Dragon*Con Part 2

[eyesthatslay]

Here's another Con report! Warning - it's really looooooong. :)

Saturday Dragon*Con Day 2:

angstchic, musing_mia, sandy_s, and I got up and headed down to the food court for breakfast. We all decided to eat at the Atlanta Bread Company, but unfortunately angstchic& sandy_s had to go and get breakfast somewhere else. After all that time waiting in line, they were told that I was the last person that breakfast was going to be served to. It seemed like ABC wasn't well staffed, especially for the influx of people the Con provided. Oh, and while waiting in line, I got bonked on the back of the head by a wing of a passing fairy. :P

Once we had our breakfast, we decided to go to the dealer room to do some shopping. We didn't have much time, as we wanted to make the 1:00 pm Ron Glass (Shepherd Book in Firefly/Serenity) & Mark Sheppard (Badger in Firefly) panel. In our quick tour, we saw lots of comic books, corsets, and lots, and lots of bondage apparel. ;) I also saw some costumes being worn that didn't cover a whole heck of a lot. Major butt cleavage, and boob cleavage. Whoa.


Firefly Panel

We quickly made our way to the area of the panel, and it was completely crowded and confusing. We tried to find the end of the line, and we seemingly did, but a Con staff member was telling us we needed to go outside to get in line. *frowns* It didn't make any sense, because the people filing in from outside weren't even looking for the Firefly panel, they were trying to get into the Claudia Black panel, which was already full. We did manage to bump into lisalamona who had her darling baby boy with her! He was absolutely adorable, and she was simply glowing. *hugs her* 

In the midst of the confusion the doors to the Firefly panel opened...and we sorta just slipped in with the rest of the line. ;) 

The panel was great! Mark Sheppard is so funny! He kept making little comments about not getting any of the questions. One person that was asking a question, indicated it was for RG, and MS said "Fine!". He has a great accent, and one person asked if he was the voice of the Gieco Gecko. Bwah! He responded by saying "I can save you 15% on your car insurance..." Hee! Then he said that he wasn't the Gecko voice, but that he'd been asked that lots of times. :) 

Ron Glass was so nice, he has the best speaking voice, I swear. Someone asked him if he felt that Book's demise was premature in Serenity, and he said YES! He said that Joss came to him and was like "Good news is that we get to do Serenity the Movie, bad news is you die." RG said his response was "Well, f**k you too!!". Hee!

After the panel, we made our way back down to the Walk of Fame. angstchic wanted RG's autograph, and I wanted RG's & MS's. I had even brought my Serenity Comic "Those Left Behind" to get their signatures in. They weren't there yet, so we wandered around and checked out the other celebrities. We tried to say hi to psubratagain, but the area she was working was completely swamped with fans. We did manage to spot several celebrities from Star Trek - Nichelle Nichols (Lt. Uhura), Brent Spiner (Data), Jonathan Frakes (Commander Will Ryker), & Gates McFadden (Dr. Beverly Crusher). I also bumped into Lou Ferrigno (The Incredible Hulk) as he was attempting to use his cell phone. He's huge! My hubby said I should have told him to watch himself. :P

By the time we checked back RG and MS were at their tables. I went up to MS first, and the first thing he noticed was my my tag with JM's photo on it. He said "Oh! Look, James Marsters staring right at me. You must be a fan." I said I was, and he responded "Yeah, but he doesn't have my accent." Hee. I laughed and told him he had a great accent. I told him we really enjoyed his Q&A and he wanted to know which one. I said we went to that day's and he was all disappointed. He said we should have went to the one from the day before, because RG was running late and he had the panel all to himself. He's apparently a spotlight hound. ;) I told him I'd like him to sign my comic and he said he knew exactly where to sign it. I had a bookmark where Badger was, and he got all dramatic and said, "Just watch." He got me to hold the comic flat and he signed by his picture. He said "Oh, and just in case someone doesn't know me." and put "Badger" under his signature. He was so sweet about not letting me take the comic back until he was sure the silver ink was dry. He even blotted it with a piece of paper to check it. Heh. I told him that this was my first Con and I was really excited about it. He said that he'd done a few, and that they were a lot of fun.

