LOOK INTO MY NOSE
(aka Suze's Adventures at the 2002
B&B Convention)
by Suze, Queen of the Con Report
(tm) ;)
Dedicated to the
"roomies" from a hopeful adjunct. You gals are the
best. Thanks for taking me under
your wings. :)
To all of this year's con virgins
- I hope your experience was every bit as
wonderful as mine was last year.
And to Steven Musacchio, the
neatest, funniest, most helpful, most
artistic, and coolest kid I know.
Thank you for keeping us all entertained!
*****
Wednesday, July 10
Well, here I sit, all packed and
ready to head to
last-minute items). Too bad my
flight isn't for another 14 hours! I'm
going to try desperately to get
some sleep tonight because I *know* I'll be
up late this weekend, and I'm
already a little sleep-deprived. I don't
want to arrive at the con and then
spend the whole time in my room snoozing
away!
Anyway, I remembered my LEARNED
LESSONS from last year and have prepared a
little better this year. In with
my clothes and whatnot, I've also
included some snacks to keep in my
room (I'm famous for missing meals,
especially breakfast!) and a full
CD player (in case there isn't one for
the Talent Show... I'm assuming
there *is* a Talent Show, though I haven't
heard any specifics...). I'm
definitely psyched about having a fridge and
microwave in the hotel room - no
more going hungry for me (like that was
REALLY an option!).
The countdown is on. I have been
looking forward to the con since last
year. Yes, I know I said (at the time)
that I wouldn't be able to make it,
but by the time I finished typing
up last year's con report, I just *knew*
that I had to be there this year,
too.
Now at 9:00pm, my laundry is done,
everything is packed (except for a few
last minute items), the self-tanner
has been applied (yes, I didn't learn
from my adventures last year, but
I wisely stuck to one application instead
of the many repeated ones from
last year - I don't think I'll be a freaky
caramel color this year!
<grin>), my alarm is set, the doggie has been
taken out to pee, and it's time
for me to get as much sleep as I can before
winging my way to
again!
*****
Thursday, July 11
After getting up at 4:45am (UGH!)
to deal with my morning libations and
last-minute packing, we (my hubby,
Dave, and I) are on the road by 6:00am
to get to the airport in
minutes), but I want to make sure
that I have plenty of time before my
8:40am flight. Everything is
rather uneventful, and my flight leaves right
on time. I was happy to learn that
it was only about 1/3rd full, so I had
plenty of room to stretch out. I
read for part of the flight, but soon my
early wake-up call caught up with
me and I snoozed the rest of the way.
We got into
the Mears shuttle kiosk arranging
my ride to the hotel. There were LOTS of
people waiting and I was a little
confused as to how the whole thing worked
(you were supposed to buy your
ticket, then go downstairs to where the
buses and vans were and give them
your number and destination), but I soon
figured it out and made it to the
right van.
Wouldn't you know, I was soon
joined by Kathleen (who I called "Caitlin" in
my report last year - sorry!!!!).
I just loved it that I managed to find a
fellow con-goer right at the
airport, even though we were on completely
separate flights. That tunnel
magic was starting early!
We were a little nervous about
finding the correct hotel. Apparently there
are two Holiday Inns on
- confirmed when we were met by
Kathleen's roommate at the door. I said a
quick "see you later" to
them and went to check in. Check-in went smoothly
and I was handed a map of the
hotel and told to go down the ramp, through
the convention center to my
building.
Now, maybe it's because I'm a New
Englander, but I expected the hotel's
buildings to all be connected, at
least by some sort of walkway. I went
down the ramp and through the
convention center, past all of the rooms
and... hit the end. Hmmm. The only
thing here is a door to the
outside. Maybe I missed something.
So, I walked all the way back to
the other end and still didn't see any
directions to the other building.
Hmmm. Okay, maybe I wasn't supposed to
go through the convention center,
but past it. So I went back into the
lobby and looked around. Nope, no
other entrances.
Okay, time to consult the map. I
looked at it and looked at it and it
definitely appeared as though
there should be some sort of entrance from
the end of the convention center.
I decided to try it one more time. So,
yet again, I walked through the
convention center to the far end. Still no
walkway.
Then a light bulb went off. Oh
wait...maybe they DID mean that you had to
go outside! So, I went out the
door at the end of the hall, and sure
enough, I could see my building
across the parking lot. Well, geez, they
could have been more specific!
I did, ultimately (though not
without further incident!), figure out the
layout of the hotel. As you walked
in the main entrance, the front desk
was to your left and a ramp and
stairs leading to the convention center
were on your right. As you kept
going straight, on the left there was a
walkway to one of the other
buildings, a small jewelry store, a gift shop
(the cheapie tourist crap kind),
an arcade, and the bar. To the right was
a convenience store/food court,
bathrooms, and the cafe - which I never
made it into, so I have no idea
how it was (anybody try it out?).
If you kept walking forward, you'd
exit into the pool area. Again, I never
got the chance to check this out,
so I don't know how it was. And if you
kept following the pathways to the
left, you'd eventually come to the C, D
and E buildings (hotel rooms).
Going back to the lobby, if you
went down the ramp and into the convention
center, you'd end up in a long
hallway, flanked on both sides by meeting
rooms. The banquet was held in the
first two rooms on the left (opened
into one big room), the Amelia and
the Biscayne. The room next to that
(Captiva) was used for panels and
such and opened to the Dealer's/Art Room
next door (
used most of the weekend by a
large family reunion.
On the right were the restrooms,
the Board Room, a lobby area (where we
hung out quite a bit), a door to
the outside/foyer area, and the Citrus
Ballroom, which could be (and was)
sectioned off into three separate
rooms. The one in the far corner
was used for the pizza party while a
wedding reception went on next
door.
At the end of the hall was another
door to the outside. If you walked left
along the sidewalk, you'd
eventually reach the A and B buildings, while the
Anyway, I grabbed my stuff and
hustled over to the
was on the 12th floor (#7245),
right around the corner from the
Presidential Suite. I idly
wondered who (if any) of the stars might be
staying there...and a little
devilish part of me thought of knocking on
their door in the wee hours of the
morning (just kidding! I wouldn't
really do it! <grin>).
My hotel room was **HUGE**! As
last year, I did not have a roommate, so I
had asked for a room with just one
bed. What I got was a room with a
king-sized bed, enough room for
another, but instead, had a couch and
coffee table. There was a work
desk and office chair, 27-inch TV, a
microwave, fridge, coffeemaker,
in-room safe... What more could you ask
for??? The room was done in blues
and seagreen with a tropical theme -
pictures of islands and palm trees
on the walls, festive prints on the
drapes and bedspread, and dark
cherry-stained woods. I had a fairly
good-sized window (which didn't
open) - under which was the requisite air
conditioner - and a view of...whoo
hoo! The highway! <laughing>� Oh well,
you can't have 'em all. At least I
could see Universal Studios off on the
right - it was fun to be able to
see the folks riding the rollercoasters.
I spent the next 45 minutes or so
unpacking and organizing my stuff (ah
yes, gotta love being anal
retentive!), then decided to head back to the
main building to check it out and
ask about finding a nearby grocery store
to stock my fridge with drinks. As
I said, I'd wisely remembered my
LEARNED LESSONs from last year and
brought snacks to keep in the room, but
I wanted to take advantage of the
fridge and get some water and soda, too.
As I was walking through the
convention center, I spotted Lori in the
doorway of one of the convention
rooms...and realized that I'd found the
Dealer's/Art Room! I found the
con! There was much hugging all around as
I reunited with PatK, JoAnn, Deb,
Sandy2, Cathy, Chan, Lyn...who were all
busy setting up the dealer's
tables and the art panels. It was just like
coming home again. It's amazing
how much of a family atmosphere this
fandom has. Even as a relatively
new member, I still felt it so strongly
from the moment I set foot in the
door. If only it could last all year!
JoAnn handed me some pictures of
myself from last year's con, which I
really need to scan in and post
somewhere. I hob-nobbed with them for a
few minutes, then ran back to my
room to get the stuff I had brought for
the 2003 convention table. I am on
the team for next year (San Francisco,
add to the mix.
