Dragon*Con 2007
Okay y'all, here it is: my report for Dragon*Con 2007 in Atlanta. Finally. Prepare to be both amused and horrified by turns.
Oh, and there are lots of pretty pictures, videos, and links, so before I get started, my apologies to dialers-up. Now, everyone ready?
Lock and load.
So I can’t decide if this is the best convention I’ve ever been to or not. I’m thinking it is, although [ last year’s Dragon*Con] was pretty friggin awesome too. I just wanted to point out how great it was first, because I think a lot of what I’m going to write about may sound like I’m complaining... which I am... but the good completely outweighed the bad, and I’d do it all again in a heartbeat, so there! That said... onward with the complaints. :)
I took half the day off work for this?
Dragon*Con started on Friday, and Atlanta is about two hours away from where I live, so I worked until noon on Friday and took the rest of the day off. I figured we’d leave the house at about 12:30 or 1, and once we arrived then we’d have to check into the hotel and register and everything, so the very earliest I planned to do any convention-type things was about 5:30. This, as it turned out, was not meant to be.
I [ posted already] about wanting to be [ evil!Cordelia] during Dragon*Con, remember? So my mom and I made the costume together (read: She made the actual costume and I just made remarks), but we cut the timing really close and she was still sewing on Thursday night... which turned into Friday morning while I was at work... which turned into Friday afternoon. In my mom’s defense, it was a really complicated costume, and we made it from scratch, and she had to design the patterns and everything, and the material was really slippery, and in between packing I was running around bitching about all the things we were going to miss... At one point I suggested that we just leave it and go on and that I could be evil!Cordy next year, and she got all mad that we had spent so much time on it and I was willing to go without it, so I waited and we were a few hours late leaving the house. Well, I say a few, but I mean several. Well, I say several...
We pulled out of the driveway at 6:10PM, speeding. Then we did a lap around the block and pulled back into the driveway so I could run inside and get my phone charger.
We pulled out of the driveway at 6:16PM, speeding.
My mom: You want to stop at an ATM for more cash?
Me: No. Yes. Shit.
And then of course we had to stop at the drugstore to pick up my mom’s blood pressure medicine (never go to a con without it). She ran into CVS to get it while I waited in the car and listened to Bon Jovi on the radio and avoided looking up when I noticed this creepy woman who has a crush on me in the parking lot.
We pulled out of the parking lot at 6:28PM, speeding.
The actual drive to Atlanta was uneventful. (I played Freecell on my laptop and listened to the Fratellis.) We had decided already that it would be a waste of time trying to find a parking spot at the hotel (plus it cost $17 per day to park there) so instead of driving straight there, we drove to a MARTA station that had long-term parking available. MARTA stands for [Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority]. It’s Atlanta’s subway, and [ here’s] an excellent way to remember the name of it.
When we got to the MARTA station (Kensington), there were signs up about long-term parking, but we couldn’t actually find the place to go, so we stopped and my mom asked a woman who worked there. She was extremely rude (welcome to Atlanta), but we finally were able to find the long-term parking lot, which was around the back. The entrance had a little booth with gates on either side of it, and when you pull up you're supposed to take a ticket from this machine and one of the gates will lift up for you to drive through, but the machine wouldn't work for us. There was a woman in the booth who steadfastly ignored us for about five minutes while she cleaned her windows, even though she obviously saw us because we had stopped the car about a foot and a half away from her, so finally my mom got out of the car again to knock on the booth window and ask what the deal was. The woman didn't speak english, but through a series of simple hand gestures and facial expressions, my mom was able to communicate what was wrong, and the woman finally realized that while she was cleaning she had accidentally unplugged the machine, so she plugged it back in and we (finally) were able to park.
Of course, the whole time I was just getting more and more frustrated because I was missing conventiony things. Thank goodness for the internet! After I got back home, I was able to catch up on some of the things I missed on Friday - like the first James Marsters, Elizabeth Rohm, Juliet Landau, and Ken Feinburg [ Q&A] and the cocktail party Friday night... which I hadn't been planning to go to anyway (I think you had to buy an extra ticket?) but I sort of wish I had been there to hear James Marsters [threaten to starve his neice], [talk about dating a porn star], and [discuss fucking a box of Cheerios, among other things]. I also heard that the Star Trek/Battlestar Galactica panel was really uncomfortable and awkward, so of course I'm sad I missed that.
Anyway, we finally got on the MARTA to go to Peachtree Center. What's funny about this is that my mom and I never ride the subway (our town doesn't have one) and so it hadn't occurred to us earlier, but when you get on at the end of the line, you have to sit there and wait while you stop. at. every. station. Which is like riding an elevator after some kid has pushed every button. (Or like riding an elevator at Dragon*Con.)
Mama on MARTA. She was a bit distressed that we couldn't understand a word the announcer was saying, since he didn't so much announce as mumble vaguely towards the microphone. But we sat beside a map, so we were able to figure out where to get off anyway.
In the picture it looks like we're on a train by ourselves, but more people got on and off. I've decided my favorite thing about taking the subway on a pretty quiet night is that no one looks at each other. I love that.
Anyway, we stopped six times and transferred once, then had to walk a couple blocks dragging our suitcases behind us toward the Hilton. (We could tell we were getting closer to the convention when people's ears and teeth started looking a bit more pointed.) It was already late by this time, and the Hilton wasn't very crowded, although the Hyatt and the Marriott were shoulder-to-shoulder. A girl with a very shiny nametag checked us in.
Her: Are you... taking a picture of ME?
So it turns out, since we were like, the VERY last people to check into the hotel, we didn't actually get the room we had reserved. We were supposed to have two queen sized beds, but they had already given all of those rooms away, so they replaced it with one king sized and a roll-away. Thanks, Hilton! It's a good thing we didn't have six people trying to stay in the same room! Oh, wait a second... we did.
602 = all party, all the time.
Here is our six person bed.
I'd be more upset, I think, if we had actually made reservations for six people. The Hilton thought we only had two people. But it still doesn't make sense to me that they would promise to reserve more queen sized beds than they actually have, you know? It's called counting, people. It's called logic. It's called I wasn't actually planning on sleeping between my mom and my sister for three nights.
It was 9:48 when we finally put our stuff down in the room (more than 5 hours later than I had anticipated arriving), and we still had to register before we could do anything, so I also managed to miss [ the first showing of the Buffy Horror Picture Show] which was at 10. Grr. Argh.
I had been planning to meet up with Christina (i_luv_trees) before the BHPS so we could go together, so I called her to tell her I would still need to register first but that she could go on to the BHPS and I would meet her later, but she said she'd rather go ahead and meet me and hang out, which I thought was nice of her. I had actually run out of the hotel room talking to her on my cell (I left my mom at the room to wait for my sister Sara and her husband Scott to get there) so I was still talking to Christina as I made my way across the street to the Marriott and she made her way to the Hilton. So the first time I saw her, we were on opposite sides of the street on our cell phones, having passed each other. Heh.
Christina and I went to the Hyatt for me to register, and the line wasn't very long, but it was concentrated around the letters M through P, so I still had to wait a little while. They had a TV set up in the line so you could watch the [Dragon*Con TV bumpers], which are hilarious if you know what they're talking about and sort of... strange if you don't. Two of the volunteers flirted with me as I walked up to pick up my pass, which was cute. I think it's funny that all the guys at cons like this automatically assume I know something about Star Trek and Marvel Superheroes, so they make remarks which I'm sure are supposed to be... witty or something, but I have no clue what they're talking about so I just smile and nod. Which encourages them. But the registration volunteer guy at the head of my line was really nice, and he noticed that there was another badge for someone at the same address as me (my mom's) and he went ahead and gave me her badge and booklet too, so she wouldn't have to wait in line. When we turned to leave, I saw my mom and Sara and Scott already waiting in the line (which was suddenly a lot longer than it had been when I got there) so I went ahead and gave her the badge and stuff, but she ended up waiting in line with Sara and Scott anyway.
So THEN I was finally ready to do some conventioning! At uh, 10:45PM. *headdesk*
Wait, you mean there's a convention going on here?
The second showing of the Buffy Horror Picture Show started at 11:30, so Christina and I went to get in line. The line was looooong. It actually went outside and curled around the building, so we followed it to the end and got in the back, and lots more people came and got behind us too. A couple of girls standing directly behind us were showing off their cell ringtones, and one of them had [The Ding Dong Song] by Gunther, which I'm just dying for someone to do an Angel video to, and they were surprised I had heard of it. Standing in front of us was this guy I talked to for a couple minutes about other conventions we'd gone to, and then his brother showed up with some Arby's food, which I drooled over for the rest of the time we were in the line, since I had not eaten since I'd gotten off work about 11 hours earlier.
They started letting people in to the BHPS at about 11:15. Every single seat was filled. They even had us do that thing where you hold up your fingers to show how many empty seats are next to you so they could squeeze in more people. And then, before the show started, they had a filker named [Luke Ski] come out and sing two songs he'd written, one about Angel and one about Firefly. The Angel one was a parody of ["Man of Constant Sorrow"], and the Firefly one was, I believe, a parody of ["A Boy Named Sue"]. I filmed a little bit of the Angel one. It's not the best singing I've ever heard, but the lyrics are kind of fun.
After that, the dude plugged his CD. I wonder if he sold very many.
The BHPS, for anyone who doesn't know, is done in a style similar to screenings of the [Rocky Horror Picture Show], which is to say that they show the dvd on a screen and have live actors standing on a stage in front of it, acting out the different parts. Also, there are specific places where you're supposed to yell things back at the characters, and the BHPS has something I've never seen at the RHPS - a person standing at the front holding up cue cards to the audience. (Genius idea.) I had wanted to go to the first showing since I've heard it's always better - the first cast tries harder to dress as the characters and actually do the right dance moves, whereas the second cast is just up there to be silly - but the second showing was fun anyway, despite a few way-OOC things, like Buffy having blue hair. Which might actually have made it more fun.
I filmed a couple of things from the BHPS, although it was superdark in there and you can't really see anything. The main thing is to hear everyone singing. I laughed pretty hard at a couple hundred people all singing Xander's "It could be witches..." line. And everyone doing Tara's jazz hands was pretty funny, too.
