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| ACen 2007; A fan's report... | |
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| Topic Started: May 21 2007, 04:16 AM (567 Views) | |
| Pipster | May 21 2007, 04:16 AM Post #1 |
Pervy VA Fancier
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Okay, kids! I have Friday typed up! I have also posted it at my LJ and MySpace so those of you who have me friended there may have already seen this. So, without further ado, My Con Report! (or at least, the beginning of it).  Friday, May 11 I met up w/ my friend, Mac at about 2.30, thinking we were going to caravan up not long after that. He didn’t get off work until 3ish and then had to run home to change and grab some stuff. So we didn’t actually get to the con until almost 5 pm. And I still had no badge. Little back story to the badges: ACen had given the option to purchase commemorative badges or regular ones and you could pay an extra $1.50 to have it mailed to you instead of having to wait in line forever just to pick it up. It’s a good idea, in theory. Not so much in practice, especially in the land of the worst postal system in the country. They decided, instead of mailing the badges out as the orders were processed, that they would do one mass mailing on April 30th. Which was only like a WEEK before the actual con. A lot of the Chicago area attendees did not receive their badges in time. Hell, Mac got his the day before the con started. I hung around and didn’t go to the Friday events early to see if per chance the badge would still make it before I left. Yeah. Not so much. So, I have no badge, no confirmation email, but I did have a printed copy of the cleared check that the Midwest Animation Promotion Society had cashed. I was geared up w/ B**** Pip on reserve if they gave me any shit. I mean, they took my money and didn’t give me a badge. And Mac had told me that 2 years prior, they had cashed his check and then had absolutely NO record of him and would have turned him away if he hadn’t produced his cleared check, proving they had his money. So, we met up w/ J and N in the hotel room at the Hyatt. Then, since N had to purchase a Saturday badge and I still needed to get mine, we all headed down to the con center and got into the 1st line (yes, you read that right, the 1st line) at around 5:30-5:45ish. By this point, I had missed most of the panels I wanted to see anyway, including the Fullmetal Alchemist one that Travis was supposed to be at.  So I had pretty much resigned myself to just hanging w/ Mac, J and N. N and I were still going to go to a couple of the Yaoi panels that night, should we both be able to get badges by then. The 1st line was the line to get into the proper line inside the main dealer’s room/badge area. We were in this line for about an hour and a half, I’d say. Possibly closer to 2 hours. Then, as we neared the entrance to the main dealer’s room, one of the security personnel was splitting the people up into two separate lines. J and N were to go ahead to the line for people who hadn’t paid for any type of badge yet. I was to stay where I was to remain in the line for people who had pre-reg’d and paid but had not received a badge. This line was about another hour and a half to two hour wait. And I had made the ENORMOUS mistake of wearing my brown sexy boots...with the 2 INCH HEELS. ESTUPIDA! Course, the girl behind me in line had me beat. She had on white, knee high platform go-go boots. And the heels had to be at least 3 inch. O_o I also met these adorable high schoolers (one of which was sick and still had managed to drag her tiny bottom out to ACen). I was very impressed. They had also still all gone to school that day, then headed out to the con. I also made friends w/ Girl in Go-Go boots and the other girl behind me in line. I finally had gotten near the front of the line, flirted w/ the cute security guy for a bit (hey, I’m not above a little flirting to get what I want  ) and then was finally allowed into the last, very short line at the badge centers. I get up to the front and ask what they need from me (J and N were two booths over so it actually took them almost as long to register and purchase as it did for me just to get up to the front of the line). The guy said he needed ID and I let him know that I didn’t have a confirmation email as I had never been sent one. He said that was fine, they could just look me up in the system. I handed him my ID and the copy of the cleared check, he typed some stuff in and....THEY HAD NO RECORD OF ME IN THE SYSTEM! Yep! No record at all! I was 2 seconds away from B**** Pip making her appearance when the guy said, “but it’s okay cause you have this so we know you’re SUPPOSED to be in here” as he held up the cleared check. I was SO HAPPY that Mac had suggested I bring that. So I finally got my badge (YAY) and J and N had waited over by the table to get programs, etc for me. As I was getting my stuff all put away, Cute Security Guy came up behind me and handed me back my driver’s license, which I had dropped (OMG!). I hugged him cause that would have SUCKED to lose that. After all this MESS, we headed up to the room to chill before our panels. J and Mac then walked N and I over to Ballroom A for our Yaoi panels (the first of which w/ Jamie McGonnigal was already half over) and then they headed to the tabletop gaming rooms. At one point in the Jamie panel, we watched a bit of a Yaoi which I don’t remember the name of but that Jamie VA’d for. He’d said something about how his boyfriend was at the back of the room, waved and said “Hi boyfriend!” I turned around to look and noticed a very cute boy waving back and he was sitting behind a group of people, one of which looked slightly familiar and was really HOTT. But I didn’t think much of it and continued to watch the yummy Boy Love on the screen. During one of the sex scenes, Jamie’s character is pushing off the advances of this other guy who is NOT his partner and Jamie turned back to Boyfriend and said, “See? I pushed Mike [McFarland] OFF of me!”