I came back and handed out the
buttons that I had made to the con
members. I had offered the use of
my office's button maker and we came up
with the idea of giving away
buttons to everybody who registered for next
year's con at *this* year's con.
And to distinguish the con team from the
registrants, I made separate
buttons for us that said "Meet Me By the Bay"
while the others said "Follow
Your Heart" (the title of the con). Both
buttons had a part of the con logo
and the dates, and they were very well
received by everybody. Yea!
I spent the next hour and a half
helping with the set-up - stapling,
decorating, etc. And I browsed
around and checked out what was already
available from the dealer's tables
and decided that I needed to get my
checkbook before all the good
stuff was gone!
I ran back to my room to grab my
purse and some money and then headed back
to the con area. I'd intended to
go to the front desk to see about finding
a grocery store (my original
mission before I got distracted by the
Dealer's/Art Room), but I bumped
into Pixie and her mom in the hall and got
to talking with them about cons
and what usually happens at them. Nice to
meet you, ladies!
By this point, I was STARVING. It
was around 3:45 and breakfast was a
looooong time ago. So, I went to
the little convenience store/food court,
got a personal pizza and a soda
and sat in the little cafe area, eating my
lunch and watching part of
"The Mummy 2" on the TV.
After finishing up, I headed back
to the con area, and chatted with JoAnn,
PatK, and Deb for a while. Then
Aurea showed up, and we chatted with her,
too! Gotta love it - once you've
been to a con, you end up spending a good
portion of subsequent cons
catching up with those folks that you only get
to see once a year. :)
We made plans to meet up at 5:30
to go to T.G.I. Friday's for dinner. I
finally gave up on the whole
"find a grocery store" idea and just made a
quick raid on the convenience
store for soda and water ($13!!!).� I stopped
by the Dealer's Room again on the
way back and perused Peggy Garvin's table
(she had LOTS of great goodies!).
I ended up picking up 7 'zines (most on
the recommendation of JoAnn, who
continues to be my Fairy Zinemother) for
$114, which was not bad. I was
especially tickled by notes that Peggy had
put into each 'zine, critiquing it
and noting basic plot points. Very cool!
BTW, who ended up with the 'zine
that had the "reference material" in
it? I'm kicking myself that I
didn't buy that when I had the chance! ;D
Anyway, I wasn't supposed to be
buying anything, since technically the
dealer's room wasn't open yet
so... shhhhh! Don't tell anybody! <grin>
After that, I ran back up to my
room to drop off my purchases, update my
notes (you didn't think I could
remember all these details on my own brain
power did you???), and veg before
dinner. I had a brief moment of panic as
I tried my CD player and it didn't
work. Thankfully, it was just a loose
power cord, but I think I took a
few months off my life (especially since
it's my hubby's CD player and if
I'd broken it, he would not have been
happy!).
But everything was fine, so I ran
through the couple of songs that I'd been
contemplating doing in the Talent
Show. I had it narrowed down to two, but
was having a very hard time decided
between them. So, I figured that I'd
just keep practicing both of them
and pick one at the last minute.
At 5:30, I met up with Chan,
Aurea, Sandy2, Deb, JoAnn, Larry (JoAnn's
hubby, for those who don't know),
Cathy, PatK, Lynn Wright, and Lyn M.'s
little boy Steven. We all walked
the couple of blocks down International
Drive to T.G.I. Friday's. I was
surprised to find out that it was located
next door to Pirate's Dinner
Adventure - a Medieval Times-like dinner
theater that I'd gone to a few
years ago with my hubby and mother-in-law.
We were definitely a rowdy group,
and our waiter did very well taking care
of us. We had loads of fun talking
about cons past, favorite TV shows (we
do all seem to watch the same
things, don't we?), and generally being
entertained by Steven.
In fact, the title of this con
report comes out of a moment that happened
during dinner. Steven had been
making faces and saying silly things all
night, when suddenly he turned to
the table and said "I'm going to
hypnotize you... look into my
nose!" Then he flared his nostrils at
us. It was the most hilarious
thing I'd ever seen. After that, "Look into
my nose" became one of the
catch phrases of the weekend. Gotta love kids,
huh? <grin>
We leisurely made our way back to
the hotel at around 7:00pm to attend the
welcome party. It was pretty low
key - most folks just hanging out and
talking. I bumped into KathyB
there and after promising that I would get
her name right in my con report
(yes, I still know who you are!), she gave
me another photo of myself from
last year's con. Thank you, Kathy!!!
I wandered into the Dealer's Room
and chatted with various folks, then
wandered back to the welcome party
area next door. Eventually, Sheila
(Official Con Virgin Wrangler)
showed up and I had to collect my requisite
hug. For those of you who haven't
yet met Sheila, she gives the *BEST*
hugs (I almost typed
"beast" there - geez, you couldn't guess what I've had
on the brain lately, huh?
<g>).
Limited con registration started
at around 8:15pm. We picked up our
schedules and paid for any
remaining items (I hadn't pre-ordered anything
except for the meal plan, so there
wasn't much for me). I chatted with a
few folks there and got myself
signed up at a table for the Saturday night
banquet.
After that, I headed back to my
room to review the schedule and relax for a
little while. The schedule didn't
look too demanding. There were no
overlapping functions (two or more
events going on at the same time), so it
was very easy to decide what to
attend! I noted that the talent show
rehearsal was slated for 3:00pm on
Saturday. Guess I'd need to choose a
song by then!
At 9:15 I headed back to the con
area to meet up with the folks who were
going to watch the 2003 con promo
video in Phil and Julie's room. We spent
*considerable* time wandering
around the grounds trying to FIND Phil and
Julie's room (remember my
confusion when finding my hotel room? It never
got any better!).
We finally found them and got
underway at around 9:45. We got the chance
to review the new music videos for
this year (which I'll describe later
when they're aired publicly - I
will say that EVERYBODY was crying!) and
then the 2003 con promo video. It
was great!!! A few folks had wandered
in late, so we watched one of the
videos again, then one by one we all
meandered out.
By now it was around 10:30 and I
was quite tired from having gotten up at
4:45am.� I was looking forward to just
going back to my room to relax and
get some sleep, but I got
shanghaied by Sheila and Lori (yes,
*shanghaied*!) into the hotel bar
to have a drink and check out the karaoke
that was going on. After watching
for a little while, I got up and sang
"Almost Home" by Mary
Chapin Carpenter (I love that song, even if it is a
tad too low for me). But the show
was absolutely stolen by 2 brothers
(twins, I later found out) who did
the Celine Dion/Barbara Streisand duet
"Tell Me", in falsetto,
complete with movements! The whole place was
rolling on the floor laughing. And
the cool thing is that they were
actually GOOD! They were silly,
yes, but they had the whole thing down
cold. They must do this sort of
thing on a regular basis (not sure what
that says about them, but I sure
had fun watching them!).
I finally called it a night around
11:30pm and went back to my room. I
cranked up the A/C (not that it
helped much - I know other folks were
freezing, but I was definitely hot
all weekend), laid out my clothes for
the next day, changed into my
jammies (or lack of jammies, to be more
precise <g>), arranged for a
wake-up call, turned on my Brookstone Sound
Soother (don't leave home without
it!), and drifted off to dreamland...
*****
...to be continued in Part 2!
In tomorrow's installment: Suze
spends money, admires some amazing art,
tries her hand as a Tunnel Togs
Tailor (say that three times fast!), thinks
she has some talent, checks out
some cool costumes, reunites with some
celebs, and actually does the
"Time Warp" in public (what the hell was I
thinking???).
'night all! :D
Suze
Hey there! I'm back again!
Yeah, I decided not to leave you
hanging for too long. I actually have the
entire report written (unlike last
year where I was writing and posting at
the same time), so I may post more
than one part today. We'll see... ;)
Anyway, here is the next part:
LOOK INTO MY NOSE
(aka Suze's Adventures at the 2002
B&B Convention)
by Suze, Queen of the Con Report
(tm) ;)
Part the Second
[all disclaimers and whatnot can
be found in Part 1]
Friday, July 12 - Day 1 of the
Con!!!
