The Drink Tank 273 (2011).pdf

The Long-Delayed Drink Tank TAFF Spectacular!

Issue 273

With Guest Editor - Steve Green!

Photo by Dave Weingart

It was almost a conspiracy that caused this

issue to be so delayed. 4 others leap-frogged over

it onto eFanzines.com and that’s my fault, partly,

and partly The Fates. Big problem number one: two

computer crashes. Big Problem number two: mould

found in my apartment meaning I’ve gotta move

(and I’m seeing a place today that I think will ﬁt

the purpose!) and Big Problem number three: too

much fun. Nova Albion Steampunk Exhibition along

with Wondercon and the Science Fiction Outreach

Project all ate up a lot of time. It’s hard to deal with

these things and still get out an issue, but here it is.

TAFF is still close to my heart. It would be

fair to say that it changed my life, and certainly it

made things inﬁnitely better. I met new people who

have become good friends, I got to meet people I

only knew as pixels on a screen or printed letters

on a page, and I got to enjoy a Jacket Potato for the

ﬁrst time. I met great people, had a wonderful time

and even talked Science Fiction with Peter Weston,

what could be better than that?

Journey Planet came out of my TAFF trip. if

there is any one thing that I’m proud to have been

a part of in my Fannish life, it’s Journey Planet. Com-

pletely the fault of James Bacon that it started and

when Claire came on board to save us from our-

selves, it solidiﬁed as the best thing I’ve ever been a

part of.

And it happened because I won TAFF.

TAFF does make the connections between

the sides of the Atlantic stronger. Friendships, it is

said, build better bridges than money. I can not agree

more. In the last few years, we’ve seen TAFF build

bridges, increase the pool of interested individuals

and grow the coffers greatly. That’s a good thing, it

ensures the long-term survival of the fund.

Yes, TAFF has had it’s issues over the last

couple of decades. Hell, pretty much since the be-

ginning. There’s been discussion over what the role

of TAFF really is, how we shoudl select our candi-

dates, who’s eligible, and even whether or not it’s

needed. We’ll never have full concensus on these

matters, and that’s ﬁne. In many ways, TAFF is a test-

ing ground for what fandom can, and maybe should,

be. It’s a tradition that continues because it’s both

beloved and life-changing.

One thing that TAFF can be is tough. This

year’s race is the hardest I’ve ever seen to call.

There’s three folks I know and respect the hell out

of, and a fourth that I don’t think I met, but the

more I read and hear about him the more I like him.

I met Liam on my TAFF trip and he’s good people,

nominated by Harry Bell, Sandra Bond, Rich Coad,

Mike Meara and Robert Lichtman. I let Graham at

a CorFlu, I wanna say the second one in Austin, and

he’s got TAFF winners Bridget Bradshaw and Lilian

Edwards along with Nic Farey, Lloyd Penney and

James Shields. I’ve been John Coxon’s biggest fan

since I ﬁrst encountered his zine Procrastinations

and I’m quite proud to be one of his nominators

(along with Claire Brialey, James Bacon, Dave Lang-

ford and Steve Stiles). Paul Treadaway’s got himself

a great team, Vincent Docherty, Fran Dowd, Mike

Glyer, Tim Illingworth and Maureen Kincaid Speller,

a team including a couple of past WorldCon chairs!

So, this issue is all about TAFF, with articles

from three of the four candidates that show you

how wide-ranging this race is. I hope you’ll enjoy it

and go out and vote for one of the four great can-

didates. This year’s gonna be a big one and I hope

you’ll be a part of it!

Garcia@computerhistory.org

Into the West

Steve Green

All The TAFF Winners

Teresa Nielsen Hayden

1986 - Westbound Greg Pickersgill

1987 - Eastbound Jeanne Gomoll

1988 - Westbound Lilian Edwards & Christina

Lake

1989 - Eastbound Robert Lichtman

1991 - Westbound Pam Wells

1992 - Eastbound Jeanne Bowman

1993 - Westbound Abigail Frost

1995 - Eastbound Dan Steffan

1996 - Westbound Martin Tudor

1998 - Eastbound Ulrika O’Brien

1998 - Westbound Maureen Kincaid Speller

1999 - Eastbound Velma J Bowen (“Vijay”)

2000 - Westbound Sue Mason

2001 - Eastbound Victor M. Gonzalez

2002 - Westbound Tobes Valois

2003 - Eastbound Randy Byers

2004 - Westbound James Bacon

2005 - Eastbound Suzanne Tompkins (Suzle)

2006 - Westbound Bridget Bradshaw (“Bug”)

