Alright..  I admit it.  I’m horrible at writing reviews of cons I go to.  I take months to write em, I’m never consistent about what I write about, and most of you probably don’t care. ;)

But I’ll write something anyway.  I think for Katsucon 007, I’ll just talk about things as I remember them, per day.  Most of you probably won’t know what the heck I’m talking about, but hey, it’ll give you some insight on what the average con-goer remembers. :)

warning..  I ramble.  especially at 2am. 

Soooo....

Thursday!  Due to wild turkeys detaining the original music video contest coordinator, I was stuck compiling the contest, right up to when I was supposed to leave for the Airport for my flight down to Washington DC..  Living on one hour of sleep, I manage to get it done, get my bags packed, and hustle out to the airport..  Little did I know that this was to be ....

THE PLANE RIDE TO HELL...

Well, not quite.. But it sure felt like it.  Flying gently..  For the first 10 minutes...  It was so peaceful, flying into the clouds... The seatbelt lights go out, the friendly stewardesses hand out drinks, everything’s norma... ----kerthunk---  Ohoh.  Next thing I know, the plane feels like it wants to fall out of the sky.. It feels like an elephant is having a temper tantrum in the back.  Turbulence, bad enough to cause the stewardesses to sit down immediately and the seatbelt lights to turn on with an evil yellow glow....  Turbulence that lasted for the rest of the flight.. Forty minutes, staring out the window in fear of seeing the ground rushing up at the WRONG angle, making peace with the powers that be and my life on this Earth. 

...

After landing, and kissing the ground repeatedly, I make my way to the hotel to sleep.  Sleep is good, and its about the only steady sleep I’m to get for the whole weekend.

I meet up with some of the Thursday crew, and go hunt up some grub...  Dinner...  And poison daiquiris..  Now note.. I drink Virgin Strawberry Daiquiris once in a while.. This drink should NOT be bright neon pink, and it should at least have ONE real strawberry in it....  But I digress.  After dinner we go get the first DDR fix of the night. 

sometime around 11PM, I decide that I really should get some stuff printed up at Kinko’s, so with the assistance of Johnny and Dei, we take a quick drive.  I print, I cut, I get stuff mounted, I wave to all the sleepy eyed Katsucon staffers who are busy printing stuff too, then we run back to the lobby of the hotel.

We find Richard “Pocky” Kim, and the four of us promptly sit down and start playing Asian card games, and swapping childhood stories of growing up in an Asian household.  I get cursed out multiple times by everyone playing, and eventually, I remember that I’m a total idiot.  I left a CD at Kinko’s, full of sensitive information!  Augh!

Its quite cold in February at 3am, especially when you’re running to a car in shorts and a t-shirt.

So we recover the file, run back, and suddenly decide.. its time to sleep.  Course its almost 5am now.. But hey, you gotta sleep sometime..

Friday!  I wake up to find that someone at the foot of my bed has spun like a top and spun himself into a cocoon, gleefully stealing the blanket..  The nerve!  After we kick him awake, the crew in my room get dressed, and start wandering around looking for people.  You know the story.  I don’t need to repeat it. We find people, we hug, we scream, we socialize, blah blah blah.  Rinse and repeat all Friday long.

At some point we have to go out to the airport to pick people up...  Now, for those of you who don’t realize it, the airport is only five minutes away from the hotel..  In the pouring rain, we make it there in five minutes..  Fine.  We pick up the person, turn around and head out.

It takes 45 minutes to get back.. Must be some kind of weird space/time break.  Either that or... we got lost.

Once we’re back, its a rush over to the Otakon table.. That table’s going well, so I run up to get dressed up.  Making an appearance as ... well.. it wouldn’t be SECRET if I told you what I dressed up as right?   ;)   I spend a little time getting people to show up to the Otakon table by being loud, then start the mad rush to make sure the Music Video Contest happens.

The contest starts without a hitch, I get to say a few words, and then I get to run off to...

The Most Excellent and Stupendous... Music Video Panel.

Well okay, maybe I exaggerate a bit, but it went off REALLY well. We had a healthy crowd to listen to the four music video creators that were in attendance..  The panel went on for a jaw breaking 3 hours, and would have gone longer if we had let it!  Most of the conversation centered around creative aspects, which was a pleasant surprise to most of the veterans.  Questions ranged from the typical to the best question of the panel, which was targeted at the so called “successful” creators.  To paraphrase.. “Which video was harder to make, the one that made you a hit, or the one right afterwards?”

After what I will say was the most enjoyable AMV panel I have ever been on, I sit on the floor in the basement, watching people wander around and eating Pizza while talking to my buddies, who are all pissed at me for spending so much time in the panel.  ..  Whoops. 
Its now almost 2am, so we run off to help lil Aja celebrate her birthday..  A small herd migrates along the 15th floor, and hits my room for a DDR fix, then migrates back to Aja’s room to have cake and hang out..  By the time 4 am rolls around, alot of us start staggering off to faint.

Of course, I don’t.  I wander down to the lobby to take a few last photos for the night, see Brad staggering into the lobby walking off the Punk Rock Anime party, then chat for a little while with last minute costumers...  About 6am, I faint.

Saturday starts off with me tumbling out of the giant bed to stagger into the shower.  I spend some time hunting down extra Music Video contest ballots, make those arrangements, then make sure the 12 o’clock showing happens like it should.. .Once that’s going, I run off to lunch.  All the guys decide they want as short a trip as possible, so I end up having lunch with four ladies.  Do I complain about the freezing cold walk to the mall? 

