Friday Evening, August 15, 2003. Fabulous Farscape Crusader, Nicola Wood and crew: her husband Ken, (the Techie, builder of ‘Moya' the video computer) - Sherry Brock (the Rural Goddess and rabid Farscape Fan, the initial instigator of this whole shebang) - and yours truly, (Shauna Day, a mildly curious bystander that had watched that last half of the last season and was now interested enough to learn more) arrived in Calgary for
ConVersion XX.

Nicola was a woman with a mission: To seduce, cajole or hog-tie as many people as possible into Farscape Fandom.

The Panel: "Farscape: Through the Looking Glass ... Darkly. What the Frell???" was bumped back a half and hour due to an over-running registration but that was the only real hitch in the presentation.

Nicola's husband Ken Shupenia, provided expert tech support and the videos were very well received.

1. "The Pain Gets Worse" by Archive – video by Tazey (Aeryn), introduced by Nicola, who expounded at length on the metamorphosis of the character of Aeryn Sun.
2. "Cherry Lips" by Garbage – video by Roksx (Chiana), was introduced by me just because I think that Chiana so doggone cute -- even if she does look like the love child of Herman Munster and Shari Lewis.
3. "Superman" by Five For Fighting - video by Bruce Micales and Kelly Hill (John), introduced by Sherri, who explained that she has loved this program from the word go, and of course how Crichton is God.

These videos gave the audience a tiny sample of the huge universe of Farscape, that sparked many questions and a lively discussion, about each character and their arc, about how much the audience dislikes pin-headed programming suits, and what everyone there could do in the fight to save a wonderful program. Nicola presented the various plans of action that are in the works and passed out postcards, buttons, cards and leaflets about Save Farscape.

CD's of the featured videos were given to two members of the audience and the final video “1812” by Tchaikovsky – video by Dallascaper hailed farewell to everyone before they kicked us out of the Panel room and the conversation spilled out into the hallway.

The next day ( Saturday August 16 ), Nicola hosted a room party that featured non-stop videos, bodies draped anywhere there was seating space, food and drink. More than one person found their way back several times to watch and then sign the petition. Several also had their pictures taken for the mosaic. Even more surprising was the fact that not a single complaint (that I'm aware of) was lodged about all the strange people traipsing in and out of our hotel room.

Sunday August 17 -- Camping out. Strategically positioned just outside of the huckster's room were several comfortable chairs a small table ...and lots of Farscape literature, post cards, and the petition. Over the course of the weekend multiple pages of signatures were gathered (and more would have been but we ran out of sheets!) and a bunch of photos were taken for the mosaic. Phew!

Nicola is probably taking a well deserved nap right now, she worked very hard and did a great job. (She also lost her mind...she volunteered to do something similar for Farscape next year!)