Thank-yous

by unchartedworlds

Thanks to everyone who made our International Celebrate Bisexuality Day meetup such a lovely thing!

A probably-incomplete list…

• Sue for her singing, the perfect jubilant finale
• Dee, Warren and Nat for poems and songs
• Grant for leading a discussion where lots of people got to share experiences
• Lisa, Ian and Paul, for helping with the setup and being on the door some of the time
• Grant and Dee for being the “friendly faces” at the newcomers’ meetup
• Everyone on the “Bi The People” CD, which we had on for background music some of the time
• Travis & Paul at Derbyshire Friend, for taking our flyers to Derby Pride
• Dee and Cherisse for other flyer distribution
• Zoe at Nottingham Unitarians for putting the word about
• Lots of venues round town for their leaflet racks 🙂
• Everyone who gave us retweets
• Kat for inventing the handy hashtag #EMidsBi 🙂
• Jen for maintaining the Bi Visibility Day site, in which our listing was just one of many around the world!
• Hanne Blank for permission to quote from her excellent “Real women” piece
• Vron for getting in contact with Hanne, and for useful planning discussions in the run-up
• Annie and Anna, for support beforehand even though they couldn’t be there for the actual thing
• Keith for helping to put up rainbow bunting, and for previous assistance with the doorbell question
• Ellie for giving me the rainbow bunting!
• Warren for sound engineering on the day, which saved us a chunk of money
• Gaz and Steph at the Maze, for friendly cooperation and for running an ace little venue in the first place
• Everyone who filled in the surveys beforehand encouraging me to think it would work!

And of course…

• Everyone who turned up on the day, and made it worthwhile bothering in the first place.

I’ve got some other stuff to write about it too, including transcribing the crowd-sourced ideas we had. All in good time…

Flat-access doorbell at the Maze: working on it…

by unchartedworlds

Latest on the Maze doorbell saga: no guarantees, but there’s now a radio-remote doorbell ordered and supposedly on its way to my house, so fingers crossed 🙂

(This doesn’t affect people who can get up a step; the front door has one step and will be open from 4pm.)

Further updates will be here or at #EMidsBi. Meanwhile, people who need flat access, it’s still worth keeping the venue’s phone number to hand – 0115 947 5650 – and the event’s temporary phone/text number – 0794 115 1276. Better still, get in touch before Sunday lunchtime to plan one of us looking out for you.

Big thanks to Keith, ex-electrician friend, who was up at the Maze with me on Wednesday night to explore if the old one was fixable! And thanks to Gaz at the Maze for an encouraging response to my questions about this, and for approving the money on the new one. Even if we don’t have it sorted for Sunday, I’m pleased we took steps on this – it’ll be a good thing for future events at the Maze.

Counting down…

by unchartedworlds

Only a few days to go now before our event for International Celebrate Bisexuality Day, 23 September 2012 at the Maze in Nottingham!

Latest updates…

Music & words: The three main performers we’ve got lined up are Sue Warren (60s & 70s songs), El Dia (hip-hop & poetry) & Warren Volume (featuring the Dr Who Song). I’m looking forward to it! There might still be room for a couple more spots to be added on the night, and we promise to give nervous performers a warm welcome.

We’ll have other interesting spoken-word stuff too, including some info on bisexuality from Grant, and some crowd-sourcing of ideas for the future.

Smoking: Several people have ticked the “smoke makes me ill” option on the “fine-tuning” survey, and no-one with mobility difficulties has said they need to smoke, so we’re going with a smoke-free back courtyard. Smokers can still smoke – they just have to nip out the front entrance, i.e. the front of the Forest Tavern.

Food: As we’re starting at 4pm and they don’t do food, the Maze management has kindly given permission for us to bring in sandwiches or takeaway. We’ll have a kind of tea-break about 6pm or so, followed by a tidying-up session so as not to leave any mess.

Please buy drinks from the venue – that’s the only way they make any money from hosting us.

Newcomers’ meetup: If you’re coming to the “newcomers’ meetup” at Fade (2:30-3:50pm), the thing to look out for when you come into the café is a (newly-acquired) bi flag! Pink, purple and blue. It’ll be on or near “our” table.

Setting up: We could still do with one or two more people on the team that’s setting up at the Maze before the start – probably around 3pm. Some of it is moving chairs and tables, which I realise some people can’t do. But there’s also stuff like putting out books or information, or blu-tacking things to the walls.

Your help would be much appreciated! and it could be a good alternative to the “newcomers’ meetup” for meeting a couple of people and settling into being there. If that sounds like your cup of tea, please drop me a line.

Hashtag: For following Twitter, we’re adopting the hashtag #EMidsBi for this event and future similar things in the area. (You don’t have to be on Twitter to view this link.)

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The rest of the details are all available via the event’s main page.

Second survey: smoking, topics, “x-only space” ideas

by unchartedworlds

Thanks to everyone who did the first survey about our event in Nottingham on 23 September, which helped to reassure me we could make it happen!

I’ve put together a second survey now, with different questions, to influence the shape of the event. This is mainly for people who might turn up on the day.

If you’ve only got 1 minute, please just fill in the first two questions, about

• your needs for smoking or smoke-free space
• an updated “which bit of the event might you come to”.

If you’ve got another 5 minutes or so, you could also give your thoughts on

• topics we might include somehow
• the possibilities of “x-only space” for various groups.

Fill in the new survey

Thank you!

Fade café = venue for newcomers’ meetup

by unchartedworlds

We’ve now settled on a venue for the newcomers’ meetup before the main event on the 23rd:

Fade is at 171 Mansfield Road, Nottingham NG1 3FR. That’s about 300 yards down the hill from the Maze. It’s just south of Chatham Street, with (like the Maze) a back entrance from North Sherwood Street.

This is a compromise choice, as it doesn’t have full wheelchair access (though the main event does). I’m very sorry if that affects anyone.

I hope & intend that the main event will be newcomer-friendly in itself, making the meetup an optional extra for newcomers – this makes sense anyway, because not everyone could get there as early as 2.30.

But I’m aware that we’re excluding any non-step-mobile wheelchair users who would have liked to meet up with some of us but wanted or needed to have children under 14 with them at the time. If that describes you, let me know, and we’ll invent something else for another day.

Although its child-friendliness and general niceness were part of the attraction, the main reason we picked Fade was so that the walk from one venue to the other wouldn’t be too long (that having other access implications).

More on access at Fade

Fade does have a wheelchair-friendly toilet, presumably on the basis that some wheelchair users do manage the steps.

If I get time between now and the day, I’ll do a photo-review of the access there (like the one for the Maze), so people can make their own judgement about the steps etc. (I did take some photos at Fade yesterday with that in mind, but they’re still on the camera as I write this.)

New Facebook page for September event

by unchartedworlds

We now have a Facebook page for our 23 September Nottingham bi event!

Facebook page for the event – best for telling people who hang out on Facebook, or saying hello there to other people who might go.

Main page for the event, on this site – best for full details.

ICBD 2012 plans

by unchartedworlds

OK, so the plans for International Celebrate Bisexuality Day are advancing!

Here’s the page for the event. Please do pass on that link to anyone you think might be interested.

The event’s taking shape gradually… I’m thinking I’ll do updates here for important information as well as updating the page itself. For instance we don’t yet have a venue confirmed for the newcomers’ meetup beforehand.

Thanks to everyone who’s contributing! and there’s still room for more people to help! Drop me a line if you’d like to. Or comment below.