Then I went to Ron Glass, he is so nice. We chatted a bit and he signed my comic for me. I told him that when Book died, angstchicand I cried. He said "Well, thank you!" I didn't talk to him as much, because by then there were more people waiting, but he was super nice and friendly.

Once we got our autographs, we found  musing_mia&  sandy_s and went back up to the room. angstchic, Mia, and I decided to take a nap, and Sandy went back to down to visit with some of her other friends. 


James' Concert

Sandy came back to the room, we got up, and decided to go to dinner at the food court, and met up with ladyanne04, and fenchurche (I was so glad to finally get to meet her!) I ended up getting chinese, and after dinner fenchurcheplanned to meet up with us at James' concert. Mia was nice enough to take the rest of us in her car to The Center Stage Theater for the concert. 

fenchurchemet us at the entrance. We got settled in, and had the chance to visit with ghostgirl13a bit before the concert started. She had a great seat! She was on the floor right in front of the stage and only a row or two back. I can't wait to see her photos. We were further back, and in the stadium seating. I didn't take my camera because we didn't think they were allowed, but it ended up being ok to have them. Darn it!!

Before long James was introduced, and he came bouncing out onto stage. He was completely jazzed and in a great mood. He was concered about his guitar though, because he said that housekeeping had jammed the end of the handle into the wall. He checked to see if it was still in tune, and seemed pleased that it was.He even kissed it for being in tune. I think he said the name of his guitar is "Crystal", but I'm not sure.

The concert began, and there were pretty colored lights. He plays and sings pretty well! I think he's defintely improved since his GotR days. He seems to have more control over his voice. He did several songs that I'd not heard,  and the neatest thing was he'd sometimes give a bit of backstory to certain songs. Like he said "Civilized Man" was written because he was annoyed by a guy he had worked around and wanted to hit him, but wrote a song instead. ;)

He told us he was going to do about 3 more songs and take a little break, and if we screamed enough - he'd come back for an encore. It was really cute, because he told us to really scream, because he really wanted to come back out. Hee. He exited stage, everyone screamed like crazy and in about a minute, he came back out and did another song.

After the concert, they had a auction of some of James' stuff for charity (seems like it was for children with AIDS). The first thing up was the Tshirt he wore to the panel & photo-ops on Friday. Steve (his manager I think) was conducting the auction, and bragging about how it hadn't been washed, and James offered up "It even stinks a little." Hee. The bidding started, and it got to about $500 really quickly. Steve handed the Tshirt to James, who mopped his brow with it, and stuck it under his shirt and rubbed it on his stomach and chest. That caused the bidding to go crazy and it ended up going for almost $900!!! James even looked shocked. :) The other items were a photo of James at a concert in the UK (that he kept in his study for a few years), a autographed limited addition poster of James, the piece of paper that James wrote his song list on for the concert (it went for almost $900 too!!! - James' mouth fell open), and then his Dragon*Con badge. Everything sold for good prices, and James was pleased and amazed for what some of the items went for. He said that the money raised would help a couple of kids, and said thanks.


Back to the Marriott

We said goodbye to Fen, and I huggled angstchicon the way back to Mia's car and told her that she's like GE...she brings good things to life. :D I was having a wonderful time!! Mia took us on a tour of a shopping district, and amazed us when she said the bowling alley there charged $80 a person. I remarked that Atlanta must have some seriously desperate bowlers, which made sandy_s& ladyanne04giggle a lot. Mia then said that she'd attended a movie in the same area, and I asked her if she had to hock an internal organ to get a ticket. But apparently movie tickets were priced normally.


