Dragon*Con post!
YES - FINALLY - I know you have been on the edge of your frakkin SEAT waiting for this post! Now you can read about my super fabulous awesome weekend at Dragon*Con!!!
In bullet point format to keep it from being too TL;DR.
-- I found the billboards on 75 to be the perfect representation of the evolution of a relationship. There are signs for kinky "adult" stores and then two miles down, there is a whole "bring the kids to the peach farm" signs, and also a nice selection of antique store signs. That about covers it haha.
-- Made it to Atlanta safe and sound, gave the car to the valet. While unloading my axe, they accidentally snapped it in two. I almost cried, but faeriesfolly packed duct tape and saved the day...and the valet had an accident in the garage and busted maybedeadcat's taillight!!!!! ARGH!!!! Luckily, we didn't get the message until later that day so it didn't ruin our Thursday night. Just our Friday morning.
-- Went to the Hard Rock Cafe for dinner on Thursday. When I went with faeriesfolly back in 2009, this is where we ate and we found out about the collectible pins. I bought a set and we split them so she has one dragon and I have the other. I wanted to do something similar, but this year I was not just attending with her, but also with maybedeadcat. But, as luck would have it, since it was the 25th Anniversary of D*C, they had a special 3-pin boxed set!!! Totally a sign. I bought it and gave two of the pins to my friends -- the set is only complete when we are together!
-- Texting jellibean as we wandered the floor in the Marriott and being told that she was "near the Dalek" -- I knew I was at Dragon*Con when that text was totally logical.
-- Also, it was SO FRAKKIN AWESOME TO STAY IN THE MARRIOTT!! THANK YOU jellibean!!!!!!
-- Friday, made a b-line for the Her Universe booth and snagged the Cylon necklace and Yoda t-shirt.
-- Went to the first Buffy panel which included Eliza Dushku, Nicholas Brendan, Mercedes McNab, Felicia Day, Julie Benz, and Clare Kramer. It was a little awkward, they really needed a moderator. Felicia did a good job of trying to keep it moving. Eliza is clearly a sweetheart. Julie Benz and Clare Kramer are adorable and I would be happy just to listen to the two of them babble all day about whatever. Mercedes seemed really shy, Nicholas seemed sort of disinterested. Still, it was fun.
-- Went back to the hotel room later that day and faeriesfolly began the process of turning me into FRAY. Phase one, spray painting my hair BLACK. We made quite a mess. maybedeadcat documented it for me.
-- Took FRAY to the streets for the Buffy sing-along. Actually had one person identify my character which made me happy. :)
-- Buffy Sing-a-Long was a lot of fun, but I always like singing those songs with a whole crowd of fans. Doctor Horrible was better though, the stage show was tighter and the actors seemed to be more confident. Hilarious thing was the lady sitting next to me. She started chatting with me as they set up the Doctor Horrible show. She was babbling about meeting someone in line and then was like "I'm commemorating this show with some Firefly tea! Do you know what that is?" And I was all innocent and was like "what is it?" and she revealed she was sipping some sort of alcoholic beverage while we were sitting there LOL! Just cracked me up! She did compliment my singing though...so she must have been pretty tipsy ;-)
-- Wandered back to the hotel, going up the escalator we reach the top and I see King Arthur come galloping by, and hearing the faint sound of coconuts being banged together I watched in pure geek joy as he rode by along with Sir Galahad, Patsy, some ladies from Castle Anthrax, and a monk carrying the holy hand grenade.
-- Saturday morning parade. I love the parade because you get to see some awesome costumes and there are always SO MANY COSTUMES to see!!!! Not sure what my favorite was. I'm really loving the Ghostbuster outfits and want to make my own. Not enough lady ghostbusters! HMPH!
-- Okay, totally fucked up thing but after the parade, we saw this poor girl fall and she probably cracked her skull. It was terrible and tragic and I sometimes wonder if she survived the fall. I wish I could unsee and unhear that moment. So sad.
-- GUILD PANEL! Okay, this might have been my favorite panel, mostly because I FUCKING ADORE FELICIA DAY!!!!! She just inspires me, makes me laugh, and is just as big of a geek as everyone else in the room so you know she gets it. Robin and Amy are also adorable. But Felicia is a great leader and speaker and just so damn adorable.
