This weekend I'll be diving deeply into a world of alternate realities, colorful utopias, and overflowing buckets of borrowed imagination. I'm going to DreamCon in Jacksonville, a science fiction convention, where my inner geek can breathe free.
Science-fiction conventions (or "cons") are not just for social outcasts or dangerously introverted 37-year-old bachelors, of course, that's just a cliche perpetuated by people who have gone to one. But all of us have something we care strongly about despite the indifference of our peers or its relevance to "real life," whether it's the precise location of Harry Potter's scar, the earned run records for the 1956 baseball season, or the flight specifications of a Cyclon Raider from "Battlestar Galactica." Why not go someplace where you can talk about it with a few hundred people who agree with you, or at least disagree in an entertaining manner?
If you've never been to a con, here's a quick rundown of what you can expect.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
Cons are really fun to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
tisk tisk . . . Cylon
Cor resembles than Xena remark, btw. Posted by eslaine (Member # 5433) on :
Limit your exposure to a day, and you should emerge relatively un-geeked.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Argh! Fixed.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Cor has the hairstyle for it, even. Any pictures? I'll trade you one of me with Callisto...
[ June 09, 2004, 01:08 PM: Message edited by: Chris Bridges ]
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
o_O
I feel so . . . powerful!
I had a newspaper's website changed!!
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
Were you at the Xena Con that Callisto came to? (We were . . .)
Posted by zgator (Member # 3833) on :
quote: If you stopped while reading this column and muttered, "Idiot, the cloud city scene was in 'Empire'," I'll meet you in the Dealer's Room. I'll be the one wearing the pointy ears.
Here I was thinking that test would include anyone who caught the misspelling of "cylon" (which includes myself) and you went and fixed it.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Scary, isn't it?
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Yup. Although I didn't have nearly as much fun as my buddy Alex. He has a just-shy-of-stalking obsession with Callisto, and he was behind me in line for pictures. I whispered in her ear about his interest, and when he stepped up she flung herself at him and just draped herself all over him. He managed to blush up over the top of his head.
[ June 09, 2004, 01:19 PM: Message edited by: Chris Bridges ]
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
Wild! (At least) two different fan events that we were both at before we even knew you!
Say . . . you aren't the guy who bought her dress are you? o_O
Cor says we should have a Xena party sometime, but I'm afraid I'm not sure what that would entail . . . o_O
Posted by zgator (Member # 3833) on :
You would have to dress up as Ares, of course.
BTW, one of the few fanboy crushes I have is for Callisto.
Posted by porcelain girl (Member # 1080) on :
is there a centralized sort of site that has a calendar for various comic/sci fi/fantasy conventions across the country?
if not there should be.
Posted by Synesthesia (Member # 4774) on :
I was at an anime convention and Yoko Kanno was there. It involved standing on a lot of long lines for a long time and people in cool costumes.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
One of the science fiction magazines had a calendar, but they probably don't mention stuff like Xena or comics.
Posted by Olivetta (Member # 6456) on :
Cons are especially fun for women, especially if you have all your parts in the right place, weigh less than 400 lbs and have all your teeth.
It's like shooting fish in a barrel.
Seriously, my sister dragged me to VulCon last year... and some guy in very convincing Klingon makeup/costume grabbed me out of the blue and started... growling in a lascivious manner. I pushed my sister at him and said, "She's the one who bites, take her!"
It was very amusing. As was this column, Chris. Nailed another one.
Posted by Telperion the Silver (Member # 6074) on :
Mmmmm... Cons... hundreds of hot, lonely, geeky people all crammed together in one hotel..."Oh! Rocky!" The stories I could tell... naughty seductive Telperion...
Posted by porcelain girl (Member # 1080) on :
two of my brothers usually run a table at comic cons, i haven't been to a con since i was very small, and it was a relatively small comic con, anyway. i missed the huge comic con by mere days in san diego that some of the hobbits and andy serkis attended. whoah that would have been sweet.
my brothers both got cool pictures with jim lee in chicago, though. so uh...yeah. hooray comics and sci fi?
Posted by sndrake (Member # 4941) on :
quote: Cor says we should have a Xena party sometime, but I'm afraid I'm not sure what that would entail . . .
Leather, dominant women, submissive men...
Sounds like something that could be folded into an Anita Blake event. Posted by Magson (Member # 2300) on :
quote:is there a centralized sort of site that has a calendar for various comic/sci fi/fantasy conventions across the country?
if not there should be.
I found one a few months ago, listing cons and planned guests across the USA for the next 2 years, but the one I wanted to go to in Salt Lake was becuz Richard Biggs (Dr. Franklin from Babylon 5) was gonna be at it, but he died, so I don't want ot go anymore. And I can't find that site again. But it was awesome. I just tried a quick google search. Seems lots of companies put out their OWN schedules, but not a compliation like that site had.
Hmm. Now I'm wanting to find that site again.
*goes off to search*
Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
My brother is going to a Harry Potter convention this summer, but I can't afford it! I'm extremely jealous.
Posted by porcelain girl (Member # 1080) on :
oh, that would be so very fun!
i gave my roommate in college a hogwarts style scarf for christmas, he loved it. i wish i had got one for my self. it would be neat if they could reconstruct a banquet hall for everyone to dine in Posted by JonnyNotSoBravo (Member # 5715) on :
quote:my brothers both got cool pictures with jim lee in chicago, though. so uh...yeah. hooray comics and sci fi?
Do you mean Stan Lee? I don't know who Jim Lee is...maybe Stan Lee's less famous brother?
Posted by Mabus (Member # 6320) on :
I believe Jim Lee is a comics artist unrelated to Stan Lee...could someone with a better memory verify?
Posted by porcelain girl (Member # 1080) on :
jim lee is asian.
Posted by JonnyNotSoBravo (Member # 5715) on :
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naughty seductive Telperion...
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