There's a better video of the performance for this song [here], where you can actually see what the actors were doing.
Some of my favorite things from the BHPS:
1. When Giles starts singing, the cue card girl holds up a sign that says "Freebird!"
2. During Buffy's slow motion scene, the bluehaired Buffy runs around the stage verrrrry slowly.
3. During "Walk Through the Fire," an extra runs across the stage holding up a toy firetruck.
4. They got someone to act out the part of Buffy's punching bag. Heh.
5. Absolutely any time Dawn comes onscreen, the audience immediately starts yelling, "SHUT UP DAWN! NOBODY ASKED YOU! KLEPTO!" Literally, her face appears and people are already shouting, "HOMEWRECKER! JUST DIE ALREADY!"
6. Whenever Willow sings, the cue card says, "Willow can't sing."
On Monday, the [Daily Dragon Newsletter] printed a [review] of the first showing of the Buffy Horror Picture Show. (This is my second year of Dragon*Con, and I still haven't managed to see a copy of this newsletter while AT the convention. Not quite sure I believe in it...)
Immediately following the BHPS, there was a Buffy panel that Christina wanted to go to. I wasn't sure where it was because we heard a couple of people saying it was in different places, so I started to ask the Ding Dong Song girls if they were going so we could follow them, but all I got out was, "Are y'all going to--" before they interrupted excitedly, "Voltaire??" Which... no. I accidentally went to Voltaire last year, and let me tell you, I'll not make that mistake twice. So we decided to go to the Buffy Track Room back at the Hilton to see if the panel was in there, and it was.
I saw this girl on the way and had to take a picture:
My hat has a cow.
So remember that one panel I hated last year?
This was called "The Shape of Your Ship," and they hype it by rating it NC17 and saying "Adults Only" and starting it at 1:00AM. But it's totally lame! And this year made me remember why I hated it last year: one of the panelists is awful. It's not just that the panel was unorganized, which it was, or that there wasn't enough to talk about, which there wasn't, but this one girl... omg. I can't even begin... So I won't. I just really, really had a hard time with her.
Something fun, though, was hearing stuff by people I know get recced. In particular, I remember kazzy_cee's graphics were mentioned, as well as a couple of stories by beer_good_foamy. Although a certain person couldn't refrain from reccing her own fic, which was annoying. And there were a lot of Spuffy recs flying around, which I didn't pay much attention to, although I remember herself_nyc's name being mentioned in with the Spuffies because she's on my flist. :)
They had a plot bunny contest, where you were supposed to come up with a crack!fic plot bunny and everyone voted at the end on which was the best. (The winner won a notebook of fansmut.) The winning plot bunny was Gwen/Drusilla doing it in the rain, which ... actually sounds kind of hot to me. Is that crack!fic? Maybe I just don't know what crack!fic is. I think I voted for the "boypile" bunny that had like 18 guys and was a crossover with Harry Potter and Pirates of the Carribbean and Lord of the Rings and featured a Gary Stu. In the words of one panelist, "I'm a fan of penis, so I think more penis is good."
The Buffy Track Room. Please do not feed the panelists.
When the panel was over, two girls who are involved with the [Buffy Between the Lines] audio drama came over and spoke with me briefly because I had mentioned during the panel that I'm in it. Their names are Kim and Tabz, and they were very nice. (You may know Tabz [sl_podcast] from the [Strangely Literal] podcast and Kim [athenamuse] from the [Upside Down and Halfway to Happyland] podcast.) They gave me a CD with some podcasty Jossverse goodness on it.
I broke the CD case pretty much immediately. I'm still not sure how those things work.
Christina and I stayed late to talk to some of the girls and to be offended by a Spike-alike who showed up at the very end. He wanted us to leave the room so they could lock it for the night, so in the middle of our conversation, he starts jumping around going, "OH MY GOD, there's a FIRE in here; everyone needs to GET OUT!" Which was... clever? And I asked if I could take a picture of him and he goes, "Yeah, outside," like he was talking to a little kid. Jerk.
The bad rude man and skittythegreat, who was dressed as Fray. (Skitty was the blue-haired Buffy, I think.)
Don't you just love a good awkward moment?
Me: I've actually been to your livejournal before.
Skitty: Oh, yeah?
Me: Yeah, I left you a comment but you... never... replied to it... *headdesk*
Skitty: Oh. Er, uh I'm sorry, I've had... a lot going on...
And that's how good I am at meeting people. *sigh*
Moving on!
Sleeping Derangements Arrangements
I said goodnight to Christina and made it back up to my room by about 3 or so. I think. There was laughing coming from inside the room when I got there, and my mom opened the door and peeked out before letting me in. Both of my sisters and both of their husbands were already there.
Jamey and Scott break in the roll-away bed. (Amy and Sara are SO their beards.)
Sara pretends to sleep so I won't make her move. But I did anyway.
We all stayed up talking for about another hour, I think. I had heard that the Whedontrack schedule was wrong in our booklets, so I tried to go online to check the current schedule on the [Whedonverse Track Webpage], and it turns out that wireless internet in the Hilton is actually $13 a day! So... I bought it. Which is lame because I only actually used about 20 minutes of it. But at least I got the correct times for the panels I didn't go to later.
I can't remember what my sisters told me they did on Friday night... I do have a couple pictures, though:
Sara meets the Doctor... sort of. There was actually a really good Ten walking around, but I never managed to get his picture. I like how the arrow is pointing at my sister's head.
Dumb, Dumber, and... Dumbest? According to Sara's con report: "Drunk Lloyd and Harry wouldn't let me go! It was flattering until Lloyd breathed into my face, 'I HAVE WORMS!'"
Oh, and I think they went to the Drum Circle, where Sara decided to become a belly dancer.
We got to sleep around 4 something. I still hadn't eaten.
Ms. Chase goes to Dragon*Con
We missed the Dragon*Con Parade last year, so we wanted to make sure we got there this year. It started at 10:00AM, so we got up at around 8, and Amy and Jamey went down to the Hyatt to register. They figured they'd do that early, then come back to the room and shower and get ready for the day. Turns out, they waited in line for about three hours and didn't manage to get back to the room before their first event started at 11:30.
Meanwhile, we had all fallen back to sleep. So, yeah, missed the parade again this year. Damn. We tried looking at the Dragon*Con channel on the TV while it was supposed to be going on, but it wasn't being played. It's a shame, too, because I heard that Angel and Spike walked in the parade under blankets so they wouldn't catch fire, and I would have liked to have a picture of that. Oh, well.
We finally made it out the door at around 11. I was wearing my completed evil!Cordelia outfit for the first time.
Yaaaaaaaaay clearstraps!
The Battlestar Galactica panel started at 11:30, so we ran to the Hyatt. I was wearing these knee-high spike-heeled boots and nearly died going up and down the stairs. (Cordy's boots were ankle-high, but I couldn't find any my size.) We ended up meeting Amy and Jamey at the panel, and Jamey was wearing an improvised Star Trek costume complete with masking tape ears and a safety-pinned-on insignia. His badge name was "Tape Ears" and Amy's was "I'm with Tape Ears." My badge said "Girlpire" on it, and Sara and Scott were sad that I hadn't given them special names when I pre-registered them online. I probably would have just called them "Thing 1" and "Thing 2."
ANYway, it's time for:
Fun with Approximate Quotes
at the BSG Panel
This panel consisted of Aaron Douglas, Richard Hatch, and Jamie Bamber (in that order).
1. Aaron "Chief Tyrol" Douglas: Who drank too much last night? Yeah? When I woke up this morning, my liver crawled out my ass and gave me the finger.
2. Aaron and Jamie "Apollo" Bamber about the horrible Star Trek panel on Friday:
Jamie: If it hadn't been for the footsie, I would have been done in three minutes.
Aaron: I was done in three minutes. That's how good he is, guys.
Jamie: I wasn't done for 18 minutes. That's how quick he is.
Aaron: Well, at least Jonathan Frakes held me after.
3. Richard "Tom Zarek" Hatch: I'm the only straight actor on this show.
Aaron: He's straight now. As soon as he got the job, he didn't have to do that anymore...
4. Aaron (about Jamie): This is how he reads his script - "Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit, my line, bullshit, bullshit..."
5. Jamie (about Richard): He's always in my trailor. I go in and he's there, and I'm like, "What are you doing in here? AGAIN?"
6. Jamie: Starbuck's dead, Adama's a necrophiliac... It's a dark show! Logically, it's going to end there.
7. Someone asks if Apollo's going to be more civillian in the next season.
Jamie: I can answer that without words. *fluffs his big poofy hair in a really gay way*
Aaron: Is it raining men?
Jamie: I'm shooting a hairspray commercial. No, it is raining men. Halleluia.
8. Aaron bashes the SciFi channel like whoa, and then someone starts to ask a question. Aaron: Yes, quickly, before I lose my job right now.
9. Someone asks what jobs each character would rather have than what they do now. Either Aaron or Richard says viper pilot - I think it's Aaron. Jamie: "I'd be right behind him in the cockpit. So to speak." And Aaron scoots his chair away.
10. A fan gets up and says that Chief was her favorite character from the beginning, and Aaron runs off the stage and goes to hug her.
11. Aaron: Yeah, Chief goes a little nuts.
Jamie: Chief has little nuts? I thought he was Everyman...?
Aaron: Well, they just look little, comparatively speaking.
12. Aaron (about Jamie): Somebody turn off mic three.
Jamie: *looks down* Mine's got a one on it. You just silenced yourself!
13. Aaron wants BSG to end this way: Everyone dies but Chief, and he lands on a planet full of women who make scotch, and he has to help them repopulate.
14. By show of hands, Aaron asks who wants the Galactica crew to find Earth (a few hands), who wants them not to find Earth (a lot of hands), and who wants them to find Earth, but not necessarily this Earth (almost everyone). Aaron: I saw some people raise their hands twice. I'm sorry, I'm going to have to ask you to leave.
