amezri | farpoint 2007;

Okay, here we go... long con report as taken from my travel log. I got teased a bit for writing this thing, but hey, I can't remember it all if I don't! Excuse the jumbled tense and rambling. Trying to get this up as fast as I can, so just transcribing directly.

Farpoint 2007 - Baltimore, MD

Friday, February 16, 2007

Got up at 5am to get dressed and ready to go. Last minute scramble as always. Mom drove me to the train station; got there about 6:30am. Found out my train was cancelled. >_< Argh. WTF. Got rescheduled on the 8:10am, which means I just miss my 10:40am to Northport. Mom came back to the station and we had breakfast and sat for a while before we both had to go. .. Man, I hope I didn't forget anything. Called Dion once I got on the train to let him know I'd probably be late. The speed this train is going right now... eesh. Oh... and swaying! Fun.

Gah, so I just missed the 10:40am to Northport. It was literally leaving as I walked up. So I had to putz around and catch the 12:15pm instead. Called mom to let her know I arrived and wasn't dead. Wandered. Stood next to a tall, gawky boy with messy kitty hair who was wearing a charcoal pinstripe suit. I may have fangirled a little, because, hi. Doctor Who moment. I decided against being stalkery enough to snap a photo with my shiny Razr. Got on my train with Long Island with no issue.Texted Vaidah to get some connection info.

Dion met me at station and we headed to his house (with a side trip to Target) to wait for Tanya. Chatted about DVDs (Blu-ray vs. HD-DVD), X-Men, movies, and other various stuff. Hooray, geekery! As soon as Tanya got home, we blew out the door and were on our way to Baltimore. I think it was supposed to be a 3 hour drive, but with crazy traffic, it ended up being about 6. Hell, we were stuck in Manhattan for like 2 hours. Blargh. Wasn't too terrible once we were past that though.

We arrived at the Hunt Valley Mariott at about 9pm. Zippy met up with us so we could dump our stuff off in the room. Immediately headed out for foods because.... HUNGRY! Found a Quizno's. WOW, did those workers not know how to take an order, wtf. They screwed up two out of 5 orders. One of them was a woman who apparently didn't eat pork and as she walked out of the place, declaring she was going to get pizza, she did some weird dance and said, "attituuuude!" It became a running gag for the weekend. Zippy does a good impression.

Anyway. Went to Walmart after eats and speed-shopped five minutes before the store closed. We stocked up on foods for the weekend. Went back to the hotel and rearranged the room so we could fit the queen-sized air matress Tanya & Dion had brought for me. Woohoo!

We met up with their friends Andres & Bonnie. Tanya was tired and went to bed while the rest of us wandered around to see what was still going on. They were showing some trailer in a ballroom, followed by the Done the Impossible Firefly documentary. On second viewing... some of those fans are still scary, but overall, I think it was a good documentary.

As we were walking through the halls, Dion answered a call from Dan and was telling him that we'd just left a Firefly documentary when suddenly we hear someone shout, "What? What?" We all sort of look up and it's Ron Glass! XD He was funny. Dion asked him if he wanted to talk to Dan, and Ron took the phone from him and started chatting -- asking him where he was and then telling him that he had enough stamina for one more drink, so Dan should meet him at the bar. Hahahahaha! We did eventually wander down to the bar and met up with Dan and his wife, Mindy. Somehow we ended up playing a really bizarre version of truth or dare that mostly involved us being asked questions that were rather absurd.... but whatever.

We crashed at about 2am.

Saturday, February 17, 2007

Woke up at an ungodly hour because the room was fracking freezing. Got up and just decided to get ready for the day. Wore my Stargate chick/Vala gear for the day.

Once everyone was up and ready, Dion, Tanya, and I went to check out our table at the dealer's room before going to buy our badges. Since no one was really about yet, we went back to the room to sit for a bit before finally hauling all the stuff down to set up the table.

Dan showed up a little bit later and let me try on the size small team jacket he'd brought for me. It fit so nice.... I... had to buy it. Even handed him the $200 in the red envelope, since it was my New Year money I was handing over XD I did manage to get one of the Air Force patches for free though, so go me. Still managed to blow $200 within half an hour though. D'oh!

