions of many good stories to those who believe this would remedy their relative illiteracy. Gaming Sig: (leaders: Charles (cwood) and Tony (avila)) Gaming Sig is responsible for all games that happen on campus. Period. Contact Charles for info on more fantasy kinds of gaming (like D&D, Magic the Gather, and WarHammer), and Tony for more board-gaming kinds of stuff. We play most of the games you've heard of, and many, many more that you have not. The Cool Movie pSIG. Or pZIG. Or ZIG. Or pFIG. Or... umm, right. Go ask Dev (purkayas) or Moira (mhill) They watch Cool Movies. They have cool announcement emails. Sometimes they do movie outings (but only to good movies), and tonight, they showed Sneakers. Yay, Sneakers! BBC SIG: (leader: Claudia (padme@bantha.org)) BBC SIG watches anything that's British. Or Sci-Fi. Sometimes, even stuff that's both! Last year, we watched some Blake's 7, Dr. Who, and Red Dwarf, and in the summer, some of the people who were around watched Prisoner. A meeting time has not yet been designated, but it tends to be after Buffy Sig. ****** There is a brief intermission for Mento SIG. We now resume our regularly scheduled programming. ********* MST3K SIG: (leader: Jason (fuyutsuki@hotmail.com) MST3K SIG not only appreciates the fine humour of MST3K (a show that is built on the concept of ridiculing *really* bad movies), it also creates new MST3K scripts for shows they really think deserve it. Last year, it showcased a marvellously successful treatment of "Fantastic Four," and this year, they hope to have weekly meetings to create a new script to put on at VeriCon. Anime SIG: (leader: Cassia (cimartin)) doesn't really exist. It used to, but then it became Harvard Anime Society, which has a lovely web page over at http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~anime. Sometimes, HRSFA and HAS put on some joint Marathons, like last years Evathon, and we are contemplating doing a Ranmathon at some point this year. Milk and Cookies: (leader: Dennis (dclark)) About once a month, M&C gathers around some nice fire on comfy couches to read stories to each other. Pajamas are optional, but teddy bears are *highly* recommended. Bizareness SIG: (leader: none) stood up to say that it had no announcement. If you are interested in this SIG, you will know. Moira taught computer class this summer, and forced her students to write a page on squirrel fishing. Aaron Dinkin was not there. Undead Elmo was trotted out, and suitably disturbed all the freshmen (and sophomores, and seniors, and grads). I think most of the juniors liked it. Cardboard Cut-Out SIG: (leader: Zena the Warrior Princess (email NA)) You remember how I said earlier that the "person" part of the SIG-formation process wasn't really necessary? This is what I was talking about. The Cardboard cut-outs wanted a SIG of their own, and they got one. They live in the HRSFA library now, if you ever want to visit 'em. That's about it for SIGs. Feel free to make more, and don't think you need to show up to any specific number of them. They are the best part of HRSFA, so shop 'em, and see which you care about. It might be hard to imagine at this point, but there are actually some bits of HRSFA that are club wide. First, what many people consider the best part of HRSFA - the library. We have 3,000+ scifi books, comics, magazines, and movies, and also a stash of games, boffer swords, MST3K videos, esoteric RPG Game Rules, and a button maker. You get the combination when you become a HRSFA member. (If you already did, and you weren't told, ask a current HRSFAn. We'll tell you.) Bryn is going to lead a trip down to the library (which is in Pfoho) at some point this weekend, so that everyone knows how to get there. Seeing as how HRSFA is a social organization and all, we also have parties. Sometimes they are spontaneous, but other times, like the Fall and Spring Parties, they are planned, and have a rich tradition. Sometimes, the Fall party manages to happen in the fall, but no matter when it happens, we have a scavenger hunt. Past scavenger hunts have searched for things like Peace in the Middle East, a Turing Machine, a Time Machine, and Hired Thugs. We also have two hunts. The Wyld Hunt happens in the fall, and consists chasing a freshman stag (a volunteer!) around Cambridge while dressed in skimpy black clothing, and painted with blue dye. Past stags have gone on to glorious careers as HRSFA officers, and we honor their endeavors. This year, the adventurous Kristin Waller volunteered to be our stag. (She may have been bribed into it by Kyle, but she still volunteered!) The Myld Hunt, by contrast, occurs on a beautiful spring day. We dress up in our proper Victorian Formal year, and don our parasols and canes for a lovely stroll around Harvard Campus, pursuing a shrewd, but gentile, hound with a distracting bag of tricks. After catching it, we retire to the Radcliffe Quad for some tea and a reconciliatory game of croquet. We also honor our lord Chronos, without whom we could not be, in two ceremonies called the "hours." The Going of the Hour is celebrated in the spring, and the Coming of the hour is celebrated this October 28th, from 2 am to 2 am, for about 1 hour. We chant, and wear black, and carry candles, and, as open flame is not allowed in the yard, we do NOT burn a clock. This year, Dennis (dclark, otherwise known as the Eerily Enlightened Poobah) is in search for a freshman to be the clockbearer, so let him know if you're interested. The Masq! The Masq, short for Masquerade, is probably not quite like any dance you've ever been to before. People come dressed as favorite characters or mythical creatures, or as objects, or indeed, some do come dressed as college students. (When pulled off properly, this can actually be a stunning costume.) We have cool, bizarre music, to which you are welcome to contribute. (Pretty much anything that you will bring will be played.) GameAThon. 24-hour gaming madness. We camp out in the science center on some relatively stressless weekend, and just always have people there to play games. Fusion. Mentioned above, with Writer's SIG, but mentioned again for completeness. We like Fusion. We want to get Fusion out. VeriCon! For years and years, HRSFA has been saying that it wanted to put on a Con. Last year, we actually managed it. We had over 300 visitors, and guests like Margaret Weiss (Dragonlance books) and Peter Abrams (Sluggy Freelance). This year, we're going for it again, with folk like Terry Moore (Strangers In Paradise) and Esthner Friesner (Chicks in Chainmail). This thing was *amazing* last year, and I highly recommend helping out if you have any free time. Our Con-chair this year is TseWei (twlim), so get in touch with him if you're interested. Movie Lines. We did the whole line thing for Phantom Menace, and the managed to get 168 seats for the very first showing of Episode I. We decided that, even if the move itself wasn't, waiting in line with friends was pretty nifty. There is a possibility that this will happen again this year, for Harry Potter, and Lord of the Rings, and, I suppose Episode II, if anybody cares. Around 20 minutes after we were supposed to be out of Ticknor Lounge, we finished the various introductions, and the meeting was officially closed. Memberships were bought from Tony at the early introductory price of $5. Munchies SIG was consumed. Then Cool Movie p?ig conducted us to the Lowell JCR to watch Sneakers, which was a Damn Cool Movie. I rather doubt anyone has read this far, but if anyone has any questions, ask an officer! We want to hear from people, freshmen especially, and we want to seduce you to HRSFA! Remember, "Friends don't let friends choose wisely." Regards, and for the freshmen, welcome to Harvard. Cassia, infernal secretary [This is the HRSFA announcement list. To unsubscribe, please send the one-line message "unsubscribe hrsfa-announce" to majordomo@hcs.harvard.edu. Please send questions about this list to hrsfa@hcs.harvard.edu]