My wake-up call was right on time
at 7:00am. As per usual, it took me a
little while to get going, but I
was up and about by 7:30, which is not bad
for me! I headed down to the con
area at around 8:30 to get some breakfast
(fruit and a bagel) and pick up my
name badge. I ran into a few folks who
I'd met last year (like Annik) and
chatted with them for a while. Right
around this time, Sandy2 gave me a
lovely handkerchief with a red and white
rose on it, thanking me for
providing her with a copy of Photoshop (and the
adventures I had trying to do that
is a whole other story! <g>). Thank
you, Sandy!!! Also around this
time (I think), Sheila handed me a gift bag
with a little pink teddy bear in
it along with a memo book, some potpourri,
and a "believe in your
dreams" bookmark. Thank you, Sheila!!! Geez, I
feel guilty - I got all of these
wonderful gifts and I didn't bring
anything. I'm going to rectify
that next year!
The opening ceremonies began
around 10:00am.� Lyn gave
us an overview of
the con and the schedule, with
Steven providing the entertainment. Then
Annik and Cecio (CP) got up and
did some international renditions of the
Beauty and the Beast opening
lines. Annik did both French and German and
Cecio did Italian. It was just
lovely!
We then adjourned to the
Dealer's/Art Room which was now officially
open. And, of course, my
"this is going to be a cheap con" plan went right
out the window! I bought the
conzine and a nightshirt with the con logo on
it (Claire Sieffert's "Walk
in Sunshine" piece), ordered two pieces of
stained glass - one a custom piece
with a red rose and white bud and the
other a palm tree, placed bids on
a couple of pieces of art, and officially
registered for the 2003 convention
(in
11-13... plug plug plug...
<vbg>). Terri and I were at the stained
glass table at the same time and
we both suggested that if she could create
Vincent's window, she'd probably
get a lot of business. She seemed very
receptive to the idea and just
asked if we could provide a photo of it. We
pointed her toward Chan and that
was the last I heard about it.
I suppose I should describe the
room. Let's see... well, as you came in
the doors from the hallway,
immediately to the right was the table with
Mary, the stained glass lady. She
had some *gorgeous* pieces and was
definitely a popular table. Next
to that (moving counterclockwise) was
Peggy Garvin's table. As I
mentioned previously, she had lots of wonderful
B&B goodies - 'zines, cards,
prints - definitely something for
everyone. Next to her was the
"roomies" table (Sandy2, JoAnn, etc.) - they
had plenty of B&B stuff, too,
including a new 16-month calendar featuring
art from Chan and Sandy2.
Next to them was the 2003
convention table. We had registration
information and feedback sheets,
as well as postcards and brochures about
for next year. The winner would
get a lovely basket of
mementos provided by PatK and
lovingly packaged by Judy Loyd (thank you,
ladies!). Next to us was the
"rose" people, selling all sorts of items -
boxes, ornaments, glassware -
decorated with fabric roses.
Next to them, in the corner, was
Vincent's Chamber. Chan did an AWESOME
job setting this up! She had
carefully painted the backdrop (depicting the
window, book shelf and part of the
bed) onto a sheet over the past year,
then crafted a "bed"
(tables covered with quilting) to place in front of
it, on and around which was heaped
all sorts of tunnelish items - pillows
with scenes from the show,
candles, painted boxes and mirrors, and, of
course, Vinnie himself! It was
just gorgeous! The neat thing is that much
of what was there would then be
later auctioned off - functional AND
moneymaking... we definitely like
that! Oh, and Marilyn Howard had allowed
Chan to display Vincent's robe
(from "Though Lovers Be Lost") and it was
just SO cool to see in person.
Next to that, along the back wall,
was the "
section of the dealers room). Chan
and her helpers (Larry, Steven, etc.)
had set up latticework into little
cubicles and decorated it with fabric
roses and greenery, then hung the
artwork from the lattice. There was art
from Chan, Sandy2, David Z. (who
does fantasy art), Kathleen, among others.
But perhaps the most stunning were
the two pieces from Claire
Sieffert. The first was a portrait
of Vincent and Catherine, etched (with
a dental drill) into a large piece
of crystal. Oh, it was just SO
beautiful. I put in the first bid,
but I knew it would eventually get too
pricey for me. The other piece was
a hand-crafted Vincent egg. I don't
even know how to describe it -
there are several of Claire's portraits on
the side of the egg and she'd
embedded a light into the top, which had been
replaced with amber glass. I
thought I'd taken a picture of it, but
apparently I never did. Darn it -
if anyone out there has one, I'd love to
see it!
Anyway, continuing on, in front of
the art area there was another circle
(or, rather, rectangle) of tables.
At the end closest to the art room
there was Claire Sieffert's table
where she was selling prints of her
artwork and copies of a Vincent
cross-stitch pattern, and next to that were
the "soap" people who
had all kinds of (very!) fragrant soaps and incense
for sale (I had to avoid them as
strong smells give me a headache).
Continuing counter clockwise,
there were a couple of tables that I was
never sure who owned (Lyn??), but
they had lots of books, 'zines and prints
for sale. At the far end of the
rectangle was the con table, selling the
conzine, shirts, etc. And on the
other side (facing the other dealers
tables) was Lyn's scrapbooking
table (also selling candy and necklaces from
Steven <g>), and the
"egg" people who were selling eggs which had been made
into music boxes, jewelry boxes or
just for decoration (they were quite
lovely - not my thing, but
lovely).
I must say that all of the outside
dealers were VERY cool people. They
were extremely friendly and got
right into the swing of things. From what
I heard, they had just as great a
time at the con as *we* did! I hope that
they all had a successful
weekend...
As others have mentioned, the wall
between the dealer's room and the room
next door (where all of the panels
were held) was left open most of the
time. This was great for those of
us who had to spend time manning the
tables. We could still hear what
was going on and even pop over
occasionally to check things out
without worrying about leaving the tables
unattended. It really worked out
great.
As I was moseying around the
Dealer's Room, Lori caught me and asked me to
"pick one" then held out
a bag to me. I looked inside and found a whole
bunch of little stuffed animal
keychains. After checking them all out, I
finally decided on the little
striped tabby kitty... and it turns out
that's the same one that everybody
else was picking! Geez, we aren't
predictable, are we???
<laughing>
Unfortunately, as I was milling
around, I missed the International panel,
which I later heard was *really*
wonderful. Sandra (from
pulled together two CDs of dialog
from Beauty and the Beast in various
languages (English, French,
German, Russian, Italian, etc.) and Annik and
Cecio discussed the differences in
the translations (it's not always the
same thing from one language to
another!).� I have to
say a huge thank you
to Sandra for doing this - it must
have taken hours and hours of work to
put together AND she made lots of
copies of the CDs to give away. Wisely,
the folks in the panel advised
that those taking the CDs make a donation to
the charity, so that's what we
did. I quickly snagged copies for myself
and when I was finally packing up
to leave the con, I popped one into my CD
player. It was SO neat to hear the
intro and other key bits of dialog in
all those different languages.
Italian is just so damn sexy...I only wish
I could understand it! <g>
Anyway, so it's now around 11:30
and I've got a pile of stuff, so I decided
to run back to my room to drop off
my purchases and gifts and just sit down
for a few minutes.
At noon I headed back to the con
area to join the Tunnel Togs
panel. Maranda and Karen were
running it and they (and Lyn) had hit
Goodwill and assembled a pile of
odds and ends that we could put together
however we liked. I selected a
pale green knit vest and added pale pink
yarn stitching along the seam
(after removing the buttons - and, dang, did
that stitching take a long time!)
and fringe, leather ties cut from a woven
belt, pink pockets made out of
shoulder pads with lace trim added, and a
blue embroidered scarf to finish
off the ensemble. I grabbed a quick lunch
from the deli tray at about 1:00,
then continued to work on my vest until
2:30. It was WAY past time for us
to be finished and when I left, there
were still people working on their
costumes! This was definitely a big hit
and we've already decided to add
it to the panels for next year's con.
I then quickly ran back to my room
to drop off my vest, pick up my karaoke
CD and CD player, and headed back for
the talent show
rehearsal. Unfortunately, this
part of the program wasn't well advertised,
so there were only a few of us
participating, but the cool thing is that
the extra time meant I could
perform both of the songs that I'd been
agonizing over. Yea! One less
decision I have to make!
I got the chance to run through
part of each song to do a mic and sound
level check and everything seemed
to go fine. After that, I headed into
the dealer's room and chatted with
Deb for a while as we watched over the
con table.
