I mentioned the noisy hinge to the front desk and they had taken care of it before I was ready to go out.
I walked down the road a little ways, to an Albertson’s, looking for something to eat for breakfast, on the run.
It was too early, so a clerk was removing all the old pastries from the shelves. New stuff was still in the oven.
I bought a small bottle of OJ and a couple small snack pies, apple and pecan. I was hoping to find a small fruit bowl, but couldn’t afford them.
I had gone too far in that direction, so I ended up having to come back to get to the convention center, taking a long flight of stairs, instead of crossing a half dozen train tracks. This lead directly to the convention center, but the only entrance open in the morning was on the other end.
Seriously, these people do not know how to organize a large group. There are maybe a dozen doors along the front, but they funnel 10,000 through only 1. They do utilize more later, but then the flow is significantly more spread out anyway.
There is an escalator that takes you down from the second floor, and then it is blocked off at the bottom, so that you must scan to go out, then you may re-scan in the next door to come back in. Why??? I have already scanned to get in the first place, so why do I have to go out?
There is another elsewhere, going up, where they have a long (60-70 ft) barricade at the top before you can choose which way to go, even if you then walk directly along the side of that escalator.
Nothing started until 10, the main doors opened at 9, so that people could line up (out of the sun) for whatever event they wanted. I headed upstairs and was one of a handful that was at the panel that I wanted, so I got a seat, right up front.
I just bounced from panel to panel, surprisingly not having to stand in line to get into any of them.
One was in the Grand Ballroom, well, it was actually called Ballroom 20, but I think my name would have been better. It could easily hold a few hundred dancers, without crowding. Also, it is the only room, that I know of, that was called a “ballroom” and not a “hall”.
There was a vampire discussion, with Ashley Greene and Peter Facinelli, who both played “Cullens” in Twilight, and the director, Catherine Hardwick.
They also had a K-pop boy band, N-Hyphen, who just released a vampire video, with many vampire themed songs. Although, from the preview, it looks very homo-erotic. I’m not sure if that was they were going for.
By 2pm, there were no more interesting panels, for a while, so I browsed around the main hall for a bit.
I came up to one booth, and looking at the artwork on the book cover, it looked very familiar. The artist asked me if I knew his work, and I replied it looked like a “zombie fetus” book I bought in Orlando 20-something years ago. He was very surprised, because he had only gone to that convention once. I loaned out the book I had to someone, and of course, never seen it again. So I bought the 25th anniversary edition and a sequel, $40. He autographed both, for free, which he normally charges for, just because of the previous purchase. I think he may have just been more impressed that I remembered it from that long ago.
“Artist Alley” has at least 100 artists in their booths, most of which had some awesome artwork displayed. But I have a limited bank account and really don’t want to carry anything at all.
Hunger was striking, and the food at the con was limited in variety, and very expensive. I headed back over to the “Gaslight” district, and found a Irish bar that had a reasonable priced menu posted out front.
I order a shepherd’s pie, only $16, but was disappointed in how small it was. It did fill me a bit, so I guess I should not complain for that. I sat about 10 minutes after I finished, waiting for my check, before someone came over to take my dishes, who was not my waitress, then waited another 8 for it to actually come.
The total was over $18, because of added sales tax, but also a “hospitality” fee. I presume that was the tip, so I left exact change on the clipboard and left. I don’t know who would have been tipped anyway, as the person who sat me, the person who took my order, the one bringing my order, and the one who brought the check, were all different people.
They were not that busy to have that poor of service.
I came back to the room, just to drop off some of the stuff I was carrying, including some swag I got from panels. Then I headed back over to the main hall, for a while.
The next panel I wanted wasn’t until 7, and it was just after 5, but I was hurting again, so I just went up to just sit.
There is a “food court” with a seating area, but every seat is taken up by people just sitting there, not eating, even though there are plenty of rooms with panels that they could sit in, and maybe be entertained.
One panel was really just a trivia contest, for Andy’s mint chocolates. Many of the questions and answers I did not have any clue about. Other questions, I was just way too slow for my brain to process.
One question was about a character that liked lollipops, no one was answering, so I joking called out “Kojak”. The host thought it was funny enough, so I got a chocolate.