-- Went and wandered the hotel again, checked out the art room and looked at some more awesome costumes. Then we ran back to the hotel to find the line for the DOCTOR WHO showing. SO awesome of BBC America to do that for D*C. faeriesfolly turned herself into Amy for the showing and got several comments (she dyed her hair on Thursday night and it looked VERY Amy).
-- Had a really funny line buddy for Doctor Who. Lady in front of us was in a belly dancer costume. I complimented her on the outfit and she said "actually, I am a belly dancer for a living, these are my work clothes, I came straight from my job to here...really wish I could change out of them". This made me LOL.
-- Doctor Who showing was SO much fun. We had our sonic screwdrivers at the ready. Just great to watch with a group of Whovians. Everyone was so quiet and attentive and laughed in all the right spots.
-- Hussled from DW showing to find the line for the Jonathan Coulton concert. We went to the ballroom where it was supposed to be, then followed all the people to find the end of the line...ended up walking ALL THE WAY around the hotel to the door that we walked in to get into the hotel in the first place! Twas funny. Had another really nice line buddy who we talked to about libraries and computers and then JoCo and general geekery.
-- Even though the line was crazy long, we made it into the JoCo show. It was sort of weird because it didn't feel like a concert, more like people hanging out while someone played. I guess D*C people are not as hardcore about their JoCo as PAX people? Paul & Storm were Paul & Storm...this is the third time I've seen them this year and it's gotten old now. At least JoCo has a good catalog. There was a girl that played Ukelele and had a cute song about dating Wikipedia but I was so tired I just wanted my JoCo! It was fun but not as fun as PAX. His new album was out though, so I picked that up. Good stuff. You know it will be featured on my 2011 mix :)
-- Sunday I finally went to the Walk of Fame! Autographs seemed extra pricey this year, so instead of getting a ton of things like I did last time, I just went with two very important ones -- Tahmoh Penkett and Eliza Dushku. I had both of them sign my Dollhouse blu-ray slip sleeve, which I had Joss, Felicia, Maurissa, and Zack sign at Comic-Con last year. I know, that is a pretty fucking epic thing now. Tahmoh was so sweet, listening to me fangirl, and he even wanted to see the picture after we took it so make sure it was okay. So nice of him! Eliza is also adorable but she is so TINY!!! But she has these amazing, big brown eyes...just wow. So glad I got to meet her, she is very cool.
-- went to dealer room to search for Ralph Bakshi, one of simontrueheart's geek heroes. We found the booth but no signing times were listed. They said he stopped by sometimes but they didn't know when. Sadly, we texted simontrueheart and told him it was a no go, then went to wander around a bit more. BUT SUDDENLY, they made an announcement that Ralph Bakshi was at the booth and signing! SCORE! So I did get the autographs AND we got to totally surprise simontrueheart when we came back. BONUS :)
-- maybedeadcat is a big Venture Bros fan (and I'm getting there!) so we went to line up for that very popular panel. But before we left the room, I had to give him a taste of the dress-up experience for D*C, so I spray painted his bangs blue. I put on my Starbuck outfit too, because it was the last night of D*C and you gotta dress up!!!!
-- Lots of people watching as we waited for the evening to happen so we could join jellibean and her crew in her room to watch the Masquerade on the TV. LOTS of pizza was eaten and some coke with bourbon was imbibed. They were a great bunch, so nice to let us crash the party considering we only knew Jess. But they were all nice and chatty and we had some laughs (though it's hard not to crack up when Aaron Douglas is clearly buzzing while he's "hosting" the ceremony).
-- The Masquerade ended and we dispersed into the hotel lobby again for one more night of crazy. This might have been my favorite night of the Convention because maybedeadcat & I found an awesome spot on the third floor and just watched as the costumes appeared on the escaltor and walked in the door. Snapped some photos and just chatted a bit. I texted my brother some pictures and I think I might have convinced him to come along next year LOL.