2008 - Eastbound Christopher J Garcia

2009 - Westbound Steve Green

2010 - Eastbound Anne KG Murphy & Brian

Gray

1954 - Westbound Vin¢ Clarke

1955 - Westbound Ken Bulmer

1956 - Eastbound Lee Hoffman

1957 - Eastbound Robert A Madle

1958 - Westbound Ron Bennett

1959 - Eastbound Don Ford

1960 - Westbound Eric Bentcliffe

1961 - Eastbound Ron Ellik

1962 - Westbound Ethel Lindsay

1963 - Eastbound Wally Weber

1964 - Westbound Arthur Thomson (“Atom”)

1965 - Eastbound Terry Carr

1966 - Westbound Thomas Schlück

1968 - Eastbound Steve Stiles

1969 - Westbound Eddie Jones

1970 - Eastbound Elliot K Shorter

1971 - Westbound Mario Bosnyak

1973 - Eastbound Len & June Moffatt

1974 - Westbound Peter Weston

1976 - Eastbound Bill Bowers & Roy Tackett (tie)

1977 - Westbound Peter Roberts

1979 - Eastbound Terry Hughes

1980 - Westbound Dave Langford

1981 - Eastbound Stu Shiffman

1982 - Westbound Kevin Smith

1983 - Eastbound Avedon Carol

1984 - Westbound Rob Hansen

1985 - Eastbound Patrick Nielsen Hayden &

Every TAFF trip is unique, an individual interface

between that particular fannish ambassador and

the communities he or she encounters.

In my case, for instance, it represented both my

ﬁrst venture outside Europe and the ﬁrst time a

westward TAFF trip had sent its winner to a Cana-

dian Worldcon. I was astonishingly fortunate in my

choice of hosts in Montreal and Toronto, and then

over the border in Seattle, San Francisco, Las Vegas,

Chicago and New York. If my successor has even

half as much fun, it’ll be a journey he’ll never forget.

TAFF, and the generosity which has underpinned

it for more than ﬁfty years, displays fandom at its

ﬁnest. If you haven’t voted yet, please visit taff.org.

uk and read the candidates’ platforms, then con-

sider adding your own support to our longest-es-

tablished institution.

TAFF was inspired by the Big Pond Fund,

which brought Ted Carnell over in ‘49 and

The WIllis Campaign in 1952, though nei-

ther were TAFF, per se.

A few words from the Candidates

Paul Treadaway

FEAR AND LOATHING IN RENO, NEVADA

By Graham Charnock

There can be few communities like sf fandom.

As we approach the 75th anniversary of the ﬁrst

con, it’s quite inspiring to think about how the prob-

lem of keeping in touch with like-minded people,

dotted all over the globe, has been tackled in the

days before modern communication technologies.

I’ve always been pretty bad about keeping up with

people in my personal life – I can’t think of anyone

that I went to school with that I would even know

how to contact, and only a few from my college

days. Even within fandom, I’ve lost track of the num-

ber of fanzine mailing lists I’ve dropped off by not

quite getting round to sending that LOC in time. Of

course with the internet it has got easier and easier,

as new methods of talking to people appear, increas-

ingly unrelated to any type of real world interaction

– an email is kind of like a letter, but what on earth

is a Facebook poke kind of like?

The real joy though is that the earlier so-

lutions have not disappeared, despite the arguably

more efﬁcient modern ones. There are still fanzines,

in many cases still printed with actual ink on pa-

per. And conventions, whatever challenges they may

face, show no sign of becoming obsolete – people

still want to meet each other face to face, as they

have since those early days of the 1930s. I suspect

they always will – human ingenuity has created

amazing technology, but there’s still millions of years

of evolution urging us to congregate and interact in

person. And fandom’s adaptability suggests we will

continue to ﬁnd ways to do so.

TAFF, it could be argued, has been particu-

larly adaptable over the almost 60 years of its exis-

tence. The only constant is the potential for creating

new connections within fandom. As a purely demo-

cratic institution, its purpose can be inﬁnitely adjust-

ed according to the wishes of those who support

it. But in any case, it offers an opportunity to create

new links, networks within networks, to introduce

people to each other who didn’t know how much

they had in common. To be fandom in microcosm.

And that’s pretty much my plan.

Mike Hammer squinted up at the merciless

Nevada sun. There was dust on his alligator boots

and grit under the handkerchief he’d tied about his

neck to mop up the sweat. He cursed the bitch in

the yellow sports car who’d ditched him at the last

gas station. Okay, he’d told her that her song writing

sucked and her guitar playing was even worse. Was

it his fault the crazy bitch couldn’t take honest criti-

cism?

