tofublog

Woke up today were at the convention center by 9:30.  Got into a line for The Family Guy talk, we were in the line about 40 minutes before the talk started.  Turns out, you need to be in these lines about 2 hours before they start.  After waiting for  about 45 minutes they let about 5000 people the room (that seated 10,000 people) was full.  Sucks.  Carter was pretty bummed.  So we regrouped and hit a line for Futurerama.  This line we were in about 2 hours before it started…  The line started moving right away and we were let into the room 2 hrs early, just in time for the Battlestar Galactica talk.  It was actually pretty cool and funny.  I’m not a huge fan of the show, I watched the pilot (which was excellent) and then saw the first season, but sorta lost interest…  They pretty muched talked about the upcoming season, which will be the last.  I guess its good that they totally planned on it having a finite story line and after the talk I will probably pick up seasons 2 and 3 on DVD before the new season starts.  No Edward James Olmos, but 4 other cast members were there.  All of the members who attended were female, which sorta points out how female heavy the show actually is.

After the Battlestar talk (and an extended clip of the new season) there was 15 minutes until the futurerama guys.  They don’t clear the rooms between sessions which I think may explain why you need to be so early.  We were able to move up before the Futurerama started and were actually in about the 10th row.  They handed out a little futurerama comic and then the cast came out.  They did a reading of the comic since the entire cast was there, it was really cool to see the cast change voices and you could follow along in the comic as they read.  Billy West does about 10 different voices in the show and it is pretty weird to see all these different voices coming out of his mouth hole.  The guy that does Bender is super funny, he was one of the most vocal of the cast for most of the talk.  He said Benders voice is based on Slim Pickens and Drunk guys.  So they are bringing the show back after the success of the DVD’s (sorta like the Family Guy deal).  But they will be on Comedy Central instead of Fox. 

After the futurerama talk Joss Whedon was up.  I tried to talk Carter into sticking it out for Joss, but by now it was like 4:30 and we hadn’t eaten since morning.  No Joss.  Nerd cred just took a huge hit.  I coulda been at about the 4th or 5th row for Joss…  Oh well.

So we hit the floor and looked at more stuff, got some more schwag.  The funny thing is I hate most of it but feel compelled to take it.  Carter was killing me to sit through a some demo games at the Wizards of the Coast area.  Once you played a couple of demos you could roll a d20 for Wizards stuff…  Carter rolled a 19…  He could pick from pretty much anything they had, so he picked up a new D&D box set…  Pretty Cool.  I rolled like a 4.  I suck and got a pack of Magic cards. 

Anyway…  We had a lot of fun and would do it again, but I think we learned a bit how to handle the lines and stuff. 

Some notable sightings today:

• Warren Ellis – I was pretty surprised by a lack of line, again I was just walking by and there he was signing a comic, but no real line. 
• George Romero – he had a line…  I considered waiting for a signature, but got a pic of Carter next to him and called it good.
• Mike Mignola - Mike had about a 15 minute line but he was giving out these great Hell Boy posters – Carter and I both got one.  I think the studio sunk some money into these…
• Adam Hughes – More Boobies and F Bombs for Don…
• Major Victory – We saw him walking around the convention floor with a salad.  So we took a pic of Carter with him.  I’ve never actually seen the show.

Off to Disneyland in the morning…  Hopefully not another 5 hr commute. 

Later.

 Carter, Ed and Adam Hughes – Another couple of books for Don.

 Carter and a who wants to be a Super Hero Guy – Major Victory… 

Warren Ellis and Ed (looking a bit wide eyed and crazy)… 

Ed and StormTrooper Elvis 

 Carter and George Romero. 

The Joker and his Gun

 Spartans Smoke.

ChimChar And Ed 

Carter and Ox the Ugly Doll

Ed, Carter and Frank Cho

 Got up and were on the road at 10.  The 2 hour drive to San Diego from LA took close to 5 Hours.  Traffic was horrible.  We are staying in the 500 West Hotel.  It is a converted YMCA that is about 100 years old.  The room is tiny and has a 13″ tv, no ac and the bathrooms are down the hall and shared.  It isn’t too bad for a building this old, but it definately wouldn’t be everyones cup of tea.  Considering how late I booked the room I’m just glad we got anything.  On the plus side it is about a 15 minute walk to the convention center.  After we dropped our bags in the room we went to the comic-con.  It is Crazy.  There are thousands of people, some of the display booths are pretty amazing.  We watched a talk from some video game developers who are working on 4 new Marvel games.  After that we went into the main floor, it was huge and has booths for just about every comic company in the world, tons of movie booths, game booths (pokemon, wizards of the coast, video game booths, etc).  Carter bought some Pokemon figures for a new collectable game they are releasing in the fall, he also bought a vinyl figure that an artist drew on for him.  