-- Walking back to the elevator, I caught a glimpse of some wings out of the corner of my eye. I said "excuse me, are you wicked0witch on livejournal?" and she turned around and it was her! LOL! So cool to meet her after following her on tumblr and LJ for a bit. :) And then we got in the elevator and maybedeadcat was like "oh look, it's Jess!" so I ran out of the elevator to get my mandatory Jess hug and photo before D*C came to and end.
-- Went back to the room and found faeriesfolly and chatted with her about her adventures. Ended up staying awake until 3am, babbling about everything we saw that day, that weekend, and how sad it was that it was all over. Luckily, jellibean suggested we call the desk and ask for a late check-out, which is apparently how everyone rolls at D*C since they didn't even bat an eye when I asked.
-- Monday we rolled out of bed, knowing that we had until 1 to check out, we planned a few last minute stops. I caved and went to the Her Universe booth and picked up a set of the Rebel Alliance earrings. Also wandered the dealer hall and found some cat ears I had been eyeing up since PAX 2010.
-- Went back into the Walk of Fame for a bit of chatting with the stars. I was out of money at this point but I wanted to at least say hello to Sean Patrick Flannery. Luckily there wasn't a line, so I went up to him and said "I have to tell you this, but you were my first poster boy. I had a poster of you as Young Indy on my wall as a kid". He was like "OMG I WAS YOUR FARAH FAWCETT THAT IS SO COOL!!!" Made me laugh, so sweet of him to even humor me. He was very nice, shook my hand and stuff.
-- Also made my way around to Clare Kramer and thanked her for being so awesome to me at Comic-Con the year before. She was really nice and talked with us a for a bit about the Con and what we thought and if we had fun. She also mentioned she was starting up a website of her own called GeekNation so I signed up for the mailing list. :)
-- so now that i had fully embarassed myself AND spent all my money, decided to go up to the room and call for someone to help us move our bags. This was at noon. They said it would take an hour and a half to send someone up. SO then we waited...and waited...and waited...which sucks because I wanted to meet up with starbuck92!!!!!
-- Hopped back on the road, rainy rainy drive ahead but we had plenty of music on iTunes and philosophical conversations. Too bad we didn't take notes, we could have solved most of the world's problems. Perhaps we should put all of the world leaders into a car together and have them take a road trip...
SO READY FOR DRAGON*CON 2012!!!!!!!!!!
In bullet point format to keep it from being too TL;DR.
-- I found the billboards on 75 to be the perfect representation of the evolution of a relationship. There are signs for kinky "adult" stores and then two miles down, there is a whole "bring the kids to the peach farm" signs, and also a nice selection of antique store signs. That about covers it haha.
-- Made it to Atlanta safe and sound, gave the car to the valet. While unloading my axe, they accidentally snapped it in two. I almost cried, but faeriesfolly packed duct tape and saved the day...and the valet had an accident in the garage and busted maybedeadcat's taillight!!!!! ARGH!!!! Luckily, we didn't get the message until later that day so it didn't ruin our Thursday night. Just our Friday morning.
-- Went to the Hard Rock Cafe for dinner on Thursday. When I went with faeriesfolly back in 2009, this is where we ate and we found out about the collectible pins. I bought a set and we split them so she has one dragon and I have the other. I wanted to do something similar, but this year I was not just attending with her, but also with maybedeadcat. But, as luck would have it, since it was the 25th Anniversary of D*C, they had a special 3-pin boxed set!!! Totally a sign. I bought it and gave two of the pins to my friends -- the set is only complete when we are together!
-- Texting jellibean as we wandered the floor in the Marriott and being told that she was "near the Dalek" -- I knew I was at Dragon*Con when that text was totally logical.
-- Also, it was SO FRAKKIN AWESOME TO STAY IN THE MARRIOTT!! THANK YOU jellibean!!!!!!
-- Friday, made a b-line for the Her Universe booth and snagged the Cylon necklace and Yoda t-shirt.
-- Went to the first Buffy panel which included Eliza Dushku, Nicholas Brendan, Mercedes McNab, Felicia Day, Julie Benz, and Clare Kramer. It was a little awkward, they really needed a moderator. Felicia did a good job of trying to keep it moving. Eliza is clearly a sweetheart. Julie Benz and Clare Kramer are adorable and I would be happy just to listen to the two of them babble all day about whatever. Mercedes seemed really shy, Nicholas seemed sort of disinterested. Still, it was fun.