Aaron Douglas was also at Dragon*Con last year, but I didn't get a chance to meet him. I'm sad to say I didn't get a chance to meet him this year either, OR Jamie Bamber, who I really really wanted to meet. But I did get to meet someone I've been wanting to meet since before I even got into BSG, and that's where I headed after the BSG panel. But first, to the Consuite! Because I haven't eaten in 24 hours.
ConSweeeeeet.
This place saved my life, no lie.
Scott had not come with us to the BSG panel, and on the way up to the Consuite we lost track of Sara as well. So it was just me, my mom, Amy, and Jamey who got little peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and turkey pastrami rolls and chips and salsa and coke. And Jamey got some kind of energy drink called Freeeeeek, which I thought was appropriate.
The obligatory Mama-in-the-Consuite-wearing-her-backpack photo
We ate in the hallway outside of the Consuite because it was full. There was a dude interviewing the Ice Queen from Chronicles of Narnia down on the floor below us, so I took a picture looking over the rail, and it didn't turn out... but this little video did.
After we ate, we started making our way back towards the Hilton, because the next thing I wanted to do was the Buffyverse Panel at 4:00, so we had a couple hours to kill and I thought the dealer rooms would be a good place to do that. Only, when we got to the Marriott, I saw the signs up about James Marsters doing his photo op at 2:30, and I decided that would be time better spent, since it was already almost 2 anyway, and I really didn't feel up to tripping back to the Hilton in those boots just to shop when I would be coming back through in a short while anyway. So Amy and Jamey went back to the room without us so they could take showers, and Mama and I went and stood in line for me to have my photo made with James for twice as much as the other celebrities were charging.
I carried a watermelon?
In which Jen meets James Marsters for the first time.
So the deal with the photo ops is that you go and buy a little ticket that has your actor's name on it, then you stand in line for an hour, have the picture made, and leave without it. You're supposed to go back a couple hours later and pick it up, and meanwhile anyone who happens by the photo tables can admire your dorkiness preserved in color forever. I stood in line behind a girl dressed as Tonks from HP and another girl wearing some sort of crown (I didn't ask who she was). There was also a woman standing a few people in front of us named... Patsy? Or Patty? Who had a notebook full of pictures she's taken with James at different conventions and concerts. The girl with the crown actually broke ahead of me in the line to ask Patsy(?) if she was, in fact, THE Patsy who posts con reports in certain James Marsters Yahoo groups. She was. (I would link to one of them, but I didn't catch the name of any of the groups.) We flipped through her James pictures and made appropriate noises of admiration.
While we were standing in line, James walked by. He was using a cane, which surprised me because I hadn't heard that he had hurt himself while filming... Torchwood, I think? (I'm never up-to-date on the JM gossip.) It was on the set of whatever he did right before he did Without a Trace, because later someone asked him how the injury affected his acting on Without a Trace, and he said it made it hurt.
He's shorter than I expected.
Sara and Scott showed up while we were standing in line, which was weird because they didn't know we'd be there. Sara touched up my makeup for me because I normally don't wear makeup and haven't the slightest clue what to do with it. Also, I went to the bathroom while my mom kept my place in line. And I only mention this because the stall walls in the bathroom go almost all the way to the ceiling and all the way to the floor, and there's a light in each stall, but I happened to get the one stall with the blown light, so I had to pee in the dark. Which I thought was kind of funny since that is exactly the kind of luck I have.
We gave Sara and Scott some money, and they went to the Dragon*Con store to buy lanyards for us to wear our badges on instead of clipping them on, leaving me and my mom alone in the line again. I was trying to think of something to say to James when I met him, but I couldn't think of anything. I told the girls I was standing with that I was nervous, and they were like, "Oh, don't worry, he's so nice, just be yourself, etc." So I took their advice and embarrassed myself, like usual.
Let me just preface this by saying, I'm lame. Like, really lame. Lamer than most people. And I get nervous really easily, which usually either means I get quiet or I say really dumb, irrelevant things. Let me also preface this by saying that I looked for a fake butcher knife to carry around with me as part of my Cordelia outfit for a long time and never found one, so I ended up buying a plastic hunting knife instead, which had red liquid squishing around inside it to make it look bloody, and I had to spraypaint it with metallic silver paint to make it look more real.
So this is what happened.
I walked into the room where they were taking pictures, and James was sitting on this chair that was kind of high up, and the line was moving pretty fast because the fan would walk up, he'd smile and put his arm around her, they would snap the picture and call out NEXT! and then the next fan would walk up. So I was relieved, because it meant I didn't have to say anything, and that would reduce my chances of making a fool out of myself. Except, when it was my turn, I walked up and he spoke to me... which ruined everything.
James: Hey, darlin'.
And he's got this smile, right? That just... gah. He called me darlin' and he smiled at me and put his arm around me, and I was just like... "Hey." AND THEN his eyes dropped down for a few seconds, and I was like, what's he looking at? So I looked down too, and OMG he's looking right into my spectacular cleavage that I get in that evil!Cordy outfit. And I'm just like, holy crap, man! So I thrust my knife forward and squeak out, "Will you hold my knife?" And he takes the knife and goes, "Yes, I will hold your knife!" in this voice that kind of sounds like he's making fun of me a little bit.
So then they take the picture, and the photographer goes "NEXT!" and James looks down at the knife before handing it back and saying pleasantly, "It's a very nice knife." And THAT's when I say,
"Thanks, I spraypainted it."
*headdesk* Seriously, Jen? Seriously? Thanks, I spraypainted it? God. I am the biggest dork on the planet.
And so James just smiles at me again and goes, "Rock on." Which is always a safe way to answer someone who is a complete social retard.
I think I walked out of the room shaking my head at the absolute awkwardness of me. And my mom was standing there going, "So? How'd it go?" And I was just like, "He seems nice." I'm just glad there's pretty much no way he'll remember me if I ever see him again. And maybe at that point I can pretend to be normal for a few seconds. (Although he did remember me the next day when I got his autograph.)
Considering what's liable to come out of my mouth at any given moment when I'm nervous, I've put together a list of things I'm just glad I didn't say when I met James Marsters. Any one of these things could have happened.
It could have been worse. At least I didn't say...
1. I used to think you were hot when you were younger.
2. Dude, you just looked at my boobs! I saw you!
3. I've written smut about you. Like, really hot gay smut.
4. Can I touch your bottom lip?
5. Would you ever do it with David Boreanaz? Hypothetically.
6. What if I paid you?
7. You smell like fabric softener. And sweat.
8. I'd totally go down on you right now. No, really. Really.
At least the picture came out pretty. And it's kind of fun that he's threatening me with a fake knife. :)
You can't really tell in this photo, but we're actually having sex.
So then, after James Marsters touched my bare skin and ogled my boobs, it was time to get in line for the Buffyverse panel. On the way, I stopped and took this picture:
The sisters of Plenitude from Doctor Who, interrupted while drinking Starbucks frozen coffees.
We went to the Hyatt to wait, but the line stretched outside and down the stairs and around the building, and I wasn't keen on going up and down more stairs in those boots, so we figured we'd just wait by the door and when the end of the line reached the door then we'd fall in behind it. But while we were standing there, these people who were at the front of the line got really paranoid that we were going to try to break in front of them, so when I struck up a conversation with them about the JM concert that night, they politely informed me several times within the space of about five minutes that I really needed to go get in the back of the line. Like, I really needed to. I just wanted to be like, "Look, I'm not trying to cheat you out of your seat!" So we walked VERY FAR away from the line and sat on the floor so it wouldn't look like we were trying to break, and one of the women kept a wary eye on me to make sure. *sigh*
The problem was that while we waited, more and more people kept getting into the line. And I started to get worried that the panel would become full before we got into the room, so we did eventually head toward the back of the line to wait, since there was still about half an hour before the panel was supposed to begin. So we followed the line outside and down the stairs, and we were going around the side of the building when all of a sudden I heard someone call out, "GIRLPIRE!"
So I turned around, and there were some women standing in the line waving at me. And I had no idea who they were. Which was... yeah, odd. But then! It turned out they were from [CDS]!
I love CDS. It's a James Marsters fanboard full of the coolest women you'll ever meet in your life, plus a few guys I think. Seriously, they're awesome. I stumbled across the board a long time ago when I was hunting for some good fic to read, and I've been a lurk there ever since - although I have posted "Friday" in their Spangel thread. They also have a livejournal community called colddeadseed. Anyway, before I went to Dragon*Con, I posted at CDS that I was going to be there wearing an evil!Cordelia costume on Saturday, and they recognized me!
The women I met standing in that line were Rebecca (sockmonkeyhere), Deb (sistercuervo), Karen (anindoorkitty), Kerry (Scout), Savannah (fenderlove), and fender's friend Sarah (who isn't on a board). I... think that's everyone that was in the line... (if I left you out, let me know!) So I hung with them and chatted for a while, and Christina (i_luv_trees) met us in the line just as my mom was leaving to hook up with my sister, and we all walked in and sat together. I sat between Rebecca and Christina.
More Fun with Approximate Quotes
at Saturday's Buffyverse Q&A
If I had known that a [recording of this entire Q&A] was going to be posted on the internet almost immediately following the convention, I probably wouldn't have taken such detailed notes about what was said. But since I did anyway, I'll hit you with a couple of the things I wrote down.
This panel was James Marsters, Juliet Landau, Elizabeth Rohm, and Ken Feinburg. James seemed to be hitting on both Elizabeth and Juliet during the whole thing, but it could just be that he's naturally very flirtatious. He said "right on" after just about every question anyone asked, even if it wasn't for him.
1. A fan asked if any of them would consider plastic surgery. James: I'd do it in a second! Yeah.
2. What "special skills" are listed on your resume?
James: I used to have so many lies about my special skills. Horseback riding... I've never ridden a horse. You know, racecar driving... I guess guitars. I can play guitar; that's about it.
Elizabeth: I don't have any. Next question? (James laughs.) Actually I can ride horses, unlike James...
James: They're so big and scary.
3. Something about working with Doug Petrie. James: Doug? Yeah, Doug's a jerk, man. No actually he's one of the nicest guys you'll ever meet in real life. And he doesn't even realize how incredible he is... (Someone mentions he's on CSI now.) Really? I gotta call Doug. He's my friend again!