Don’t be silly.  I flower my girls then go shopping with them. ;)

We get back to find the Otakon table is running along just fine, so I go to hunt down Y2KJ and Aja, to give them their DDR fix.. I get caught by Staff, so I get delayed for 15 minutes dealing with Katsucon staff stuff..  ...  I get back to my room to find a message on my machine... 

“Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet? Are you there yet?”

...   After I hunt down the two YOUNGSTERS who left that message on my machine, we get a quick DDR fix, and I get dressed in my alternate outfit.  We hunt down more people, collect more hugs, goof off...   I skip cosplay this year, again.  Y2KJ helps me count music video ballots.  After a while I gather the refugees who skipped Cosplay as well, and we all play a little DDR and hang out.  I wander downstairs to take photos of cosplayers as they exit Cosplay, gather everyone else and go back to the room.

We decide to order Chinese.  NO!  We order Pizza.  Why? Because at 11PM, there’s nothing else.. (I miss New York City for a few minutes now..)

Wander off to go watch...  .. no..  Takeshi’s castle is too crowded.. Its past midnight now.. Alot of us are tired.. and suddenly, people FLEE..  Everyone disappears..  We’re left with me, stick and Bunni..  .. . I don’t believe this.. Its Saturday night at a con and we’re.. 

BORED!

After 10 minutes of this, we get fed up.  We grab Humpy, the #CAML-Anime mascot, and run off to stir up trouble.   Humpy, the #CAML-Anime mascot, proceeds to have a good 3 hours of HUMPY MOMENTS...  More on those in the photos of Humpy’s World Tour...

Around 3:30AM, most of us wander to bed.. Humpy goes to bed.. I wander over to hang out with artists for a couple of hours.. then I faint as well..

Sunday sees me so tired and achy that I almost have to do a controlled fall to the bathroom.. My shower consists of me mostly turning the water as hot as possible and praying that it’ll ease my tense muscles, and trying not to slip and reenact scenes from “Final Destination”. 

Its around 10:30, and people are already planning to go, so we rush around, trying to find people for breakfast.   Got a nice little breakfast going at the hotel restaurant, a nice buffet...  Just um, guys, remember, no stealing muffins for your non-paying friends.. ^_^; 

After breakfast, I run to hunt down Katsucon staffers, so I can make the winners tape for Katsucon’s music video contest..  This is a small adventure in and of itself.. Rushing as fast as I can, and then RUNNING from the top floor to the basement, I manage to show up to the announcement show..

15 minutes late, sweaty and out of breath.

Duane and Joe make their winners choice announcements, then I make the main contest announcements.  Whee, what fun!  After this, I finally get a chance to shop in the dealers room..  Finally...   I make off with only ONE item, a Lupin lighter..  With a P-38 trigger guard!  Its a great little toy.

A bunch of us run over to Steve Bennett’s panel to talk convention business, and just to hang out for a while..  I find out that Tris and I won stuff in the Ironcat raffle, but since we weren’t there we lost em!  (I was busy announcing videos.. wahhhh)  Wander over to Takeshi’s Castle and see ONE episode..  The Vampire rocks. 

After this, we spend time saying goodbye to yet more people. <sniff>  Depressing!

We get dinner at a local Chinese place, not bad, its surprising to get authentic Chinese food around here.. :)  We say goodbye to Dar, Scott and John now..   Its just me and Tris, playing cards in the lobby...

Wait..  John, what are you doing back? 

Seems John lost something in my room, thereby preventing him from getting on the plane..  Not that I’m complaining, it means we get more people to hang out Sunday night. :)  We find the lost slip of paper, shuttle over to the airport and back..  Grab some leftover chocolates and play “Feed the starving artists” in the lobby.    Its like a herd of rats converging on a random crumb, in three seconds flat all the chocolate is GONE!

So now we’re in the lobby, and its time to finish what I started.. I quickly train some people into playing Asian card games, specifically, “Big 2” or “Chaw Dai Di”...  Everyone who plays gets addicted.  Eventually, everyone who plays starts cursing me out instead of calmly passing when they can’t do anything.. <sigh>  Oh well, the price of skill!  <evil grin>

After two hours of this, I wander over to Pocky’s room.  He’d been muttering something about card game revenge all weekend, so I give him the opportunity. 

HE FAILS!! HAHAHAHAHA<cough cough>    Ahem.

The people playing at this point start cursing me out again..  .. In different languages....  IN SIGN LANGUAGE! 

After a few hours of this, my much smaller crew wanders back to my room to take care of minor details and prepare to go to bed..  I peek in Pocky’s room to see that everyone’s cleared out.. <eep>  Go back to my room, spend a little while chatting with John about “what makes a con fun” – then faint.

Monday is always a rather unsteady day after a con, even more so when you’ve been getting about 3-4 hours of sleep for almost a week.  I get woken up by my cell phone, its a (awfully chipper) Scott asking about breakfast.  Fine fine, drive in.  I fall back asleep, eventually to get woken up by his knocking on the door.   I look at John, grin evilly.... and start saying..

Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet? Are you awake yet?

Sweet revenge...  :)  We all pack.  (yuck.)  We go grab breakfast.  My hamburger moos at me.  After choking down the still kicking cow, we all head to the airport.  Thankfully, no misadventures getting there.  Everyone says goodbye, and I get on the plane.

Thankfully, the plane decides to stay in the air this time.

I get home.  I throw my stuff in the corner.  I fade to oblivion.  Thus ends my story.

And if you actually had the patience to read through this, you have my respect!  Go get yourself a pocky and a soda.  You deserve it. :)

Doc_Ido