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	Worldcon

The audience politely waited for the event to begin as organizers tried to find a unionized employee of the hotel with the rights to turn down the lights in the sub-sub-basement convention area. Then, 45 minutes past the scheduled starting time, ASFA president Teresa Patterson announced that the hotel could not or would not turn out the lights part way.

They could only turn them off all the way, and then it would be for the rest of the night. "Our choice would be we wouldn't be able to see the slides very well," explained Patterson, "or we wouldn't be able to see anything else."

"Slides!" cried the crowd, proof once again that organizers should never give attendees of a Worldcon choices about anything.

But the event finally begun, with good humor all around on behalf of both the ASFA brass and those attending. After thanking the audience for "joining us in the bowels of the earth for the Chesleys," Patterson turned over the ceremonies to Paul Barnett, the Commissioning Editor at art book publisher Paper Tiger, and Betsy Mitchell, editor-in-chief at Warner Aspect books. The two made a pair, with Mitchell as the straight face letting Barnett's wry humor bounce off without leaving any dents.

The audience and the artists were some of the best dressed people at the entire con. Many of them were in somewhat formal attire, giving the whole show a somewhat formal, Oscars-like feeling. And like the Oscars, there were those dressed conservatively in plain suits, and those dressed provocatively, like Patterson, whose accentuating dress left little to the imagination.

But this was still a con.

"This is a complete and total shock," said Johnna Kulkas upon accepting her award for Best Three-Dimensional. "I want to thank my husband, who has supported me and believed in me even when I didn't believe in myself," she said, sounding like every gushing winner on the stage at the Academy Awards.

Then she ended with, "This is cool!"

Few of the winning artists actually accepted their own prizes, most had someone there as a representative. Most of the proxies just mumbled a thanks, though a few had prepared remarks to read. Rick Berry, the winner for Best Monochrome Unpublished, sent a note reading, "Sorry I'm not here to accept the award . . . I grew up on Kmart book cover art and hanging out drawing with my mutant peers."

The most exuberant winner was, to few people's surprise, Artist Guest of Honor Bob Eggleton. After he was announced as winner for the Best Cover Illustration: Magazine category (his 11th Chesley), Eggleton bounded up to the stage in three steps. "Cool!" he boomed into the microphone. The front row visibly cringed. Then perhaps thinking about the barely-visible slides of his work, he gestured to the roof.

"Maybe I'll just shatter the lights," he said at half the volume.

Maybe that would have improved the show, but people like Eggleton were having a ball anyway.