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Have visited Perfect Spin Off Cosplay since Halloween, 1998.
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Recollections of Events
Ah yes. Conventions(Events). Why I remember the day....
2001
San Diego Comic Convention
Location: San Diego Convention Center, San Diego and Embassy Suites, California
Redemption! Yes. This convention will have to make up for last years. A real hotel room. And no last minute costume prep. All the costumes were done at least a month ago. What a relief. This was very close to being Project Akon 1999 revisited. Except that. 1. Ashy didn't come. 2. Henry and I already had experience with this convention. But the similarities were cool! 1. Bunked out in a hotel with Tiff and Allie. 2. I portrayed the evil bishonen villian with very little skit input except for the fight choreography. 3. Potato skins!
Friday: First things first. Went over to SJ HQ and picked up Reichan cos Makochan left days before. Left about 9 AM to arrive in SD at about 10:45. We made some really good time. Traffic wasn't too bad. We went to the airport to scope out where we'd pick up Tiffy (Terminal 2) and decided we needed to kill some time before her 12:30 pick up. So Reichan and I were going to go to the beach for a nice walk and picnic. But right as we were leaving the airport, I got a ring from Genri's cell. He had arrived early! He wasn't supposed to get here until 1:30. Geez. Mess up our picnic. Oh well. We grab Genri from commuter terminal and go to the Embasssy to check in. Our room isn't ready (730) and so we need to head back to the car. Did I mention that parking at the Embassy is not for the claustrophobic? All the cars there are crammed in and I had to make like a 20 point turn (Austin Powers style) to get out. We didn't have enough time to run to the convention to get badges so we went to the beach anyway for the picnic before Tiffy arrived. While we were eating peanut butter sandwiches and soda, we were watching and making references to a bunch of pigeons near by. hee hee. At 12:30 we drove over to Terminal 2 but no Tiffy. Since it only took 5 minutes to get from the terminal to the beach, we went back to the beach and waited, guessing that Tiffy would call the instant she arrived wondering where we are. 1:00 rolls around and we figure she's delayed so we send our peace offering Genri to see what the deal is. She was delayed and she had just got off and found Genri when she was calling us. We went back to Embassy and found out our room still wasn't ready so it's off on the tram to the convention center. Justin was waiting there at the lobby for us and we drag him along. Tiffy and Gina got their badges but Genri and I wanted to wait for the 4 PM late badge fee. So they went to wander the dealers room while Genri and I went to Horton Plaza to look for the new Final Fantasy Movie figs. They did have them, but only the 7" variety and they were fugly. 4 PM rolls around and we head back to the convention center. Now we've added Riri and Emily to the group in their slayers dresses. We finally go get our badges. I settle on the 3 day after all to avoid any further hassle. We all head back to the room to change. I get into Hayato and the sideburns fit with help of eyelash glue. Tiff's been in Kyoko all day. Justin dresses up as Kuja. Reichan as Kaede. Genri falls asleep. 6 PM rolls around and we're back at the convention center in costume. Reichan and I run into scary ninja guy and Reichan quickly learns to find a distraction. "Oh Genri!" And we're free! 7 PM rolls around and we meet everyone for pictures, so we add on Dai, Joe and Taiki. We go upstairs to take some pictures and come down at 7:15 to walk to the Old Spaghetti factory. They don't take reservations and they say a table for 12 will be 1 hour. Many people stay behind and wait, but the restless Genri, Reichan and I tour the city for the hour. On the way back, we get a call....Allie's arrived. Horribly late. We instruct her to grab a tram and we all head back to the dinner. Everyone else has been seated for 15 minutes. But that's kewl. We all order at the same time and dinner was good. All the people were staring at Justin. I'm surprised they let him in. After dinner we part ways, Gina comes with us to the Embassy to get some stuff to bring to her place. Connie and Chris come to pick her up at 10. Afterwards I take Justin on a run (You owe me Justin!) to get his Lucifer outfit. We go through some quick rehearsals in the hallway and retire late as usual.
Saturday: It's the big day of the convention. We get up at 10 and haul to the 10:30 masquerade meeting. That finishes early but the turning in tape and materials took us an hour. We got our backstage passes and then we were out of there. Back to the Embassy for dress rehearsal. Allie rehearsed in dark pantyhose and her swimsuit. ^_^;;;; Then we change into costume. Me into Butch, but I forgot my Jedite gloves so I make due with Hayato's. Henry as Pink Pirate. Justin as Gekka, Tiffy as Mana and Allie as Dakki. We head over to Anthony' Fish Grotto forgetting that Allie hates seafood. Lucky for us she found they had chicken sandwiches. We take pictures in front of the Star of India Pirate ship, exceedingly good for Genri. Dining at the Grotto is interesting, with all sorts of people staring at us. Especially Justin who can't eat with 4 inch nails. He mooches food from the rest of us. I had a chowder combo with a sandwich. The clam chowder was so good. Genri cancelled going to the Spiderman panel and 4 PM was rolling around. I was supposed to meet Reichan at the Embassy at 4 PM and since they weren't picking up their cells, I left the Grotto early in order to meet her on time. So I don't even bother with the tram and walk to the Embassy from the Grotto, scratching up my cell phone in the process. That totally sucked. I arrived on time, but Reichan never came. I got a call about an hour later stating that she needed to meet me elsewhere. I took a nap. All my stuff was packed and ready to go. Everyone comes back at about 5:30 and in preparation, 6 comes along before we know it. We need to book all this stuff to the SDCC! We arrive at SDCC at 6:30 but all the dressing rooms were taken. So the bathroom was the dressing room. Luckily for us, we were entry 40. Alita, Benma and P. Kuno were also in preparations for their skit, and they sure did have last minute preparations on Spam. They were entry 28. There was of course Team Rocket, and a cool SNK vs. Capcom skit with Mai and Yun. They both knew their trademark moves and stances. Must recruit for ACP. ^_^. Our skit went off without a hitch, and got good crowd response, especially with the Yap yap yap kick. No one could here the "Good work girls, now enjoy the convention" business at the end due to the laughter left over from the ultimate attack. After 50 entries, and re-enactments and various group pictures, we find out we won. I'm guessing industry award and I'm right. We get the award from Anime Pavilion, which totally shocks Allie and Tiffy. We send Henry to get the award which he is happy to do. We had alot of interviews and pictures taken. Avoided near disaster backstage with scary guy again. After all is said and done, we meet up with Karrie, Jon, Hichan, Natsume and Kurumi. Hichan was in her cute Mima outfit. We took even more pictures before heading back to Embassy. Hichan decided to stay with us instead of driving back. Hichan, Allie and Tiffy were going to sit in the hot tub while Genri and I went to TGIF to get potato skins. All the restaurants in the gaslamp district were closed at 1 AM but there was one place open. *shining light at the Jack in the Box* 24 hour service. OOOOOOOH. Genri finally gets his Ultimate Cheeseburger and it's good. Everyone else, we get cheese and bacon potatoes for Tiffy, chicken sandwiches galore and double chocolate cake (the closest thing to CCCCWS). Afterwards, we all pass out. Except Hichan who scares away some weird stalker guy. Hichan's still hyper so I don't know what she does after I go to sleep.
Sunday: Everyone needs to leave early! Hichan forgoes her practice to sleep in some. But Henry must leave in haste to catch his flight. He forgets his dress pants in the process but thank god he gets his codpiece. We all pack and get lost in a hurry at 11 AM. I just throw all my stuff in the car with full intention of going back to the convention center. I see the rest of them off when my tram arrives before Richard can leave. I head over to DM's booth to see Chrissy and she tells me Reichan just woke up. >.< So I tour the dealers room by myself for a few hours until she does show up. We go searching for Chrissy's Saint Seiya stuff since she is infatuated with it. We pick up some stuff, as the rest of the stuff is ridiculously priced. The dealers room closes at 5 PM so we meet up with Connie and Chris. We sneak a trolley to the parking stop and Reichan/I were dropped off at Horton. We go to eat at Planet Hollywood. They changed a little bit since 2 years ago, mainly the menu has been made boring. Guess it was out of date. Afterwards Reichan and I do some more shopping at Horton but very soon, all the stores close up. Chrissy calls and she's done. We wait 40 minutes for the Comic Expo tram to take us all to the Wyndham. We leave Chrissy there to gather her stuff while Reichan and I go to the Embassy to get my car. Back to pick up Chrissy and on the way home, find.... traffic. X.X It takes 2 hours to get home to their home, I drop them off and return to my home. All in all, a very good experience.
Anime Expo 10
Location: Long Beach Hyatt and Convention Center, Long Beach, California
Tenth year anniversary. Or so they say. Chances are it won't be any different from past AX's. With all the hub-bub this year, AGSMA is going to take it easy with this AX and use an AniMagic style skit.
Wednesday. One day early. I swear, I've never done this before. Just two days prior I decided I'd work on my Movie 2 Li Syaoran costume. ^_^;;;; I guess I always have to have a last minute costume. No matter what the circumstances. My competition piece was done one week prior, the AniMagic release Hayato was done 3 days ago, and Butch was ready by Fanime. So I get lost in Long Beach, but finally arrive at the Hyatt, after multiple cell phone calls. I bring along a large supply of soda and a little junk food since I knew there was going to be some major starvation going on. That and 5 new costumes, 2 old ones, and the uncompleted Li. When I arrived, Kelly, Gina and Frank were at the pool but quickly retreated due to "hairy back guy in jacuzzi". It is July the 4th, and dinner was rapidly approaching. I ate dinner already when I arrived at 7 but with the fireworks and crowds at Long Beach, dinner for everyone else would be a long time coming. Tamachan was immediately accosted by Kelly. While the Change Card scared Gina with it's extending tongue action. Our room was 1036. I spent most of the night with crazy heat n bond action working on the Li costume. We didn't go to sleep until 3 that day. I claimed the couch bed the first night.
Thursday: First real day of the con. Totally did not feel like it after Wednesday. Early on, I drop off the soundtrack and confirm our spot in the masquerade, switch from standby status. Today is the Rival Schools day but first I need to pick up my badge. So I walk with Tiffy and Mack to the Westin and pass poor Phavo chan Kyoko in the hall. "I'll be back soon!" One hour later that is. Got into Hayato and once and again, I hate fake sideburns. They kept on falling off. After I took the requisite pictures, I axed them since I didn't want to keep picking them up. I liked having Shinai D'Wayne around tho. There were like 2 other Hayatos around and plenty of random shinai welding people. We took pictures of Justice Gakuen with Albert and Phavo and requisite push up/back nailing pictures. Then Phavo, Henry and I decided to go to the dealers room. But it was raining. X_X. Kelly was in Miyu walking barefoot the long way around to the dealers room. Henry in Gene with red dripping down his face and costume. Phavo in Kyoko. Gina in bright orange Naruto and me in iridescent rainbow Hayato which reflects water. The line for the dealers room was huge, and so we were going to head back when me and Henry saw a little back entrance. So Phavo, Henry and I worked our way into the dealers room. heeeeeeee. Not a bad size as far as dealers rooms go. It looks alot larger than it really is due to the artists alley in the back. We went looking for KinKi and Kelly, but we skipped one of the first rows (The one with KinKi). We saw Kelly in the last row, near Aloha Anime. We also visited the artists alley to see Kyubi Kitsy and AKG studios. Very nice. After getting out of Hayato I was normal, but then changed into Jedite for the Sera Myu panel. Sera Myu version of course. That was going on at 4 and I sat with Cindy who was all ready to ask corny questions. -_-. I had to restrain her from doing so and embarassing us. Afterwards, Char got me my Jedite-chan yellow wig so I wouldn't look like Cruise Blues Jedite. I'm really not meant to be blonde. Afterwards was the female cosplayers panel and japanese cosplayer panel. Kelly and I changed into our Love Hina costumes and made an effort to find it. We walked in at the last minute and decided not to stay around. We left to get supplies for the room including ramen and Popeye's fried chicken for dinner. That was a good dinner. But the Vons we went to was totally ghetto. It took us forever to locate the ramen and not only that, it was completely gated. Yeh. Great neighborhood. Allie and Ashy had arrived and were changing. After that, I spent the rest of the night chatting and working on Li. Well that and egging KinKi to finish her masquerade costume too.
Friday: The only real thing that would happen today is King of Fighters Friday. In the daytime, I changed into Laguna (which was delivered the day prior by Northern Campus AGSMA) and took pictures with SJ at the Aloha booth. Had ramen for lunch (which was about 4 PM ^_^;;;;) and then Allie and I figured it was a good time to get ready for King of Fighters Friday. It was so goddamn huge! I've never seen so many Terrys, Kyo's and Ioris. All I cared about really was getting the Orochi Team pictures, and we had some really cool pictures with Matt's Orochi. After KOF night, I finished the Li costume, and kept on harassing KinKi to finish her costume. *omitted stuff* Henry did teach me the moves for the skit and we sat outside watching the Moulin Rouge video, as well as a few others. We also made Jack out of poster board from an prize that Mack won but didn't want. Some J Pop thing. We used left over baroque satin from Li for Jack's hat and other odds and ends. A quick headband and Jack would stay on someone's head. No way the beachball idea would have worked. 2D South Wars style Jack was the way to go. Definitely. Benma arrived earlier in the day and we worked on his choreography. He also dressed up in Kelly's version 1 Beryl. -_- Kelly tried to dye her hair red, but it only succeeded in turning the bathtub red and giving her a fine tint. Good thing Mack has red hair spray. Before then, Kelly and I took Chun Li/Li photo shoots on the top floor of the convention center, with no one else to bother us or try to peace bond the weapons. That was nice. I hope those photos come out good.
