(I’m going to try like hell to be positive. I really am. I’ll save my negative comments for another post.)

Picked up HellZiggy at around 1 and we had lunch and headed home to rest up for the night.

Thursday night was good. Staff was surprised at how many people showed up. The numbers were huge even though there wasn’t much going on.

Friday morning started slow for me. CJ and I reported for duty and there wasn’t much for us to do until we both moderated a panel in our last hour. Mine was anime voice actors from Texas, which out of all anime choices most matched where I figure I’m qualified so that worked. At that point we thought it was packed. HellZiggy and I met up with Jack and Oden and had lunch at Coach and Willie’s. I puttered around the vendor hall but didn’t buy anything, then wandered over to the Hyatt to stand in line for Wil Wheaton’s Rock Band. After being informed the event would start at least 90 minutes late we bagged on that and went to Kirk’s for dinner.

Saturday started about the same. Nothing to do until a panel during my last hour of volunteer time and it was one of the same voice actors, so that was easy. This is when I learned what packed really was. I stepped outside at around 11:15 and the line to buy tickets snaked around the side of the building. By the time I went to buy my Geek Prom ticket they were sold out so I angsted over that all afternoon, so I bought myself a present.

I’m not really into steampunk (it gets pretty expensive) but these are beautifully made (trust me there was a few booths with tacky crappy steampunk stuff) and gorgeous! The hands actually move. Or rather, you can move/adjust them as you wish. Go here to check out her stuff.

Turns out knowing one of the people in charge (yay being social) got me a last minute Geek Prom entry. That started out great with an okay cover band and then recordings of geeks’ favorite songs. The high point was Felicia Day jumping up on the catwalk to sing “Do You Want To Date My Avatar” alongside a young cosplay girl in a great Codex costume. After the costume competition the “prom” tanked when the next band was crappy metal screaming and electric feedback guitars. People left in droves… it was time to go home.

This morning was a drag. I was tired and achy and had to force myself to go in. I monitored an early panel and then we were released. We trudged over to the Hyatt to meet Jack’s kids and after that CJ and I gave up and left. Too tired. Too hot. Too crowded.

If you want to listen to recordings of some of the more popular panels, go to VTW Productions.

Good time, but the new venue and new staff created problems where there didn’t need to be. Hopefully next year stuff will be better organized. And Ryan will have moved to Bora Bora.  Ooops, I said I’d be nice. Sorry.

Couple of quick notes:

• Hank at Coach and Willie’s was a fantastic fun server.
• Getting a 3-day pass for the light rail was a great idea.
• Got to see lots of old friends.
• I still hate anime kids. The most annoying teenagers on the planet.
• Tea Party people are very cliquey. People who don’t know what that means (like small children who want to go to said Tea Party) are treated like crap.
• Metal is not appropriate for a geek prom.
• I scored another Steamcrow book for Kira. She loves her After Halloween book so I bought her Caught Creatures.

So if I seem to disappear from twitter, Facebook, here and everywhere it’s because from tomorrow afternoon through Sunday afternoon I’ll be over in Phoenix volunteering at and attending the PCC.

This is the first year I’m volunteering. I asked for mornings, but I don’t have verification yet. Maybe I’ll get an email tomorrow. They’ve got me moderating panels in anime. What do I know about anime? Other than dabbling in a little hentai, not a whole hellava lot. Should be interesting.

It will be exhausting, but fun. There’s the usual fare, plus Wil Wheaton Rock Band, a much larger space and more friends to share it all with. Last year I got to hang out at Four Peaks with Aaron Douglas some of the actors so maybe I’ll get lucky again and get to socialize outside the con. Who knows.

@HellZiggy is coming into town tomorrow and staying with me the first night. We’ll be riding the light rail downtown and I pretty much plan on that for the rest of the weekend. Getting home to sleep and shower and go back.

I’ll try to post notes as I go, but I just know this is going to kick my ass.

The Jonathan Coulton and Paul and Storm concert was MARVELOUS Thursday night. Absolutely and totally worth the bullshit we went through before it actually started. MadCrap MadCap Theaters is THE most horrible venue I’ve ever ever been to. It’s a testament to how much I love JC and the boys, that I’d EVER go back there again.  Why would anyone want to go there? They don’t give a shit about the customers, they have extremely lousy organizational and communication skills, and I’m guessing they spend hours wanking each other off rather than cleaning up the theaters. The whole experience is practically abuse and we’re paying them to do it.

