As a staff member for this con, it can be difficult to remain unbiased.
While it is in my duty to promote the convention, it is also my duty to
bring attention to any problems that may come up. More importantly,
I’ll just be busy as hell for the entire weekend. While a lot of
work was done through the year, this report will be about what began on...
Off we go!
As soon as I put in my last 8 hours at work, I zipped back to my house to pack my bags and clean some junk out of Yamiko-chan. Then, I dived onto the Baltimore beltway, just past the peak of a rainy rush hour to go pick up @ndrew and his dance equipment. I had just about hollowed out Yamiko-chan to get it all in, but did it.
Gonna have to come HERE again.
We get near the Sheraton, and have to stop for gas. At least the
gas station also had Jolt! Heheh. Got to the hotel, and trucked
everything to the room. Discovered the room was already half occupied,
but despite the surprise, I knew there would be four to the room.
Wasted no time in pulling out the air mattress, then we went to Wendy’s
for a pre-con meal. On the way back to the hotel, we notice that
some police had pulled over a suspicious white van.
@ndrew: “Maybe they’re looking for that sniper.”
me: “I sure hope he doesn’t affect the con.”
@ndrew: “I can’t believe you just said that.”
Ahh... what’s going on here?
Was woken up and dragged to a meeting next door. After a shower and a change of clothes, went to help out with registration for a few hours. People were already lining up to get in. Lanyards are MIA; hopefully they’ll be here today. Program guides are lost somewhere on the DC beltway. After prepping up a bunch of badges, I get into my planned duty of working the t-shirt table. Needed some markers and post-it notes; gotta love those side-streets in somewhat familiar territory. Steve brings over several large boxes of Pocky. It makes me feel like some kind of drug trafficker.
Got Pocky and Jolt, ready for action.
Dealers room has opened, so business is picking up some. A 19” TV about 30 feet away is showing Chobits, can’t read the subtitles. Can’t even hear it. Later they were playing some crack-type anime; Patti kinda got the name for it, which is Azumanga Daio. It’s on the schedule here, but again I’m busy working.
Selling Pocky for the con brought forth interesting comments and responses.
c: “I can buy this at Anime Pavilion for less than this.”
r: “Guess where it came from.”
as well as
c: “I can get this at an Asian supermarket for less.”
r: “Well, there’s not an Asian supermarket in here.”
The Pocky is for impulse buying, for people to snatch up while they’re
caught up in the high spirit of buying. I tried to be polite, but
sometimes I felt compelled to bluntly point out the obvious.
Hobnobbing!
My table is right next to Christina and Jo Chen; they’re quite talented and personable. I showed them the sketches that Aeris did in my notebook, and the Yamiko-chan badge, and they commented that she was far past the beginner stage. A lot of people have been asking me where I got the Yamiko badge, and where could they get one too.
Those responsible for the error in the schedule have been sacked.
The time was up, and even though I had a small break towards the end,
I was glad to be done. Did get a Trigun figure, and then got some
more Wendy’s food with Cliff. Some scheduling snafus resulted in
annoying a lot of people that wanted to see Witch Hunter Robin, but last
I saw that was being addressed. Got back, wandered around to the
room that was showing Pita-Ten 5-8! Watched that, then the AUSA version
of MST3K, which was more of open heckling than the full setup that Otakon
does. The movie chosen was “A Wind Named Amnesia” which is something
that years ago I thought about getting, never did, and now I’m glad I didn’t.
After that room closed for the night, I checked out the last naughty bits
of the Nan da to? hour, and called it a night.
Why do I have to wake up before noon at a convention!?
Woke up, had to go out of the room to use the bathroom. There was just enough time for me to grab a shower and get the t-shirt table up and running. After the dealers room officially opened, it actually started to get a bit lively.
But I’m not really a guest...
So I’m still here, kicking back. Patti asked me to sign her program book. Wow, I’m like some kind of convention personality celebrity now, I guess. Then I gave her a Yamiko-chan badge. During a break, bought a neat-o looking Kanon art book. I want to see the show, although I bought the art book solely on looks. Then again, that’s what they make art books for.