Saturday: Oh today is the big day. We all file up for the 10 AM meeting well except for Matt who was in a coma and KinKi who lost her badge. The meeting was standard pre-convention meeting. And there was another one to be held at 4 PM to look at the theatre. In between time, I went to change into Butch and grabbed Victreebel and took pictures with my Cassidy and Sabrina. $3 Pizza for lunch. Time flew by before we knew it and it was time for the 4 PM meeting. KinKi didn't want to go and wanted to show up exactly at 7 when it was time to start cos she needed that much time to do the costume. ARRRR. That meeting was good to show us the lay out of the small stage and backstage. Alita and Jorge were both there as backstage helpers. That was nice of them. They're on sabbatical for a while. We head back to find out KinKi has only made minimal progress on the costume, and with only two hours left, it's up to the team to crank out a Britney Moon costume. We borrow Kelly's Miyu obi for a bow, Allie's pendant, and Kelly's Suppy top. No time for fraying edges, Britney Moon's meant to look skanky. KinKi worked on the wig while Henry worked on the collar. We used some Hayato athletic tape for the stripes (so ghetto!) Benma tied the bow up. With some work, the costume, although skanky and ghetto was presentable. Due to problems with the bow, we had to attach it directly to the Suppy top. It was 6:45 PM and we had to haul to get to the convention center. They blocked off the shortcut so we had to walk all the way around to get to the entrance. We barely arrived at 7 PM before everyone else was let in. Mainly due to Kelly's Beryl and low mobility. We got in and went to the far back dressing room where we rehearsed for the first time as a full group. I had pretty much gotten down my moves, but this would be the first time for KinKi to know about her moves. Luckily they were really easy moves. We used to be entry 33 but bumped up to 30 from all the drop outs. By the time we got on stage, they started our music early and so the first part of the skit was edited out. KinKi had to run on stage and start. Other than that, the skit went remarkably well. Good audience response. There was some confusion about winning for us, but in the end, we didn't win anything for the skit. Perfectly fine with us as the audience was good this time around and the skit was sorta inside joke for fans of the boy bands. I dont expect people not familiar with the Meaty Cheesy Boys to know what the hell we were doing on stage. Afterwards we came back to change! Kelly's feet were totally bruised up from the walking. And we were all requisite cranky. AMC won two awards which was totally cool for them especially how they were robbed last year. We ordered out Jack in the Box but I just had some pinapple and dwelled on the situation. All night. Since people were up in our room, Kelly and I invaded Tiffy's room and took up floor space.
Sunday: Saturday was pretty much the last day of the con for me. I was pondering dressing up as Li or Zato again, but then just got plain lazy. The Fashion Show was not what I expected and thus the ACP photo was a bust. Wasn't a smart idea since the stage was very small and there was a ton of photographers and the fashion show was an hour long. I left the con at about 1 PM. But then Kelly, Henry, Gina and Frank all went to Disneyland at 6 PM. I joined up with them at 7 PM after meeting PSeed at the tram stop. That was totally a coincidence. We went on Pirates/Haunted and then went to eat at Zocalo. I got Kelly's CCCCWS as promised from Cafe Orleans, but Henry took one of her last bites. So she didn't complete it. Then we went to Peter Pan, Mr. Toad, Alice, Tea Cups and we subjected Kelly to Small World. She had the song stuck in her head but I guess that's not as bad as some of the songs that were going on the weekend. We dropped by the Downtown Disney to get caramel apples. Anytime Kelly saw any sweets she was freaked espesh after her CCCCWS. Tiffy was incredibly tired so we retreated. I took Hichan's burnt toast present to give to her at a later date.
Fanime Con
Location: Santa Clara Westin Hotel and Santa Clara Convention Center, San Jose, California
Fanime Con. Ooooh, another con with multiple fronts. KinKi's will be in a joint production with AMC, which leaves me to figure out what to do without a Sakura. For a Card Captor Sakura skit. Luckily, a week before the event, I manage to draft a skit for CCS without the S and run and edit it with Henry and Kelly. With the soundtrack being done 3 days before and everyone listening to it on Thursday.
Saturday Early Morning. Very early morning. We're talking 4:00 in the AM. Heh heh. I finish up the trim on Li Syaoran's sword. Wooo! The first time I make the sword after the costume and actually finish both before the convention! I pack it up in my new trusty gun-case which I bought for $7 specifically for prop sword transporting reasons. ^_^ This will be sooooooooooooo cool.
Saturday Morning: Check in two luggages (a tote and a guncase). The guy had me open the gun case and asked if sparred with that sword. Ha Ha.... No. Hop on Southwest Airlines at 8:30 and arrive at San Jose airport at 9:40. I thought I had packed everything. So no worries. I went to prepare my Clow cards by putting them together front and back. Managed to get my 45 cards done since I didn't like the remaining 7. I packed them in my one carry on. I was dressed in Shinji top with Touya pants. But no one's gonna be able to tell. Plane flight uneventful. I was totally out to lunch until I arrived. And yay! Allie was on time to pick me up from the airport. I had to go to the special desk to reclaim the gun case, but the other baggage was ready and came quick. Now to find the MCM. No musical shuttles this time. She parked in the right concourse. But uh.... Which side of the parking structure. So now was the search for the MCM. Of course, we walked to the wrong side first so we circled the entire circumference of the parking structure before hitting the MCM. That's when I find out we're supposed to be there at 10 for Masquerade check in. Good thing Kelly and Henry were there. Yep yep. I use the cell phone to contact AGSMA Northern division and they were on their way. Perfect. Looks like smooth sailing. So I thought. We don't arrive at the Westin until 10:30. But it's good, I got some catching up time with Allie. Allie didn't have her badge either so we were in the same boat. As we drove by the hotel we realized how incredibly hot it was outside. And the huge line for the dealers room. Erk. This is supposed to be a winter type con. I brought mostly winter type outfits. Well except one. ^_-. Head up to the room and find out that Henry's been DDRing all night and now he's MIA. On the way up, I see Rei-chan's shooting star and motion to her that I'm around. They want me to get into Laguna but I got some pressing matters to fix first. Like registration. I get my reg, and pick up Allie's pre-reg. And we need to find our soundtrack and give it to the staff so they can copy it to a master. Aaaaaaaar! Me and Kelly go on a Cookie Monster Man hunt. I quickly change into Touya and find myself requiring a picture with cutey Sara in her Sakura outfit. A scale Sakura to my Touya! WOoooo! Anyways. No trace of Henry at the DDR room. Maybe he went to the masquerade meeting place. Kelly and I must have made three separate trips to and fro that place looking for Henry. On our second trip, we had just barely missed up so we thought he headed back to the meeting hall. Of course he wasn't there. But when we came back, Henry was in dream land. We inquisition him for the soundtrack and go off to deliver it. Excuse northern AGSMA division to go goof off until later for rehearsal. So phew, we are the last to turn in our tape but we make it. Kelly and I decide we need to errrrr, finish her costume and cards for the skit so that's what we do. She goes to work on her wings, outlining them, and I trim off my manga style clow cards. That's finished real easily. We let Henry sleep until he's rested. I finish before Kelly so I start working on the prop Clow Cards made of foam core.
Saturday Noon: Henry and Kelly managed to finish the backs of most the cards with red and yellow stars (with finger painting!). Unfortunately we need to retrieve the cards from the meeting place. X_X. Another trip. Also.... "Henry, where's the tape of the soundtrack to rehearse with?" Uhhhhhhh. So we have to ask the nice masquerade staff to copy it right then and there so we can practice with the CD. They graciously do that and we bring the unfinished cards back to room 625. What remains is the names of the cards on the other side. Gawd. (mustn't let Kelly continue designing the cards. I get a sharpie and rescue what Kelly was working on the Song Card. Next comes Dark, Light, Shot, Voice, Visa. We're kicked out of 627 for Malice Mizer rehearsal. Alright it's 3 and we track down the rest of the team for Rehearsal! We try to rehearse near the meeting place but they kick us out. We can't rehearse in last years room because it's now the dealers room. So we were going to rehearse in the room, but Tiffy was changing in 627 and Matt was changing in 625. So we rehearse in the hallway with many interruptions from people and the house cleaners. We work out the choreography and move the Light/Dark sequence to earlier on in the skit due to dead time in the skit. Good thing we had Catch You Catch Me as the back ground music since the girls knew all the words and could base all the cues from it. They love Love Machine and we grudgingly make Yukito and Nakuru do the back up to that song. She bangs moves were also perfected. Another script change was now Touya would set Kero up for a punt by Li. Kelly still refused to jump inanely at the end to the Groovy song, but now we change the ending so that Yukito will smile and follow Touya off stage as Touya runs. And the Yaoi card will now be flipped at the WOO! in Groovy. It all looks like it will work out nicely. Of course it's 3 PM and none of us have eaten anything. So Kelly and I stay behind and mooch food in the room while the rest go outside to Taco Bell and get baby powder to change our Yukito. While I'm eating, I finish designing the Fanservice and American Express cards. Kelly fixes her ears and starts putting on her Kero girl costume. I go to get my shorts that I'd wear underneath the Li costume from my Zato costume but find.....AAAAAAAAAAh. I forgot them. X_X And the spandex pants for Zato I forgot too. Crap! What am I going to do. No one else has shorts that can fit me, so I end up rolling my pants up and using 3 safety pins on each side to make them shorts and wear Li over them. X_X. Everyone says I'm so cute. errrrr. Especially with the lil hat. Oi. We need to be at the meeting place at 7, but we get conflicting reports of needing to be there at 6. We decide not to chance it and head there at 6:15. Hardly anyone there. But people already getting seated. What the heck! Finally it dawns on us that people are getting seated for the Mari Ijima concert. So we really weren't due until 7. So Kelly and I go off walking around and get stopped.... alot. We meet up with Tiffy, KinKi, Ashy and Mack in their Malice Mizer gear. They look so great! We tour around some more and head back to lay claim to a room backstage.
Saturday Evening. It's 7 and time to show up. They expect us all to fit in the Green Room? HAHAHAHAHAH. Kelly and I set up camp outside the water cooler and are soon joined by AMC/NCC. First thing to go is the Individual walk ons. 13 of them. 14 dropped out. And before we know it, we were called to get inline. Ugh, we need to fight to get our props in order to line up. We're 25. iPLAY is 24 in their fantastic Guilty Gear outfits. Without my Zato spandex, I didn't know how I'd change into Zato later for group shots with them. After us was Phoenix Seed with their Animal Magnetism/Digimon/FF9 costumes, then AMC/NCC with Malice Mizer and then SJ as skit 31. With a couple skits in between. iPLAY goes up with their Guilty Gear musical Bemani games skit. Everything is there, including Space Channel 5. And finally we're up. Kelly, Henry, Kevin and I are on one side and the rest of the girls (Eriol, Nakuru and Little card start on stage left). Good thing our Little card knew the cue and she went to plant the Kero and the fanservice card. Music starts on cue. Everything proceeds smoothly since I didn't bring on any clow cards or incantation cards. The audience loves it when Nakuru glomps Touya. Li starts off with the lasin board on stage and Little gets the right cue to run away. We actually get some boos (as well as cheers) for kicking Kero off stage. He got some serious hangtime. Voice card isn't yelled out but the effects are far reaching. The audience KNOWS about the American Cardcaptors theme. I go to replace the lasin board with the sword and at the right cue, out comes Kero girl! Whoa, the audience response is great. Dark is casted but not called out, but Light wasn't casted fast enough. Not a big deal. Song card is next but.... X_X Dead time. So we improvise. And then Love Machine busts out, and Henry "Love Machine" Genjitsu breaks out in a wild dance. He loses the jacket and tie and does strange dance moves with Kelly with the tie.... Totally improvised. X_X. But it gets a good response. Next up is Shot. She bangs, even tho Kelly won't admit it, she loves it. And the sound cues of She bangs were coordinated to attacks and She moves for evasive manuevers. Now for the final cards. I drop the sword and waste some time getting ready, rolling up my sleeves, cracking neck and knuckles. I pick up the Visa and keep and announce that I will use the most powerful card.... and right when the music starts. I shout Credit Card! Great response. Eriol whips out American Express. Henry says his line but Tomoyo states her line before Nakuru.... oops. Still good. Li leaves with Kero girl, and Eriol leaves with Nakuru. Leaving Tomoyo and the upper classmen. Tomoyo picks up this last card lying around and right at the WOO! of Groovy, she flips it to reveal the Yaoi card. She shows it to the audience then then shows it to the upperclassmen. Touya freaks and bolts, while Yukito smiles and slowly follows. Great response. Overall, a great skit with our last minute prep and rehearsal.
Saturday Night. Now it's time to wait. And wait and wait. The video room is full so we can't see the remaining skits. They have all the contestants get on stage prior to announcing the awards. We were kind of late so we sat in the front row in front of Malice and SJ on stage. AMC/NCC wins some superiority award. Kelly and I figured it was craftsmanship or something. They get to the judges awards and we were the second one announced! Yay! Must be the beginner's luck for our Northern Division half, combined a a whacked out script and the well versed knowledge of Card Captor Sakura in the audience. Od course the certificate we got for Der Cosplay doesn't have our name on it, just being blank but okay. We can take care of it. We also get a Gundam Endless Waltz DVD. Kelly snakes it since the rest of my group is quite passive. She promises to make us copies. Anyways, she flew all the way from New York to attend so it's a decent recompense. Also she had to put up with all the hecklers and stalkers as Kero girl which was quite amazing. It was a fiasco to try and get the ACP group picture done, but we took control of the microphone after the masquerade was over to get it done. We held it onstage mainly due to Hichan and Tikki's immobile costumes. I almost escaped being in the picture. Eventually Bennett pimp master himself also got in the picture. heh. Then it was disband time. We were going to take pictures but totally forgot about re-enactment pictures. We've been forgetting about those recently. Anyways, we made the mistake or correct decision to stay in the area to take pictures and soon.... We were all blinded. 20 minutes later, we were free again to head back to the rooms. OOooooo, free food. Must come down after dropping off stuff and changing. We got out like 11 PM? I guess? I lost total track of time about then.