After sitting at the table for a while, I decided to go find Richard Hatch to get something signed and give him Tom's CD. He was sitting at a table next to Suzie Plakson who I sadly no longer care about because I am so over TNG :x Met up with Zach while down there. Waited in the rather short line of two and picked up the photo of him and Jamie Bamber, which I plan on getting Jamie to sign at ICON as well as the DVD cover. The first thing Richard Hatch made me do was take off my glasses so he could compare them to his because they were so similar, but I was all, "Yeah... that's great but I can't see a damn thing. No, really, I am totally blind without my glasses." I gave him to sign and while he was doing so, he was asking me all these questions like what I did, where I worked, if that's what I wanted to do... when I told him about my digital art, he asked if I had any with me, which I sort of did on Harvey (my Mp3 player), but there were two other people waiting so was all apologetic for taking up so much time and said they could just go on ahead. They let me continue, though, and I handed him Tom's CD and told him that Tom was a huge fan and I thought he'd like Tom's CD. At first he thought I wanted him to sign it for Tom XD But I said it was for him and I hope he'd like it. I also told him I'd be seeing Jamie Bamber in March, and asked if he'd sign my DVD cover... and he wrote "Watch your back Apollo" on it! XD At some point during that, I got a photo with him, which was all sorts of flustered embarassing because the first was blurry, the second didn't take, and I finally handed the camera to Zach, who got a good shot.

Came back to the table for a while. Tanya wanted to wander the dealer's room and I hadn't had a good look yet, so I went with her. One vendor in the corner had the Alias figures I'd remembered but never got. He had the "Almost Thirty Years" Vaughn & Syd set! Wasn't about to pay $80 for it though. Eesh. They also had new Buffy figures: Dark Willow, Illyria, and Faith. Cool stuff. Way more than I'd want to buy for any of them though.

During our wanderings, we ran into a guy dressed as Jack Harkness from Torchwood! Snapped a photo. Chatted for a bit about Who, Torchwood and putting together a Jack costume. Also spotted a couple dressed as Kate & Jack from Lost. I got a photo of them and also chatted a bit about the show, the con, and some other stuff. It was cool ^_^ On my way back through the dealer's room, I spotted the Serenity ornament for $20! I had to have one. That's a great price and I haven't been able to find a place online that had them in stock for a good price. Gleeee!

At some point during the day, Dion and Zippy had gone off to print some flyers and business cards. It's possible they drove all the way home to do it because they were gone for like three hours. They came back with only the flyers ebcause the business card stock broke the Staples machine. Hahahaha!

I sat at the table for a few more hours before finally headed back to the room for foods. I called

sweetwildandmad while there to let him know about the Jack Harkness and Kate & Jack I saw. Ate a ham sandwich.

Back to the table to hang out and snap pictures of people and their cool costumes as they walked by. Got quite a few! I also ended up buying giant microbes. I was able to talk the guy into selling me 3 for $20, for a grand savings of like $2. Oh well. zipyy and I went back for more, but the guy refused to go lower -- they were selling too well. Meh. We got 9 for $50, which wasn't too bad -- came about $1 less for each.

Once back at the table, a dgeek squirrel came by. That's really all I have to say about that publically.

As we were closing down for the day, the guy selling cards next to us (Ted) had Dan gave me a free set of SG-1 cards because I'd spotted a broken Scorpy bobblehead (which I sort of wanted to buy... damn) and also covered his bathroom run. That was really, really nice of him.

We headed back to the room with Andres and Bonnie and ended up geeking out over giant microbes and other stuff. Good times. After a quick bite to eat, we headed for the Masquerade, which I guess was disappointing this year due to the stellar lack of entries. While the judges were deliberating, we were... "treated' to a Boogie Knights show. Look, they're good musicians, I'm sure, but filk? Is not really my thing. At all. The BSG group must be happy though -- their award was presented to them by Richard Hatch, who bowed before them on the stage. Hahahaa.

After the judging was done, we stood around for a while before heading to the bar to see if there was anyone around. Uhm. Ron Glass was already there. Haha! We sat with some people for a while before heading back to see if the 10 Forward dance party had started. GOOD GOD was that music AWFUL. There were some awful tragedies on the dance floor and what was with all the little kids?! It was pretty fun watching Andres table dance, though. And there was a girl with a hula hoop who was pretty cool. She came back a little later and was dancing in the back where the stage was. It was nice and dark so I took some long exposure photos. Got some cool shots. I was able to chat with both the girls -- Cara, who was the hula hooper and dressed like River (even though she wasn't trying to) and Janine, who'd just learned to hula. I showed them both the photos and got their e-mails so I could send them links when they're uploaded. Cara did some tricks so I could get more photos.

After the general lameness, we went to Andres and Bonnie's room for a while before finally stumbling back to our room to go to sleep.

