CONvergence 2007 - Part The Seventh
Oooh! One thing I forgot about Sunday. After The Mummy, Mark Tempel dragged me aside for some reason. It turned out Bernie Wrightson autographed a couple of his sketch chapbooks for me, as a thank you for the bio. That stunned me. One of my regrets this year was only getting to talk to Bernie for that brief moment when I first arrived at the hotel. Bernie is a ridiculously cool and nice guy, and if you have any chance to meet him, you should do it.
We got back from Khan's and settled in to watch the assortment of weird shorts and ephemera that Cinema Rex shows to end out the con. I keep meaning to put some effort into collecting shorts over the year, so I can offer the guys some more stuff to show for the Dead Dog, if they are amenable. I love that "Star Trek Eternal" montage, but I think I've seen it enough. I wonder if they can show YouTube stuff? The quality would probably blow, but maybe something could be done.
Oh, and Brian Keene gave me beer. Yeah, it was Miller Lite, but I didn't care. It's all about the company.
Then the traditional reading of comment cards. Nothing particularly wacky or asshatty was submitted, which was kind of a letdown. But I had hit that mysterious zone of sleeplessness in which everything becomes hilarious, so I didn't mind.
Since Cheb and Cajones had their room for Monday, I opted to stay one more night. Usually I just kind of crawl home around dawn, but this was nice. Semi-real bed ahoy! I went to be about 4:30 and got up at 10:00. And the ultimate in bizarre, I was in a really good mood and wide awake. But that was not to last.
There was a lot of wandering around, saying goodbye, seeing people off at the airport shuttle bus. I just felt really really good. Enough so that it was almost odd.
I was planning on going home when I got an invite to go to Olive Garden and meet cargill and the other people from Austin, TX. I thought hey, why the hell not. It was an entertaining meal, Olive Garden managed not to suck, and we were not force sold wine (the huge group probably was a factor). It was one of those sit around and listen to other people talk meals, which was fine by me.
We went back to the hotel. I was under the impression there was going to be some viewing of the raw video footage of various con events, but I was jumping the gun. There was a crapload of stuff to manage before such indulgent fun could be had. I wound up helping out with accounting stuff, the processing and handling of pre-registrations for next year. Regretfully, the fans were out in the room we were in. That kept checks and money from being blown everywhere, but it got kind of awful after a while.
We got stuff all organized and ready for deposit around 8:00. Ye gods. It made me realize just how much work it takes to make this thing happen.
So, what to do? More food, obviously. moneygod hadn't eaten all day, so we decided on the Cheesecake Factory. And this was the point when a long weekend of short sleep finally caught up with me and bit me on the ass. The second I set foot in the Cheesecake Factory, with its dark lighting and busy decor, I realized it was a bad idea. The energy just drained from me. I couldn't form sentences. I got a monster headache, the kind only sleep can cure. Several days of diuretic consumption caught up with me and sent me to the restroom I don't know how many times. At one point I was even hallucinating, I thought people at the next table were calling my name and stuff. And we all rode in the same car, so I couldn't just take off. Finally, we got back to the hotel, I muttered my goodbyes, and took off for home and six odd hours of the hardest sleep I've ever had.
Okay, so I overdid it. Can you blame me? It was an awesome damn weekend. I finally got all my attitudes and desires in balance. I refused to get wrapped up in drama. I didn't ride that stupid rollercoaster of worry and anticipation, and I had a blast.
Tuesday night was the watching of the raw con footage, mostly panels people had missed. And on Wednesday and Thursday I wound up rewatching all the other con videos I had. Like always, I didn't want the weekend to end.