Sunday. Stroke of Midnight: Kelly and I are ready and I'm in half Touya gear again. We loiter downstairs looking for food, to only salvage some fruit punch. Then we take plenty of pictures of Kelly. Kelly got hit by that Japanese photographer with the little paper of English translations. ^_-. And he's followed by that ultra cute Misato. But it's not Zan from Tokyo Cosplay Zone 23 so I don't try to embarass myself. We even took pictures outside near the freezing water fountains. What was Kelly thinking. And all the time she wanted a drink from the bar. When we get back to the room to find cold ramen Kelly can't find her purse. So we go on a mad hunt for her purse. We were offered to go to Dennys with Albert or IHOP with the SJ girls, but with Kelly in her Kero girl outfit.... better not. We vouch to stay in the hotel. We also avoid the dance area since Kerogirl's wings have taken some damage already. After we head back we find out that Mack and Tiffy are heading up to iPLAY's room in 1042 to watch Albert's tape of the masquerade. Kelly finds her purse. Since we didn't want to sit around and wait to go thru all the other skits downstairs we decided it would be better to watch Albert's version, which we could fast forward. So since we're heading up to iPLAY's room, I decided to change into Zato to scare Tenken. I use my black slacks since I forgot the spandex. I have some problems with the bangs of the wig but figure out that I need to tuck them behind the mask. Everyone thinks I can't see thru my Zato mask. They are WRONG. But they take too long, so me and Kelly go downstairs to take some shots of Zato before we head up. The good thing about Zato is that no one knows it's me. I think Kelly's sick of taking my posed shots. She's lucky I don't know many of Zato's poses. hehhehehehe. And Zato does NOT have a slidekick. And Li definitely doesn't have one. iPLAY. We head back up to the room to find that Mack and Tiffy have returned. iPLAY got complaints that they were too loud so we'll need to watch the tape down in our room. Tenken's sick and already gone asleep so I can't scare her with Zato. Justin decides he wants to be Testament and Karrie as Ky. We go to 1047 to get the materials sans weapons and some fruit too (cos we're still starving). It takes some time for them to change so I head back down to the room to relax for a little bit without the Zato wig. That hair retains alot of heat! We watch the tape and fast forward thru icky skits. Daylight savings time hits us and wham, the masquerade is 2 hours long again hehehehehe. After the tape was completed, the Guilty Gear people head down to the arcade for a peak. But Kelly is so tired we make her take even more Guilty Gear pictures and head back up and retire at about 4:30 AM. I get the floor but use the white comforter like a sleeping bag.
Sunday. I wake up first at about 9:20 and start getting ready some costumes. I can't find my freaking Syaoran shoes. Arrrgh! I turn the place upside down looking for those loafers. KinKi wants a Li Syaoran at 9:30. So I end up borrowing Matt's oversize loafers for the job. They still work, just a little on the big side. I find cutey KinKi and we have one of the artist gallery people take an assortment of AGSMA pictures for us. Cute Li and Sakura pictures. I head back up cos it's time for me to go to room 546 and change into Laguna for Chrissy and Gina. Argh. I see Henry on the way down and find out they've dropped Raquel chan at the room. Raquel chan is still too big, thanks to Mike. But the twins still have my Laguna boots and gun-chan. So I head to the room, no one answer and decide to go down. Only Chrissy is there. Evidently Gina is back up working on Shooting star chan again. So I head back up to get the boots and gunchan and we come back down together. No one else showed. We took some pictures but the SJ girls needed to get back into their hot pants costumes for their panel. So I head back to the room to return gunchan and raquel chan (now fixed cos of the magical straps in the back) and boots. I head back to my room and change into casual wear for once. Now it's super schmoozing time, as if I haven't done that all throughout this con. I got one of Gina's exhibitor passes so I could get into the panel without people bothering me. During the panel, sent Annie out and so I went too cos I wanted to see the dealers room. Came back during the Sera Myu videos but it was nice and dark, and I ended up falling asleep. ^_^;;;; I sneak out of there to meet up with Matt as a check point time. Matt, Hichan, Irvy and me were all going to share a cab to the SJC airport. I catch up with Kelly again and we go shopping. I get KinKi a chibi Bulleta for her White Day present. Saw Ikuhara and Mari around in person. Said bye to Aya and Tikki, and wow! Ran into Destiny (cutey Rinoa fangirl from last year). She couldn't get her Raine costume ready but that's okay. She has my E-mail and we can discuss AX plans on the net. I finally did end up finding my Li Syaoran shoes hiding at the head of Kelly's bed. I have no idea how they got all the way over there. I pack Matt's Venom pool cue with my sword in the guncase and get that ready to go. I'm so starved I eat at the hella expensive restaurant inside the hotel with SJ twins. I had a mushroom burger. A little emergency during lunch as I had to move the stuff from Gina's car to the PSeed waiting area but I come back in time. But at that time it's 3:40 and time to mobilize. We get on a green shuttle and head off to SJC. The SJ twins left about the same time, but they're driving. We get to the airport and erk, the check in line is long! I should have checked in outside with the other Seeds. But it's okay. I still have time since they didn't start boarding until 10 minutes before the flight was supposed to take off, and that was first class and people requiring special assistance and small children. Hey I should wear my Li and get on sooner. heh. NO. I head over to CPK where Matt and Irvy are eating duh, pizza. I wear Hichan's J.R. hat. ^_^ Oops. Probably time to board now, and I was right. They were calling my number now. Later SJC! Back home I go!
Daicon 2001
Location: Aladdin, Las Vegas, Nevada
This was a cozy convention, much like Charcon prior to it. With all the people at Katsu this week, we need a con on the West Coast to make up for that void.
Saturday: Wake up bright and early! 7 PM and got on the road. Ran some errands and intercepted the SJ twins. We actually got in gear to go to Las Vegas at about 7:50. Had a little stop at Barstow and at Stateline for some shopping. Didn't stay long except to buy some outlet clothes. From then on we arrived at the Monte Carlo where the twins would be staying and had a traditional Las Vegas buffet. I think we finally got to go to Chars at about 3 PM. Slightly off from the 12 PM arrival time. No sweat! Went over to Chars where we looked at all of Char's post Japan goodies and went to their local costume store and Serges. I didn't find what I wanted at Serges. Dropped by Mary K's (their tiny smoke laden arcade). After that, we were all hungry and retreated back to Char's for pizza. However Lisa and Natalie wanted to pick up the Dreamcast so we went to their place while Char took the twins back to wrap the present for Dai, a Rei action figure. Well after picking up the Dreamcast, we stopped by the local game store and got Rival School Project Justice in Japanese. Char waited for us to come back to order the pizzas, two cheese, pepperoni & pineapple and mushroom. Oh Char's going to kill me with all that Magical Babies talk. X_X. Anyways, we looked at all the Katsucon pictures and played some Rival Schools 3. I had to take the twins back to the Monte Carlo at about 11:30 and I returned to Char's place to camp out for the night. Darn the Las Vegas traffic!
Sunday: I think I woke up about noon. hee hee. The twins came over with Dai at about 2 PM and we got changed into the Capcom vs. SNK cosplay and headed for the Aladdin at 4 PM. I brought my Jin and I think I was scaring all the little kids with the spikes. So many spikes they started calling me Spike-chan. I took plenty of requisite "to-be-CG'ed-but-prolly-will-never-do-it" pictures. Chrissy got her Pirate fix for the day, and Dai got more than she bargained for Genie fix. Hee hee. She dreams of Genie! Char tried to get us to bellydance but we all evaded it while she was bellydancing as Vice. Then she got hit on by some guy from Texas. Hilarious! Afterwards we headed off to Star Trek Experience at the Hilton to eat dinner at Quarks. This was about 9 PM. We didn't finish until about 11 PM. x_X. But first, I must take on Dai at Marvel Vs. Capcom 2! We waited for a game to finish, but I got impatient and beat them off to clear a spot for Dai to challenge. Dai's Ken, Ryu, and Chun Li vs. my Jin, Bulleta and Iron Man. I get her the first time. She continues with Psylocke instead of Chun Li. She was working my team and eliminated Bulleta and Iron Man. So I was left with Desperation Mode Jin (there's a reason why I keep him for last) vs. all three of her characters. But with Deus Xex Machina, I pull off the most unbelievable comeback ever and beat her! Oh.... not a good present for Dai. Oh well. Boosts my ego. ^_^. I need the adrenaline to drive back anyway. We all head back to Char's to change out and I'm on the road back home at midnight. Thank god for the Mohave Desert Radio station. I also passed through this nice patch of zero visibility fog. Lovely. But I make it home at 3:45 AM and all in once piece! Woo!. Zzzzzzzz.
2000
Comic World 2
Location: Automotive Museum, Los Angeles, California
This was more prepared for than CW1, as more people that we knew were slated to come. And even if we didn't have a good time, we had a post con back up plan just in case. Journey to Little Tokyo.
Saturday: Nothing like waking up and watching Gary's Eevee kick some Pikachu tail. Pack Gary, because I need more pictures of him, and Kensou for Mako and Karrie upon request. Karrie and I will be competing in the Athena/Kensou this time around. Prior to that, I go to Tiff's to pick her up. I arrive at 9:20 to find Tiffy ironing and ironing. And then Tiff needs to do her hair for Sakura. So it turns out to be 11:05 when we step out of Tiffy's apartment. I nearly forgot to change into Gary, but in 5 minutes, woo I'm done. Tiff is smart and packs a change of clothes underneath the Sakura gear. We arrive at about 11:30, and the original parking area was locked. So we still parked. ^_^. We arrive and the only other cosplayers are Gina and Chrissy and Pu-chan from SJ running a booth. So Tiff and I are the first to sign up on the cosplay competition. #1, and #2. We go look around and Tiff really likes the atmosphere. She loves the fanart and little stuff she can get. She has her eyes on two buttons, an eraser and some stationary. Finally near 1 PM, TenKen and Kamui arrive. Kamui's conspicuously hidden in some dingy sweats, whereas TenKens in her Mimi outfit. We go to take some pictures, including the ACP one, then retreat inside to watch their previous Comicket videos. Mike Vocal also joins in and ends up attracting more attention with his home videos. Tiff is hungry so we're off to that strange chicken place. I dress down quickly before departing whereas everyone else (Gina, Chrissy, Tiff, Mike, TenKen, Karrie) are pretty much in full costume still. And boy did we get the stares, walking by the La Brea Tar Pits. We hada quaint little chicken lunch, but by the time we were done it was almost 2:40. So we need to head back for the 3 PM deadline for the masquerade. But then we figured out, we're the entire competition almost, so they can wait. No more time for extra Gary shots to fill my camera so it's into Kensou. We get there on time, but still end up waiting until 3:20 PM. 6 people, 5 entries. Kamui and I are the only joint entry. Just a walk-on. In the end, we get 3rd place and a bag of random stuff. I take the Gengar stress squishy and Kamui takes the Jigglypuff one. After all is said and done, the SeeD's finally show up. I change back into Gary to finish my roll of film. (and finally did so). Next stop, gather everyone, after a crazy photo session to drive down to Mitsuwa. We lose Lisa, Love Meeko and Mike on the way there, but they meet us there luckily, at the same time. Jon and CiCi meet us there as well. Everyone unloads their wallets at the bookstore. Tiff also buys some rice and snacks for karaoke later tonight. We walk over to the curry house to eat, and at the turn of 8 PM, we are out of there. Tiff, Hikki, Irvy and Bryan make the mad dash back to Mitsuwa for shaved ice, but fail. We get a large karaoke room, but kicked out after an hour. Karrie and TenKen's curfew is met and they leave. We loaf around for an hour drawing random stuff on the board, and letting Hikki massage people. Then we get a smaller room back and karaoke forever! People slowly leave the group, and midnight rolls around, and we thought we only had 1 hour in this room. We go check and aaaaaaa! We still have 1/2 hour left. Well it's really late now, so Tiff and I leave at midnight to return home.
AniMagic 2000
Location: Best Western Hotel, Lancaster, California
This was a small operation, a first year con. I expected it to be larger than CW, but not as big as ACen. And of course, iPlay was pulling a summon on me so it was kinda nice to have a skit decided on month before the con, where as my poor friends from other groups did last minute skits.
Thursday: I am so -sick- of watching the "Battling Eevee Brothers" episode of Pokemon over and over and over. But Eevee's always sitting down in the hackneyed pictures on cards and stuff so I have to watch Eevee rage tackle to see what it's hind legs look like. My 2nd Pokemon was completed today and just a wince more difficult than Togepi.
Friday: I wasn't even planning on showing up yet, so that gave me time to work on some Gym Leader Badges. I went through some extra Orange Island adventures to get the designs and names of the Orange Island League badges since those would probably be better recognized. Oh I guess I'd better pack everything too. Kensou, Gary, Chris x 3, and Terry packed just for Karrie. Cos Terry's cute or something -_-.