At 4:15pm I decided to go back to
my room to veg and rest before the big
night. I knew I wouldn't want to
eat before I got up to sing so I had a
snack and watched
"Serendipity" through the in-house movie system. Not a
bad movie - nice little romantic
comedy, definitely the right kind of
mood. After it was over, I changed
into my talent show duds. I I'd
brought
a dusky rose peasant-style shirt
with flowing cuffs (very Tunnelish, I
thought) and some funky, dangly,
multi-beaded earrings. I topped it off
with my newly-created Tunnel vest
and scarf and some $7 Indian-style
Payless sandles, threw on a little
make-up, and I was good to go.
At 7:00pm I returned to the con
area where everybody was hanging out,
eating, and taking pictures (of
costumes, etc.). At about 7:40pm we headed
into the room and then hung out
for a while waiting for the festivities to
start.
Things got rolling at 8:00pm when
Muffy, Fluffy, and Buffy (aka Judy,
Maranda & Karen) stepped up to
play M.C. NovTek showed the first of the
new videos - "Help!" by
the Beatles, which was kind of a Batman-inspired
silly piece (lots of fun). Then
Muffy, Fluffy and Buffy led us in an
audience participation segment. We
were all divided into groups and when a
certain word was uttered, we had
to recite our lines. Any time "Vincent"
was mentioned, one group would say
"Oh, baby!". When "Catherine" was
mentioned, my group would say
"Hubba, hubba!". When "Father" was
mentioned, another group would say
"That's not a very good idea,
Vincent". When "candles"
were mentioned, another group would say "Flicker
flicker!". When the
"tunnels" were mentioned, the group (called to the
front) were supposed to blow into
their noisemakers and make a whistling
sound. And lastly, when
"CBS" was mentioned, the last group would say "Get
a rope!".
Okay, so we all knew what we were
supposed to say and Muffy (Judy) started
to read us a story. We definitely
got into it! And as Deb mentioned,
JoAnn was just unable to get the
hang of working the noisemaker and that
whole side of the line was just
laughing hysterically through the whole
thing. It was great! And, of
course, we definitely took to our lines and
for the rest of the weekend
"hubba hubba", "oh, baby" and especially
"flicker flicker!" were
often heard in conversations.
After that, all of the
participants in the costume workshop (Tunnel Togs)
were called up on stage to display
what we had created. The audience voted
by applause for their favorite and
Kathleen won hands down (she did a
beautiful job on her brocade vest
with leather ties and clips and all sorts
of stuff).
Then it was yours truly's time to
get up on stage. The first song I
performed was "How Do I
Live" which has been sung by both Trisha Yearwood
and LeAnn Rimes (I was using the
LeAnn Rimes version).� Then I
did a song
that I had written the lyrics for.
The backstory is that upon Karen's
recommendation (she knows I like
Jim Brickman), I picked up Jim's "Destiny"
CD, and there was an instrumental
song on there called "Crossroads" that I
immediately felt should have
words, but didn't.
So, I decided that I would try to
do like I did last year and write some
lyrics to go along with it. It
didn't end up being as B&B specific as last
year's "Solemn Vow", but
I still think it turned out pretty well. I called
my piece "Coming Home"
and the lyrics are as follows:
All my life I've been searching
Far and wide across this crazy
world
Every road, every highway
Seems to have led to distant
shores
Bright lights called out to me
But didn't know my name
I made some friends along the way
But it was not the same
In your smile there was laughter
In your arms there was a gentle
warmth
In your eyes was a light
That I could simply not ignore
I've traveled all around the world
Searching every face
But though I came so close
sometimes
None could take your place
I've known kings, I've known
princes
I've had wealth beyond the common
man
But I known now I would give it up
For just a touch of your hand
In your smile I saw laughter
In your arms I felt a gentle
warmth
In your heart I found love at last
And I knew that I - I wanted
nothing more
Now as I watch the world go by
I don't even see the view
'Cause my roaming days are over
now
I'm coming home to you
I'm coming home
I'm coming home to you
Anyway, I think it was pretty well
received and I was definitely a LOT less
nervous than I was last year. No
more lips stuck to teeth for me! :D
After that, we had the costume
parade featuring Rebecca's legged mermaid,
Lisa's Vincent, Renee's Tunnel
person, the Tunnel "gypsies", J'ecris
"Jamie" (complete with
flashlights attached to her hat!), and lots of
others. It was very cool!
Then Claire got up and read a
story about how quantum physics leads us to
believe that there really are
infinite parallel universes and since that's
so, Vincent and Catherine are real
and everything that's happened to them
in fanfic - good and bad - has
happened and is still happening. :) Then
she sang a lovely rendition of
"You'll Never Walk Alone".
Somewhere around here, David
Schwartz and Jay Acovone (our celebs for the
weekend) finally made it. They
were supposed to get in hours before, but
were apparently delayed. They got
up to say a few words (and I had to give
them a hard time for missing my
turn at bat! <g>), then sat down to watch
the rest of the festivities.
Andy and Steven M. got up to do a
skit about the Crocodile Hunter which was
*extremely* cute, followed by
Phil, Julie and Critter (
Scully and William. Apparently,
NOT (most vehemently NOT) want to
participate. Finally, Phil and Julie
plunked him on stage and they did
their spiel with Mulder and Scully
reading the classifieds (as their
show has been cancelled and they're now
out of work - get it?). Poor
I think at this point (though it
may have been earlier - geez, even with
the notes I'm still confused!),
the... oh shoot, I don't remember what they
called themselves. The Underground
Puppet Theater (I think) did several
numbers for us including frogs
singing "Blue Moon" and an absolutely
gut-busting rendition of chickens
singing "In the Mood" (with chickens
actually singing "In the
Mood" on the tape!).
Then, lord help us, the
"Three Kitties" got up and recited their poem about
a cat hanging around their
mother's door, leaving mom with a litter (them),
and that cat's name is Vincent! (I
swear it was much funnier than
that!)� Then they ran down the aisle to
hug Vincent (Lisa) and give him a
huge "#1 Dad" medal. It
was definitely a hoot!
Finally, NovTek ran another video
- "That's What Friends Are For" by Dion
familiar faces!). And last, but
not least, Claire led us all in a round of
"God Bless
Things wrapped up at this point
(around 9:00pm) and I hung around and
chatted with folks for a while
before finally heading back to my room to
ditch my "Tunnel Togs"
(the vest and scarf were itchy in that humid
weather!), and update my notes
(see, I'm always thinking of you guys!).
Then it was back to the con area
where I ended up getting sucked into a
conversation with David (after I'd
collected my requisite hug), Cecio, Pat
Jackson, Rebecca, and a few
others. We talked about movies, WWII, Sept.
11, NYC, Ron, Roy Dotrice... just
all kinds of stuff.
Finally, after several attempts,
we got David and Jay to join us in the bar
for karaoke, which had apparently
been in progress for several hours. I
heard (but unfortunately missed)
that K.G. and Pixie were absolutely
AWESOME, so I'm definitely adding
you two to the roster for the talent show
next year - no ifs ands or buts!
Many from our group got up to sing
(as we were the overwhelming majority of
the patrons) - Teri, Claire,
Brooke, Kathleen, Cynthia - and I finally got
up and did "Valentine"
by Jim Brickman/Martina McBride. I've done it
before in karaoke and I don't like
to repeat myself if I can help it, but
it was my 3rd choice for a talent
show song, so I figured this was a good
time to do it. Everybody seemed to
like it and I even got a kiss blown to
me by David. <g> David and
Jay took off around 11:30pm and we kept right
on going.
The twins from the previous night
showed up around 11:45pm and we coerced
them into getting up and doing a
couple of numbers (including an Air Supply
song and "Stayin'
Alive", which was hysterical). Then the DJ did Macy
Gray's "I'll Try" (which
he'd done the night before) and Sheila (it's
always the quiet ones...) got up
and stuffed dollar bills down his
pants! I swear! She did!
Karaoke finally wrapped up at
about 12:15pm with a rousing version of "The
Time Warp" (yes, I got up and
danced - you *have* to!) and by this point I
was Wiped with a capital
"W". I headed back to my room, quickly cleaned
up, laid out my clothes for the
next day (remember, I'm anal), set up my
wake-up call, turned on my Sound
Soother, and fell asleep to dreams of
singing and laughter...
