Worst convention ever?
Wednesday: I arrive in San Diego. Water bottle leaks in my bag and ruins my notebook, where I have my schedule and all of my notes on what I'm doing, where people are going to be, and questions to ask them. A lot of the pages are okay after it's laid out to dry overnight, but the hard cover is soft and squishy and the pages aren't quite attached anymore. (Today the damn thing is still damp.) On the up-side, I'm not carrying around my usual <> worth of electronics in my bag and my Kindle seems fine. Whew.
Thursday: I trip and skin my knee while hopping on and off a curb, dodging crowds. This may seem excessively whiny, but it hurts, okay? It still hurts. At some point during the day I lose my debit card. I never carry cash -- I use that card for everything. I have a back-up credit card... but it's closing on its limit with all of my travel stuff on it. Comic-Con is less fun when you're broke. Pretty much all of my "work" was on Thursday, so the entire day is spent running at high speeds from meeting to meeting and taking lots of notes. By the end of the day, wow, tired.
Friday: After zero success finding my card, I call the bank to cut it off. They can't replace it (even at a local bank branch) but will send a new one to my home address. I should see it in seven business days. Holy god, how will I live seven business days without a debit card? I may need to find my check book. I miss the Coraline panel because all the trolleys heading towards the convention center are overflowing and it's a longish walk. Proceed to miss the Star Wars: The Old Republic panel because when I get there, the line goes down the hallway, down the next hallway, down the next hallway, and then outside through a small maze. When the line starts moving to go inside, half of the maze ditches the whole "line" concept and mobs the doors. I try to set them on fire with my mind, but fail miserably. I am surrounded by very intense Star Wars geeks in the interim. One of them threatens me with a lightsaber for saying bad things about Star Wars: Galaxies.
Throughout, I have maintained a complete inability to talk to anyone remotely famous. I kind of stand there and smile and sometimes manage to wrangle words at approximately kindergarten level, and tend to say "thank you" an awful lot.
Though I guess there are some good things out of this con...
Thursday: I trip and skin my knee while hopping on and off a curb, dodging crowds. This may seem excessively whiny, but it hurts, okay? It still hurts. At some point during the day I lose my debit card. I never carry cash -- I use that card for everything. I have a back-up credit card... but it's closing on its limit with all of my travel stuff on it. Comic-Con is less fun when you're broke. Pretty much all of my "work" was on Thursday, so the entire day is spent running at high speeds from meeting to meeting and taking lots of notes. By the end of the day, wow, tired.
Friday: After zero success finding my card, I call the bank to cut it off. They can't replace it (even at a local bank branch) but will send a new one to my home address. I should see it in seven business days. Holy god, how will I live seven business days without a debit card? I may need to find my check book. I miss the Coraline panel because all the trolleys heading towards the convention center are overflowing and it's a longish walk. Proceed to miss the Star Wars: The Old Republic panel because when I get there, the line goes down the hallway, down the next hallway, down the next hallway, and then outside through a small maze. When the line starts moving to go inside, half of the maze ditches the whole "line" concept and mobs the doors. I try to set them on fire with my mind, but fail miserably. I am surrounded by very intense Star Wars geeks in the interim. One of them threatens me with a lightsaber for saying bad things about Star Wars: Galaxies.
Throughout, I have maintained a complete inability to talk to anyone remotely famous. I kind of stand there and smile and sometimes manage to wrangle words at approximately kindergarten level, and tend to say "thank you" an awful lot.
Though I guess there are some good things out of this con...
- I met Colin Baker, who called me "my dear" and hugged me. Holy crap. I met the Doctor. Holy crap.
- I'm getting Ben Templesmith to draw me something. Think I managed not to come across as more or less a sane human being. More or less.
- I met John Barrowman, who liked my "you never forget your first Doctor" t-shirt. He signed a picture for me "love always, John Barrowman." Now wondering how much of Captain Jack is scripted and how much is just John Barrowman being himself.
- Got autographs from Gabe & Tycho of Penny Arcade fame. Did not manage to say a single intelligent word to them in the process, which is a real shame. Tycho is more or less my idol and I'm just not sure how to tell someone that without sounding incredibly awkward.
- Had almost entirely non-fangirlish conversations with reasonably famous (to me) people Greg Dean (of Real Life) and R. Stevens (of Diesel Sweeties). Both revolved around Doctor Who. My "you never forget your first Doctor" shirt is an honest-to-goodness conversation-starter.
- Found someone selling Jelly Babies on the con floor.
- Had the best dessert ever. Still blissing out. May never be able to enjoy other food.