Not much else happened while I was in there, when it was time for the room to close, zipped over to the green room for some food. After that, I picked up my camcorder and went to prepare for the Cosplay. Wow, there’s a line to get in! Only downer is that all I brought with me were my 3-hour camcorder tapes, cause I know I’ll never be able to fill the whole tape with just AUSA’s cosplay. Maybe I can use the same tape next year.
And, wheeee!
Everything fit in just over an hour. Hm, Marc’s happy about something to do with over 800 people at this con. That’s a believable figure. Spent a couple hours in the room talking with some of my roommates, then spent some time wandering about with various people from the York club, including offering piggyback rides and just overall tomfoolery, the kind you can only have after being up until 3 AM in the morning. We would stand on the elevator for several minutes, just to see if it would go anywhere without any input. There was a Staff/Guest party going on, but since I’m not much of a drinker and my friends weren’t staff, we just goofed off outside the room until it got too noisy and crowded.
I’m not sure how the evening ended, all I know is that when I got back
to the room, I was the only one there. Two of my roommates were on
the night shift, and I had no idea where Andrew was. I had given
him my last bottle of Jolt earlier that day. I was running on some
serious caffeine myself, and while I know I wasn’t acting too crazy, I
know I wasn’t really myself. Look at me now, I used to just go to
these conventions with just a clue as to what I was doing, now I’m helping
to staff one. Have I truly come so far? I lay down on my air
mattress, and drifted into slumber.
Wait a minute... I was supposed to be working?
Woke up around 10:30, about an hour later than I should have. Much to my relief, the table was being taken care of. My presence served to offer a break to my fellow staffer.
Mmm, goodies.
Around noon, it was time for AUSA’s Anime Tractor Pull. Goofed off in that, then went back into the dealers room for packing up the remaining shirts. Found some old Transformers for reasonably cheap. A full set of the green Constructicons! They were missing the weapons, but I had those at home.
Did a bit of wandering around, cleaning up some of the mess as I went, and grabbed some food from the green room. The Chen sisters have some relatives that own a restaurant nearby, so they had some samples with them. Good thing too, I was getting hungry.
Going into “Drooling Fanboy” mode for a few minutes.
Right before closing ceremonies, I mooched some sketches from some of the guests. After the closing ceremonies, @ndrew and I got his equipment into my car. We helped unload some refreshments to my car, as well. Dinner at Fuddruckers to celebrate a year of finally making it officially into the black, then onwards to home we went.
So that’s how it was. AnimeUSA 4, what a weekend. I only
wish that I would have spent less time doing one single thing, but that
comes with the territory. All in all, I had fun. Good fun,
and while I was tired by the end, it was a good kind of tired.
Attendance: About 900.
Highs:
The line of where the good times began is blurry. I’ve been getting closer to a point where I begin to appreciate more and more of the convention. But I’d have to lean towards watching Pita-Ten, the late night romping around, for starters. By being in the dealers room selling shirts for a good portion of the weekend, I met a lot of people, including some of the guests. Plus, it’s nice to be able to go to a convention and not spend too much, job or no job. Again, the air mattress proves invaluable, and well worth taking along.
Lows:
I guess that would have to be being slightly less than prepared for the Cosplay, and being stuck in one place for much of Friday and Saturday, but even then that was fun. Then there was the matter of that sniper on the loose, causing many people to not come at all. (That asshole has been caught.) Sure wish more people would have bought some shirts.
Nourishment:
whatever I could grab from the green room
massive burger from Fuddrucker’s
stuff from Wendy’s
several bottles of Jolt
Cost overview: In light of the fact that I was staff and got a bunch of things paid for because of that, it really cut costs for me. Just over a hundred bucks, entirely because of fast food, gas and goodies.
As it looks, unless something really drastic happens, I’ll be on board for it next year.
Up next: Neko-con 5!