I have a wish list of books that Don (the guy responsible for my current comic book habit) wanted me to pick up for him if I could.  Walking through the floor I looked over and saw Frank Cho sitting there with no line or anyone around, just another artist at the con.  I bought his current sketch book and a novelty nudie pen for Don…  See attached pic, I think they thought it was funny that Carter was standing in for the pic considering the cover of the book.  1 down 4 to go for Don’s list, just finding people in the place is a nightmare. 

After walking around for a few hours we finally headed back to the room.  Carter went to the bathroom and I waited in the hall outside, he called to me and said he needed to show me something…  It is never good when a 9 year boy is alone in a bathroom for a few minutes and then wants to show you something.  Expecting some amazing surprise in the toilet he was actually standing there with his shirt off and his entire chest, stomach and back covered in a bright red rash.  Crap.  I grabbed him a change of clothes and sent him into the shower.  After he was done I ran down to a 7/11 down the block and bought some lotion and benadryl.  I gave him the benadryl about 20 minutes ago and hope the rash goes away.  No Air in the room.  Damn. 

Well, i’m hoping it is just from the heat and he is better in the morning.  More updates soon.

Carter and I woke up a bit late today – About 9:30…  We got to Magic Mountain at about 11:00.  Just in time for it to hit 100 degrees.  It was just brutal, we went into the water park and floated around for about an hour in a water ride that just flows around in a huge circle.  After that we went over to the main park and read a list of ride names…   Viper sounded pretty fun to Carter.  The wait time was only about 1/2 an hour.  The ride starts with the world’s tallest vertical loop at 140 feet, does a total of 7 loops and hits about 70 mph…  This is all info that might have been good to know going in.  One ride and we were done.  We got off that coaster and decided it was just too hot.  We went back to the hotel and Carter logged about 3 more hours on the DS while I looked at muscle cars on ebay and read comic books.

We headed back to the park at about 6 pm…  It was MUCH more comfortable, the temp was probably down to the low 90’s…  Much better.  We got in a line at about 7:30 for a Batman live action stunt show that started at 8pm…  We were at the front of the line and got front row for a show that actually filled up completely.  It was pretty cool, lots of guys flying across a huge lot on zip lines, Batman riding on the hood of a car, the Batmobile, motorcycles, and tons of explosions.   Carter said he would give the show an 8.5 out of 10…

After the Batman Show we headed over to the Batman Ride.  This is a coaster where you sit strapped in, hanging under the tracks instead of over the tracks.  This ride was much smoother than the Viper.  It also did loops and twists but just felt a bit more low key.  We ended up going on the Batman Ride twice, the second time we waited a little longer and rode in the front of the ride. 

Tomorrow we are off to San Diego for the Con…  I’m not sure if the hotel in San Diego will have a connection to the interweb, so it might be a day or so before the next update.

The Batman Stunt Show… 

Carter going into another loop on the Viper.

Carter and I are spending our first 2 nights in Cali at the Magic Mountain Hilton.  It was about 2x as much as the hotel we stayed at last night, but for $150 a night we are right next door to the park.  The room is also huge, i’m writing this from the desk space sitting in a Herman Miller office chair, it’s way more comfy than the chair in my office at work.  Carter is playing his DS and watching Robot Chicken.   We each have our own queen bed and the room overlooks a lit up fountain area.  Pretty nice.

We left Seattle Tuesday at 4pm drove until 10pm…  Woke up today, ate breakfast and started driving again at 10am…  We made it to Six Flags Magic Mountain tonight at 11pm.  Yuck, lots of driving…  Tomorrow we are going to get up and go to the park.  Carter decided Six Flags sounds funner than watching Andy Samberg and not getting an autograph.