-- Went back to the hotel room later that day and faeriesfolly began the process of turning me into FRAY. Phase one, spray painting my hair BLACK. We made quite a mess. maybedeadcat documented it for me.
-- Took FRAY to the streets for the Buffy sing-along. Actually had one person identify my character which made me happy. :)
-- Buffy Sing-a-Long was a lot of fun, but I always like singing those songs with a whole crowd of fans. Doctor Horrible was better though, the stage show was tighter and the actors seemed to be more confident. Hilarious thing was the lady sitting next to me. She started chatting with me as they set up the Doctor Horrible show. She was babbling about meeting someone in line and then was like "I'm commemorating this show with some Firefly tea! Do you know what that is?" And I was all innocent and was like "what is it?" and she revealed she was sipping some sort of alcoholic beverage while we were sitting there LOL! Just cracked me up! She did compliment my singing though...so she must have been pretty tipsy ;-)
-- Wandered back to the hotel, going up the escalator we reach the top and I see King Arthur come galloping by, and hearing the faint sound of coconuts being banged together I watched in pure geek joy as he rode by along with Sir Galahad, Patsy, some ladies from Castle Anthrax, and a monk carrying the holy hand grenade.
-- Saturday morning parade. I love the parade because you get to see some awesome costumes and there are always SO MANY COSTUMES to see!!!! Not sure what my favorite was. I'm really loving the Ghostbuster outfits and want to make my own. Not enough lady ghostbusters! HMPH!
-- Okay, totally fucked up thing but after the parade, we saw this poor girl fall and she probably cracked her skull. It was terrible and tragic and I sometimes wonder if she survived the fall. I wish I could unsee and unhear that moment. So sad.
-- GUILD PANEL! Okay, this might have been my favorite panel, mostly because I FUCKING ADORE FELICIA DAY!!!!! She just inspires me, makes me laugh, and is just as big of a geek as everyone else in the room so you know she gets it. Robin and Amy are also adorable. But Felicia is a great leader and speaker and just so damn adorable.
-- Went and wandered the hotel again, checked out the art room and looked at some more awesome costumes. Then we ran back to the hotel to find the line for the DOCTOR WHO showing. SO awesome of BBC America to do that for D*C. faeriesfolly turned herself into Amy for the showing and got several comments (she dyed her hair on Thursday night and it looked VERY Amy).
-- Had a really funny line buddy for Doctor Who. Lady in front of us was in a belly dancer costume. I complimented her on the outfit and she said "actually, I am a belly dancer for a living, these are my work clothes, I came straight from my job to here...really wish I could change out of them". This made me LOL.
-- Doctor Who showing was SO much fun. We had our sonic screwdrivers at the ready. Just great to watch with a group of Whovians. Everyone was so quiet and attentive and laughed in all the right spots.
-- Hussled from DW showing to find the line for the Jonathan Coulton concert. We went to the ballroom where it was supposed to be, then followed all the people to find the end of the line...ended up walking ALL THE WAY around the hotel to the door that we walked in to get into the hotel in the first place! Twas funny. Had another really nice line buddy who we talked to about libraries and computers and then JoCo and general geekery.
-- Even though the line was crazy long, we made it into the JoCo show. It was sort of weird because it didn't feel like a concert, more like people hanging out while someone played. I guess D*C people are not as hardcore about their JoCo as PAX people? Paul & Storm were Paul & Storm...this is the third time I've seen them this year and it's gotten old now. At least JoCo has a good catalog. There was a girl that played Ukelele and had a cute song about dating Wikipedia but I was so tired I just wanted my JoCo! It was fun but not as fun as PAX. His new album was out though, so I picked that up. Good stuff. You know it will be featured on my 2011 mix :)
-- Sunday I finally went to the Walk of Fame! Autographs seemed extra pricey this year, so instead of getting a ton of things like I did last time, I just went with two very important ones -- Tahmoh Penkett and Eliza Dushku. I had both of them sign my Dollhouse blu-ray slip sleeve, which I had Joss, Felicia, Maurissa, and Zack sign at Comic-Con last year. I know, that is a pretty fucking epic thing now. Tahmoh was so sweet, listening to me fangirl, and he even wanted to see the picture after we took it so make sure it was okay. So nice of him! Eliza is also adorable but she is so TINY!!! But she has these amazing, big brown eyes...just wow. So glad I got to meet her, she is very cool.