Sunday, February 18, 2007

Woke up about 9am. Decided to wear my Aeryn gear for the last day of con. Tanya and I went down to the dealer's room first. Dan was already there waiting to sell some product. He (and Dion :P) almost immediately sold me a new pulse pistol because the one I got from eBay is sort of crap. So.... I bowed to peer pressure and got it, but only beause I could pay him later. LOL

Just sort of hung around the table for the day. Zach got our banners signed by Ron Glass, which was cool. Later on, Zach and I went down to get Richard Hatch to sign them. He'd just gotten out of a panel so his line was way longer this time. We each had a banner and planned to somehow get both signed on one fee XD Even though the line was long, i don't think people minded waiting because Richard was taking his time talking to people, which was really cool. As we got up to him, I realized he was left handed. Lefties FTW! Zach got the first banner signed while we both explained what it was for and who we were. I sort of placed the second banner in front of Richard while Zach looked like he was making motions to leave me there, so I was like, "uh where are you going? Hold on!" and Richard was all, "you can't leave her here by herself." Hah! So while he was signing the second banner, I asked him if he remembered me from the day before (he said of course he did, hm.) and I showed him my artwork on the player. He was saying how great my artwork was ("there are really beautiful") and that I should stick with it and I could be really successful and that I should really persue it. That people aren't really encouraged by their parents to be creative. I mean, it was really cool and nice that he was saying all that, but somewhere in my head I was going, "hellooooooooo so phoney," which maybe he wasn't being, but. Hm. I dunno. It triggered something internally. Whatever. Nice to hear either way XD And we got both banners signed, so that's what counts.

On the way back up to the table, I snagged a few free posters -- Hot Fuzz and TMNT. The day before I'd snagged a Black Snake Moan one for Annalisa.

The rest of the day was spent at the table. Mindy wasn't feeling well so I tried a Reiki treatment, but she was so sick, I'm not sure it helped at all. Probably needed two or three treatments to do anything. I saw hula hoop girl again and double-checked her e-mail because I couldn't read what was written... well, actually, I think I just didn't understand what it said, now that I think of it.

Found a guy dressed like Shaun from "Shaun of the Dead" and got a photo of him. Also helped him fix some name tag thing.

While packing was going on, Tanya and I were at Ted's table looking at cards. She bought a set of Enterprise season 1 cards and I got the Farscape motion cards, which are so completely cool.

Zach left once we'd gotten everything packed away in our room. Dan, Mindy, Dion, Tanya, Zippy, Frank, and I headed to Cheeburger Cheeburger, where the guys apparently subject their stomachs to one pound burgers. There were definitely mass amounts of dead cow and fried potatoes/onions consumed. Dion & Zippy finished theirs and got their photo taken with the giant plush burger.

After foods, we went back to the hotel and Dan & Mindy could head to the airport and catch their plane home. Said our goodbyes to them and Frank. Went back to our hotel room and sort of sat around before we finally broke out all the stupid internet videos we could think of. Off the top of my head we watched...

+ Crazy Indian Intersection
+ Tardy Delivery
+ Chis Bliss' Amazing Juggling Finale
+ two parts of Hard Gay and Social Improvement
+ Tom Gleeson's You're Beautiful
+ Piano Ball

Eventually, Tanya & Zippy headed to the hot tub, which they'd been wanting to do all night. Dion and I stayed in the room and geeked out over action figures... like zombie Spider-Man and zombie minimates. Hooray!

We ended off the night watching a bit of TV.

Monday, February 19, 2007

Another 9am morning. Got dressed and then packed up my stuff. Had cereal. The original Planet of the Apes was on TV.... on the History Channel. Tanya showed my some sites she wanted help with -- I think at lunch/dinner yesterday I somehow agreed to be the designer for the SG2 site and have now ended up on Command staff or something. How does this happen to me? XD

We check out of the hotel at about 11:30am and headed out. Stopped at a Denny's along the way and Zippy joined us. Thinking I was getting something light, I ordered a salad that turned out to be the biggest meal at the table. Oy. Said goodbye to Zippy (who I found out lives like an hour and a half from Albany and could have given me a ride to and from the con.. d'oh!).

We made good time into the city and Tanya & Dion dropped me off at Penn Station. There was a... uh.. issue with my ticket -- it was for &:45p when I distinctly remember buying a t 5:45p ticket, but whatever. I went to see if I could change it and they wanted 425 to do so. Uhm. I only paid $32 for the ticket. So I decided to wait the extra 4 hours :-P

I miss the days when you could just buy an unreserved ticket and get on any train you wanted. Really I do.

Putzed around for a couple hours; almost fell asleep a few times. Finally it was time to catch my train back... which was when AIM finally decided to connect on my phone. Stupid network. IMed Dion and

pgnblade. Called

tiscb28 to let him know I didn't need him to pick me up and mentioned that there was a Star Trek thing on History Channel I was missing -- but he mentioned he was DVR-ing it so maybe we could work that in to our BSG viewing next week. Sweet. I mentioned I missed this week's BSG (but it was taped for me) because the hotel didn't have SciFi, and when I got off the phne the girl next to me said something like, "it's rough not having the SciFi channel." We got into a conversation about BSG (Fat!Lee=bad!), Buffy, and Firefly. It was sort of neat. Random fan on the train!

I slept most of the way back. Dan &

queenmaab were there to pick me up and take me home. Promptly dumped my stuff in my room, changed, and went to bed.

Selected photos from the trip