Friday night was the usual #evfn, except E and Sheila weren’t there and neither was the guy they had organizing it in their absence. So of course I take up the slack and try to make sure everyone is taken care of and the newbies are introduced around. I don’t think I did a very good job as certain people walked out. Oh well, there’s always next week.

Kira and I hung out Saturday night and this morning we wandered over to a new (for us) McDonald’s, shopped at WalMart and took the light rail to downtown Tempe (yes, I live here but I’d promised Kira we’d take the train one day) to check out #comiccreate.

And tonight I get a following notification on FourSquare (a social geolocation application) for Earl Newton! Now I’ve met the man at D*C a couple of times, and maybe he would friend me on twitter where you’re getting occasional light-hearted updates/comments from people. And maybe on Facebook which is pretty much the same thing. Likely because of my connection to Evo and less on my own merit I think. Twitter/Myspace/Facebook are places you “friend” anyone you’ve ever met and then some. But wouldn’t you only follow people on a location-based application that you might, maybe, kind of EVER thought you’d actually want to know where they are? Earl Motherfucking Newton wants to know where I am? That’s soooo fucking cool. I feel like somebody now.

And Earl? If you’re a googling fool and come across this post, please don’t explain or get freaked out or delete me or anything. This is me after a couple of drinks – FREAKING THE FUCK OUT because someone of your caliber clicked on me as a connection somewhere, that’s all. Let me have this. Carry on and I’ll never bother you again.

Oh yeah, I got paid for work I did! Actual money instead of possibilities.

What a great weekend.

We’ve often had this value vs. worth vs. cost conversation in my family.  The kids and I went to yard sales almost every Saturday morning when they were younger. In an effort to teach them value and thrift we’d discuss at length what people at one sale would ask for an object because we’d see it at another sale for a different price. It’s not what the price is that matters, it’s what you’re willing to pay for it. Some people having yard sales over-price their item when the item has no value to anyone else. Value is personal to you, and would the price of VALUED ITEM A be worth the cost.

1stSon is the get-rich-quick kid, always asking, “what can I get for this?” He’s also cheaper/thriftier than I. Where I’m picky about which off-brand items I’ll buy, he seldom buys name-brand anything.

2ndSon on the other hand, goes for the label. Every item of clothing he owns (outside of what the Army made him wear) has Oakley or Tap Out or DC all over it.

GirlChild? Well when she has money she’s thrifty most of the time. She does splurge on Victoria Secret bras. And she prefers to eat out a lot, as do I.

There are some things one shouldn’t go cheap on. I refuse to use anything other than Dawn dishsoap. You MUST have at least 400 thread-count Egyptian cotton sheets, seriously. Never ever buy cheap sheets, you’ll thank me later. With food, I’ll try off-brand things, but I usually end up as cheap as my taste buds will allow. I’m not eating crap to save a buck.

Value of things is harder to identify. The value of an object usually has a direct correlation to the cost of replacing it. I have a couple of Firefly/Serenity items and my Anne McCaffrey books where I’d be upset if anything happened. Of course photos of my family have value to me. But mostly stuff is just… stuff.

I won this comic book (signed by one of the artists, Jay Fotos) last night. I’ve never been a comic book person and I’ve no interest in that whole world. Other people at the event were very impressed which led me to believe there was value in this object. Someone even mentioned eBay! Seriously? I won’t bother with that but I would gift it (as an object of value to them) to someone who would appreciate it, but my non-interest in comic books means I’ve no idea which of my friends would… appreciate it, that is.

(Bad sentence structure there, I apologize.)

What do you place value on in your home? I guess it goes back to the old question, “If you had 10 minutes to leave your home forever what would you grab?” What items do you splurge on?

I’ve never claimed to be the perfect parent.  In fact, when my kids were very little I made all kinds of obvious mistakes.  But I’ve noticed in the last couple of weeks a new one.

First there were all those parents who dragged their very small children down to the mall for the inauguration festivities.  Seriously, it was freezing, there were no facilities or room for children to play, no strollers allowed, and massive amounts of people for HOURS.  So there’s a new President.  Great!  But honestly, what exactly is a kid supposed to get out of that entire experience.  They can say there were there when?  That’s like me saying I saw the first moon landing from Cape Canaveral instead of safe at home.  Unless you’re on the frakking space ship it’s all the same.  Unless Obama could stop and take a picture with them, there’s no reason to drag your children down there.