Wookie Wrangling

We made it back to the Marriott, and as we were walking towards the entrance I saw Chewbacca!!! ZOMG!! Big, tall, furry, Wookie at 12 O'clock!!! I really wanted a photo, and ran to catch up with him. I got around the front of him and waved, trying to get his attention. He was like 8' tall, and couldn't see me. I even hopped up and down. The Jedi walking with him looked startled and then amused. Finally I grabbed his fur and tugged on it. That did the trick, he peered down at me and I asked if I could get my pic taken with him. He said "Sure!" So I got my photo taken with Chewie! EeeeeEEEeee!! angstchicwas endlessly amused by my attempts to get the Wookie to notice me.  Since I didn't have my own camera with me, I'm waiting with baited breath to get a copy of the photo from sandy_s. 


The Shindig

We went up to the room, I grabbed my camera and we decided to make our way over to the Shindig at the Hyatt. On the way, we spotted Darth Vader and a Storm Trooper!!! I also got my picture with them! *has Star Wars nerd moment* It was great. We also saw Spiderman being angsty in front of the Starbucks. I told everyone he gets depressed over their prices too. Once we made our way to the Hyatt, we bumped into kcarolj65again. The Shindig was full, and they weren't letting people in, until people left. They were literally counting people as they left, and letting in the an equal amount in groups. 

We finally managed to get in, and wandered around. It was full, but not packed. There was a band, but they never played the entire time we were there. They just constantly tuned up. *frowns* We did see several interesting characters. One girl had on a really tight corset that made her basically look like a human muffin. I noticed something tucked in her cleaveage, but didn't get a close look. I mentioned it to Mia, and she told me it was a cigar. o_O I quipped "What, was someone looking for an ashtray and figured, hey, she'll do?"  I took some pictures of a guy dressed like Wash, and one dressed like Jayne. I also saw a couple of girls dressed as Buffy in the episode of the prom, and Drusilla. Then Angel walked in. We were astounded by the resemblance. Of course pictures were taken, and he was more than happy to pose. (surprise, surprise, hee) 

Mia came over to me and said there was a piece of art depicting the Firefly/Serenity cast on the wall, that she wanted to take a picture of, but that there were a bunch of conversing nerds in front of it, and they wouldn't move. She asked me to make them move, so I went over there - got the nerd's attention and said "Hey, I really want to take a picture of the art piece, do you mind moving?" They said "No problem!" and like magic they moved. Mia was v. impressed and pleased. We took photos and decided to regroup with the gang and leave the Shindig. Once again, the band still wasn't playing. :P


Battlestar Galactica Party; NOT!

We made our way down to the line for the BSG party, and hung out. It was hot and there was a table of brochures, post cards and advertisments, and ladyanne04was nice enough to give me one to fan myself with. I was fanning myself enthusiastically with my card, and my eyes kept catching snatches of words on it. I slowly stopped fanning and read it and realized I was fanning myself with a sex-erotica advertisement. (!!) Dammit Jim, I'm no pervert!! I quickly tossed it down, and found a more benign Goth Band adverstisment to use. :P 

While in line, angstchic suddenly nudged me and pointed to my left. There in all his glory was a blue fairy guy, flitting down the hall. He was flapping his arms and leaping, while wearing a blue spandex body suit. Spock eyebrow ensues. I was riveted. He fluttered into a room next to us, and that was when I noticed his little fuzzy green tail. Hee.

Then a D*C security/staff member came down the hall and bumped into a sign easel next to us. He wandered over and started flirting and leaning. He explained how he gets in free since he's staff, and then he gets so trashed that he can't work. While he was talking to us, another fan came up and asked him for directions. His response? Cricket noises. Really realistic cricket noises. Apparently his nickname was Cricket. He then thought Sandy's jacket was a purse, until I showed him it was just a jacket. He also liked her shirt, and thought it was designer. Sandy cracked me up, because she was like "Uh, I got it at Kohl's."  Anyway, he told us we were a lot of fun, said he just loved women, and thanked us for being so cool. Then he staggered away. ;) 

We were making decent progress to the doorway, when suddenly Richard Hatch appeared. He was like two feet from us, and waiting to leave in the hallway. He was there for a few minutes, and then ducked out to an exit. Then the guy managing the line cut his arm right in front of Mia & Sandy and declared that was the end of the line that was going to be allowed in! Grrrr! All that waiting and no dice. 