4. What's your most embarrassing moment in acting? James: The whole thing's embarrassing. I'm 45 years old and I wear makeup to work. How do you explain that to people? (He tells a story about doing off-camera work while Allyson Hannigan and Nicky Brendan are recording on-camera lines. He's acting out a fight scene off-camera and goes flying through a set wall. He said they never let him live it down. *Interesting note: this is the same story Nicky told last year about James. He said it was his favorite blooper. I recorded him talking about it, and it's in my [ con report from last year].) Elizabeth tells a story about being on Angel and having to film a whole scene by herself while she's reacting to nothing, and Juliet talks about Julie Benz making fun of the motions she did while saying certain lines ("Yeah, spank us 'til Tuesday" and "I'm ringing all over!") - stringing the motions into one long dance and teaching it to the crew.
5. Someone asks about working on independent films. James says that while he was working on [Winding Roads], it was winter and all the actors shared one Winnebago as their trailer, and it didn't have heat. He says one day it started to smell bad, and it just got worse and worse every day until they finally discovered a dead rat in there.
6. Someone asks how it makes James feel that when people have Spike fantasies or read fanfic about Spike, they're picturing him. Does it make him feel used? James: I like to be used! I'm cheap. (He talks about staying away from the internet because it makes his ego swell and he thinks he would probably become addicted to it if he let himself go online and see what people were saying about him. He says he would "lose his soul." Heh.)
7. Someone asks James to do some Shakespeare. He does a bit of Caliban from The Tempest, and is so good at it that it gives everyone in the room chills. Seriously. This is the one he does:
Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises,
Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.
Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments
Will hum about mine ears, and sometime voices
That, if I then had waked after long sleep,
Will make me sleep again: and then, in dreaming,
The clouds methought would open and show riches
Ready to drop upon me that, when I waked,
I cried to dream again.
James: That was a bit silly, wasn't it?
8. James took modern dance in high school to meet chicks. (I would kill to see him perform a modern dance.)
9. What was your favorite experience working on Buffy or Angel? James: Bar none, my favorite experience working on Buffy and Angel was working with Juliet Landau. (To her) I really felt like I was Spike when I was with you, and all the other times I was kinda faking it. (pause) Now you say something nice about me.
10. James had a $4,000 guitar stolen from the set of [Saving Grace].
11. A gay guy asks about Torchwood, and James becoming more of a gay icon than he already is. James: I'm a gay icon? Rock on! ...Really?
12. James says that he has to kiss John Barrowman in Torchwood, and that he was nervous because when he got there John was playing around with the other actors, like grabbing them and stuff, and he sort of thought he was being a jerk (James: I was like, I gotta let him know that if he tries that with me I'm gonna punch him) but when it came time for them to do their scene he was completely different and it was a nice kiss, except for the whiskers. And then he starts talking about his character being "omnisexual, which means he'll do it with anything." ... "My character would do it with a poodle, if you let him. Because he does it with aliens anyway and a poodle is just, you know, another alien." He says that his character talks like Spike, in a lower class English accent, but the character is different from Spike because Spike was a romantic and this guy isn't.
13. Someone asks for advice for actors. (Has anyone else gotten tired of this question in Q&A's?) James says to be yourself, be private in public, and allow other people to stare at you. He says in the animal kingdom, the only time animals stare at each other is when they're about to eat each other, so it's natural to feel nervous if a bunch of people are staring at you, but actors have to allow themselves to be stared at even when their whole mind is screaming, "Run away, they're gonna eat me!" He says he got into acting because "A life of crime wasn't really going to work out. Seriously."
14. When James was in Shadow Puppets, did he ever find himself slipping into Spike? James: No, no. Um......................no.
15. Someone asks the panelists to ask each other a question.
James: What is your favorite moment... of mine?
Ken: My favorite moment of yours... was the first moment you looked at me, with those eyes...
16. Someone asks James, "How cheap, exactly, are you?" James: Baby, I'm free.
17. A woman gets up and asks a very pointed question about how the actors get into character and whether or not they've ever lost themselves in a character. I can't imagine anyone asking James something so specifically worded without having already heard the story before, so it was kind of annoying. He of course gave his usual answer about the Method and how being Spike for so long ate him alive and turned him into a wreck and all that. Juliet had a fun answer, though. She said she likes taking her characters out to a public place and trying to be them without having any lines memorized. She said she took Drusilla out a few times, but she's never been back to those places because the people there think she's insane.
18. James: I used to get offended when people called Drusilla crazy. I never really thought of you as crazy, at all. And when people said it, I was... "Shut up!"
Juliet: He defended me.
James: Heck yeah. You were special!
Ken: 'Special,' not 'special needs.'
The panel ended with a shameless plug for James' concert that night. I still sort of don't know how I feel about the fact that he agreed to do this convention, then pulled fans away from it in order to do his own thing for more money. I mean, I'm glad he did - and I certainly went to the concert and had a great time - but it seems kind of... I don't know, wrong somehow. Maybe it's just me.
Why CDS is My Favorite
After the panel was over, Christina had a Stargate thing she wanted to do, and I hung out with the CDS ladies for a few minutes. Rebecca had voodoo!Gunn with her and Deb had a Captain John (James from Torchwood) doll that she made from a Spike doll, and I took a picture.
OT4? OT5 if you include the guy in the back.
It was about 5:30 by this point and the concert doors opened at 7, so everyone was going to go get something to eat and then leave for the concert. I wanted to go with them, but I *so* didn't want to wear my boots on the MARTA and then walk two blocks to the concert because my feet were absolutely killing me (I don't normally wear high heels, and I had never worn the boots for longer than about five minutes before I wore them at the con - won't make that mistake again), so I said something about going back to my room to change my shoes, and Rebecca volunteered to come with me. ♥
So we decided to meet in a little while at Peachtree Center, and then Rebecca and I went back to the Hilton together. The elevator line was insane. When we got to my room, I decided to go ahead and put on jeans and a t-shirt for the concert, as well as changing my shoes, and then we tried to go back downstairs, but the wait for the elevator was insane again. We took some stairs down but couldn't get further than the third floor before being forced to wait for the elevator again because the layout of the Hilton is insane. By the time we actually made it to Peachtree Center, most of the girls had already gotten on the MARTA to go to the concert, but Deb had waited for us. ♥ And then Deb tried to give us a turkey sandwich. ♥
I got a pineapple and banana smoothie from Gorin's for supper, and we ate and then followed Deb to the Marriott to get Christina, who was a bit lost. Listen, Deb knows what she's doing. I am so impressed with her. ♥ (While at the Marriott, we met a nice older dude dressed as Indiana Jones, who shared some of his personal history with us.) Then we went BACK to the Peachtree Center Mall, which is connected to a MARTA station.
I just want to say that I love the Peachtree Center Mall slogan.
Because it could mean "You can find everything in this one place," or it could mean "Don't worry, everything is okay here." (I think about things like that.)
This is the log ride, right?
So there's this really freakin' long escalator from the mall down to the MARTA station. I filmed us going down, but it's not as impressive as going up. Going up looks like ascending to a higher plane, because you can't see where it ends or if there's a floor at at the top.
There was a Braves game on Saturday that had just gotten over when we were about to go to the concert, so the station and the first train that stopped were packed. (Half the passengers were wearing Atlanta gear, and the other half were wearing elf and fairy costumes.) We declined to ride the first train because there simply wasn't any room for us, but we squished onto the next train when it showed up.
Something fun about the MARTA is that it kind of sways back and forth while you're riding it, so it feels like you're surfing - especially when you're stuck in the middle standing up without anything to hold onto, like I was. Every time the train stopped and then started again, I burst out laughing because I kept almost falling down. It's like, no matter how braced you feel like you are, you still aren't ready unless you're holding onto something. So I ended up holding onto Rebecca with one hand and Christina with the other, since they both had hold of a pole. And I kept bumping into this drunk frat boy and his girlfriend, who were making out almost the whole time. But they were very good-natured about it.
The MARTA tickets look like this:
I think the slogan is something like, "Just tap it and go." Which is possibly the best slogan for anything ever.
This one woman was really rude to Deb on the train, trying to push past her and all, and Deb goes, "Honey, I'm trying to get OFF!" which cracked me up because in the south, if you want to be rude back to someone, you definitely call them honey or sweetie in a condescending tone, and Deb has it down. ♥ That's actually why I hate it when people call me stuff like that online, because I can't hear their tone and I automatically read it as an insult. Just... FYI.
Once we stopped at the Arts Center station, we still had to walk a couple blocks to get to [Center Stage], which was the concert venue.
Check out the marquee on the right.
There were some dudes checking ID's out front and giving bracelets to people old enough to drink. I accidentally pulled out my fake David Boreanaz driver's license first, which was... funny. And then the guy who braceleted me asked, "Why would I want to save the cheerleader?" and I was like, "Eh?" and he gestured down at my shirt, which said "Save the cheerleader" on it and made me feel stupid.
Right inside the venue, there were a couple of bars, so we got drinks. I asked the guy and girl behind one of the bars what I should drink, and they disagreed for a minute before the girl just started making something for me. She said she spent an entire night inventing this drink and it's the best thing she's ever had. It had raspberry vodka in it, and it actually tasted pretty good, but I always forget that vodka makes my chest hurt pretty bad (I think I'm allergic...?) so later when I went back to the bar I just got a coke. Which was twice as big and cost $5 less. I think I hurt the girl's feelings.
Christina, Deb, Rebecca, and I sat together.
♥
I'm glad that there wasn't an opening act, because that gave people time to mingle before the concert started. There were CDSers spread throughout the audience, and groups of fans from other boards sitting together. It was neat. I met hawera, who is from England and has the best voice ever. She sounds so proper! :D And she told us that Juliet Landau's English accent is bad, which I hadn't realized. I think she said it was as bad as David Boreanaz's Irish accent! I feel kinda dumb for not even knowing that - because it's easy to tell DB has a bad Irish accent, but for some reason I had never questioned Juliet's English one. But now I feel enlightened. :)
Also, Deb managed to give away her turkey sandwich. ♥
Wanna Read about the Concert?
Click [here] for part two of my Dragon*Con report, including the concert set list, highlights of the Sunday Q&A, and the adventures of four young women stranded in downtown Atlanta at night!