Saturday Morning: Man, I wanted to watch the return of Gary to the TV show, but I had to get on the road. Watched some of the Prima episode while I was eating breakfast and then I was on my way for two glorious hours of driving thru desert and mountains to get to Lancaster. I arrive on time at about 10 AM. Everybody I figured was still asleep so I was walking around the grounds in the Terry costume (since it looks normal) Actually I passed the Best Western hotel on the first time but then discovered that it -was- the right place. Went first to the pool area and ^_^;;;, saw the little stage construct. I get my pre-registration, #133 and explore the place. Luckily I ran into Gina, Albert and some others who came down to the dealers room. I got some of my costumes up and Gina took us back to the room #390 and #388. Rooms that were next to each other but no central door between the two. I'll be staying in #390 with Tiff and Mack. Tiff forgot her ACP badge! Gah! Anyways, Allie Henry Nick and Gina were in #388. So, not wanting to stay in Terry all morning, I changed into Kensou. Stupid shoe covers were always misbehaving. Henry got into Serge and Allie as Quistis and we all headed back down to the garage sale, errr, dealers room. There I found the rest of my team for this con, the iPlay girls in Shinra costumes. Exchanged room #'s their's being 287 and a meeting time. "Pick us up at 3:45 PM as Gary". hee hee. Thank god they got the sixth cheerleader. It would look hokey if we only had 5. They came through on their side of the bargain, so I have to use Gary. Karrie tried to assault me with her Reno baton but pppbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbt! Nice try. She's just lucky I didn't bring Strider to this con. Henry and Allie wanted to check out the stage (or lack thereof) and we didn't have to go within the confines to examine it closer. Went back to get their DDR tape so they could rehearse King of Dancing (DKOFII), which I probably would have been in if it weren't for my summon. Kensou gets pretty hot with his triple layers so I split off and walked in on Char's wig panel and chatted with Lisa and Brian for a bit. OOOOOps. I left food in the car. Better go get it before it dies in the super hot heat. Good thing I brought my own lunch cos, my roommates didn't eat anything until about dinner time. And I was starving. Strawberry Pocky and Fruit punch doesn't quite cut it. :D So I changed out of Kensou into the AGSMA 2000 shirt and went back down with the others for their Final Fantasy gathering. Took some pictures there, but then grabbed Allie back up to change into Athena. With Gina as Bao, and Allie's Athena, I had to get back into Kensou for the Psycho Soldier team. Course this is about 3 PM and in about half an hour I have to change into Gary and contact the cheerleaders. I took a flurry of Kensou pictures with the help of Nat's KOF moves book, including his "I'm an idiot and chokes on a pork bun intro". And an Athena rejecting Kensou picture, which I'm sure Allie enjoyed. And when all that was done, whoosh, back to the room to change into Gary. Rehearsals are at 4 PM.
Saturday: I scared Tiff after putting on Gary's hair back in the room because she didn't know exactly what that was for. Eevee was sitting around the room all day and finally now has a chance to go out. I visit the iPlay room and the floor is covered with sparkles. Half the girls have the hair spray and glitter and half don't but we need to go to rehearsals now. There were 14 entries with the first 8 being walk ons. A joint production between AGSMA and iPlay was #11. SeeDs were 10. King of Dancing was #13 (which was the same as DKOF at Fanime, #13). Mack was flippin' out. While we were at the stage, we looked over at poor little Eevee (Iibui) who was waiting by the tree and his eyes were glowing. I didn't make Eevee evil! We totally blew the rehearsal, cos I forgot some of my lines, cues were missed and we didn't do the complete skit on purpose, but at least we got the cues and the microphones set. The iPlay cheerleaders took this time to stretch and practice their moves. The stage is kinda cramped since it's about the size of two twin size beds end to end, but we'll just have to manage. After rehearsals were all said and done, we got some pictures while the sun was still out. But not that many. Back to the room to get dinner! Rooms 388 and 390 couldn't decide where to go so we all just went to the Rose Grill on the grounds. I got a barbecue chicken pizza in my dressed down Gary gear. WOA, Albert & Sunshine and the iPlay girls showed up later. Henry wanted to see what my cheerleaders would do if he ordered their table a single scoop of ice cream. They should have come beat him up. ^_^, but they didn't. After some digesting and re-suiting up in costume, Allie and Tiff wanted to go get craftsmanship judging to I kept them company down there. Also talked to the Baby Neko twins in their cutey Minmei outfits. At about 7:50, we leave the judging area to head towards the pool where I am re-united with 6/6 glittery cheerleaders.
Saturday Evening: Karrie: "Now Wayne, just be yourself and you'll be perfect for Gary. Actually no, use a little less ego than your normal self." *growls* Like usual I got some pre-masquerade jitters when entries 1-4 went on, but those eventually went away. After the SeeD's interesting Exorcist skit were were up. I got all my lines down, but on the third cheer, the girls started to crack up so there was no third cheer. (Refer to the script to see which cheer they missed) They just went on with Yay Gary to cute the music. After that it all flowed nicely again. Although the soundtrack wasn't dubbed over, they pretty much yelled the Hey Gary lines over the Hey Mickey ones. My cheerleaders loved being obnoxious and loud all throughout the rest of the masquerade. In the end, we took a judges award home so that was a nice return. And we took separate shots of Gary with each of the cheerleaders. During that time I had Henry organize the ACP picture and take it. Hrm. Henry might be getting an ego now too, cos he put himself in the ACP picture with the other 20 or so girls. ^_^;;;. Gary and his Cheerleaders head back to the room since the dance was coming up and we were going to change into different outfits. I thought their room was glittered up before but now it was just a gob of glitter everywhere. Karrie changes into Athena 2000, so I need to get back into Kensou. While I'm back in the 388, I convince Allie not to cosplay for the dance, but wear regular clothes. Henry puts on Serge. The dance was sort of happening so Allie, Henry, Karrie, Carol and the rest of them stayed at the dance for a bit. I finally fulfilled my promise to Allie from like 5 cons ago to dance with her. I still have to get Karrie though *narrows eyes* After which Karrie and I took a break back to the room to set up DDR and Guitar Freaks. We intercept Jon and CiCi and head over to 7-11 for a bit so that Athena could get a slurpee. That all said and done, back to the dance for a little bit, then up to 287 for a little bit. Then Tenken sends us back out to tell everyone that DDR is ready. No one's at the dance floor so we were wondering where Henry went. I know where he went as I glanced towards the poor area where I see a stupid grin on someone with glasses. "Karrie, over there". Henry's plan went thru and he dunked Allie in the pool. Of course he sacrified his Serge costume a little bit and MY Terry belt. Karrie and her big mouth challenged Henry to throw her in and before she knew it, Athena was dunked in the jacuzzi. Soaking wet we need to retreat back to the room so she can change out. Sorry no hug now Karrie! *brush off* Tenken wanted to change out of Kid when she found out that Athena got dunked so I took some pictures of her and whoosh. Karrie put on nappy pj's and sweats and there's a nice chlorine smell to her Athena outfit. I got into the Terry costume since Karrie things it's "so cute" for a little bit. Everyone assembled back at 287 for some DDR, and then Albert brought in the tape of the masquerade ^_^;. I never like watching myself on tape. It was a very short masquerade though. Afterwards, Mack and Tiff were going to retire and everybody started leaving. I do return back with Henry since SNK vs. Capcom was set up. I didn't hardly know what I was doing so I picked Zangief, Morrigan and I accidently put Honda at double strength instead of picking up a fourth character. I was getting tooled until Honda was up, and I cleared the round with Honda beating the last three characters to save the game. So I put Honda as the last character for each of my matches and I managed to survive Irvine, Wuken, Henry and even Albert's Kim fury. Well actually I totally lucked out since I put Ryo up against Al's Rugal. I'm sure the missing KOF moves has something to do with it too. After that it was like 2 AM so off to bed.
Sunday: Wake up at about 9 AM. Sneak over to Allie's room and snap a picture of her sleeping per Henry request. Henry returns a damp Terry belt and reports that his Serge costume is drying on Gina's truck. Henry needs a ride to the airport and Allie needs a ride home. I take Henry and leave Allie for Tiff to take care of. Especially since Allie wanted to stay longer and Henry needed to go at 11 AM. Change into Imperial Chris for about 10 minutes to show people who haven't seen it and then over heat and change back out. Move all the stuff back to the car and dine on cold barbecue chicken pizza for breakfast. Allie had some of that too. Hichan came over cos she woke up and didn't want to wake the rest of her group up. Went down to the dealers room to say bai bai to the iPlay girls in their Shinra get up again, and picked up the certificate for the award from the night before. Karrie has a scanner so she'll scan it in. Drove Henry to LAX and that was it. Repaired Eevee and put everything in it's own little place.
Comic World 1
Location: Automotive Museum, Los Angeles, California
This was a small little get together. A chance to see some friends. Even Gina migrated all the way from no man's land Novato to come! So it was a good time.
Saturday: Traffic! Augh! I make it to my old stomping grounds, but I've never been inside this auto museum before. I made it there at about 12:50 PM got my "badge" sticker for 8-19 ($10 later) and got my cosplay contest spot (#8) right before she was going to close the registration. There were about 8 dealers there, but I'm not really into doujinshi so I didn't buy anything. I saw Gina there to my big surprise. What a nut. We talked for a bit and I went down to get changed into Strider. I brought Laguna too, but Strider is not as hot, and it was about 85 degrees outside on the 4th floor of that building. Oh ya! No parking fees. Woo woo! It took be about 5 minutes to clear the dealers room. I also managed to annoy Karrie some with her "boyish" short short shorts costume with extra holes in the bottom. And reminded her not to glomp me since even if I'm not carrying Cypher around, I still got the grappling hook. The pre contest information session was supposed to be at 2:30, it ended up being 2:45. 9 contestants, and 10 people, since Carol and Karrie were in one group. They put us in this nice business room sort of place so we were all taking pictures on the tables, and I got my Sliding Roundhouse Attack picture without worry about damaging the costume. This is the first time I did a walk on, so it was just a slash and a pose. We came back to the business room and took more pictures on the tables. It was nice and air conditioned too. In the end, the brought back all 10 contestants back to the side where all the press and dealers were to announce the prizes. Strider got 3rd place. Which is not bad considering it took about 4 days to put together and this was the third time I was wearing it. And so now it goes into my category of costumes that have competed. I got 2 Digiko cards, 4 Houshin cards, One piece board and sticker book, and this SD Gundam enemy thing. I'm told it's an amphibious thing or something or other. Not a bad haul at all! Random anime stuff is good! The con (if you can call it that) was over by 4 PM so out of there and on the way home!
San Diego Comic Convention
Location: San Diego Convention Center, San Diego, California
This convention in one word.... blah. In two words. blah blah. Three? blah blah yeuck. Get the drift?
Thursday: I believe I had too many expectations for this con, and most of them fell short of their goals. SDCC preparations came plenty before AX ones were finalized, so I was ready to come down, relaxed and have a good time. What I got though was hours of slaving away, trying to finish the masquerade costume, minimal sleep in suboptimal conditions, with multiple auditory distractions, mosquito/spider bites which are both itchy and painful, and an essentially unfinished costume to compete with, which was only presentable halfway into the masquerade. At the convention, walked around as Laguna Loire with about 3 people recognizing me. "What's Final Fantasy VIII?" -_- I don't work with spandex, so I let my San Diego team handle most of it with trips down there for fitting and such. I come down to find that there was not much change in the status of my costume since last week when I dropped by, and alot of time was invested into the non competing walk about costumes. Fine, whatever. I'm not going to sit around and bail out something that was known for weeks, and second, I have zilch experience in stretch fabrics, and third, the San Diego team had their own plans on what to do next on that costume, and I wasn't going to interfere with that. Instead I'm going to finish my Strider costume so that I have something complete to compete with should these costumes not get done. Which in my mind, was a distinct possibility. So I managed to finish everything on my Strider costume that remained (securing the hook and straps), and the bandages. Oh but the belt was painted on Friday morning so not exactly then. Off to sleep where dogs barking and mosquito/spiders kept me essentially up all night.
Friday: Half asleep, another day of con attendance that started off past noon. Actually make progress in the costumes in the morning but 8/9 costumes remain unfinished, including all the walk around ones. The only one that was finished was Dana's. Was walking around as Terry and I knew no one could recognize me, it was kinda nice, since I was full of rage still and wanted to keep low key. Goku got alot of attention and I'm sure they would have lost me if it weren't for the reflector pads on my jacket. Met up with Lisa and Brian and Gina. Good thing I kept our masquerade plans a secret cos I didn't know if they were even going to go through. Alot of progress was made on the other costumes, but not mine. Also, didn't win the drawing for the Rumiko Takahashi signing. The only good thing that happened today was that I bought a SD Soujiro pin. Back to substandard sleeping conditions and pretending to be asleep so I wouldn't be bothered.
Saturday: Spent the morning slaving away at the masquerade costume while Ucchan and Ranmachan went to get their Ranma 1/2 #1 signed cos they actually won the drawing. Also recorded the crappy soundtrack because the recorder device would not lose the echo. And rushed those two to turn in the tape and return. Miffed at the prospect of needing to return at 4 PM, and the possibility that no Strider debut at SDCC sunk in. Rage level building. I go retrieve the two from the signing and we re-record the soundtrack, with lousy echo still in place, but better background music. Alot of progress has been made on my costume now, and we're at about 7/9 complete costumes. This is a hours before the masquerade mind you. Benma and I leave at 4 and I lose track of where my cameras are. Upon calling back and the two we left behind not being able to find the cameras, I pronounce them stolen and sulk/worry/apathy/isolate myself for the rest of the day. A little glimmer in the day was walking around as Strider which I amazingly got to do, and many people did think I was going to compete in it, including me since I was the only one at the masquerade check in for a long time. I caught up with Henry that got the only existing picture of Strider that I have. Also saw Rumiko Takahashi, but hey, nooooooo cameras. -_- But the rest of the team showed up with my unfinished costume. 8/9 costumes done and mine is the one that isn't. Screw the wings. Sewing machine broke down. No insignia, the mask isnt finished, no zipper in the back. What the hell! Added to losing the cameras, and missing all but one of the drawings for Takahashi signings for that day (and losing the one that I did make it to). A little note on that drawing. They said you only have to enter once, and they keep the tickets all the way through both days. That's a bunch of hooey if you look at the numbers. They throw out the tickets after each drawing. Look at the numbers for each drawing and they are all within 1000 of each other. If they kept all the tickets, you would come to expect a wide range of numbers. Knowing that I resubmitted, but still lost. 7:30 comes around and that's the last time we're supposed to take polaroids. I think we took them at 7:45 after sloppily applying the insignia on and speed stitching everything else. Send out half the team to retrieve forgotten goods back at the work room. Force down some dinner. The two come back, and yet, stuff is forgotten in the car, so they have to go back. The blacklights which were supposed to be manned by SDCC staff, sucked. The skit got boo'ed. I don't blame em either. My heart was not into it, cos mainly I was dwelling on the cameras. How can I be so careless? Hrm, sleep deprived, so starved I have no appetite, rushed, stressed...hrm! Upon taking Strider's blade back to the car, found it to have several more dents in it cos someone handled it while I was changing. -_- Just what I need. I changed out before anyone could take additional pictures, dashed to the work room not being able to find the cameras, and departed for home a day early. Sunday wasn't going to do anything different for me so better to be at home with a good shower, real food and a nice fluffy bed.