So we made our way back out and on the way saw Beaker!!! I got a quick picture of him and Sandy tried to, but he started walking away, so I yelled "Beaker!!!" He turned around and let Sandy take a picture. I'm good at being bossy apparently. Who knew? :P

We made it back to the room, and I declared I'd seen enough blue fairies, boob and butt cleavage to last me a lifetime. :) Then we went to bed, to rest up for the next day.

Now for photos from Day 2!


Firefly panel: (left to right) Ron Glass & Mark Sheppard



Firefly panel: (left to right) Ron Glass & Mark Sheppard



Storm Trooper & Darth Vader



Spiderman: I can't haz latte. Woe.



Wash at The Shindig.



Jayne at The Shindig



Airbrushed art piece at The Shindig



Buffy (with crossbow) & Drusilla at The Shindig



Angel at The Shindig. Not the hair...never the hair. :P



Beaker!

 
More later!

Comments

[betagoddess.livejournal.com]

Thanks for sharing! *g*

[eyesthatslay.livejournal.com]

You're welcome! :D

[mermaid-wench.livejournal.com]

I was there too! Though I really think I walked around in a daze most of the time just staring at all the shiny costumes and whatnot. Next year the plans are go in costume, and go to more panels. I had an amazing time though!!

[eyesthatslay.livejournal.com]

There were lots of shiny costumes, no doubt! I had an amazing time too, even though I only made 2 panels. There was just so much going on, and plus, we were so tired!!

[danaid-luv.livejournal.com]

SHEPHERD BOOK DIES??!! *hits the floor* I've had the movie since Christmas & couldn't make myself watch it because people warned me that character(s) die. *is a weenie dork* So...does anyone else die? And please tell me it isn't at the hands of the Reavers. I couldn't take it.

Meanwhile, I love your report! So very real! And what a riot that you were fanning yourself w/ smutty word pr0n! *giggles*

[eyesthatslay.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you liked the report. I hoped that someone was reading these things. :D

OMGosh! Hon! I'm so sorry I spoiled you. I was certain everyone had seen/knew about the movie by now. O_O

Yeah, uh...the character death does get worse....so don't read further if you don't want to know....





Wash...Reavers. It truly sux. :(

[danaid-luv.livejournal.com]

Pretty much you write it? I read it. :)

No no, s'ok! I mean, it's been out for ages, right? I just can't hardly bear the idea of the characters dying, let alone at the hands of the #$@@$ Reavers. When T got home from soccer, I pounced on him. "WHO ELSE DIES?!" (I hadn't read your response yet).

I cried. *weak grin*

[eyesthatslay.livejournal.com]

Pretty much you write it? I read it. :)
See? That's why I love you. :)

No no, s'ok! I mean, it's been out for ages, right? I just can't hardly bear the idea of the characters dying, let alone at the hands of the #$@@$ Reavers.
Whew! So glad you weren't upset by being spoiled. :)

I cried. *weak grin*
I cried too, beleive me. You'd do worse if you saw the the scene. Joss knows how to make it hurt. The b@stard. ;)

[psubrat.livejournal.com]

I know that Jayne guy!!! That's neoengel! I work with him on Polaris (formerly Toronto Trek). Hee!

[eyesthatslay.livejournal.com]

Bwah! How cool is that! He had the best Jayne costume at the Con IMO. :D

[sandy-s.livejournal.com]

I loved reading about our adventures! :o) Hee...you are so cute! :o)

[eyesthatslay.livejournal.com]

I love reading your reports too! It's fun to see our days from another POV!


Hee...you are so cute! :o)
I think you're cute too! :D