Oh, and there are lots of pretty pictures, videos, and links, so before I get started, my apologies to dialers-up. Now, everyone ready?
Lock and load.
So I can’t decide if this is the best convention I’ve ever been to or not. I’m thinking it is, although [ last year’s Dragon*Con] was pretty friggin awesome too. I just wanted to point out how great it was first, because I think a lot of what I’m going to write about may sound like I’m complaining... which I am... but the good completely outweighed the bad, and I’d do it all again in a heartbeat, so there! That said... onward with the complaints. :)
I took half the day off work for this?
Dragon*Con started on Friday, and Atlanta is about two hours away from where I live, so I worked until noon on Friday and took the rest of the day off. I figured we’d leave the house at about 12:30 or 1, and once we arrived then we’d have to check into the hotel and register and everything, so the very earliest I planned to do any convention-type things was about 5:30. This, as it turned out, was not meant to be.
I [ posted already] about wanting to be [ evil!Cordelia] during Dragon*Con, remember? So my mom and I made the costume together (read: She made the actual costume and I just made remarks), but we cut the timing really close and she was still sewing on Thursday night... which turned into Friday morning while I was at work... which turned into Friday afternoon. In my mom’s defense, it was a really complicated costume, and we made it from scratch, and she had to design the patterns and everything, and the material was really slippery, and in between packing I was running around bitching about all the things we were going to miss... At one point I suggested that we just leave it and go on and that I could be evil!Cordy next year, and she got all mad that we had spent so much time on it and I was willing to go without it, so I waited and we were a few hours late leaving the house. Well, I say a few, but I mean several. Well, I say several...
We pulled out of the driveway at 6:10PM, speeding. Then we did a lap around the block and pulled back into the driveway so I could run inside and get my phone charger.
We pulled out of the driveway at 6:16PM, speeding.
My mom: You want to stop at an ATM for more cash?
Me: No. Yes. Shit.
And then of course we had to stop at the drugstore to pick up my mom’s blood pressure medicine (never go to a con without it). She ran into CVS to get it while I waited in the car and listened to Bon Jovi on the radio and avoided looking up when I noticed this creepy woman who has a crush on me in the parking lot.
We pulled out of the parking lot at 6:28PM, speeding.
The actual drive to Atlanta was uneventful. (I played Freecell on my laptop and listened to the Fratellis.) We had decided already that it would be a waste of time trying to find a parking spot at the hotel (plus it cost $17 per day to park there) so instead of driving straight there, we drove to a MARTA station that had long-term parking available. MARTA stands for [Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority]. It’s Atlanta’s subway, and [ here’s] an excellent way to remember the name of it.
When we got to the MARTA station (Kensington), there were signs up about long-term parking, but we couldn’t actually find the place to go, so we stopped and my mom asked a woman who worked there. She was extremely rude (welcome to Atlanta), but we finally were able to find the long-term parking lot, which was around the back. The entrance had a little booth with gates on either side of it, and when you pull up you're supposed to take a ticket from this machine and one of the gates will lift up for you to drive through, but the machine wouldn't work for us. There was a woman in the booth who steadfastly ignored us for about five minutes while she cleaned her windows, even though she obviously saw us because we had stopped the car about a foot and a half away from her, so finally my mom got out of the car again to knock on the booth window and ask what the deal was. The woman didn't speak english, but through a series of simple hand gestures and facial expressions, my mom was able to communicate what was wrong, and the woman finally realized that while she was cleaning she had accidentally unplugged the machine, so she plugged it back in and we (finally) were able to park.
Of course, the whole time I was just getting more and more frustrated because I was missing conventiony things. Thank goodness for the internet! After I got back home, I was able to catch up on some of the things I missed on Friday - like the first James Marsters, Elizabeth Rohm, Juliet Landau, and Ken Feinburg [ Q&A] and the cocktail party Friday night... which I hadn't been planning to go to anyway (I think you had to buy an extra ticket?) but I sort of wish I had been there to hear James Marsters [threaten to starve his neice], [talk about dating a porn star], and [discuss fucking a box of Cheerios, among other things]. I also heard that the Star Trek/Battlestar Galactica panel was really uncomfortable and awkward, so of course I'm sad I missed that.
Anyway, we finally got on the MARTA to go to Peachtree Center. What's funny about this is that my mom and I never ride the subway (our town doesn't have one) and so it hadn't occurred to us earlier, but when you get on at the end of the line, you have to sit there and wait while you stop. at. every. station. Which is like riding an elevator after some kid has pushed every button. (Or like riding an elevator at Dragon*Con.)
Mama on MARTA. She was a bit distressed that we couldn't understand a word the announcer was saying, since he didn't so much announce as mumble vaguely towards the microphone. But we sat beside a map, so we were able to figure out where to get off anyway.
In the picture it looks like we're on a train by ourselves, but more people got on and off. I've decided my favorite thing about taking the subway on a pretty quiet night is that no one looks at each other. I love that.
Anyway, we stopped six times and transferred once, then had to walk a couple blocks dragging our suitcases behind us toward the Hilton. (We could tell we were getting closer to the convention when people's ears and teeth started looking a bit more pointed.) It was already late by this time, and the Hilton wasn't very crowded, although the Hyatt and the Marriott were shoulder-to-shoulder. A girl with a very shiny nametag checked us in.
Her: Are you... taking a picture of ME?
So it turns out, since we were like, the VERY last people to check into the hotel, we didn't actually get the room we had reserved. We were supposed to have two queen sized beds, but they had already given all of those rooms away, so they replaced it with one king sized and a roll-away. Thanks, Hilton! It's a good thing we didn't have six people trying to stay in the same room! Oh, wait a second... we did.
602 = all party, all the time.
Here is our six person bed.
I'd be more upset, I think, if we had actually made reservations for six people. The Hilton thought we only had two people. But it still doesn't make sense to me that they would promise to reserve more queen sized beds than they actually have, you know? It's called counting, people. It's called logic. It's called I wasn't actually planning on sleeping between my mom and my sister for three nights.
It was 9:48 when we finally put our stuff down in the room (more than 5 hours later than I had anticipated arriving), and we still had to register before we could do anything, so I also managed to miss [ the first showing of the Buffy Horror Picture Show] which was at 10. Grr. Argh.
I had been planning to meet up with Christina (i_luv_trees) before the BHPS so we could go together, so I called her to tell her I would still need to register first but that she could go on to the BHPS and I would meet her later, but she said she'd rather go ahead and meet me and hang out, which I thought was nice of her. I had actually run out of the hotel room talking to her on my cell (I left my mom at the room to wait for my sister Sara and her husband Scott to get there) so I was still talking to Christina as I made my way across the street to the Marriott and she made her way to the Hilton. So the first time I saw her, we were on opposite sides of the street on our cell phones, having passed each other. Heh.
Christina and I went to the Hyatt for me to register, and the line wasn't very long, but it was concentrated around the letters M through P, so I still had to wait a little while. They had a TV set up in the line so you could watch the [Dragon*Con TV bumpers], which are hilarious if you know what they're talking about and sort of... strange if you don't. Two of the volunteers flirted with me as I walked up to pick up my pass, which was cute. I think it's funny that all the guys at cons like this automatically assume I know something about Star Trek and Marvel Superheroes, so they make remarks which I'm sure are supposed to be... witty or something, but I have no clue what they're talking about so I just smile and nod. Which encourages them. But the registration volunteer guy at the head of my line was really nice, and he noticed that there was another badge for someone at the same address as me (my mom's) and he went ahead and gave me her badge and booklet too, so she wouldn't have to wait in line. When we turned to leave, I saw my mom and Sara and Scott already waiting in the line (which was suddenly a lot longer than it had been when I got there) so I went ahead and gave her the badge and stuff, but she ended up waiting in line with Sara and Scott anyway.
So THEN I was finally ready to do some conventioning! At uh, 10:45PM. *headdesk*
Wait, you mean there's a convention going on here?
The second showing of the Buffy Horror Picture Show started at 11:30, so Christina and I went to get in line. The line was looooong. It actually went outside and curled around the building, so we followed it to the end and got in the back, and lots more people came and got behind us too. A couple of girls standing directly behind us were showing off their cell ringtones, and one of them had [The Ding Dong Song] by Gunther, which I'm just dying for someone to do an Angel video to, and they were surprised I had heard of it. Standing in front of us was this guy I talked to for a couple minutes about other conventions we'd gone to, and then his brother showed up with some Arby's food, which I drooled over for the rest of the time we were in the line, since I had not eaten since I'd gotten off work about 11 hours earlier.
They started letting people in to the BHPS at about 11:15. Every single seat was filled. They even had us do that thing where you hold up your fingers to show how many empty seats are next to you so they could squeeze in more people. And then, before the show started, they had a filker named [Luke Ski] come out and sing two songs he'd written, one about Angel and one about Firefly. The Angel one was a parody of ["Man of Constant Sorrow"], and the Firefly one was, I believe, a parody of ["A Boy Named Sue"]. I filmed a little bit of the Angel one. It's not the best singing I've ever heard, but the lyrics are kind of fun.
Click to viewAfter that, the dude plugged his CD. I wonder if he sold very many.
The BHPS, for anyone who doesn't know, is done in a style similar to screenings of the [Rocky Horror Picture Show], which is to say that they show the dvd on a screen and have live actors standing on a stage in front of it, acting out the different parts. Also, there are specific places where you're supposed to yell things back at the characters, and the BHPS has something I've never seen at the RHPS - a person standing at the front holding up cue cards to the audience. (Genius idea.) I had wanted to go to the first showing since I've heard it's always better - the first cast tries harder to dress as the characters and actually do the right dance moves, whereas the second cast is just up there to be silly - but the second showing was fun anyway, despite a few way-OOC things, like Buffy having blue hair. Which might actually have made it more fun.
I filmed a couple of things from the BHPS, although it was superdark in there and you can't really see anything. The main thing is to hear everyone singing. I laughed pretty hard at a couple hundred people all singing Xander's "It could be witches..." line. And everyone doing Tara's jazz hands was pretty funny, too.