And yesterday as I wandered through the autograph area at Phoenix Comicon I noticed Marina Sirtis holding an infant to her shoulder.  That baby couldn’t have been more than few days old.  My first thought was that “she’s got a baby?” and I wandered on.  A few minutes later I watched as the Father handed that same baby over to Wil Wheaton and I realized some fan was getting photo opportunities for a child who might never know it.

Now I know Mirina and Wil are decent (and likely clean) human beings who would not hurt the baby, and in fact were very touched by and loving to the tiny infant.  But the fact is, both of them had been shaking hands, signing whatever was handed to them, standing close to strangers for photo ops and generally NOT being in the most germ-free situation for HOURS and someone hands them a newborn.  What were the parents thinking?  Who else did they hand that kid off to for a stupid picture?

Taking your child into adult situations can be dangerous.  As well as inauguration day went, the whole area had disaster potential.  Imagine the panic of 2 million people had there been any terrorist activity – or even just some bigot making a statement – and how would you protect your child in that panic?  And there’s a reason we all talk about Con funk.  All those unwashed bodies spreading what have you and you’re taking an INFANT into that and handing it off to strangers?  Just because these people are on TV that doesn’t mean they didn’t shake hands with disease ten minutes before you stepped up.

Parents, please give your baby a couple of months to build up some sort of immune system before you take them out in crowded places.  Especially if you’re going to pass it around to strangers.  I think they’d rather be alive in the future than just a memory in a photo.

Well, we didn’t end up going to Karaoke after all.  Something better came along.  Jack called and invited us to join him and the group he was with which turned out to be some of the Farpoint Media people and some voice actors from the con, and Aaron Douglas.  Yes, I hung out with Aaron Douglas!

CJ, Scotty and I met them all at some restaurant in Tempe but we quickly shifted the entire party to Four Peaks, where Scotty and I were seated between Aaron, Yuri Lowenthal and another extrememly interesting voice actor whose name I was never sure of.  He said Boris, but I think he was pulling my leg.  All very nice, very funny people.  I had such a good time and I’m pretty sure I didn’t make too much of an ass of myself.  I was well behaved, honest!  Athough in the end when we were heading out onto the street to wait for their limo/van and I said, “I guess we’re walking out on the street.”  Boris quickly replied something like “I would think you’d be used to that.”  Dude!

We’d told jokes, chatted about twitter and other similar internet stuff, fear, government conspiracies, a little about their careers and lots about podcasting.  Very fun night.  Even when CJ’s car wouldn’t start we immediately got a jump from some other people and kidded around with them, too.

Edited: Boris is actually Boris Kievsky and he was amazingly interesting to talk to.

Holy crap what a long weekend, and it’s only Saturday night. I’ve been sooooo busy!

Wednesday evening I grabbed my friend Wendy and dragged her up to Gangplank with me. She played silent studio audience during the Gangplank recording and joined in on the Evo @ 11 (no, it’s not posted yet, but I linked to the site anyway) one. I think she’s going to fit right in there. After that we went back to Wendy’s to watch the tail end of Dark Knight and then Definately, Maybe.

Thursday I edited and posted Gangplank show, ran some errands and went to the opening of the Phoenix Comicon – which is actually in downtown Mesa. Hung with CJ and ScottyJ and Dan and Jack Mangan.

Friday, oh Friday. Back to the Comicon, with friends again. Chatted with Wil Wheaton, wandered the booths but with no spare money kept going. Left to go to #EVFN at nearby restaurant. Epic fail and if you really want that whole story, go HERE. The group left there and went ’round the corner to Kirk’s where we should actually have started, and had a great time socializing and eventually karaoke. I left there in time to go back to Comicon for Wil Wheaton’s Rock Band Party where a room full of geeks and nerds rocked out like rock stars and had a great time.

Today, back to Comicon to hang with Evo and Sheila and Marshall. Too crowded, too many anime teenagers, too many unshowered and undeodorized bodies. Oh well. I came home for a nap and now I’m waiting for CJ to come pick me up to go out for more karaoke.

I HAVE A LIFE!