*****
...to be continued!
In the next installment (maybe
tomorrow, maybe later today...depends on how
much you guys beg! LOL!): Suze
tries her luck at Beast Bingo, learns the
"Sky King" story, cheats
at "Who Wants to Be a Beastie-aire", buys stuff,
buys more stuff, gets dressed up,
takes lots of pictures, avoids potatoes
(YUCK!), and buys yet more stuff
(did I mention buying stuff?).
Until then! :)
-- Suze
Well, I really didn't mean to
tease you that badly. I did intend to post
another part of this last night,
but then I got caught up doing other
things (including working on my
con photos) and didn't get the
chance. Sorry about that. Maybe
I'll manage it today.
And before I go any further, I
need to apologize to Claire Sieffert and
post a correction. I knew I didn't
know the name of her piece that was
being used as the con logo but I
was...*ahem*...a little too lazy to go
find out. Claire graciously posted
the correct title which is "The Two of
Us in the Sunshine". Thank
you, Claire! I actually got to see the
original of this piece at last
year's con and it is simply *gorgeous*!
And now, without any further
ado...
LOOK INTO MY NOSE
(aka Suze's Adventures at the 2002
B&B Convention)
by Suze, Queen of the Con Report
(tm) ;)
Part the Third
[see part 1 for all disclaimers,
etc.]
Saturday, July 13 - Day 2 of the
con!
Yet again, my wake-up call was
right on time at 8:00am. I slowly got
myself moving, up and dressed, and
headed down to the con area around
9:00am. I grabbed some breakfast
(fruit and bagel again), then sat down to
chat with JoAnn, Terri, PatK,
Sandy2, Lynn and Lori. We were discussing
"badfic" and they had me
utterly in hysterics!
At 9:45am, Muffy, Fluffy and Buffy
(now in their human guises <g>) started
up Beast Bingo. For those of you
who have never played before, it works
like regular bingo except that
instead of "Bingo" you have "Beast" across
the top and instead of numbers,
there are people, places, things and
episode titles from the show in
each square. For a minimal donation of $1
per card, per game, to the
"fishbowl" (the charity collection plate for the
weekend), you could play along. I
only had $20 bills, so I just tossed one
into the fishbowl, and asked to
play two cards for all of the games. I They
were all too happy to take my
money! ;)
I lost the first couple of games,
but won the third one! I looked over the
prizes and selected one of
Steven's necklaces - a gold Asian-looking charm
on a leather thong. I lost the
next game and the next and the next and
finally lost the last game, which
was a "blackout" game (you have to cover
the entire board).
However, there were two people who
covered their boards at the same time,
so they had to play a tie-breaker
game. The rest of us were allowed to
play for the regular prizes, but
the other two were playing for a $15 gift
certificate to the dealer's room.
And wouldn't you know? I won
again! The game kept going (as
they still had to decide the tie-breaker),
but I wandered up and selected a
small digest 'zine (Best Mirrors) for my
prize.
At 10:45, David and Jay returned
for the Celebrity Q&A session. There was
some chatting about what they're
up to now. David took the last year off
to concentrate on writing and has
some spec scripts up for grabs and is
working on developing a
"Wonder Years"-type series with his writing partner
that is meant to feature Ron
Perlman. Jay has done a number of guest-star
stints (including a hard-assed
drill instructor on "JAG"), as well as some
corporate work.
The highlight was, yes, the
"Sky King" story. Jay told us this hilarious
story about David getting him
involved in an infomercial for Intel. For
whatever reason, he (along with a
bunch of young kids) were playing
soldier-types, and as part of the
shoot, they were going to throw a bunch
of computer parts out of an
airplane. David convinced Jay that it would be
"fun" to go up in the
plane with them.
Now apparently Jay isn't thrilled
with flying, but he went along with
it. I can't do the rest of the
story justice, but let's just say that it
involved a plane without doors
(Jay thought it was a junk plane and was
horrified to learn that's what he
was about to go up in), crazy kids
tossing equipment out of the plane
then casually jumping after it, and "Sky
King", the crazy old coot
flying the plane who took the thing into a
nosedive to "save fuel".
Ooookay. Needless to say, I don't think Jay will
be letting David talk him into
anything like this in the future!
There was also some brief
discussion about the new B&B series that had been
proposed a few months ago.
Apparently, Ron Perlman was heavily involved in
it and The Powers That Be at
UPN/Paramount were very much in favor of it
and it was speeding down the
pipeline at record speed. Then,
unfortunately, there was a big
changing of the guard at
everybody who supported the series
was gone and the new PTB didn't like the
idea and it died out. There is,
however, a pilot script out there, and
some folks with some interest.
This is the closest we've gotten to getting
our new series, and I figure we
should take that as a good sign. Maybe in
a few years things will work out,
you just never know!
The Q&A session wrapped up
around 11:45 and we moved onto "Who Wants to Be
a Beastie-aire" (based, of
course, on "Who Wants to Be a
Millionaire"). Four people
got up to do the "fastest finger" round, where
they had to put a list of
conventions into their proper chronological
order. Lori won and was the first
contestant. The questions were all
based on B&B or those involved
with B&B. They were a little uneven,
difficulty-wise (for some reason
the $200 and $300 questions seemed to end
up being much harder than most of
the higher level questions), but it was
LOADS of fun. There was lots of
rampant cheating going on, as we all
(including Lyn, who helped create
the questions) had a great time giving
hints. I think Lori made it to the
$32,000 question before making an error.
There was another "fastest finger"
round (which got a little confusing - it
had something to do with the women
in Vincent's life, but we couldn't
figure out how "Eddy"
[sic] fit into it) and Irene won this one. She
got...hmm...I don't remember...I
think she went all the way to the million
dollar question, but I'm not sure.
All I can say is that we all had a
wonderful time and I even learned
a few interesting facts! (like, did you
know that Jay's first stint on a
soap opera was on "All My Children"? or
that David played a trash collector
in "The Rest is Silence"?)
We broke for lunch at around 12:45
(deli meats for sandwiches and cold
salads) and I ended up hanging out
with Teri, Pat Jackson, Laura and Brooke
Hardy, and a few others. We were
talking about Brooke getting ready to
head off to college next year. The
rest of the crew was trying to tell her
that college was going to be so
much harder than high school and that she
was going to need to bust her butt
taking all of these classes...and I
leaned over to her and said,
"Hey, I found college a lot easier than high
school because I could choose my
own path. Yeah, I goofed around and made
some mistakes, but I had a great
time doing it!" So maybe I'm the bad
influence, but all work and no
play makes Suze a dull girl, ya know?
At 1:30 we had a panel discussing
the 2003 convention. Deb gave an
overview of what would be
happening and what our plans are. Everybody
seemed to be very enthusiastic,
which I am grateful for. It helps to know
that everybody is so supportive of
our efforts.
At 2:00 I wandered back into the
Dealer's Room and found that the stained
glass lady had indeed found a
photo of Vincent's window and had gone home
and asked her husband to put
together a design for her. I was just
amazed! And I *HAD* to have one!
It wasn't as detailed as the original,
but, hell, it's close enough. And
we were able to choose our own glass for
each part. I picked a marbleized
amber glass for the main part of the
window, a medium green glass for
the design work, and a hammered blue glass
for the small arch. I can't wait
to see it finished!
About this time, I'm really
starting to realize how much money is going out
the door, but I just can't help
it. There's so much cool stuff and I'm
still a relative newbie and need
to build up my collection! Plus, my hubby
was out of town right before I
left, so he couldn't give me the "Remember
we're poor speech" before I
left. Silence implies consent, right? LOL!
Anyway, then I headed over to the
"roomies" table and bought one of the
16-month calenders (which are
gorgeous!), then went over to sign all of the
cards going to BBTV members who
couldn't be at the con (we missed
you!). After that, I went over to
man the 2003 con table for a while and
help stuff the BBTV cards into
their envelopes (in fact, JoAnn wandered
away after the first few and I
ended up doing all of them! <g>).