There's a better video of the performance for this song [here], where you can actually see what the actors were doing.
Some of my favorite things from the BHPS:
1. When Giles starts singing, the cue card girl holds up a sign that says "Freebird!"
2. During Buffy's slow motion scene, the bluehaired Buffy runs around the stage verrrrry slowly.
3. During "Walk Through the Fire," an extra runs across the stage holding up a toy firetruck.
4. They got someone to act out the part of Buffy's punching bag. Heh.
5. Absolutely any time Dawn comes onscreen, the audience immediately starts yelling, "SHUT UP DAWN! NOBODY ASKED YOU! KLEPTO!" Literally, her face appears and people are already shouting, "HOMEWRECKER! JUST DIE ALREADY!"
6. Whenever Willow sings, the cue card says, "Willow can't sing."
On Monday, the [Daily Dragon Newsletter] printed a [review] of the first showing of the Buffy Horror Picture Show. (This is my second year of Dragon*Con, and I still haven't managed to see a copy of this newsletter while AT the convention. Not quite sure I believe in it...)
Immediately following the BHPS, there was a Buffy panel that Christina wanted to go to. I wasn't sure where it was because we heard a couple of people saying it was in different places, so I started to ask the Ding Dong Song girls if they were going so we could follow them, but all I got out was, "Are y'all going to--" before they interrupted excitedly, "Voltaire??" Which... no. I accidentally went to Voltaire last year, and let me tell you, I'll not make that mistake twice. So we decided to go to the Buffy Track Room back at the Hilton to see if the panel was in there, and it was.
I saw this girl on the way and had to take a picture:
My hat has a cow.
So remember that one panel I hated last year?
This was called "The Shape of Your Ship," and they hype it by rating it NC17 and saying "Adults Only" and starting it at 1:00AM. But it's totally lame! And this year made me remember why I hated it last year: one of the panelists is awful. It's not just that the panel was unorganized, which it was, or that there wasn't enough to talk about, which there wasn't, but this one girl... omg. I can't even begin... So I won't. I just really, really had a hard time with her.
Something fun, though, was hearing stuff by people I know get recced. In particular, I remember kazzy_cee's graphics were mentioned, as well as a couple of stories by beer_good_foamy. Although a certain person couldn't refrain from reccing her own fic, which was annoying. And there were a lot of Spuffy recs flying around, which I didn't pay much attention to, although I remember herself_nyc's name being mentioned in with the Spuffies because she's on my flist. :)
They had a plot bunny contest, where you were supposed to come up with a crack!fic plot bunny and everyone voted at the end on which was the best. (The winner won a notebook of fansmut.) The winning plot bunny was Gwen/Drusilla doing it in the rain, which ... actually sounds kind of hot to me. Is that crack!fic? Maybe I just don't know what crack!fic is. I think I voted for the "boypile" bunny that had like 18 guys and was a crossover with Harry Potter and Pirates of the Carribbean and Lord of the Rings and featured a Gary Stu. In the words of one panelist, "I'm a fan of penis, so I think more penis is good."
The Buffy Track Room. Please do not feed the panelists.
When the panel was over, two girls who are involved with the [Buffy Between the Lines] audio drama came over and spoke with me briefly because I had mentioned during the panel that I'm in it. Their names are Kim and Tabz, and they were very nice. (You may know Tabz [sl_podcast] from the [Strangely Literal] podcast and Kim [athenamuse] from the [Upside Down and Halfway to Happyland] podcast.) They gave me a CD with some podcasty Jossverse goodness on it.
I broke the CD case pretty much immediately. I'm still not sure how those things work.
Christina and I stayed late to talk to some of the girls and to be offended by a Spike-alike who showed up at the very end. He wanted us to leave the room so they could lock it for the night, so in the middle of our conversation, he starts jumping around going, "OH MY GOD, there's a FIRE in here; everyone needs to GET OUT!" Which was... clever? And I asked if I could take a picture of him and he goes, "Yeah, outside," like he was talking to a little kid. Jerk.
The bad rude man and skittythegreat, who was dressed as Fray. (Skitty was the blue-haired Buffy, I think.)
Don't you just love a good awkward moment?
Me: I've actually been to your livejournal before.
Skitty: Oh, yeah?
Me: Yeah, I left you a comment but you... never... replied to it... *headdesk*
Skitty: Oh. Er, uh I'm sorry, I've had... a lot going on...
And that's how good I am at meeting people. *sigh*
Moving on!
Sleeping Derangements Arrangements
I said goodnight to Christina and made it back up to my room by about 3 or so. I think. There was laughing coming from inside the room when I got there, and my mom opened the door and peeked out before letting me in. Both of my sisters and both of their husbands were already there.
Jamey and Scott break in the roll-away bed. (Amy and Sara are SO their beards.)
Sara pretends to sleep so I won't make her move. But I did anyway.
We all stayed up talking for about another hour, I think. I had heard that the Whedontrack schedule was wrong in our booklets, so I tried to go online to check the current schedule on the [Whedonverse Track Webpage], and it turns out that wireless internet in the Hilton is actually $13 a day! So... I bought it. Which is lame because I only actually used about 20 minutes of it. But at least I got the correct times for the panels I didn't go to later.
I can't remember what my sisters told me they did on Friday night... I do have a couple pictures, though:
Sara meets the Doctor... sort of. There was actually a really good Ten walking around, but I never managed to get his picture. I like how the arrow is pointing at my sister's head.
Dumb, Dumber, and... Dumbest? According to Sara's con report: "Drunk Lloyd and Harry wouldn't let me go! It was flattering until Lloyd breathed into my face, 'I HAVE WORMS!'"
Oh, and I think they went to the Drum Circle, where Sara decided to become a belly dancer.
We got to sleep around 4 something. I still hadn't eaten.
Ms. Chase goes to Dragon*Con
We missed the Dragon*Con Parade last year, so we wanted to make sure we got there this year. It started at 10:00AM, so we got up at around 8, and Amy and Jamey went down to the Hyatt to register. They figured they'd do that early, then come back to the room and shower and get ready for the day. Turns out, they waited in line for about three hours and didn't manage to get back to the room before their first event started at 11:30.
Meanwhile, we had all fallen back to sleep. So, yeah, missed the parade again this year. Damn. We tried looking at the Dragon*Con channel on the TV while it was supposed to be going on, but it wasn't being played. It's a shame, too, because I heard that Angel and Spike walked in the parade under blankets so they wouldn't catch fire, and I would have liked to have a picture of that. Oh, well.
We finally made it out the door at around 11. I was wearing my completed evil!Cordelia outfit for the first time.
Yaaaaaaaaay clearstraps!
The Battlestar Galactica panel started at 11:30, so we ran to the Hyatt. I was wearing these knee-high spike-heeled boots and nearly died going up and down the stairs. (Cordy's boots were ankle-high, but I couldn't find any my size.) We ended up meeting Amy and Jamey at the panel, and Jamey was wearing an improvised Star Trek costume complete with masking tape ears and a safety-pinned-on insignia. His badge name was "Tape Ears" and Amy's was "I'm with Tape Ears." My badge said "Girlpire" on it, and Sara and Scott were sad that I hadn't given them special names when I pre-registered them online. I probably would have just called them "Thing 1" and "Thing 2."
ANYway, it's time for:
Fun with Approximate Quotes
at the BSG Panel
This panel consisted of Aaron Douglas, Richard Hatch, and Jamie Bamber (in that order).
1. Aaron "Chief Tyrol" Douglas: Who drank too much last night? Yeah? When I woke up this morning, my liver crawled out my ass and gave me the finger.
2. Aaron and Jamie "Apollo" Bamber about the horrible Star Trek panel on Friday:
Jamie: If it hadn't been for the footsie, I would have been done in three minutes.
Aaron: I was done in three minutes. That's how good he is, guys.
Jamie: I wasn't done for 18 minutes. That's how quick he is.
Aaron: Well, at least Jonathan Frakes held me after.
3. Richard "Tom Zarek" Hatch: I'm the only straight actor on this show.
Aaron: He's straight now. As soon as he got the job, he didn't have to do that anymore...
4. Aaron (about Jamie): This is how he reads his script - "Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit, my line, bullshit, bullshit..."
5. Jamie (about Richard): He's always in my trailor. I go in and he's there, and I'm like, "What are you doing in here? AGAIN?"
6. Jamie: Starbuck's dead, Adama's a necrophiliac... It's a dark show! Logically, it's going to end there.
7. Someone asks if Apollo's going to be more civillian in the next season.
Jamie: I can answer that without words. *fluffs his big poofy hair in a really gay way*
Aaron: Is it raining men?
Jamie: I'm shooting a hairspray commercial. No, it is raining men. Halleluia.
8. Aaron bashes the SciFi channel like whoa, and then someone starts to ask a question. Aaron: Yes, quickly, before I lose my job right now.
9. Someone asks what jobs each character would rather have than what they do now. Either Aaron or Richard says viper pilot - I think it's Aaron. Jamie: "I'd be right behind him in the cockpit. So to speak." And Aaron scoots his chair away.
10. A fan gets up and says that Chief was her favorite character from the beginning, and Aaron runs off the stage and goes to hug her.
11. Aaron: Yeah, Chief goes a little nuts.
Jamie: Chief has little nuts? I thought he was Everyman...?
Aaron: Well, they just look little, comparatively speaking.
12. Aaron (about Jamie): Somebody turn off mic three.
Jamie: *looks down* Mine's got a one on it. You just silenced yourself!
13. Aaron wants BSG to end this way: Everyone dies but Chief, and he lands on a planet full of women who make scotch, and he has to help them repopulate.
14. By show of hands, Aaron asks who wants the Galactica crew to find Earth (a few hands), who wants them not to find Earth (a lot of hands), and who wants them to find Earth, but not necessarily this Earth (almost everyone). Aaron: I saw some people raise their hands twice. I'm sorry, I'm going to have to ask you to leave.
Aaron Douglas was also at Dragon*Con last year, but I didn't get a chance to meet him. I'm sad to say I didn't get a chance to meet him this year either, OR Jamie Bamber, who I really really wanted to meet. But I did get to meet someone I've been wanting to meet since before I even got into BSG, and that's where I headed after the BSG panel. But first, to the Consuite! Because I haven't eaten in 24 hours.