After this panel was the Mind of a Yaoi Fan Girl panel. Which sucked major monkey c***. It was a bunch of fan girls sitting around and talking nonsense and it was impossible to hear anything cause one of the damn dances was going on in Ballroom BC right next door. This got done around 2 am and I headed home after that, the whole time thinking how much this particular con experience was totally SUCKING compared to my others. I simply prayed that Saturday would be better. Saturday, Sunday and link to pics page to come... EDITED: cause I forgot that when I typed this up, I used some pretty foul language. My Apologies! |
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| Niko | May 21 2007, 04:52 PM Post #2 |
Traveller
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I sometimes think that the absolute *worst* thing about being a yaoi fangirl is *all the other yaoi fangirls*.  It's always such a frustration to me at conventions when I attend an 18-and-up panel, and get a room full of supposedly adult women acting like giggling fifteen-year-old girls who just got their first glimpse of a Playgirl.I'm glad to hear that your badge thing eventually worked out, despite the frustration. Looking forward to the rest of the report.
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| MeggieMay | May 21 2007, 10:56 PM Post #3 |
 
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Just a heads up to let you know I'm reading your report. I've heard this convention didn't go all that well from the convention production side (you should read Chris Patton's (ADV VA) LJ on what he thought of the con
 ) but that fans did have fun if they could find the right things to do.Also, I ran into some video of the convention and had a smile at it - it seems this con was held at the hotel where Visions 97 and 98 was held (this was a big Doctor Who Convention that use to be held in Chicago). So I've actually been in that hotel around ten years ago .
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| Pipster | May 25 2007, 02:45 AM Post #4 |
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Pervy VA Fancier
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The girl who was leading the panel? Totally unprepared, didn't know WHAT she was doing and then decided it would be a good idea to mock the little teenybopper "Squee" so she held the mike up to her mouth and squee'd long, loud and WAY too high-pitched for 1 AM. Made me kinda wanna smack the living shite outta her.
Linky, please? Thx. I don't have Chris Patton on my LJ. Just on MySpace.
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| MeggieMay | May 25 2007, 03:37 AM Post #5 |
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I meant My Space. I've been having a really bad week of things here with screwing up stuff, so this isn't really news
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| Pipster | May 26 2007, 12:26 AM Post #6 |
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Pervy VA Fancier
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Hmmm, I didn't seen anything on his MySpace but I'll check again. I'd be very curious to see what he had to say as that may dictate whether or not we can get him back here next year.
Thx! |
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| MeggieMay | May 27 2007, 01:39 AM Post #7 |
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It moved off the first page. Here are the two blog entries in question http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseacti...AAC0A5676248358 http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseacti...8817DC876291709 And one other entry that is just about the bubble event http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseacti...AAC0A5676248358 I didn't re-read them but going off memory I didn't think he sounded like he'd never come back. He just had some criticism of the event. |
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| Pipster | May 30 2007, 04:03 AM Post #8 |
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Pervy VA Fancier
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Saturday, part I Saturday: Considering the fact that I didn’t get home and to sleep until around 3 AM, I still made it to the con about 11ish, when I met up in the room w/ J, N, and Mac. We all headed down to the Dealer’s Room for a bit since none of us had had a chance to look around there yet. I didn’t have a whole lot of extra money so I had to be very frugal. However, I couldn’t help myself when I walked by a booth that had ancient Egyptian figurines (which I collect). I got a black and gold Horus figurine. At this point, we all kind of split up. Mac went to meet up w/ another friend, J headed off to the tabletop gaming rooms and N headed over to the High and Mighty Color concert. I had missed the autograph signings I wanted to go to but I wasn’t too upset about it cause most of them were going to have signings on Sunday as well. I needed to be ready to head over to the Autograph Area at 3 PM for the Travis Willingham signing (Kirk Thornton was also going to be part of that session). So I went and sat to wait for the FanFiction Panel to start and then changed my mind at the last minute cause it would have coincided w/ the autograph signing. I decided to head downstairs to wait in line for the autographs instead. Only I was a moron and went to the wrong autograph area. I was sitting and talking to a couple of girls and then realized I was in the wrong place and I only had like 10 minutes to get all the way over to the Dealer’s Room and the Autograph Area before 3 pm. I took a detour thru the Dealer’s Room so I could try and find something FMA for Travis to sign (which I did; an 8 x 10 card that has Ed, Al, Mustang, Hawkeye and Havoc on it). I booked over and was told by the security person that they had cut off the line about ½ hour ago. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! So I was pissed, mostly at myself for fucking up, and I had a MASSIVE tension headache. I decided to try and go to on of the other panels instead. I went to the Creating Manga/Comics (Japan & US) panel w/ Phillip Moy and Yasuhiro Nightow (creator of Trigun). I sat thru half of this and took some notes, but my head was really bothering me and it was getting hard to concentrate thru the pain. I had been going to leave that panel early and go to the Writing Unique Heroes and Memorable Villians panel but I just needed to lay down somewhere and relax for a bit (and not have to lug my backpack around anymore). I called Mac and he said they were all up in the room chilling for a bit. I went up there, laid down on the bed and tried to relax for a bit (it helped my headache immensely when I took my Shigure hat off). Mac, K (the friend Mac met up w/), J and N all played Dance Dance Revolution (yes, they had the pad up in the room and everything). Then N headed off to one of her panels and the rest of the crew headed off to the Dealer’s Room for a bit. I decided to stay in the room and relax a bit more and then was going to go down and get in line for the Voices For concert. I did some stretching and breathing (I guess you could say yoga), which also helped alleviate the headache and then, come 7:15ish, headed down to the line for Voices For. J, Mac and K met me down there after a panel they’d gone to. The concert was supposed to have started at 8 PM but didn’t actually start until like 8:30-8:45ish. But once it started, every bad thing that had happened all weekend dissipated in my memory. This concert rocked my SOCKS off. It was the first time all weekend that I actually got to SEE my fave VAs. Greg Ayres, Chris Patton, I was in VA Heaven! The music was loud, angry, hardcore rock for the most part (which you would think would have made my headache worse but when that show started, my headache just disappeared). Jan-Scott Frazier was totally awesome and really worked the crowd. Hell, she was hopping off the stage and just getting right up in people’s faces w/ the mike; it was AWESOME. Mike McFarland and Brittney Karbowski both have incredible singing voices and Mike is totally awesome on acoustic guitar. (I may have fallen just a little in love w/ him during this show.)
Xero Reynolds, whom I’d never heard of before this con, was pretty awesome. Still don’t know a lot about him but he rocks the house and well, there’s more to come from later in the evening as to why he rocks the house.
Chris Patton was HOTT. Man can sing, man is HOTT, I was just all fangirl a-squee when he took the stage. Chris Ayres and Tiffany Grant were wicked cool as well. But the person who blew me away was Greg Ayres. First of all, he was still sporting the purple, blue and pink hair, which I just LOVED. But his voice. GAWD, his VOICE just knocked me over! He has that perfect, raspy rocker voice and he is a great performer. Hell, everyone on that stage was a great performer! I just absolutely *loved* this show and highly highly recommend, if Voices For plays a live show anywhere near you? GO TO IT! I pretty much hadn’t used the camera at all at this point (Sis was kind enough to lend me her digital for the weekend). But lemme just say, that camera came out in force once that show started and didn’t go back in the pouch until much later in the evening. I got some really great shots as it wasn’t very crowded. J and I were sitting back a little ways (Mac and K got up and left partway thru cause apparently, this wasn’t their scene). I had to go up closer to the stage, which meant coming dangerously close to the mob at the front (and those of you who know me well know I am not a large person and could very easily be squished by a mob). I got some good shots from back at my seat, particularly the one of the crowd knocking around the beach balls that Jan threw out into the audience came out well.
They did a bunch of the songs that are on the Voices For Peace album. Chris A. and Jan did “War Pigs”, IIRC; Brittney did “For What It’s Worth” which is one of my fave songs and she rocked it. Patton did “Origin of Love” (I think that was the title). Did I mention he was HOTT? I don’t remember either of the songs that Greg did cause I may have been a little too starry-eyed and awed at those points.
They also did “Sweet Home Chicago”, which made my frelling YEAR. (I love that song.) Then they ended up w/ “We’re Not Gonna Take It” and when they were starting up, Jan was yelling at all the VA/performers to get up on stage (Patton, Greg, etc) and then she was like, “Colleen, Brina, Travis. Get up here!” And there was Colleen Clinkenbeard! I hadn’t even *noticed* her standing on the side of the stage! Then I did a double take cause the hott guy I’d seen sitting at the back of Jamie’s yaoi panel the night before was standing there too and then it hit me like a ton of bricks. OMG! That’s Travis Willingham! This is the problem w/ voice actors. You tend to not always recognize them in the flesh right away. So the show ended up and J and I had decided that we were going to go to the 18+ Improv that a bunch of the VAs were going to do in an hour or so. I had to buy the Voices For Peace album (which I’ve pretty much been listening to nonstop since I bought it). I had noticed that Travis and Greg were still in the room, talking to fans and stuff. I asked the girls at the table w/ the cds if it would be okay for me to get some autographs and they were like, “Of course! That’s what they hang out after the show for!” So I had J take a pic of me w/ Travis (who is GINORMOUS! Man is a full *head* taller than me, which I know, isn’t difficult cause I’m a short-ass but still!) And then I went up and talked to Greg for a bit and he autographed my cd cover and I fell more than a little in love w/ him. We mainly discussed his hair as I just had to compliment him on it and then he gave me the rundown of what he was thinking of doing w/ it next. Then, on our way out of the ballroom, Mike was standing at the cd table so I stopped and asked if he’d autograph my cd too. He did. I asked how he was doing, he said “Sweating like a pig!” and I said “I hear ya, man.” Cause it really did get warm in that room and it had nothing to do with my raging hormones. Nothing at ALL.
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