He paused for a while in the intense heat.

His Colt 45 was a comforting bump on his hip, but

it was the only comforting thing at the moment. And

he probably wouldn’t even get a chance to use it. “I

don’t want anyone shot,” the Old Man had told him

when they’d met at a Turkish smoking restaurant in

Harringay. “I just want this bloke frightened. Just let

him know that no one crosses the Old Man and

gets away with it.”

Hammer took the photo that the Old Man

had supplied out of his pocket. He was a pretty

looking kid with an innocent smile that set Ham-

mer’s teeth on edge. Never mind, Hammer would

soon make him look a bit older. Hammer didn’t

understand what this TAFF business was all about.

He didn’t have to, as long as the Old Man’s money

stayed good, but they all seemed a bunch of nuts

In no particular order...

to him. Science ﬁction fans getting together in one

of the hottest cities of the state, not to buy hook-

ers or gamble, but to talk about science ﬁction fer

Chrissake. He’d like to go to Reno to shoot them all

just to watch them die. But they probably wouldn’t

get the reference.

At that moment a Prius swept by him on

the desert road and stopped a hundred yards ahead.

He caught up with it eventually after nearly treading

on a lizard that had run across his path. The lizard

had looked up at him and said ‘See you later, dude,’

before scuttling on its way. It had borne a strange

resemblance to Hunter S. Thompson. He saw the

driver was a pint-sized bespectacled geek with a pe-

culiar accent he couldn’t pin down, something be-

tween New York and Manchester. That’s Manchester

England, rather than Manchester New Hampshire.

“I’m going to Reno,” said Hammer.

“So am I,” said the geek. “Jump in and enjoy

the comforts of a true hybrid motoring experience.

Is that a gun on your hip or are you just pleased to

see me? Ted White has sat in that seat, you know.

Ah, Reno, divorce capital of the USA, but strangely

late in taking up telegraphic cabling. The county seat

of Washoe County, it has a population of about 220,

500, which is boosted by several thousand when

the Annual Worldcon is in town. City residents are

called “Reno-ites” Most call the metropolitan area

“Truckee Meadows”. I don’t know why they do that,

and I care even less.”

Mike Hammer took out his Colt and start-

ed wiping it with an oily rag. “You’re going to this

Worldcon thing, aren’t you?”

“Sure am,” said the geek. “But, take care. It’s

registered as a trademark and if you misuse or in-

fringe it someone might have to kill you.”

“Shut up and drive,” Hammer said.

The geek drove. They arrived in Reno. The

geek declined Hammer’s offer to take him to a local

gun shop and let him shoot an Uzi. They booked in

at the Peppermill because the block booking at the

Atlantis had already expired on 28th January.

Several hookers later, Hammer squinted up

at the merciless glaring ﬂuorescents of the Reno

Convention Centre. Several thousand geeks gath-

ered together in one place, half of them dressed up

in Star Trek and Star Wars costumes. If only he had

a rocket launcher, or at least a dirty nuclear weapon,

he thought. Hammer scanned the crowd and settled

on the meanest ugliest looking retard he could ﬁnd.

According to his name badge he was called ‘Peter R.

Weston’. Hammer showed him the photo the Old

Man had given him.

“Know where I might ﬁnd this guy?” he

asked.

“That’s John Coxon,” said Weston in a pe-

culiarly mangled accent that in itself made Ham-

mer want to throw up. “But he’s not here. He beat

that worthless Charnock shit, but had to pull out

of TAFF. Something about an accident with his jock-

strap, I believe. Paul Treadaway was keen to come

but managed to get a proper job and couldn’t take

time off, and Liam Proven came down with gout, and

Ontological Irish Insecurity mostly brought on by

James Bacon’s failure to vote for him, despite them

both being Irish. It’s a harsh non-partisan world out

there.”

Shit, Hammer thought to himself, it looked

as if he was going to have to pay the Old Man back

his £50. That would put him out by £10 on expenses

alone.

“If you’re looking for a TAFF person, though,”

said Weston. “I’m an ex-winner so I’m probably the

nearest you’ll get. Would you like to buy a copy of

my book ‘Stars in My Eyes? It comes with a free dust

jacket.”

A glint came in Hammer’s eye, and his hand

fell naturally to rest on the comforting bulk of his

Colt 45. He took off the safety.

“Step this way,” he said, putting a friendly

arm around Weston’s shoulders.

Variety is the Spice of Life

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