Anime Expo
Location: Disneyland Hotel, Anaheim, California
Anime Expo Year 3. But this time on real home turf. I need to use my advantage this time, all the stars are in alignment for this Expo. And this will be a Wayne run skit and script. *cackle* Boy is my team in for it now. Now where did I put all my Disneyana stuff....
Please click here to refer to the Chronicles from AX 2000
And read the purple text for my recollections.
Fanime Con
Location: Santa Clara Westin Hotel and Santa Clara Convention Center, San Jose, California
Fanime Con. I really didn't plan on coming to this one. But after much co-ersion and free wheeling I was "convinced" to go. Quite haphazard though as I'd only be doing a hit and run like I did last year, I still set out to have some fun! Although it was costly as a sustained a serious glue gun burn to my finger tip and have since then lost all sensation there. But besides that, I had three costumes of thinking to bring to Fanime, two would be worn. Laguna, Lei WuLong and Soujiro. Soujiro will have to wait. And so Laguna and Lei would be the lucky new debuts and Fanime Con 2000 will be the old guys whose names begin with "L" with long hair and guns cosplay for Wayne. Much nicer too since I didn't organize the skit this time around, so it was more laid back.
Saturday Early Morning. Very early morning. We're talking 12:10 in the AM. Heh heh. Finished Laguna's jacket at this time with my finishing touches on those four silver circle things that go two on the front and two on the back. I still have to work on that long haired wig. Cos....hello! I don't have long hair!
Saturday Morning: Hop on the plane at 8:20 and arrive at San Jose airport at 9:30. Halfway on the plane, I realize that I forgot to bring my Soujiro costume's dress shirt. Drat. But Laguna and Lei were complete so that's all that mattered. (And thus, Fanime Con will be the con where I cosplay older bishonen characters with long hair and guns. Wee!) Plane flight uneventful. Managed to do some American Cosplay Paradise updating while on the plane. *grumble* Henry better appreciate me bringing the laptop over. Allie was there to pick me up as part of my agreement to go to Fanime Con this year. Baggage was waiting for me downstairs at the claim. It was so fast. Of course something has to hapen cos I was at Concourse A. But, Allie had parked at Concourse C. ^^; Parking problems, eh? Can't we just walk there? No, somehow Allie managed to sweettalk some parking tram to take her to Concourse A. You know, twirl her hair, wink her eyes sorta thing. So we had to find the correct tram back. We were standing at a closed tram stop for a good 10 minutes until someone pointed out to us what idiots we were. ^^;. So we find the correct one and Allie drives me to the gorgeous Westin Hotel in the Magical Cosplay Machine (Landcruiser). Allie had fun parking the MCM, and we walked to the front entrance. I didn't pre-reg so it was $40 down the drain. Registration took me all but 20 minutes. Allie left with my luggage to go to room 445. I joined them up shortly, Tiff, Mack, Gina and Henry. They were pretty much all geared up, and thought that I had many more hours to go on the Laguna costume! But hey! I actually finished it! And the gun! Weeeeeeeee. Take that! Course it would take 3 hours before I was done with the Laguna costume cos it took that long to get Tiffy to trim the hair and style it. Good thing I brought the laptop for Laguna reference pictures for Tiffy to look at. Tiffy is just the best at hair styling! Henry, Allie and Mack were done early leaving me, Tiff and Gina to get ready. So they went off and had tons of pictures taken while me and Gina were shedding tons of black and white hair all over the floor and getting gel and glue in the wigs. I swear, the wig is possessed! It does not behave at all! Of course I had it trimmed to half it's normal size but still! Yes it's a wig. Don't expect to see me with hair that long anytime soon.
Saturday Noon: We completed Rinoa, Laguna and Sephiroth at about 12:30 PM. So after the other three we went a searching down at the dealers room. We have to wait about 10 minutes. Behind us were the cosplay twins, Lady Phav and BSL that Gina knew. We were stopped a few times for pictures. We finally got in the dealers room. Halfway down the first aisle I was *glomped* by some random girl. At least it wasn't a pure tackle like Henry got yesterday. And then, this girl, this same girl glomped Gina too. hee hee. We scope out the entire scene and no huge gunblades to be found! Or chain whip. But as we were deciding.... "hungry, must eat" and on the way out, we run into our Squall, Seifer and Quistis. And 1 minute later we were joined by our Selphie and Irvine! The Fanime Final Fantasy Fiasco Team had assembled. And many pictures were to be taken. Plenty of poses I took with my non digital camera. Someone wanted a picture of just Laguna and Irvine *smirk*. Henry and I also took the classic dumbfounded hac eyed picture of Squall and Laguna staring off into space. So classic. Lunch Lunch Lunch! I'm getting hypoglycemic at about this time. My Virgo twin too. So we had to return to the room. To get keys and stuff. We decided on going to Sushi Lovers. Well I'm game. We drive off to the AMC 20 and wait over there. Gina took a separate car. And Irvine and Selphie were coming separately too. Or sothey told us. We were all waiting. While we were waiting, we took staring pictures in front of the brass pineapple. That's where that picture came from. Also took a cute picture of Quistis and Rinoa too, in front of a pineapple. Finally after freezing in the blowing winds, we just went in to order food. I got a chicken/beef teriyaki combo. Mack and Gina ordered combos and the rest ordered sushi. I however, could not finish so now I had leftovers....dinner! Selphie and Irvine never showed up so we all returned to the hotel. Allie dropped us off at the door but it wasn't until we all got to the room door to the bottomless pit, that we remembered that Allie had all the keys. *jingle jingle jingle* Oh Allie's coming round the corner! Her silly Quistis bells make her noisy. It's quite useful! I must remember to make her costumes have bells at all times. I leave dinner inside and eep. We sorta need to get to the 4 PM rehearsal. We all jet over there, but keep on forgetting assorted doo dads. We made the Jolt bottle at this time though. But we forgot the pillow and the cue cards. We send someone back to get them after waiting in line. Behind us was the perfectly twin like Lady Phav and Baby Snow Leopard in their twin officer Jenny from Pokemon costumes. So I can't tell them apart. *sweatdrop* And so we wait. And wait. And wait. I don't wear a watch as Laguna so I am absolutely time deprived. Quistis and Squall were our time keepers. We went to the auditorium and turned in our forms. The FFFFT took up almost an entire row. And the row in front of us we used for the props. Wai! I meet up with Pyxie (Chun Li of AGSMA) who came through with her Vampire Miyu costume! That she sewed herself. With Heat N Bond too! Ah, my pupil is learning well! Muahahahahahaha. We take a couple of pictures together. Also meet up with Emi and adorable little Sara. She still doesn't recognize me. ^^; But she soon remembers. So cute little Sakura. Tons of questions ensued and we waited about an hour for the first 4-5 skits to rehearse. *zzzzzzz* We find out that we are entry #21. So we ran off to Ballroom C to rehearse. Heh, I still haven't listened to the soundtrack. So we go through the motions while we are effecting repairs to the Lionheart gunblade with epoxy and tons of black duct tape. After a run through, me and Gina work out what we need to do for the Laguna part of the skit. I must work in that leg cramp. It is essential for Laguna to have a leg cramp. I'll work it in even though it wasn't in the script. Since Pyxie won't be able to be my Julia Heartilly, I'll just point to a random girl in the audience. After a scout mission we were informed that it was our turn to rehearse on stage. Number 20 was up. We SCOOT. Number 20 was still rehearsing, whew. Good thing Nick (Irvine) was saving our two rows. Finally, #21 was called up to rehearse. This will be the first time I hear the soundtrack. During the rehearsal Mack's solid wood gunblade smacks Gina's solid wood sword with a loud crack. I didn't think much of it and handed Henry the Lionheart without any second thought. Allie goes into dominatrix mode and gets knocked out. As she falls back she slips over Tiffy before going to sleep. *cringe* That's gotta hurt. My turn to go on. Smack Irvine. Go to grab Henry and throw him at Sephiroth and grab my gun. I get my gun and face Sephiroth. As Gina turns around I see the sword is ALOT shorter than it used to be. Uh, no sword swinging for her. Laguna win music comes on....Oops that's my cue! *kill Sephiroth* hehehehehe. And the rest of the skit works out. But alas, a second prop casualty. Many people thought that broke on purpose. But we got good support during the rehearsal. Of course all that changed when we yelled out...."Anyone have duct tape?" Luckily TJ from the Soul Calibur group lent us their duct tape as we retreated back to Ballroom C for repairs and more rehearsal. The sword was still quite wobbly after much duct taping. Then I figured we could splint the sword with plastic knives or something.
Saturday Evening. We need to return to the stage at 7 PM to get backstage. I needed to retrieve some pictures from Fanime 99 for some people I met last year so I went to retrieve those. I was also assiged to get anything that could splint the Sephiroth sword. No plastic knifes from the plastic ware I got from Dallas Texas in 1999 from Akon, but plastic forks! So I took a pair of those, Gina's comb and file just in case. Caught up with the people I needed to and handed some pictures to TJ and to the Ryoko from last year. I had to find our group in the back and presented Gina with the godly forks of splint-dom. The first one broke easily. The second one managed to escape breaking by Gina, Henry, Mack and Allie. But muahahhahaha. Laguna snaps the godly fork. It will serve Gina's sword well. So we duct tape the darn thing in. There were two other Rinoas besides our Tiffy at Fanime. I took a picture of all the weapons while we had various members of our team holding our spot in line. Finally it was up to me and Allie to watch our spot in line. The last watch before we go on. We're up! And we send off Irvine to stage right and Selphie to stage left. Cue music and the skit starts. We declined the use of microphones due to the fight scenes so everything was yelled. The first audience reaction was when Squall, Rinoa and Quistis assumed battle stances and "bounce" like they do in the game. *please oh please let the gunblades and swords hold up during these three minutes* Jolt! Double Team! Our absolutely great fanboy Aaron (who was Five Star Story Mirage Knight entry #18) brought in the pillow for all the sleep attacks. Dominatrix mode. Sleep. Squall dreams he's a moron. That's my cue! -_-. Head over to Irvine, get a good look at the sign and punch him. He switches the sign to "Dreams he's a Galbadian Warrior! Sorry!" Sephiroth misses. Go over to Quistis (who didn't fall over Rinoa this time) and nudge her. But then something else catches my attention. Gina misses again. Point at some random cute girl in the audience and pretend she's looking at me. And then, in pure Laguna style. *cramp right leg* Duck and Gina misses again. See Selphie's warning and flail over to Squall to use him as a distraction. Grab the gun and again, unload a clip into Sephiroth, winning the game! Stand off to the side of the stage in a smug win pose. Seifer grabs the sword and Squall wake up. Rinoa wakes up. Slow motion. Seifer and Rinoa kiss. Irvine and Selphie kiss. Quistis rustles up Squall. Poor Laguna is left by himself! *sniff sniff* I want my Julia Heartilly! All in all, no props broke on stage. It was a flawless skit. And we got a good response from the audience and the backstage crew and cosplayers. We return to our back room and collapse, take off painful boots and eat. Henry and Mack return to the room to get my dinner and lemon bars, purified water. Allie eats some of my teriyaki chicken as we are waiting for the cosplay to end. There are way too many people out there by the television. I'll just watch it on tape.
Saturday Night. The awards are finally announced. SoulCalibur wins something. I can't tell what. Then Sailor Jamboree. Then First place goes to us! Weeeeee! We did it! $75 at Anime Depot. Whatever that is. And then for the walk ons.... Jaymie Pyxie wins for a second year in a row, first place walk on for her Vampire Princess Miyu and Larva. Wai! And later on, even more surprise, Allie won another award for the Fanboys Choice. She got a Eevee fan, a Macross shirt and something else to be given tomorrow. After the awards are all said and done, we gather all the belongings and go out for the photo ops. I see red and green flashes all over. Chocobo Steve and Aaron were there as well. We did all sorts of poses including the classic "staring off into space" pose with Laguna and Squall. Even for a request picture from a kawaii Rinoa with Laguna got alot of pictures. Steve Bennett even got in a picture with us telling us how his brother loved and laughed at the skit. Of course he also wanted to meet the owners of American Cosplay Paradise. Eventually Fanime staff moved us out of the area to go down. So I told everyone I met that I'd see them at the dance. We all retreated to the room and dressed down. I got rid of the wig and gloves and boots but retained the jacket, belt and earrings. Allie retained most of her costume too while everyone else changed to something more comfortable. Jon shows up and takes some pictures and get the Dreamcast set up. Me, Allie and Steve head down to the dance. We get a nasty rumour from Jon that the dance got disbanded.