Chan's sculpting workshop was
going on at this time, but I couldn't get
away from the table to attend. It
looked like lots of fun, though! I got
to head over and see the results.
Everyone had been instructed on how to
create Vincent's head, but each
one was slightly different. And they were
all just great! I hope that they
survived the trips home...
At 5:00pm the autograph session
finally got started (very late!). I had
Jay and David sign this year's con
poster (and David wrote me a lovely
little note - thank you, David!),
a printout of the 2003 con logo, and I
had Jay sign one of his headshots
for my friend Debbie, who is a big
Stargate SG-1 fan. He signed it
from "Kawalski" (his character), which was
very cool. (Enjoy Deb!!! That's
your surprise! <g>)
By the time I got out of the
autograph line, it was 5:45pm and we were
supposed to be assembling at
6:00pm for drinks and such before the
banquet. No pressure! (and I was
definitely not the last in line - there
were folks who were leaving to
change as the first wave of people were
arriving for the banquet) I ran
back to my room to drop off my stuff and I
realized that I'd already written
about $500 in checks and spent about $300
in cash...and we hadn't even made
it to the auction yet. Yikes! My
"cheap" con was getting
very expensive! I couldn't pass up the stained
glass, though, and I wanted to
sign up for next year's con before the
prices went up, but it still hurts
when you total it all up! ;)
So, I quickly cleaned up and
changed, threw on some make up, and headed
back to the con area. This year I
was wearing a floor-length,
scoop-necked, short-sleeve sparkly
silver/navy (metallic fibers) dress with
the same dangly rhinestone
"Catherine" earrings from last year and some
sparkly sling-back shoes that I'd
bought to wear in my sister's wedding
last fall and hadn't worn since!
I hung out in the lobby where
everybody was taking LOTS of pictures. I had
decided to leave my camera in my
room in deference to the "no cameras"
rule, but it looked like nobody
else did! I'm just going to have to beg
for those of you who brought your
cameras to please send me a copy of your
photos, huh? Pretty please????
The BBTV group got the honor of
being selected to introduce the con on the
video. We all gathered in a corner
and Ron filmed us saying "Welcome to A
Kingdom By the Sea III!"
Cool!
Many people were dressed up in
regular dress clothes as I was, but some
were wearing their Tunnel Togs,
and some had outfits from the show (JoAnn
was wearing the large red coat
that Catherine wears in Siege - *everybody*
wanted to try it on!). K.G., Roy,
Phil, Julie and Nancy had all gotten
together and wore these sort of
fancy Old West style outfits. They were
really neat!
After milling around for a while,
we were allowed into the banquet room and
I went to find my table. No
confusion this year! I found table #5 and
joined my tablemates: JoAnn,
Larry, PatK, Sandy2, Cathy, Lori, Lynn, Deb,
and Sheila. We settled in and soon
started the candle lighting ceremony,
read by David and Jay. The
candles, as last year, had been provided by the
Chesapeake B&B club (whose
official name I don't recall) and were the same
orange, yellow and white as the
Winterfest candles on B&B. It was quite
beautiful as all of those lights
filled the darkened room and we came
together once more. You could
really feel the love in the room as all our
hearts were one, for just a brief
moment.
After it was over, we blew out our
candles and I was able to check the
place out. The centerpieces at
each table were large glass hurricane lamps
(that type of shade) etched with a
portrait of Catherine and Vincent on one
side and quotes from the opening
on the other, surrounding a Summerfest
candle. They were so gorgeous!
Throughout dinner, we just chatted
amongst ourselves about various
things. We had an appetizer of
green salad with a choice of Italian or
Ranch dressing and some dinner
rolls. I'd decided to have the chicken this
year, which came with potatoes
(YUCK!), baby carrots and broccoli. Except
that there was no broccoli on my
plate! Lori offered to give me her
broccoli for my potatoes and I
eagerly made the trade. She thinks that she
got the better end of the deal but
believe me, I was all too happy to get
those things off my plate (YUCK,
YUCK, YUCK!� There
*will* be a rice option
next year if I can help it!). For
dessert there was chocolate cake, which
more than made up for the
potatoes. Yum!
As things were winding down, Lyn
and David asked everyone to please put
away their cameras. They were very
graciously placing their trust in us as
they produced that certain video
for our enjoyment. There was a bit of a
shadow over this moment, which is
usually the highlight of the weekend, but
the video was as wonderful as
always and thank you SO much to everybody
involved in procuring it again
this year, especially after all of the
unpleasantness that happened right
before the convention.
After that, NovTek ran their next
two videos, both created by Julie. The
first was "Breathe" sung
by Faith Hill, which was simply GORGEOUS!� Very
romantic and definitely hitting
the best points of the series. And the
second was "Anyway" a
song by Nicole Nordeman. This was the only time I
cried the whole weekend. It was
just so moving. There was an intro of
still photos of Catherine over a
waving flag with the "You have the
strength" dialog running over
it. Then the video came on and the basic
"story" is of how
Catherine wasn't a perfect person and had flaws and made
mistakes, but Vincent's love made
her beautiful and gave her the strength
to be the person she wanted to be
(and vice versa, though Catherine was the
primary focus). I just can't
describe how absolutely beautiful and
touching this is. If you have the
chance to purchase this music video set
from NovTek, do it, if only for
this one video. Thank you, Julie, for this
incredible creation.
To lighten the mood, Claire got up
and read an oldie but goodie, "Twas the
Night", then the puppeteers
did a couple of numbers. The first was a
reinactment of Catherine being
rescued by Vincent (from the pilot), then as
he is reading her the fairytale
Beauty and the Beast, we segue into a few
acts using the music from the
Disney musical (both screen and stage).� They
also did a reinactment of
Catherine's return at the end of "A Happy Life"
complete with car (it was
hilarious - this little red car kept rolling
across the top of the stage set)
and Vincent getting tackled by
Catherine. Of course, there was no
"soul kiss" here...in fact, it got
downright R-rated there (at least,
as R-rated as puppets can get!
<g>). They also did a scene
with Vincent to "My Boyfriend's Back" with
Puppet!Vinnie breaking through
numerous doors, riding the top of the
elevator, riding the top of the
subway, etc. It was just a lot of fun!
After that, NovTek showed another
music video by Ron - "A New Day Has Come"
sung by Celine Dion that was a
combination of her video with scenes from
the show. Very cool! Then...ta da!
The 2003 convention promo video. It
was so awesome to finally see it
after all of the agonizing about it over
the past few months (and I'm sure
it was even more so for Deb, who actually
helped create it). I was so happy
with the way it turned out - definitely
a wonderful promotion for next
year (I hope you'll all be there!!!).
I think they showed the
"Help!" video one more time after that, then the
banquet was officially over. I
made a dash back to my room to change into
my comfy clothes, grabbed my
camera, and ran back to the con area. Of
course they were still taking
pictures and had grabbed David and Jay for a
quick photo op with next year's
con team. PatK and I got relegated to the
back row (and being as short as I
am, that's not exactly where you want to
be) to hide the fact that we were
no longer dressed up. Oh well...
Then it was auction time! (aka the
David and Jay Show) Most of the crew
from my table (plus one or two
others) dragged our chairs over toward the
right side of the stage to get a
better view. Cathy very bravely got up
and spoke briefly about how SIDS -
Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (one of the
designated charities) - had
affected her life...I don't think there was a
dry eye in the house. Then Lyn got
up and talked a little about the
American Cancer Society (the other
charity), and then we were underway!
I tried for an autographed 45 LP
of "The First Time I Loved Forever" but
was quickly outbid. I tried for
another few items, but was outbid on those
as well. I finally got a print of
the Brooklyn Bridge with the Twin Towers
in the background, mat signed by
Ron P., for $60. I think I got off pretty
cheap on that one.
The most hilarious moment of the
night was definitely - as many people have
mentioned - Jay donning the little
lion backpack. First he wore it
appropriately (although it was
about 5 sizes too small for him and his arms
stuck out at odd angles), then
David got the brilliant idea that it could
also be used "at the
beach" and had Jay step into the backpack and hike it
up...well...to his crotch. Oh,
man, the room went nuts. A little backpack
that was worth nothing went to
JoAnn (I think) for $50! Then David decided
to stay with the theme and stuck a
little lion toy into his pants. What nuts!
