Here Be Dragons
So! DragonCon. Finally made it there for the first time. Four days. 30,000 or so people. 430 guests. Seven people in the mini-van. Wheee.
It was fun. Hilights included:
Babylon 5 Q&A with Peter Jurasik (Londo), Stephen Furst (Vir), Mira Furlan (Delenn) and person who's name I've forgotten who played Na'Toth in seasons one and five. It's really quite scary how much Stephen Furst is Vir. Either he's acting all the time, or he's not acting, that's just him. Peter Jurasik is also a lot of fun. We were rather gob-smacked to here him comment off-handedly that he's currently a professor at UNC. Bwuh? According to wikipedia, he means UNC-Wilmington, alas. He said he teaches astro-physics, but oddly the UNC-W site only mentions him as a guest lecturer for the Film Studies department. Huh. It does, however, jibe with his official home page which coyly mentions that he now lives "in a small town near the Atlantic Ocean". But enough stalking for now. (COUP beach trip stalking expedition later! No, wait...) Anyway, the other interesting revelation from the panel was apparently since JMS sold some screenplay or something and has people who like him in Hollywood again, we might get some new B5 shorts in the future. Nifty.
Next up: Firefly/Serenity Q&A. Despite consisting only of Alan Tudyk (Wash) and Summer Glau (River) there was a two-hour line. It was pretty much worth it, though, as Alan is completely insane and would basically be entertaining delivering monologue for days on end. And Summer is adorable. Then they did it again the next day (only I managed to get into that one without the line, yay).
After missing her a couple times I managed to track down Jennie Breeden of The Devil's Panties. I bought something from her table and later managed to find her annual "raising of the kilts under the stares" gathering, which involves a leaf-blower and is about what it sounds like. And I got to touch The Boots. I feel special.
Speaking of comic artists, we also found Phil Foglio (author of Girl Genius, among other fine comics). From him we acquired the latest GG collection, and some adorable Petit Mort pins, and some cool signed sketches, and the very last copy (reportedly Kaja's, but he insisted on taking my money anyway) of a cool Xxxenophile chap-book. And also in comics news, I picked up a signed copy of "Portrait of the Warlock as a Young Man" (from the Courtney Crumrin series) from Ted Naismith.
And speaking of buying things (don't you love the segues?) there was of course an extensive dealer's room in which I picked up some Lunamaria and Meyrin figures, a set of Range Murata figures, a surprisingly cheap model of the Advent Children airship, a Geddoe (Suiko3) pin, and a really cool FF6 doujin from 1995. Woo.
Also, we got to see madmanatw briefly, which was fun.
I got plenty of use out of my purple pirate outfit, and akiko looked absolutely stunning in her new Bujold-inspired dress, which you can read all about on her various blogs if you're so inclined.
Oh, and I managed to beat worlds 2, 3, 5, and 6 of New Super Mario Bros. while in the mini-van.
Anyway, as I said, it was fun, if completely exhausting. If akiko ends up with a gov't job (go go federal holidays), we might even try it again next year.
It was fun. Hilights included:
Babylon 5 Q&A with Peter Jurasik (Londo), Stephen Furst (Vir), Mira Furlan (Delenn) and person who's name I've forgotten who played Na'Toth in seasons one and five. It's really quite scary how much Stephen Furst is Vir. Either he's acting all the time, or he's not acting, that's just him. Peter Jurasik is also a lot of fun. We were rather gob-smacked to here him comment off-handedly that he's currently a professor at UNC. Bwuh? According to wikipedia, he means UNC-Wilmington, alas. He said he teaches astro-physics, but oddly the UNC-W site only mentions him as a guest lecturer for the Film Studies department. Huh. It does, however, jibe with his official home page which coyly mentions that he now lives "in a small town near the Atlantic Ocean". But enough stalking for now. (COUP beach trip stalking expedition later! No, wait...) Anyway, the other interesting revelation from the panel was apparently since JMS sold some screenplay or something and has people who like him in Hollywood again, we might get some new B5 shorts in the future. Nifty.
Next up: Firefly/Serenity Q&A. Despite consisting only of Alan Tudyk (Wash) and Summer Glau (River) there was a two-hour line. It was pretty much worth it, though, as Alan is completely insane and would basically be entertaining delivering monologue for days on end. And Summer is adorable. Then they did it again the next day (only I managed to get into that one without the line, yay).
After missing her a couple times I managed to track down Jennie Breeden of The Devil's Panties. I bought something from her table and later managed to find her annual "raising of the kilts under the stares" gathering, which involves a leaf-blower and is about what it sounds like. And I got to touch The Boots. I feel special.
Speaking of comic artists, we also found Phil Foglio (author of Girl Genius, among other fine comics). From him we acquired the latest GG collection, and some adorable Petit Mort pins, and some cool signed sketches, and the very last copy (reportedly Kaja's, but he insisted on taking my money anyway) of a cool Xxxenophile chap-book. And also in comics news, I picked up a signed copy of "Portrait of the Warlock as a Young Man" (from the Courtney Crumrin series) from Ted Naismith.
And speaking of buying things (don't you love the segues?) there was of course an extensive dealer's room in which I picked up some Lunamaria and Meyrin figures, a set of Range Murata figures, a surprisingly cheap model of the Advent Children airship, a Geddoe (Suiko3) pin, and a really cool FF6 doujin from 1995. Woo.
Also, we got to see madmanatw briefly, which was fun.
I got plenty of use out of my purple pirate outfit, and akiko looked absolutely stunning in her new Bujold-inspired dress, which you can read all about on her various blogs if you're so inclined.
Oh, and I managed to beat worlds 2, 3, 5, and 6 of New Super Mario Bros. while in the mini-van.
Anyway, as I said, it was fun, if completely exhausting. If akiko ends up with a gov't job (go go federal holidays), we might even try it again next year.