ConSweeeeeet.
This place saved my life, no lie.
Scott had not come with us to the BSG panel, and on the way up to the Consuite we lost track of Sara as well. So it was just me, my mom, Amy, and Jamey who got little peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and turkey pastrami rolls and chips and salsa and coke. And Jamey got some kind of energy drink called Freeeeeek, which I thought was appropriate.
The obligatory Mama-in-the-Consuite-wearing-her-backpack photo
We ate in the hallway outside of the Consuite because it was full. There was a dude interviewing the Ice Queen from Chronicles of Narnia down on the floor below us, so I took a picture looking over the rail, and it didn't turn out... but this little video did.
After we ate, we started making our way back towards the Hilton, because the next thing I wanted to do was the Buffyverse Panel at 4:00, so we had a couple hours to kill and I thought the dealer rooms would be a good place to do that. Only, when we got to the Marriott, I saw the signs up about James Marsters doing his photo op at 2:30, and I decided that would be time better spent, since it was already almost 2 anyway, and I really didn't feel up to tripping back to the Hilton in those boots just to shop when I would be coming back through in a short while anyway. So Amy and Jamey went back to the room without us so they could take showers, and Mama and I went and stood in line for me to have my photo made with James for twice as much as the other celebrities were charging.
I carried a watermelon?
In which Jen meets James Marsters for the first time.
So the deal with the photo ops is that you go and buy a little ticket that has your actor's name on it, then you stand in line for an hour, have the picture made, and leave without it. You're supposed to go back a couple hours later and pick it up, and meanwhile anyone who happens by the photo tables can admire your dorkiness preserved in color forever. I stood in line behind a girl dressed as Tonks from HP and another girl wearing some sort of crown (I didn't ask who she was). There was also a woman standing a few people in front of us named... Patsy? Or Patty? Who had a notebook full of pictures she's taken with James at different conventions and concerts. The girl with the crown actually broke ahead of me in the line to ask Patsy(?) if she was, in fact, THE Patsy who posts con reports in certain James Marsters Yahoo groups. She was. (I would link to one of them, but I didn't catch the name of any of the groups.) We flipped through her James pictures and made appropriate noises of admiration.
While we were standing in line, James walked by. He was using a cane, which surprised me because I hadn't heard that he had hurt himself while filming... Torchwood, I think? (I'm never up-to-date on the JM gossip.) It was on the set of whatever he did right before he did Without a Trace, because later someone asked him how the injury affected his acting on Without a Trace, and he said it made it hurt.
He's shorter than I expected.
Sara and Scott showed up while we were standing in line, which was weird because they didn't know we'd be there. Sara touched up my makeup for me because I normally don't wear makeup and haven't the slightest clue what to do with it. Also, I went to the bathroom while my mom kept my place in line. And I only mention this because the stall walls in the bathroom go almost all the way to the ceiling and all the way to the floor, and there's a light in each stall, but I happened to get the one stall with the blown light, so I had to pee in the dark. Which I thought was kind of funny since that is exactly the kind of luck I have.
We gave Sara and Scott some money, and they went to the Dragon*Con store to buy lanyards for us to wear our badges on instead of clipping them on, leaving me and my mom alone in the line again. I was trying to think of something to say to James when I met him, but I couldn't think of anything. I told the girls I was standing with that I was nervous, and they were like, "Oh, don't worry, he's so nice, just be yourself, etc." So I took their advice and embarrassed myself, like usual.
Let me just preface this by saying, I'm lame. Like, really lame. Lamer than most people. And I get nervous really easily, which usually either means I get quiet or I say really dumb, irrelevant things. Let me also preface this by saying that I looked for a fake butcher knife to carry around with me as part of my Cordelia outfit for a long time and never found one, so I ended up buying a plastic hunting knife instead, which had red liquid squishing around inside it to make it look bloody, and I had to spraypaint it with metallic silver paint to make it look more real.
So this is what happened.
I walked into the room where they were taking pictures, and James was sitting on this chair that was kind of high up, and the line was moving pretty fast because the fan would walk up, he'd smile and put his arm around her, they would snap the picture and call out NEXT! and then the next fan would walk up. So I was relieved, because it meant I didn't have to say anything, and that would reduce my chances of making a fool out of myself. Except, when it was my turn, I walked up and he spoke to me... which ruined everything.
James: Hey, darlin'.
And he's got this smile, right? That just... gah. He called me darlin' and he smiled at me and put his arm around me, and I was just like... "Hey." AND THEN his eyes dropped down for a few seconds, and I was like, what's he looking at? So I looked down too, and OMG he's looking right into my spectacular cleavage that I get in that evil!Cordy outfit. And I'm just like, holy crap, man! So I thrust my knife forward and squeak out, "Will you hold my knife?" And he takes the knife and goes, "Yes, I will hold your knife!" in this voice that kind of sounds like he's making fun of me a little bit.
So then they take the picture, and the photographer goes "NEXT!" and James looks down at the knife before handing it back and saying pleasantly, "It's a very nice knife." And THAT's when I say,
"Thanks, I spraypainted it."
*headdesk* Seriously, Jen? Seriously? Thanks, I spraypainted it? God. I am the biggest dork on the planet.
And so James just smiles at me again and goes, "Rock on." Which is always a safe way to answer someone who is a complete social retard.
I think I walked out of the room shaking my head at the absolute awkwardness of me. And my mom was standing there going, "So? How'd it go?" And I was just like, "He seems nice." I'm just glad there's pretty much no way he'll remember me if I ever see him again. And maybe at that point I can pretend to be normal for a few seconds. (Although he did remember me the next day when I got his autograph.)
Considering what's liable to come out of my mouth at any given moment when I'm nervous, I've put together a list of things I'm just glad I didn't say when I met James Marsters. Any one of these things could have happened.
It could have been worse. At least I didn't say...
1. I used to think you were hot when you were younger.
2. Dude, you just looked at my boobs! I saw you!
3. I've written smut about you. Like, really hot gay smut.
4. Can I touch your bottom lip?
5. Would you ever do it with David Boreanaz? Hypothetically.
6. What if I paid you?
7. You smell like fabric softener. And sweat.
8. I'd totally go down on you right now. No, really. Really.
At least the picture came out pretty. And it's kind of fun that he's threatening me with a fake knife. :)
You can't really tell in this photo, but we're actually having sex.
So then, after James Marsters touched my bare skin and ogled my boobs, it was time to get in line for the Buffyverse panel. On the way, I stopped and took this picture:
The sisters of Plenitude from Doctor Who, interrupted while drinking Starbucks frozen coffees.
We went to the Hyatt to wait, but the line stretched outside and down the stairs and around the building, and I wasn't keen on going up and down more stairs in those boots, so we figured we'd just wait by the door and when the end of the line reached the door then we'd fall in behind it. But while we were standing there, these people who were at the front of the line got really paranoid that we were going to try to break in front of them, so when I struck up a conversation with them about the JM concert that night, they politely informed me several times within the space of about five minutes that I really needed to go get in the back of the line. Like, I really needed to. I just wanted to be like, "Look, I'm not trying to cheat you out of your seat!" So we walked VERY FAR away from the line and sat on the floor so it wouldn't look like we were trying to break, and one of the women kept a wary eye on me to make sure. *sigh*
The problem was that while we waited, more and more people kept getting into the line. And I started to get worried that the panel would become full before we got into the room, so we did eventually head toward the back of the line to wait, since there was still about half an hour before the panel was supposed to begin. So we followed the line outside and down the stairs, and we were going around the side of the building when all of a sudden I heard someone call out, "GIRLPIRE!"
So I turned around, and there were some women standing in the line waving at me. And I had no idea who they were. Which was... yeah, odd. But then! It turned out they were from [CDS]!
I love CDS. It's a James Marsters fanboard full of the coolest women you'll ever meet in your life, plus a few guys I think. Seriously, they're awesome. I stumbled across the board a long time ago when I was hunting for some good fic to read, and I've been a lurk there ever since - although I have posted "Friday" in their Spangel thread. They also have a livejournal community called colddeadseed. Anyway, before I went to Dragon*Con, I posted at CDS that I was going to be there wearing an evil!Cordelia costume on Saturday, and they recognized me!
The women I met standing in that line were Rebecca (sockmonkeyhere), Deb (sistercuervo), Karen (anindoorkitty), Kerry (Scout), Savannah (fenderlove), and fender's friend Sarah (who isn't on a board). I... think that's everyone that was in the line... (if I left you out, let me know!) So I hung with them and chatted for a while, and Christina (i_luv_trees) met us in the line just as my mom was leaving to hook up with my sister, and we all walked in and sat together. I sat between Rebecca and Christina.
More Fun with Approximate Quotes
at Saturday's Buffyverse Q&A
If I had known that a [recording of this entire Q&A] was going to be posted on the internet almost immediately following the convention, I probably wouldn't have taken such detailed notes about what was said. But since I did anyway, I'll hit you with a couple of the things I wrote down.
This panel was James Marsters, Juliet Landau, Elizabeth Rohm, and Ken Feinburg. James seemed to be hitting on both Elizabeth and Juliet during the whole thing, but it could just be that he's naturally very flirtatious. He said "right on" after just about every question anyone asked, even if it wasn't for him.
1. A fan asked if any of them would consider plastic surgery. James: I'd do it in a second! Yeah.
2. What "special skills" are listed on your resume?
James: I used to have so many lies about my special skills. Horseback riding... I've never ridden a horse. You know, racecar driving... I guess guitars. I can play guitar; that's about it.
Elizabeth: I don't have any. Next question? (James laughs.) Actually I can ride horses, unlike James...
James: They're so big and scary.
3. Something about working with Doug Petrie. James: Doug? Yeah, Doug's a jerk, man. No actually he's one of the nicest guys you'll ever meet in real life. And he doesn't even realize how incredible he is... (Someone mentions he's on CSI now.) Really? I gotta call Doug. He's my friend again!