I wanted the Ron P.-signed book of
Shakespeare's sonnets, but that ended up
going for $100. I *REALLY* wanted
(but knew I couldn't afford) this
GORGEOUS statue of an entwined
Catherine and Vincent, which was apparently
one of the centerpieces at the
1995 con. That ended up going to Sheila for
a whopping $700, but I think it
was worth every penny (and if they'd
accepted credit cards, I would
have been tempted to give her a run for her
money!).� Somewhere around this point, our
little group in the corner got
called the "hot seats",
'cause we were upping the prices. <g>
I finally settled on a PC game
voiced by Ron P. and a few others for
$10.� Well, at least it was cheap! My personal favorite moments were
David
yelling out "I have a bid of
$6!" on the game, just to drive me crazy (I'd
already bid $10), because he "like
to hear me laugh". <g> Also, I was
amused by him scoping me out as I
was stretched out prone on the floor
trying to get a shot of the
above-mentioned centerpiece against the dark
green table skirting, and making
some sort of comment that if I didn't get
up he was going to have to marry
me or something (I dunno, it was something
silly to that effect - I was busy
trying to get my picture!), then giving
me a smootch. :)
The auction was still going strong
and there were still LOTS of items left
when they finally called it a
night at about 1:15am. We were all drooping
(although things do seem be
awfully funny when you're short on sleep, so
there was a lot of laughing going
on!), so they decided to pick it up again
during Sunday's brunch. I
collected and paid for my two items, then headed
back to my room to clean-up,
change, turn on the ol' Sound Soother, and
utterly collapse into a dreamless
sleep...
*****
...to be continued (oh yes,
there's lots more!).
In the next installment: Suze is
running a little late (big surprise!),
buys YET more stuff (uh, honey?
How much do we have in the checking
account???), battles for some
artwork, challenges her math skills, waves
goodbye to yet another con
(although the fun isn't over yet!), gets up
close and personal with Vinnie,
helps clean up the place, eats some pizza,
and laughs with friends until the
wee hours of the morning (oof...I'm
getting too old for this...).
Until next time, true believers!
:)
Suze
LOOK INTO MY NOSE
(aka Suze's Adventures at the 2002
B&B Convention)
by Suze, Queen of the Con Report
(tm) ;)
Part the Fourth
[disclaimers, etc. in part
1]
Sunday, July 14 - Day 3 of the
con! (last official day)
Well, due to lack of proper sleep
(I'm one of those people for whom
anything less than 9 hours of
sleep feels like I've had about 2!), I was
getting slower and slower about
getting up in the morning. I didn't bother
to set up a wake-up call, and I
finally woke up on my own a little before
9:00am. I slowly got up and did my
usual morning thing (it's times like
these when I wish I liked
coffee!), then headed down to the con area
shortly before 10:00am.
The brunch had started at 9:30am
and I was obviously late as the place was
already packed with eating (and
even finished!) people. I was able to find
a place at the same table I'd sat
at during the banquet, and joined up with
Annik, JoAnn, Larry, Pat, Sandy2,
Lori, Cathy and a few others (my brain
was still not yet awake enough to
take the full census!). I ate my eggs,
bacon, and danish while hanging
out and chatting with them.
At 10:30am, the auction started up
again. I started bids on numerous items
(just to get the ball rolling) but
was quickly outbid just about every
time. I did finally end up with
The Complete Works of William Shakespeare,
signed by Ron P., for $75 (which
is not much more than the book would have
cost anyway, so I think this was a
good deal).� I also
won a VHS tape of
the 1946 Jean Cocteau version of
Beauty and the Beast. In the discussion I
was in with David on Friday night,
we'd talked about this movie and I
mentioned how I'd never seen it
and how much I wanted to. Well, I got my
wish! Sure, the $40 price tag was
a whole lot more than I would have paid
for it at Blockbuster, but it was
going to a good cause, so what the
heck! :) (BTW, I finally watched
it yesterday and it was *very* cool -
the special effects are quite
impressive, given the lack of today's fancy
technology)
There were various art pieces
(most by Chan) that went for respectable
amounts, but the big ticket item
was the dinner with Ron P. I can't recall
who won it (there was a bidding
duel between Jan Sutter and Marilyn
Howard), but it went for $1100.
Wow. That money is going to help a lot of
people. We are such a great,
giving group of people and I am very proud to
be a part of this!
After that, they started up the
"Who Wants to Be a Beastie-aire" again. I
picked up my purchases and paid,
then tried to run back to my room to drop
off my stuff, but I got corralled
by Deb and asked to watch the con table
for a few minutes. Those few
minutes seem to last a long time,
Deb! LOL! I actually had to take
several registrations which, although I
was extremely pleased to do, I am
not good with money and receipts and
stuff (it makes me nervous - I
think it's the math involved) so it was a
bit of a circus! Thank goodness
Lori came over and helped me or we'd
probably *still* be there! ;)
I finally managed to get away to
watch most of the last game with Jay in
the hot seat and David asking the
questions. He got up to $1
million...with a lot of coaching!
(and blatant cheating! <vbg>) We wrapped
at around 1:15pm as David and Jay
had to get ready to leave. They said a
quick round of goodbyes and I went
to collect my hugs from each, then they
headed off to pack.
Shortly after, I collected my
stuff and started to head back to my room. I
swung by the NovTek table first to
pick up my copy of the Teaser video with
all of the music videos and the
2003 con promo on it (HAD to have that,
what are you kidding???). Then I
was off to my room to drop off my stuff
and update my notes. I had spent
SO much money by this point. Dave (my
hubby) is going to go nuts. I
called him yesterday to check in and after
I'd mentioned a few of the items
I'd bought, he frantically trotted out his
"Remember we're poor!"
line. Too late, buddy! I'll just have to sneak
some money from the savings
account into the checking account while he's
not looking. Shhhhhhh! <g>
By 1:45 I was hungry again, so I
swung by the convenience store/food court
to grab a sandwich, then headed
back to the con area for the art auction
(already in progress). I hadn't
planned to buy anything, but I ended up
with a matted photocopy of a Rita
Terrell piece of Vincent and Catherine as
"The Phantom of the
Opera" (which I then donated to next year's
auction).� I still really wanted that one
piece of Sandy2's called "Stolen
Moment" and I got into a
bidding war with JoAnn over it. I finally
couldn't afford the $200 bid and
had to let it go (I wish we could have
used credit cards!), but JoAnn and
Sandy graciously offered to make prints
of it and send me a matted copy.
Thank you, ladies!!!
I was consoled, however, as I was
able to walk away with my second favorite
Sandy2 piece of Vincent and
Catherine reading called "It's Good to Read"
for only $30. That's not a bad
deal for original art. My first one! Yea!
I missed the lovely shadowbox
being auctioned (I knew I couldn't afford
that), but I did see Claire's
beautiful etched crystal go for $400. Worth
every penny!
The auction wrapped up at around
3:30pm and after picking up and paying for
my art, I started to head back to
room to drop them off. I had to pass by
the NovTek table on my way and
decided to give in and purchase the video
for this year's con (what the hell
- I've already *more* than blown my
budget!). So after signing up for
and paying for that, I continued on to
my room to add to my ever-growing
piles of con loot! ;)
At 4:00, I headed back to the con
area for the closing ceremonies. There
were teary words of thanks from
Lyn for Chan, hubby Andy, and the
precocious Steven. She called up
all of us on the 2003 con team to perform
the ritual of passing on the light
to the next year's con organizers. We
all got another Summerfest candle
and slowly lit each other's candles all
the way down the line and
officially took over the con duties. After
blowing out the candles, we had
Steven pick one of the raffle tickets out
of the converted shoebox (thank
you, Cathy! <g>) and awarded the San
Francisco basket to Lisa Gould
(congrats, Lisa!). There was one last big
goodbye, then that was it!
I went to help pack up the con
table and retrieve my coffee basket (from my
room) which had been holding candy
all weekend. We got one last
registration while I was there
(from Rebecca, who said she'd never
registered for a con at the
previous con before - yea, Rebecca!) which
brought us up to a grand total of
39 registrations - 9 more than we'd
planned on! And there were still
members of the con team who hadn't signed
up yet! Woo hood!!!!