Sunday. Stroke of Midnight: We head down there anyway to find out it's true. So we loiter down in the main hall for about an hour. I catch up with Jaymie again and we take more pictures. Also I get a chance to talk to Aya and Karen. Outside where the dance is, I run into that kawaii little Rinoa that asked for a picture with Laguna and I shamelessly plug my homepage and give her my URL and e-mail. ^^; Bad habits die hard. After being extremely bored for that time, Allie and I head back up for a KOF DC tournament. I can't get used to the DC controller! But my throws are getting there. heh heh. Of course as the night goes on, my skills taper down with my consciousness level. We infect Chocobo Steve with KOF ness who must pick Choi and actually did well with him (only cos he had a pimp hat). At about 3 AM we all patter out and clonk out. I sleep in the little space next to Gina and Allie's bed since I didn't want to get stepped on my Tiff and Mack if they had to wake up at night. Morning wake up 9. Zzzzzzzz.
Sunday. I wake up first at about 8:45 and got us the late check out at 2 PM. I got into the Lei costume in 5 minutes. Instant cosplay, gotta love it. A slight modification from a hair extension I got from KinKi Claudia at SDCC99 attached to the Laguna wig and voila! Lei, in Supercop mode. Allie got into Tiffy's Tifa costume. Henry needed to be Orphen for Albert. Mack went out with Zell hair and Tiffy as generic cat girl. Gina went as Dan again. We went down to the dealers room to find out that Anime Depot was a video store. I needed to buy some FF8 dogtags but none were to be found. *sniff sniff* I'll get em someday. I can't keep on borrowing Allie's dog tags every time. I think we agreed on Saber Marionette J series for the award. I took pictures of the Lei WuLong costume from Tekken for the webpage, as well as a Orphen's under arrest picture. heh. The cosplay coordinators got a hold of Allie and presented her with an official Fanime T-shirt and a gorgeous life size Belldandy poster! *jealous jealous jealous*. Time is approaching for me to go since my flight is 1:30 PM. So we head over to the art show to retrieve Ashley's art. The auction is not done yet so we leave it there. We head up to the room for final packing and I change out. I say my good byes, and Allie takes me to the airport (correct concourse this time) to fly home in the rain. Thank god no driving. And zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz all the way home.
1999
San Diego Comic Convention
Location: San Diego Convention Center, San Diego, California
Please click here to refer to the Chronicles from SDCC 1999
And read the purple text for my recollections.
Anime Expo
Location: Anaheim Hilton and Convention Center, Anaheim, California
Please click here to refer to the Chronicles from AX 1999
And read the purple text for my recollections.
Project A-kon
Location: East Wing Hyatt at DFW, Dallas, Texas
The tenth anniversary for Project A-kon, what excitement. I had first heard about it in late 1998, and had really wanted to go. Unfortunately, none of the other AGSMA members were free during that time, and I was still unsure about my schedule myself so I shuffled it to the back of my mind. Until about March of 1999, when Allie had invited me to come with her sisters to A-kon. They were planning to do a skit from Sakura Taisen or Sakura Wars, and so I had decided if I could get a good airfare, I would go. Lo and behold, I got one. Even though it was an icky transfer flight, I really wanted to go. But it would be kind of silly for me to go spend an entire weekend with them without contributing to their Sakura skit. So I asked Allie to find me a suitable character to cosplay so I could be in their sketch. After rejecting several attempts of getting crossdressed as female Hanagumi members Kanna and Iris (and one attempt at Leni), I was finally shown a picture of their enemy unit commander, Aoi Satan. Such a cool costume, but complex too.... But with a month before the convention I decided I would postpone a work in progress in order to finish Aoi Satan for A-kon. In addition to the Sakura Taisen Cosplay, Ah My Goddess was planned for hall costumes. After some brief discussion with Tiffy, I decided to go ahead and be the President of the Racing Club, Rival to Keiichi and admirer of Belldandy, Aoshima.
Thursday. It's Thursday already? 12:01 AM and I am working on Aoi's black kimono. With a recipe for a kimono by Allie, and 4 yards of black baroque satin, I was hand sewing feverishly after not being able to get a double needle sewing machine to work. Ah, Heat N Bond hem tape is the godsend of cosplay costume production! Allie told me on Wednesday it could take her 2 hours to complete a kimono with a sewing machine. So for me, that would be about three times as much, sans sewing machine and prior kimono experience. I was up til about 5 AM, and I had 90% completed the kimono. Woke up at 8, and did some work on the blue vest. I had planned to do some major sewing of the blue vest and belt on the plane trip since it would be a long flight. I grabbed a bunch of supplies (glue gun, paint, scissors, fishing line, needles), Chris costumes, and packed everything to go to Texas.
Thursday Night. Well almost everything. When I arrived in Texas at 8:30 PM, I found out that I had forgotten to bring Aoi's sandals that I had worked so hard on before. Argh! I was so upset. Not as upset when I found out that TWA had so grossly thrashed my swords that I had made for Aoi. Upon arriving in Texas, Allie and Ashley were there with a very cute sketch of Soujiro for me. It was decided once again that if grew my hair out a little bit longer, I would be the perfect Soujiro. After waiting about 20 minutes for the luggage, my super deformed box with my swords came out on the conveyor. Even with careful packing, it seemed like TWA ran over my swords or something because the box looked like hell. Both swords and sheathes were bent about 30 degrees clear in the middle in two spots. Luckily from a distance, the damage to the swords themselves was not so apparent, but the sheathes would need some quick repair. So I left the war-torn carrier box there, and with Allie and Ashley we departed for the room with the damaged swords. After a ever-so-delightful ride on Casey Junior (I-think-I-can tram system at DFW) we arrived at the Hyatt at DFW, Room 2312 on the third floor, where Henry and Tiffany were waiting. On the door, there was a sign, "Cosplayers will work for cookies". I was the last to arrive so now the team was complete. Hungry! Need food. So I dropped off my stuff and we went out searching for sustenance. Our travels took us to the West Tower of the Hyatt where we found the SOS Diner. A 50's styled diner that was 24 hours and had reasonable pricing on food. I had a Mae West chicken sandwich, Ash and Tiffy ordered potato skins, Allie had a humongous chicken salad, and Henry got the cheeseburger, fries and vanilla shake combo. At the time the food was good, and the placemats filled with water and sprinkles amusing. But little did we know the SOS diner would be an oh too familiar place to go. I still got alot of work to do on Aoi. As of arriving at the hotel, the completion stages were, kimono 90%, vest 30%, swords 90% (were at 100%), hair 10%, dragon headband 50%. The Ah My Goddess walk about was scheduled for Saturday so the goddesses were ironing and getting the wigs ready. Not only that, but with some musical arrangement, the goddesses started to dance on the beds like total lunatics. In preparation for Keiichi, Henry took a shower but didn't dry his hair, for the perfect bed head hair tomorrow. The wig for Sumire for Sakura was also done at that time. I, myself, started work on the dragon, since it needed to be painted and would require drying time. I had some pre-made scales from the airline trip so I had those painted. I also went to work on fixing Aoi's sleeves which were 5 inches too long and did not have the rings attached. A little before then I had called to check which room C had arrived in, but according to the hotel, she had not arrived yet. I thought that was odd, so I left a phone message. But then, I got online and checked my E-mail to find out that she was indeed in hotel and located in room 2774. I dropped by but thier CD player was too loud so I had to go back down and call. Contact! We had originally planned to do dinner, but since that was a bust, we decided on lunch the next day. I think the entire Sakura team managed to retire at 2 AM with Ashley going out first, Tiffany, Henry, Allie, then me.
Friday. Wake up call at 9 AM! Time for the goddesses to get ready. As for the Keichii and Aoshima, we just stayed in bed, since our costumes (if you can call them that) would take ooooo, about 5 minutes. I managed to squeeze in some more working time on the dragon, and got more scales ready since I only had about 1/3 of the scales done. Skuld couldn't bring the hammer, so sad, but she had her bug. It was about 11:30 AM when everything was all set and we set off for the art room first to display Ash and Tiffy's work. Ashley had her work for sale, but Tiffy's was display only. Then off to the dealers room. I must have stepped on Urd's cape about two times every hour, scoring scorn and bitterness points from her as she'd reel back and choke. ^_^' Blinded by lights. So many pictures of the goddesses. Of course there were people to didn't recognize Keiichi and Aoshima and didn't want us in the picture, or cropped us out (which is what I suspect) but that's alright. As long as some people realized that the real reason the goddesses wanted a Keiichi and Aoshima was to prevent fanboy attacks or harrassment of the goddesses. Muahahahahahahahah. Keiichi also served the important role of money carrier for the goddesses. Interestingly enough, it was Skuld who needed the most defense. Poor Skuld. Sick if you think about it tho'. At the Studio Ironcat table I established contact with COSP ML'er H-chan first, and subsequently also met M-chan, Dan and Tikki. It was so great to finally meet all these great cosplayers in person. After some serious photo-ops, we were interviewed by a familiar group (that me and Henry met at Anime Central) They asked us a variety of questions. Henry and I were all ready to answer "Green!" for their "What is the color of bitter?" question, but they caught on to us. So they asked us "Peanut Butter, Crunchy or Creamy?" The boys answered crunchy. The goddesses all answered creamy. Ergh. These people did an interesting filming technique too, from the feet to the head, all the while claiming not to be crazy fan perverts, but they were paid. So logically that would make them paid fan perverts. Where do we sign up? It was so great to be recognized too. "You all so great, you even got the jerk! (Aoshima)" Oh that made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside, aaaaaah. The jerk. So what if my character hits on Belldandy when she is already going out with Keiichi? heh heh. We then heard two announcements, barely, but heard the distinct word "karaoke" in them, so we left in a mad dash to find the karaoke room. This brought us to the con ops eventually. When we entered, the man said "Oh I have what you need!" We were all bewildered to say the least. At he had 6 badges and was about to go laminate them. We were mistaken for guests of honor! He was about to hand us badges of Ippongi Bang and her crew. We found it to be quite amusing, except for no one could tell us where the karaoke was. Finally we went back to the dealers room to find out that the messages only mentioned karaoke in reference to an anime quiz show. Drat! Break for lunch! The goddesses were hungry, so we retreated back up to 2312. I had suggested that we change the room sign to "Three Goddesses, and two boys" At this time, I wanted to change into a Chris, but couldn't decide which form. Allie and Ashley wanted blue and adorable Chris. But when Henry came back after a brief trip stating he saw a girl who looked like she might be a Chris, with a blue shirt and gold medallion.... Riot Chris here I come (to the dismay of Allie). We decided the hospitality suite would be a good place to go. I called up C and said I would get stuff and meet her, Woody and Paul after wards. But of course, we needed to find where the con suite was. Back down to the dealers room. I tracked down the rumoured "blue Chris" but found out that she was in fact Robert, and not Chris. Henry needs his vision checked, or at least some more King of Fighter's experience. Talked to Margaret (Felicia) at her booth who asked "Are you going to confuse everyone again and change into blue Chris later?" But of course, that's the fun part. At the Iron cat table I ran into a nice Japanese lady who immediately recognized me and wanted my picture. Turns out that she was a big King of Fighters fan and her favorite was Iori. But then she started speaking Japanese....*sweatdrop* But I think with the nodding and smiling it went alright. Also got a full custom team picture with Clark (Dan) and Robert (Ibuki). There was something wrong with the camera so I had Henry take these pictures. I thought it might have been a battery problem. Afterwards, the group finally found out where con suite was, and we went up to the tenth floor. We had to wait 10 minutes but they had sandwiches, chips and vegetables all ready for us. I held on to Skuld's gloves so she could eat, since Chris has pockets! I got my plate of food and headed down to 2774 where I chatted with C, Woody and Paul over lunch. She finally got to see the flames and my medallion, and I go to see the Chocolat gloves, Haz Knight Armor and assorted metal spikes. They needed duct tape so Henry and the goddesses brought some down after lunch. Unfortunately, I was experimenting to see if I could fit in one of Chocolat's gloves (I swear I did not put on the rest of the costume) but couldn't get it off before the goddesses showed up. *sweatdrop* I barely got the glove on but it took about 5 minutes to get the darn thing off. The goddesses and Keiichi were going to watch some anime so I went on run to get 3 volt batteries at DFW. While at DFW, I picked up some crucial cardboard, courtesy of Delta, and plastic forks (which got lost) but empty handed when it came to the batteries. I geared up into Blue Chris mode and went down to the dealers room to confuse people again. Got some cute pictures with Tikki and Dan and we chatted for a bit. While I was there, a pair of Japanese workers for Studio Ironcat were sorta talking to me. (the typical nods and sign language) They motioned that they wanted to take a picture, but I didn't understand why they were crouching. So I did a pose as Chris, and lo/behold, they wanted a picture of the Chris hi-tops. *sweatdrop*. Sure! *fix fix the hi tops* Sure! *put feet together for the perfect picture*. I must say, never had people only wanting to take pictures of the shoes before. Tikki had brought along a digital camera which ran on floppies. Luckily for Henry's digital camera, I brought my laptop along so he could dump pictures on the computer without problem. I ran into the Bakeretsu Hunters as well, but no functioning camera! So no Chocolat glomping cute lil' Chris pictures, but I promised Sunday we'd fix that situation up.