4. What's your most embarrassing moment in acting? James: The whole thing's embarrassing. I'm 45 years old and I wear makeup to work. How do you explain that to people? (He tells a story about doing off-camera work while Allyson Hannigan and Nicky Brendan are recording on-camera lines. He's acting out a fight scene off-camera and goes flying through a set wall. He said they never let him live it down. *Interesting note: this is the same story Nicky told last year about James. He said it was his favorite blooper. I recorded him talking about it, and it's in my [ con report from last year].) Elizabeth tells a story about being on Angel and having to film a whole scene by herself while she's reacting to nothing, and Juliet talks about Julie Benz making fun of the motions she did while saying certain lines ("Yeah, spank us 'til Tuesday" and "I'm ringing all over!") - stringing the motions into one long dance and teaching it to the crew.
5. Someone asks about working on independent films. James says that while he was working on [Winding Roads], it was winter and all the actors shared one Winnebago as their trailer, and it didn't have heat. He says one day it started to smell bad, and it just got worse and worse every day until they finally discovered a dead rat in there.
6. Someone asks how it makes James feel that when people have Spike fantasies or read fanfic about Spike, they're picturing him. Does it make him feel used? James: I like to be used! I'm cheap. (He talks about staying away from the internet because it makes his ego swell and he thinks he would probably become addicted to it if he let himself go online and see what people were saying about him. He says he would "lose his soul." Heh.)
7. Someone asks James to do some Shakespeare. He does a bit of Caliban from The Tempest, and is so good at it that it gives everyone in the room chills. Seriously. This is the one he does:
Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises,
Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.
Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments
Will hum about mine ears, and sometime voices
That, if I then had waked after long sleep,
Will make me sleep again: and then, in dreaming,
The clouds methought would open and show riches
Ready to drop upon me that, when I waked,
I cried to dream again.
James: That was a bit silly, wasn't it?
8. James took modern dance in high school to meet chicks. (I would kill to see him perform a modern dance.)
9. What was your favorite experience working on Buffy or Angel? James: Bar none, my favorite experience working on Buffy and Angel was working with Juliet Landau. (To her) I really felt like I was Spike when I was with you, and all the other times I was kinda faking it. (pause) Now you say something nice about me.
10. James had a $4,000 guitar stolen from the set of [Saving Grace].
11. A gay guy asks about Torchwood, and James becoming more of a gay icon than he already is. James: I'm a gay icon? Rock on! ...Really?
12. James says that he has to kiss John Barrowman in Torchwood, and that he was nervous because when he got there John was playing around with the other actors, like grabbing them and stuff, and he sort of thought he was being a jerk (James: I was like, I gotta let him know that if he tries that with me I'm gonna punch him) but when it came time for them to do their scene he was completely different and it was a nice kiss, except for the whiskers. And then he starts talking about his character being "omnisexual, which means he'll do it with anything." ... "My character would do it with a poodle, if you let him. Because he does it with aliens anyway and a poodle is just, you know, another alien." He says that his character talks like Spike, in a lower class English accent, but the character is different from Spike because Spike was a romantic and this guy isn't.
13. Someone asks for advice for actors. (Has anyone else gotten tired of this question in Q&A's?) James says to be yourself, be private in public, and allow other people to stare at you. He says in the animal kingdom, the only time animals stare at each other is when they're about to eat each other, so it's natural to feel nervous if a bunch of people are staring at you, but actors have to allow themselves to be stared at even when their whole mind is screaming, "Run away, they're gonna eat me!" He says he got into acting because "A life of crime wasn't really going to work out. Seriously."
14. When James was in Shadow Puppets, did he ever find himself slipping into Spike? James: No, no. Um......................no.
15. Someone asks the panelists to ask each other a question.
James: What is your favorite moment... of mine?
Ken: My favorite moment of yours... was the first moment you looked at me, with those eyes...
16. Someone asks James, "How cheap, exactly, are you?" James: Baby, I'm free.
17. A woman gets up and asks a very pointed question about how the actors get into character and whether or not they've ever lost themselves in a character. I can't imagine anyone asking James something so specifically worded without having already heard the story before, so it was kind of annoying. He of course gave his usual answer about the Method and how being Spike for so long ate him alive and turned him into a wreck and all that. Juliet had a fun answer, though. She said she likes taking her characters out to a public place and trying to be them without having any lines memorized. She said she took Drusilla out a few times, but she's never been back to those places because the people there think she's insane.
18. James: I used to get offended when people called Drusilla crazy. I never really thought of you as crazy, at all. And when people said it, I was... "Shut up!"
Juliet: He defended me.
James: Heck yeah. You were special!
Ken: 'Special,' not 'special needs.'
The panel ended with a shameless plug for James' concert that night. I still sort of don't know how I feel about the fact that he agreed to do this convention, then pulled fans away from it in order to do his own thing for more money. I mean, I'm glad he did - and I certainly went to the concert and had a great time - but it seems kind of... I don't know, wrong somehow. Maybe it's just me.
Why CDS is My Favorite
After the panel was over, Christina had a Stargate thing she wanted to do, and I hung out with the CDS ladies for a few minutes. Rebecca had voodoo!Gunn with her and Deb had a Captain John (James from Torchwood) doll that she made from a Spike doll, and I took a picture.
OT4? OT5 if you include the guy in the back.
It was about 5:30 by this point and the concert doors opened at 7, so everyone was going to go get something to eat and then leave for the concert. I wanted to go with them, but I *so* didn't want to wear my boots on the MARTA and then walk two blocks to the concert because my feet were absolutely killing me (I don't normally wear high heels, and I had never worn the boots for longer than about five minutes before I wore them at the con - won't make that mistake again), so I said something about going back to my room to change my shoes, and Rebecca volunteered to come with me. ♥
So we decided to meet in a little while at Peachtree Center, and then Rebecca and I went back to the Hilton together. The elevator line was insane. When we got to my room, I decided to go ahead and put on jeans and a t-shirt for the concert, as well as changing my shoes, and then we tried to go back downstairs, but the wait for the elevator was insane again. We took some stairs down but couldn't get further than the third floor before being forced to wait for the elevator again because the layout of the Hilton is insane. By the time we actually made it to Peachtree Center, most of the girls had already gotten on the MARTA to go to the concert, but Deb had waited for us. ♥ And then Deb tried to give us a turkey sandwich. ♥
I got a pineapple and banana smoothie from Gorin's for supper, and we ate and then followed Deb to the Marriott to get Christina, who was a bit lost. Listen, Deb knows what she's doing. I am so impressed with her. ♥ (While at the Marriott, we met a nice older dude dressed as Indiana Jones, who shared some of his personal history with us.) Then we went BACK to the Peachtree Center Mall, which is connected to a MARTA station.
I just want to say that I love the Peachtree Center Mall slogan.
Because it could mean "You can find everything in this one place," or it could mean "Don't worry, everything is okay here." (I think about things like that.)
This is the log ride, right?
So there's this really freakin' long escalator from the mall down to the MARTA station. I filmed us going down, but it's not as impressive as going up. Going up looks like ascending to a higher plane, because you can't see where it ends or if there's a floor at at the top.
There was a Braves game on Saturday that had just gotten over when we were about to go to the concert, so the station and the first train that stopped were packed. (Half the passengers were wearing Atlanta gear, and the other half were wearing elf and fairy costumes.) We declined to ride the first train because there simply wasn't any room for us, but we squished onto the next train when it showed up.
Something fun about the MARTA is that it kind of sways back and forth while you're riding it, so it feels like you're surfing - especially when you're stuck in the middle standing up without anything to hold onto, like I was. Every time the train stopped and then started again, I burst out laughing because I kept almost falling down. It's like, no matter how braced you feel like you are, you still aren't ready unless you're holding onto something. So I ended up holding onto Rebecca with one hand and Christina with the other, since they both had hold of a pole. And I kept bumping into this drunk frat boy and his girlfriend, who were making out almost the whole time. But they were very good-natured about it.
The MARTA tickets look like this:
I think the slogan is something like, "Just tap it and go." Which is possibly the best slogan for anything ever.
This one woman was really rude to Deb on the train, trying to push past her and all, and Deb goes, "Honey, I'm trying to get OFF!" which cracked me up because in the south, if you want to be rude back to someone, you definitely call them honey or sweetie in a condescending tone, and Deb has it down. ♥ That's actually why I hate it when people call me stuff like that online, because I can't hear their tone and I automatically read it as an insult. Just... FYI.
Once we stopped at the Arts Center station, we still had to walk a couple blocks to get to [Center Stage], which was the concert venue.
Check out the marquee on the right.
There were some dudes checking ID's out front and giving bracelets to people old enough to drink. I accidentally pulled out my fake David Boreanaz driver's license first, which was... funny. And then the guy who braceleted me asked, "Why would I want to save the cheerleader?" and I was like, "Eh?" and he gestured down at my shirt, which said "Save the cheerleader" on it and made me feel stupid.
Right inside the venue, there were a couple of bars, so we got drinks. I asked the guy and girl behind one of the bars what I should drink, and they disagreed for a minute before the girl just started making something for me. She said she spent an entire night inventing this drink and it's the best thing she's ever had. It had raspberry vodka in it, and it actually tasted pretty good, but I always forget that vodka makes my chest hurt pretty bad (I think I'm allergic...?) so later when I went back to the bar I just got a coke. Which was twice as big and cost $5 less. I think I hurt the girl's feelings.
Christina, Deb, Rebecca, and I sat together.
♥
I'm glad that there wasn't an opening act, because that gave people time to mingle before the concert started. There were CDSers spread throughout the audience, and groups of fans from other boards sitting together. It was neat. I met hawera, who is from England and has the best voice ever. She sounds so proper! :D And she told us that Juliet Landau's English accent is bad, which I hadn't realized. I think she said it was as bad as David Boreanaz's Irish accent! I feel kinda dumb for not even knowing that - because it's easy to tell DB has a bad Irish accent, but for some reason I had never questioned Juliet's English one. But now I feel enlightened. :)
Also, Deb managed to give away her turkey sandwich. ♥
Wanna Read about the Concert?
Click [here] for part two of my Dragon*Con report, including the concert set list, highlights of the Sunday Q&A, and the adventures of four young women stranded in downtown Atlanta at night!