I helped Deb clean up and organize
all of the various paperwork,
decorations, etc. Then we ran a
load up to her room to drop off and while
she figured out what she was going
to need to ship, I ran up to my room to
drop off the basket and a couple
of other items.
Around 5:00, I met up with Deb
again and grabbed the load of stuff that
needed to be shipped, then we
headed back to the con area where Mailboxes,
Etc. was setting up court.
Around this time, I noticed that
Vinnie (who had been lying on the bed in
his chamber and also sitting in a
little photo op spot at the banquet) was
lying, abandoned, on his back on
the floor. Well! Who could pass up an
opportunity like that??? Not me! I
quickly ran over, lay down on the
floor, and snuggled up to Vinnie -
right there in the middle of the
Dealer's Room! It was only a few
milliseconds before we were spotted and
the flashbulbs started going off.
I'm sure it won't be long before we see
those shots in the National
Enquirer...just don't send them to Catherine,
okay? ;D
Anyway, after my close encounter,
I needed a drink! (wouldn't you???
<veg>) So I headed to the
store to restock my fridge (I was definitely low
on beverages again!). I took the
drinks back to my room, and hung out for
a few minutes before heading down
to the pizza party.
I ate and chatted (poor Lori was
getting the hard sell to be the con chair
for 2004! LOL!) and tried to
ignore the big water leak that had started in
the middle of the room. Around
7:30, I headed back to my room to clean up
and just veg for a little while
(needed a *few* minutes of downtime after
this whirlwind weekend!).
At around 8:20, I headed down to
the "roomies" room to participate in
fanfic reading with Peggy Garvin,
Terri, JoAnn, Sandy2, Cathy, Lori,
PatK, Linda Barth So--something (I
can't remember how to spell it,
Linda!). We had a WONDERFUL time!
Each of us took turns reading a page
and it was just so much fun
(tum...tum, tum, tum...TUM! <veg>). We
eventually dissolved into just
general chat with interesting gossip about
previous cons (I love being a
still relative newbie!), discussion of the
state of B&B fandom today, and
pretty much anything we could think of to
bring up, we did! I had a BLAST!
The party finally broke up shortly
after 2:00am and I headed back to my
room. Con team meeting in less
than 8 hours. Ugh!
It took me a while to wind down,
so it was around 3:00am before I finally
turned on my Sound Soother, hopped
into bed, and finally got some well
needed SLEEP!
*****
...to be continued (one more
time!)
In the last installment: Suze
spends lots of time in meetings (what is
this? work???), has a brief
encounter with a "tobacco inhaler", reads some
frantic, acquires a one-of-a-kind
piece of art, watches TV with people as
interactive as she is, packs up
all of her loot, and finally says goodbye
to the con for another year
(::sniff::).
Until then! :)
-- Suze
Well, this is it...the last part
of my con report (kinda short, but last
couple of days weren't as
eventful). I had an absolute blast and I hope
you all enjoyed hearing about
every, single, little, teeny, tiny detail of
my experience! <grin> I hope
that everybody will be able to make it to
San Francisco next year, 'cause I
can't wait to see you all again!
And so, the weekend comes to a
close...
LOOK INTO MY NOSE
(aka Suze's Adventures at the 2002
B&B Convention)
by Suze, Queen of the Con Report
(tm) ;)
Part the Fifth (last one!)
[all disclaimers, etc. can be
found in Part 1]
Monday, July 15
I honestly can't remember if I
called for a wake-up call or not (the
details are MOST fuzzy at this
point), but I did manage to get up around
9:00am, shower and dress, and grab
a breakfast of some Nutragrain-like bars
in my room before heading off to
the "roomies" room for the 2003 con meeting.
We spent about 3 1/2 hours
reviewing the status so far and going over ideas
for next year. Things are
definitely in good shape. We got more
registrations than we'd planned on
and the website is up and running, so we
couldn't complain! We did have
some more con business to attend to, but we
decided to put it off until later
that night. Deb then gave each of us
this neat little card with a mini
rose candle holder and teeny little
candles to go in it (thank you,
Deb!!!). We all agreed that we needed to
try to find more of these for the
con next year!
The meeting broke up at around
1:30pm and most of us headed across the
street to Quiznos (a sandwich
place) for lunch. We bumped into Judy and
Maranda outside the hotel on our
way over and Judy handed me a little
stuffed lion with a "Beast
Wishes" card tied around his neck. How
cute! Thank you, Judy! (geez, more
gifts! I've got to start stocking up
for next year!)
Some took their lunches and headed
back to the hotel, but Deb, Lori and I
stayed and ate there. I had a
honey bourbon chicken sandwich that was to
DIE for. Yum!
As we left, we took a quick peek
in the tattoo parlor next door. Nope,
definitely not tempted. I did that
once (a small, discreet heart on my
left ankle), and NEVER again. I
did see a number of bongs (excuse me
"tobacco inhalers"...uh
huh...) on the wall and idly thought about buying
one for my brother, but decided it
would be too much of a pain in the ass
to try to ship it. Can you imagine
me trying to get THAT through airport
security??? <laughing>
We headed back to the hotel and
everybody pitched in to help Lyn, Andy and
Chan load up the van with the
remaining con items. It didn't take long at
all and soon we were all hanging
out in the lobby area of the convention
center. We chatted and watched
Steven draw (I now have a beautiful picture
of Catherine and Vincent gracing a
prominent place on my fridge - thank
you, Steven!), discussed fandom,
next year's con, and everything that
happened at this one. We were soon
joined by J'ecris (it was nice to meet
you!), and we decided to do some
more fanfic reading. We picked one of
JoAnn's stories from the conzine
and everybody took turns reading a
page. It was just beautiful,
JoAnn!
Around 5:30pm, some folks headed
off to dinner, and I returned to my room
for a little while before going
back to the "roomies" room to finish up our
con business. At least it was
*fun* work this time! (can't tell you the
details - top secret! <g>)
We got dinner from room service (I think I
still owe you money for that,
JoAnn!) and quickly managed to find the
obsceneness (is that a word?) in
various food items (pickles, french
fries...). We are a sad, pathetic
group of people. LOL!
We wrapped things up in time to
watch "Witchblade" at 9:00pm.� I have to
say, it is quite an experience
watching one of your favorite shows with
people who yell at the TV as much
as you do! I swear, I missed a bunch of
the lines because we were all
talking over each other, but I've never had
so much fun! After the show was
over, we chatted for a few minutes, then
things wound down and we went our
separate ways.
By 10:30pm I was back in my room,
and spent the next hour or so packing up
all of the stuff I'd bought (it
all fit into my one suitcase! Woo
hoo!!! I am the Queen of
Packing!!!!), then finally turned on my Sound
Soother one last time and hit the
hay, dreaming of all the fun we're going
to have in San Francisco next year
(...plug, plug, plug! <g>).
*****
Tuesday, July 16 - It's over! WAH!
I was up by 9:30am and leisurely
got dressed, ate the remaining room snacks
for breakfast, and finished up my
packing. After doing one last check of
the place, I headed down to the
"roomies" room (I promised I'd stop in
before I left) to hang out for a
few minutes. Finally it got to be around
11:30 and I had to leave or I'd
miss my shuttle ride to the airport. There
was one last round of hugs, then I
was on my way.
I ran into Maranda and Judy at the
check-out counter and it turns out that
they were also taking the 11:45am
shuttle to the airport. Isn't it funny
how things work out? That tunnel
magic was still with me and wanted to
make sure that I left with
friends.
I chatted with them during the
ride, but it wasn't long before we'd gotten
to my departure area. I hugged
them goodbye, reclaimed my luggage and
finally said my last farewell to
this year's con.
My flight back to Manchester was
just as uneventful as the one down (though
slightly more crowded) and before
I knew it, I was home. But a piece of me
will always be in the Tunnels.
Once you've been to a con, you can't help
but leave a part of yourself with
all of those wonderful folks that you
meet along the way.
I miss you all so much already,
and I hope that I will see you, as well as
those of you who couldn't make it
this year, in San Francisco. Not because
I'm on the committee (though there
is a part of me that would be grateful
for the attendance!), but because
I just can't wait to be with all of you
again.
Be well, and I'll see you around
the Tunnels...
Love,
Suze