Friday Evening. I was only in Chris mode for about an hour and went to the room to work on Aoi some more, while the rest of the group watched Rurouni Kenshin. Neka finally arrived to the room and brought along cup o'noodles and tortilla chips! Woo woo! The serpent headband only needed some minor touch up. I ironed out the kinks of Aoi's blue vest and put it together with the 8th natural wonder of the world, Heat N Bond. Then at 9 PM, the Karaoke would start. We had some great plans for the karaoke so I once again, changed into Aoshima and we left for the Futura room. Episode 2, as we affectionately called it was originally planned for Sakura Taisen and Oogami, but due to constraints we switched to the goddesses. It was the second Karaoke, and while Keiichi was singing "Natural Playboy", Aoshima would harrass the other goddesses, until finally he glomps Urd and Urd beats him down. It was fun (but Henry also managed to clear the room). The goddesses practiced Geki! Teikoku Kagekidan in preparation for tomorrow's skit. Also at 9:50 PM, Henry sang a dedicated song for Allie. Oh it was sooooo, ummmmm, we'll I'll let you decide. "I dedicate this song to someone in the audience. I met her as a goddess at Anime Expo, but when she took off her costume, she was still a goddess. *_*" Digicam in hand, I was all ready to take super blushing/embarrassment pictures and I did! Luckily that finished before 10 PM so Henry and I went to see if the COSP ML meeting was going to happen down in the lobby. Tikki, Dan, H&M-chan were all present and accounted for, but I didn't see Ruby so I guess the room party was a bust. Hey, but I got some nice pictures though! Me and Henry retreated back to the room when we decided it was time for dinner. The goddesses got out of their costumes, but Urd shed sequins ALL over the room. I mean all over. Everywhere. Little shiny black hexagons on the bottoms of our feet. Allie and I refused to go back to the SOS diner so soon, so we stayed behind to eat ramen. Neka, Ash, Tiff and Henry all left for SOS. Allie was busy ironing to get ready for Sakura while I was finishing putting the vest together and working on the wig. Ha! They scoff at my use of polyfill for the ponytail. I will make you see! *as I had to beat down Henry a few times with the stuffed ponytail* Hrm! Pillows are a good source of polyfill *looks the other way* *shove shove* Oh, back to the ramen.
Friday Night. We had ordered a coffee maker on Friday and decided to put it to good use. Course poor Allie was stressing that "the light won't go on!" "Try a different outlet" "Try cleaning it" (Boy did it ever need it with a layer of dust). After about 30 minutes of this rigamarole, we ordered a new coffeemaker. This time it worked. Lo and behold Henry comes in about 15 minutes later. "I can't stand the wait, nor the incessant arguing about Tomoe" "Henry, what do you think about Tomoe?" So Henry returned to come eat ramen with us. We weren't sure if the ramen was hot enough so Allie and I let him be the guinea pig to eat the first cup. He lives. So I was next, and then Allie. Course the plastic ware I borrowed from DFW earlier was no where to be found, so we had to rely on Tiffy's spoon. Not only that, but the rest of them returned shortly after Henry started eating. So much for 3 minute cup of noodles. I started playing 80's music and the dancing queen Tiffy got up and boogied again. This was about the only time we heard American music all weekend. (everything else, Geki! Sakura Wars) Allie got done with all the ironing, so I enlisted her to work on the teal hem for Aoi's vest while I worked on the wig. And worked we did, for a long long time. We finally worked out that 1/4 inch hem tape was too big so we simply cut it in half to conserve the teal cloth I had gotten. And back to work on the wig. "Wayne, what the hell are you doing?" It involved a lot of running back and forth to the mirror and readjustment. Not to mention the hair strands I made and the crude cardboard ruler I was using made everyone stare.
Saturday Early Morning. It's 2 AM and Allie has finished with my vest and off she goes to beddy bye. I am still up working on the wig, and added trim to the sleeves and collar and edge of the kimono. I also fixed my uneven teal belt. I finished my wig at about ten minutes after Neka's morning wake up call at 7 AM. (Imminent system failure, shut down commencing) and clonk! I was out for 3 hours. Rose from the dead at about 10, shower and frosted my hair white. Great now I really look like an ojisan. How distinctive. Allie and I were the last to get fully geared up since we had the most restrictive and HOT costumes. The serpent headband was a genuine pain to get on and keep on, it really binds to your scalp. I periodically had to readjust it to get circulation. Got a great comment though, "I love how you solved the hair problem" (in reference to Aoi). We went down to watch Orphen and 3 episodes of His and Her Circumstances. Then the Sakura troupe was off to the dealers room. Plenty of pictures and a quick interview with Akon staff. And we're back up to the room. Break time. Allie and her Sumire outfit flops face first on the bed and we take tons of pictures whilst she is immobile. I take a detour over to C's room and eep! Kind of bad timing. But we still talked for a bit so I guess everything was okay. Rehearsal upon the return. And more rehearsal. It was decided that Henry was the most mobile, and least conspicuous so we sent him on a run to SOS to get potater skins for me and Allie, a salad for Tiff and himself. We went thru that Sakura OP hundreds of times, but rehearsals paid off.
Saturday Night. 6 PM rolls around and it's time for the show. They had told us 6 PM was dress rehearsal but only about 2 skits got to rehearse on stage. They started filing us in order right away. We got number 53 out of 70. C and her Maze group were in the 30s, and Tikki was smack near the end. we got placed in this alley, much reminiscent of AX98, but at least there was water, and we stole chairs from the auditorium. There was a question about using the nerf gun onstage, but we got it cleared. Our turn was up, and it was a few second delay before the music went up. Otherwise the skit went off well. No curtains for me to hide, so I made it appear as if I was infiltrating the opera house. After all was said and done we were shuffled outside, and had some photo ops. We went to a door to go back inside but was stopped by the guards. So we went to the next door and went in without a hitch. The masquerade was over and now was the time for the judging. I got tired of the little games and interludes so I went outside to chat with C and Tikki. Came back in time for the Mari Ijima concert, and Tikki sat down with us at the last song. When the awards were being announced, I could barely hear a thing, but we all knew that Tikki won when Bang was on stage going "Pika Pika Pika, something something Myu!" And I knew our group won best something when i heard 53! Sakura Wars. The feeling was great but they shuffled us off stage right after we got the award. No "absorbing time". And afterwards we took pictures with the trophy and once upstairs on 23rd floor, we took our re-enactment photos. And whew! Showers and changing out of costume! Finally. I am mobile again! Went down to the dance to intercept Tikki and H-chan, but then we moved on since they needed to change into shorts and I had to get Allie and Henry anyway. Called C to meet us at the dance, and finally we were there. But no Tikki or H-chan to be found. Next time, I'm getting room numbers so I can find people. Spent 10 minutes looking around the inside of the dance for C's group, when they were in fact outside. So I figured this would be as good a COSP ML photo anyway when off in the distance at the stairs, I saw a familiar face. After a brief stare contest, it turned out to be Malinda! Found her finally after a day's of casual looking. Rob Lantz was just walking down so I decided now was as good as time as any to get a COSP ML photo, and I could get the Studio Ironcat affliates tomorrow at their table. Afterwards I hung out with C's group and went off to SOS diner for a late dinner (yeh yeh, SOS again). We were done by 2 AM, and I was wondering if I should peer on the dance floor to see if Tikki and H-chan had returned, but I was so tired, and an elevator had just come down, which was way too tempting. So off to crash to bed.
Sunday. Awwww. Last day of the con, I'm always so sad. Went as normal Chris to appease Chocolat's glomping needs, and Allie went as Rinoa, Tiff as Tifa. C had graciously let us store out baggage in 2774 for today so we didn't have concierge problems along the way, since check out was at noon. Got another COSP ML group photo with Tikki and M-chan (right before she left), Malinda, and Allie behind Studio Ironcat and then *glomp* Chocolat caught lil Chris. And we got that picture. Finished off my last shot with an adorable picture with Allie and MegaChibi near con ops. Went to the screening room to watch 2 episodes of Card Captor Sakura, and I saw the infamous bat clothes I was supposed to study. About 2:30 PM and *growl growl* Another trip to the SOS diner! (What a surprise) I had the Southwest burger (with a mountain of jalapenos), Ash had chicken soup, and Tiffy/Allie split a cheeseburger. After wards a long hike to the 2774 to get our luggage, couldn't say bye and thanks to C for the space (she was at the Scarborough fair) but we did leave cookies for Woody. And a hike back to the "I think I can tram" There was a super delay and tram shut down for about 20 minutes. Not to mention when it did go, it was super slow. I thought I was going to totally miss my flight! And of course, my tram exit was the last possible one. Allie and Tiffy left at gate C, Ash at B3, and I bolted out at B2 in a mad dash to get on a plane. Checking in two bags! I've had them all the time, packed them myself, no one offered me weird stuff! Give me the boarding pass! Then the metal detector with 5 minutes to go. "Can we take a look at your bag?" (thinking "HELL NO, my plane is right there!) But I still managed to weasel my way on board and that was that. Few. A good time to assemble recollections.
Anime Central
Location: Ramada Hotel, Rosemont, Illinois
It's Chris-mas in May! (Insider joke, I set a new record for being in costume, from 9:30 to 11 PM as Chris/Orochi Chris) At Anime Central, the 2nd year for this convention, and it was sort of a last minute excursion. Unlike Fanime Con, planning stages for this convention started two days before my arrival (Thursday). My most portable costumes are the Chris series so those went along in the suitcase. As through the COSP ML, Allie had introduced me to Henry "Genjitsu" Lee (A decision she will surely regret) and in the company of Laura and Gina, we all hammered out the preliminary version of our skit "Brute vs. Cute". I was slated to bring Chris and Orochi Chris, while Henry brought Sanosuke with 7 ft sword, and so putting the worlds of KOF and Rurouni Kenshin together would be a task until Laura pointed out that Soujiro Seta bears a striking resemblance to Chris. Too cool! And it was just all downhill from there.
Saturday Morning. Arrive in Chicago early in the morning. Eeeeeee! I hate cold weather. I should have brought Trunks if I knew it would be this cold. As predicted got to the Ramada at 9 and registered. With badge ready to go, now it was time to find Henry. 30 minutes later of unsuccessful searching, I decided I would be easier to spot if I changed into Orochi Chris. Still alot of "Who are you supposed to be?" but more people recognized me as Chris at Anime Central than Fanime. Ran into Tom and he got a fantastic picture with the flames sparkling in the flash, so that was extremely cool. Finally at 10 AM, run into my cohort of crime, Genjitsu in Sanosuke gear. Poor guy, he's staff, but he works like a slave. Good thing he's one of my minions my skit partner. Who says I can't talk with forked tongue? We head up to the staff suite to get his huge blinking 7.4 ft sword for a walk around and trip to the dealers room. While in the staff suite we did a dry run of the skit, since the masquerade coordinators "needed to see the sword". "It's ok! But don't swing that thing around on stage, we don't want to lose Amanda Winn." Still need to hammer out some kinks, maybe that one half of the sword. Plenty of photo ops on the way. The security gave us a little slack when we first came in the dealers room. Henry must have hit 15-20 people while we were in there. But like clockwork, about 30 minutes later, Henry's Sanosuke sword got us kicked out of the dealer's room! *evil grin* So we dropped the sword off at the video game room and we were *this* close to getting back into the dealer room until Henry was whisked away by security. (Not for the sword, for staff duties!) So I spent some time playing Bust A Move Tengoku Mix (songs not as catchy, but I do like Kelly's new costume!) Well Shorty's and Kelly's songs are pretty good. But not too caught by the other ones. They had Powerstone up and running too, SFA3, MvSF, VS, and Pocket Fighter.
Saturday Afternoon. I swear, my diet turns into a fast food bonanza when conventions come around. Anyways, spent most of the afternoon strolling about the con, shopping etc. Nothing too exciting in the middle. But I did change to normal Chris. And for some reason, Henry got a blow dryer delivered to his door. I wonder why?
Saturday Night. Finally caught up with Henry at about 6 PM, because I staked out the video room where his sword was and he had to come back to get it. All the cosplayers began to amass at back room, and there were indeed a ton of them there. After 15 minutes of thinking, "That person in the Gundam Wing costume is probably Heero," got enough courage to blatantly ask. Yep! That was indeed Heero Yuy from the COSP ML with tons of shaving cream to keep her bangs up. Luckily for her, Henry had a blowdryer in his room so that she could re-liven her bangs. Serendipity? Hmmmmm! Extra convenient of Henry to have that blow dryer ready on a moment's notice! "Oh, I can run up and get it for ya! It's not an inconvenience at all!" Chatted with the Ralf about KOF and cute KOF figurines (I need to get the New Face Team!). I also ran into Mink and Pen Pen, who have visited the AGSMA page before, and so attempted a recruitment for the COSP ML. We'll see how that turns out. Also saw Dark Mokona as Chocolat Misu (but didn't know it at the time). Since Henry was staff at ACen (*grumble*) we were almost dead last in skits (5th to last skit). But I wasn't grumbling as much as my lil' buddy who didn't eat dinner! So we miss alot of the skits. We did another dry run in the hallway and finalized our skit (just the 27th revision). I had brought a Togepi just incase we couldn't get a Pikachu, but we got one. And so we decided to use both for added kawaiiness. Chris is about to reach Super Kawaii-yajin Level 3 right now. Whew, no matter what, I'm gonna do this skit and be super cute at all costs. With Togepi and Pikachu in tow, I'm good to go! Lucky for us, Henry's 7.4 ft sword was planted on stage left for us prior to the skit. Unlucky for us, Henry planted Pikachu on stage left as well when it was supposed to be on stage right (Smooth!). We still got by. Borrowed Felicia's purse to hold Togepi (upside down) at the beginning of the skit, looking kawaii as ever. Was very pleased that people recognized it as Togepi. After Henry got his sword, I noticed that he knocked the Pikachu clear off stage (Double Smooth!). So when it was my turn to react and get the Pikachu, I used my Chris speed, darted around Sanosuke, flew off stage and jumped back onstage with Pikachu in hand to set us back in the right direction. Didn't get to use the "It does a battle good" since people were cheering too loud from "Got Pikachu?". Emanating pure cuteness as I was at Super Kawaii-yajin Level 4. I'm sure people were dropping from that radiation. We started to exit stage right, but we were re-directed to stage left after picking up all the props. They shuffled us back and forth across the stage twice for pictures, and we came up with the sword catch photo for Chris. A very sweet pose, with Chris clapping down Sanosuke's sword right before him. After all was said and done (doing the MST3K thing during the Music Videos and Awards Ceremony), we departed to a local restaurant for milkshakes and nutriment.