-- went to dealer room to search for Ralph Bakshi, one of simontrueheart's geek heroes. We found the booth but no signing times were listed. They said he stopped by sometimes but they didn't know when. Sadly, we texted simontrueheart and told him it was a no go, then went to wander around a bit more. BUT SUDDENLY, they made an announcement that Ralph Bakshi was at the booth and signing! SCORE! So I did get the autographs AND we got to totally surprise simontrueheart when we came back. BONUS :)
-- maybedeadcat is a big Venture Bros fan (and I'm getting there!) so we went to line up for that very popular panel. But before we left the room, I had to give him a taste of the dress-up experience for D*C, so I spray painted his bangs blue. I put on my Starbuck outfit too, because it was the last night of D*C and you gotta dress up!!!!
-- Lots of people watching as we waited for the evening to happen so we could join jellibean and her crew in her room to watch the Masquerade on the TV. LOTS of pizza was eaten and some coke with bourbon was imbibed. They were a great bunch, so nice to let us crash the party considering we only knew Jess. But they were all nice and chatty and we had some laughs (though it's hard not to crack up when Aaron Douglas is clearly buzzing while he's "hosting" the ceremony).
-- The Masquerade ended and we dispersed into the hotel lobby again for one more night of crazy. This might have been my favorite night of the Convention because maybedeadcat & I found an awesome spot on the third floor and just watched as the costumes appeared on the escaltor and walked in the door. Snapped some photos and just chatted a bit. I texted my brother some pictures and I think I might have convinced him to come along next year LOL.
-- Walking back to the elevator, I caught a glimpse of some wings out of the corner of my eye. I said "excuse me, are you wicked0witch on livejournal?" and she turned around and it was her! LOL! So cool to meet her after following her on tumblr and LJ for a bit. :) And then we got in the elevator and maybedeadcat was like "oh look, it's Jess!" so I ran out of the elevator to get my mandatory Jess hug and photo before D*C came to and end.
-- Went back to the room and found faeriesfolly and chatted with her about her adventures. Ended up staying awake until 3am, babbling about everything we saw that day, that weekend, and how sad it was that it was all over. Luckily, jellibean suggested we call the desk and ask for a late check-out, which is apparently how everyone rolls at D*C since they didn't even bat an eye when I asked.
-- Monday we rolled out of bed, knowing that we had until 1 to check out, we planned a few last minute stops. I caved and went to the Her Universe booth and picked up a set of the Rebel Alliance earrings. Also wandered the dealer hall and found some cat ears I had been eyeing up since PAX 2010.
-- Went back into the Walk of Fame for a bit of chatting with the stars. I was out of money at this point but I wanted to at least say hello to Sean Patrick Flannery. Luckily there wasn't a line, so I went up to him and said "I have to tell you this, but you were my first poster boy. I had a poster of you as Young Indy on my wall as a kid". He was like "OMG I WAS YOUR FARAH FAWCETT THAT IS SO COOL!!!" Made me laugh, so sweet of him to even humor me. He was very nice, shook my hand and stuff.
-- Also made my way around to Clare Kramer and thanked her for being so awesome to me at Comic-Con the year before. She was really nice and talked with us a for a bit about the Con and what we thought and if we had fun. She also mentioned she was starting up a website of her own called GeekNation so I signed up for the mailing list. :)
-- so now that i had fully embarassed myself AND spent all my money, decided to go up to the room and call for someone to help us move our bags. This was at noon. They said it would take an hour and a half to send someone up. SO then we waited...and waited...and waited...which sucks because I wanted to meet up with starbuck92!!!!!
-- Hopped back on the road, rainy rainy drive ahead but we had plenty of music on iTunes and philosophical conversations. Too bad we didn't take notes, we could have solved most of the world's problems. Perhaps we should put all of the world leaders into a car together and have them take a road trip...
SO READY FOR DRAGON*CON 2012!!!!!!!!!!