Fanime Con
Location: Wyndham Hotel and Santa Clara Convention Center, San Jose, California
Fanime Con, 5th year Anniversary would be the first year that I would come to this convention. Planning stages for this convention began early, with plans to bring Trunks and Mr. Satan up north for a visit. And through contact with the COSP ML, a King of Fighters skit was also in the works. The DBZ skit would remain similar to the one at AX98. But for the KOF skit, many many E-mails, a few cancellations, multiple script rewrites, and two tape edits, that skit would be a-go-go-go.
Friday. In the morning, I put together a real shoddy verion of the KOF tape, with pre-dubbed voices. But of course, sans microphone and other life forms nearby, I did all the voices for three characters. Without making one of them come out talking like Cartman or another of my comic impressions, all the voices turned out to be different intonations of my regular voice. Horrid. Get all the KOF costumes packed, (DBZ had been transported a month earlier) and flew out to San Jose. Met up with AGSMA member Tenchi, and we departed with a school friend to the Wyndham. I was pre-reg'ed, and it took me a whole 3 minutes to get my badge. Who knew? Got a colored Giant Robo badge. Tenchi was not, and it took him a whole 10 minutes to get his badge. That's darn fast. Cruised the dealers room and sighted Ippongi Bang. Caught up with Gina and Mack as Kyo and Shingo. First it was just a stare contest because I knew who they were cos they were in costume. Until I positively ID'ed Kyo to be Gina, gears clicked and they figured out who I was. Transported the KOF costumes to their room and played them the horrid KOF tape. Also, tested out the Benimaru outfit to see how it fit and took some pictures then, in room 321. Returned back to Tenchi's Dojo for a re-recording of the tape with his voice for Kyo, while I still did the other two voices.
Saturday. Bright and early, went over to room 231 to change into Chris from King of Fighters. Did a walkabout with Haohmaru (Gina) and Tachibana Ukyo (Mack). Hardly anyone knew where Chris was from but they recognized the costume, I think. Got a nice picture with Ippongi Bang's Lum, and did all sorts of cutesy Chris poses for pictures. I was in the Chris outfit so long, that Gina started to call me Chris! What's worse off, is that I responded to Chris! That's when you know you're in trouble. Anyways, had a run in with Godzilla. After lunch an a quick break, switched to Benimaru. Kind of hard to miss, being another foot taller with bright yellow hair. It is so fun being absolutely narcissistic. I was the subject of a debate where someone thought I was crossdressing. Sha! Benimaru is a guy! Another run in with Godzilla. Caught up with Allie just out of her SAT's and retreated back to the room to change out. Need circulation to the brain.
Saturday Night. 5 PM, Departed the Wyndham for the San Jose Convention Center. In my nWo shirt and Trunks sword in tow, encountered a very nice Chun Li cosplayer, who was curious about the sword and I promised to intercept later. Geared up into the Trunks gear and Tenchi into Mr. Satan gear. Mr. Satan had some problems with the moustache, but nothing a little tape couldn't fix. Backstage ran into Chun Li as promised and exchanged homepage addresses and compliments. Plugged the homepage with Ryoko and Sami as well. Evil! Anyway. Also saw the Ryoko and Sami from ComicCon and the COSP ML lurker Shorty. A strange request in the dressing room, they wanted to record all the cosplayers singing the ABC's. Before me, they were singing the regular ABC song, until I got up there, and sang the ABC's to the tune of Aozora No Knife, just for kicks. Afterwards, in true competitive nature, Chun Li sang them to Mary had a Little Lamb, I think. Back to the masquerade... 30 walkthru's and 13 skits. DBZ would be skit #1, and KOF would be skit #13. 30 walkthru's later and a 20 minute intermission, we did the DBZ with a wireless microphone. Learned quickly that you have to speak pretty darn close to the microphone for it to project. Mock punches and the money bribe went well. During the running off stage to change into Super Saiyan, the music was stopped, I guess they thought the skit was done. With no sense of time rushed back on stage as Super Saiyan Trunks to finish the skit in a hurry. Last few seconds of the skit, Trunks was to pursue Mr. Satan, but the Super Saiyan hair broke in half. It must have taken some damage during transport from Anaheim to San Jose. Needless to say, Super Saiyan hair will be retired after Fanime, and any future appearances of Trunks would solely be the lavender hair version, sans purple eyebrows. Changed out of Trunks into flashy red Orochi Chris, complete with the Flames of Destiny. Uh oh! Ran out of film! So a refill would have to wait until after the masquerade. While I was waiting, a Kenshin adored the Orochi Chris outfit and wanted one to wear as casual wear! Last skit of the night, the Dancing King of Fighters skit. The KOF crew decided we would lip synch our words slightly off cue, for that lousy dubbing taste. When we got on stage, I heard a "Where's Benimaru!" Evidently someone remembered from the earlier walkabout. I was flattered that someone knew. I so wanted to say something like "He's out washing his hair." Kyo challenges Orochi Chris, who splits the Flames of Destiny into two, and the Aozora No Knife Music starts. In true Strike fashion, Orochi Chris dons the sunglasses and takes a swig from his silver flask. Now people knew what was going on. From then on, the skit progressed well. After Mari's concert and the awards were announced with the conclusion of the masquerade, I dashed off to the car to get more film. But when I returned, many of the cosplayers had already departed, including Chun Li. But. I got another picture with Ippongi's Lum, this time with Orochi Chris, so the sticking around was worthwhile. I got the picture I wanted, and thanked Bang for the opportunity, and was about to leave, other photographers wanted Lum and Orochi Chris to pose again for their cameras. Twenty odd flashes later, and a little detour, returned to the Wyndham for the dance party in half of the Orochi Chris outfit. Met up with Rinoa Heartilly (Allie), Gina, Mack, and Shorty and whew! Almost forgot about that COSP ML picture. But we got it, downstairs, right outside the dance hall. Muahahahahaha! Now Shorty TJ would need to speak up on the list instead of lurking! (That sure worked well, not!) All in all, a long day, but extremely fun. To the rest of the COSP ML'ers dismay I informed them that I probably wouldn't see them on Sunday.
Sunday. I didn't stick around for Sunday, I had a flight out at noon, so it be difficult to meet up with the friends I met last night who no doubt were tired. So E-mail will have to suffice. And sleeping in is good.
1998
San Diego Comic Convention
Location: San Diego Convention Center, San Diego, California
Please click here to refer to the Chronicles from SDCC 1998
And read the purple text for my recollections.
Anime Expo
Location: Anaheim Hilton and Convention Center, Anaheim, California
An only anime convention, what a blast! I heard about this convention back in 1995, since we were asked why we didn't go to Anime Expo with those costumes (maybe it's because we didn't know and didn't have them completed yet). So I decided to scout out the scene with Trunks costume in tow. The Trunks costume was complete in 1997 and I wanted to show it off, so this would be the place. I had a script drawn up to go up against Piccolo (from SDCC 97), but he couldn't make it. Luckily, in 4 days, I managed to create a Mr. Satan costume and convince AGSMA member Tenchi to go on stage with me. Wow. Why are all these people walking around in costume? It didn't occur to me that walk about costumes were welcomed at AX (when they would have been disqualified at SDCC). No dressing rooms? No tape? Boy am I spoiled by SDCC. Anyways, while waiting in the huge line to get back stage, we were #47 or something like that, the Viz photographer wanted to take our pictures. That was cool! Unfortunately on stage, the microphones weren't set high enough to hear our conversation, so it was more of a mime show. A problem that was apparently affecting many skits. Next time, have the conversation on a tape and lip synch. I think the audience got a kick out of the sideburns on Mr. Satan, as one person yelled, "It's Elvis!". All this going on while the audience was chanting "Satan, Satan, Satan." I am so glad we got audience approval, since they were especially rough for some reason. We didn't stick around after the awards were announced, we were tired and hungry and it was approaching 0100 hours. Too bad too, I heard we missed the big photo ops, but -NEED FOOD-. Definitely need to come for AX99 with walkabout costumes and taped dialogue.
1996
San Diego Comic Convention
Location: San Diego Convention Center, San Diego, California
Oh. This was the year we learned alot of painful lessons. Our last minute preparations really got to us this time. Ryoga wanted authenticity when I distinctly said no. That lesson along cost us about 15 seconds of stage time and threw off the entire skit, so that we ran past the tape time. Also found out that we need some serious choreography to tape practice, as well as stagehand education. Also learned some lessons about armor creation, and showed everyone the wonders of drafting. I was able to draft up a replica of a full size arcade stand up machine with joysticks. Perfect true to life size. Too bad my armor only allowed 75% chest expansion. Will remember next time. The effects were great though, I was still smoking about 15 minutes after the skit.
1995
San Diego Comic Convention, 25th Anniversary
Location: San Diego Convention Center, San Diego, California
What an excellent year. One month before the convention, we knew the plan. 1995 was the year the entire team was Ranma 1/2 infectious. Ranma, Ryoga, Ukyo, Mousse, Shampoo, Akane, Kuno, all accounted for in beginning. The script was complete (or so I thought). One week before the first day of the convention, I thought to myself, "Maybe I should start working on the Mousse costume." Four days later, $20 of cloth, and hours of sewing and ironing, most of the costume was done. Claws were done a month ago since they were the easiest. Unfortunately, the claws were too long for me to wear both underneath the robe, so I only brought one down to San Diego. And an unfinished wig. And what I thought was the complete script. Not bad when I arrived, the other's costumes were about 80% complete, except for Shampoo (10% complete). But boy, when the convention started, work on the costumes sort of lagged behind. Thursday.
Friday. During the day, I went to the Playstation area and beat someone two rounds straight in Battle Arena Toshinden. I used some guy with a staff. Pretty cool! In retrospect, maybe I should cosplay him, but then again, Battle Arena Toshinden's out of style now. And so I was one of about 70 entrants that got qualified to win a Playstation (at that time $300). At the sign up, first met up with the lady I call, Indiana Jane.
Saturday. Yikes! That's the day of the masquerade! We need the tape complete! (Uh, didn't you bring the tape?) No, I thought you guys made the tape. Ahhhhh! Rehearsal and going over the stage was quick. We all are at the Con for about two hours and then make a strategic retreat to handle business. At Chateau D'Ucchan, I had my wig perfected (trimmed and permed), as well get geared up. Same for all the other costumes. I have time enough to make a huge mallet for Akane, and stuffed it with old Yellow Pages. All this going on while we try to find a tape with enough dialogue to go with the script. Can the original script. Go for the intro to the OAV's, Love Panic. Dig up Akane's Sisters and with VCR/Stereo magic, tape Love Panic on to a tape. American translation. New one hour thought up script was rehearsed about twice and into the cars we go! We get there in true AGSMA style (last minute) to hand in the tape. I think we were around number 30. Met up with Indiana Jane again. The skit went off well. Akane and Ranma-kun would be on the front of the stage while Ukyo, Mousse, Ryoga and Kuno were backstage, but visible. Ranma-kun is posing. Akane, sitting down, is supposed to lose her hat in the wind, but she forgot. She stood up, and Ranma presented her with a white flower. How touching! Just like the OAV picture. Our little advertisement girl (was supposed to be Shampoo) came by with a sign "Poster for $10.00". Of course she attracts Ranma's attention and makes Akane flustered. But as Ranma goes back to look at Akane, he notices that Ukyo, Ryoga, Kuno and Mousse all approach, and has no time to worry about Akane. Akane marches back stage to get the mallet. Ukyo, Kuno, Ryoga and Mousse each charge Ranma and attack him, and Ranma-kun manages to evade all the attacks. Thinking that he's all that, he looks to the audience, but not before Akane marching behind him and nailing him with her mallet (We told her "just use a little force") But that must have hurt. The mallet took damage from Ranma-kun's hard cranium. And then Akane improvised and dragged Ranma-kun off stage by herself. That's right herself. What type of vitamins is that girl taking? So the rest of us improvise and start attacking Ranma-kun when he's down and out. End skit. Ended a little fast, before the song ended, but was still a blast.
Conclusion. One week after the convention, I get a call from a stranger. This is Sony. We are pleased to announce that you have won a Sony Playstation. You will need to notorize the award and we'll send it to you right away. Awesome! Totally worth the trip.
1994
San Diego Comic Convention
Location: San Diego Convention Center, San Diego, California
Sorry, still a fanboy of American comics in this episode. So much that we dressed up as characters that nowadays, are far from common household names. And they took about.... hmmm, one hour to put together. But we got our pictures in their comic. You'll never find them! Maybe at the discount bin in the comic book store you will come across the right issue, or maybe the paper recycling plant. Those makeshift costumes have long since been recycled as well. I think. Mine is anyway. And, the Masquerade gained a little more prominence. "Why don't we go for the Masquerade next year." Lovely trouble we got ourselves into, eh? At this time, I was starting to be disillusioned by American comics.
1993
San Diego Comic Convention
Location: San Diego Convention Center, San Diego, California
Well this was number one. The first convention I ever went to. Man, was I the fanboy (of American stuff) then. Camping out a friend's place, checking out the exhibit hall, and all the shows. Even went to the Casino Night (back when they still had Casino Night), and the dance party. Masquerade what? I remember all the Klingons and Bajorans but that's about it costume wise. The Masquerade didn't even cross my mind, just some wording on the schedule of events.
You can reach Wayne Teh-Run-Ke-Sze by:
メール: (for Japanese patrons) waynekaa@hotmail.com
E-mail: (via AGSMA coordinator) agsma@acparadise.com
AOL Instant Messenger ID: TrunksWICQ: 26776365
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Wayne "Teh-Run-Ke-Sze" Perfect Spin Off Cosplay (PSOC) ｩ.
Anything Goes School of Masquerade Arts (AGSMA) ｩ.
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Use this hammer to break out of frames
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