Comic Con Thursday- Day 1

I woke at my friends house about 40 miles away from the convention center and proceeded to get on my way. Everyone works earlier than me so I showered, packed and set the alarm on their house and got on the road. I stopped at Vons and got a breakfast sandwich and some groceries. I drove to San Diego and went to the area my hotel was in. I stayed at the same hotel last year and know the few places you can park for free. I found a spot and took my stuff to the hotel. I couldn't check in, but I could drop the bags off and go on my way.

I went to the Marriott first. This was where the Film School was taking place. I have never actually seen the first day since I normally go down to SD on Thursday and arrive in the afternoon. So I sat and listened to Sean Rourke tell all about pre-production with the help of Jack Conway, Vera Vanguard, and Valerie Perez. I chatted with them a little bit then went off to find my friend Zack and his wife Joanne. Zack writes comics and had signings at the company publishing the comic he writes all 4 days.

We hung out and looked at stuff in the dealer hall. I left them around mid-afternoon and went back to the hotel. People had checked in and I was able to make a costume change. I made the new version of the Scarlet Spider recently and wanted to wear it. I like wearing costumes that make me anonymous. Spider-man or some derivation thereof is a great costume for being anonymous. But not great for seeing.

I wiggled into the costume and had the mask safety pinned to the body. In my haste I didn't quite get the finishing touches on it. Like snaps  to hold the mask in place.

 I called Zack and told him to meet me in a certain place in 30 minutes. I would not have a phone with me because, well, no pockets. And to carry a phone around ruins the costume.  I did learn that the gloves were thick and I was not able to use the touch screen on the phone anyway.  I went and wandered to the convention center. I waited around for Zack but he never showed up so I walked around. I could see well enough for when people wanted to take my picture. I would pose but I didn't go inot some of the typical spider-man type poses where your legs are around your ears or crouched on the floor. I'll let younger guys do that. Little kids were very excited to see spider-man. They knew the genre but not the character. Which is fine. I had my picture taken with lots of kids and some adults. After 3 hours or so I went back to the hotel to change. Funny thing about superhero costumes, how do they pee?
 
 After I changed I caught up with Zack. He left messages on the phone I told him I would not have with me, but we met up for dinner. We went to a Mexican place. I don't know the name. The food was good. Margaritas worked. After that we went to a place that was having a industry party. I was the one with the invite this time. It was thru Jack who I do the panel with, he was my hook up. We got to the club. he was working the door. I go this attention and he gave us wrist bands to get in. I thought we would get in immediately as VIPs, but we were directed to a line. It took about 30 minutes to get in the Fire Marshall was a real stickler for capacity. When we got inside it looked like the pictures below.

There were hot girls dancing on platforms to super loud techno music. They were wearing costumes from a video game I didn't recognize. Some apocalyptic first person shooter. And they had bits of steel attached to the costumes. In their hands they had grinders painted silver, apply grinder to steel and you get a shower of sparks. It made for a interesting show.  We found a place near the bar where we could watch the crowd and stayed there for an hour listening to the music and gyrating to the beat. Someone gave us glowsticks and we waved those around. Since we were not on acid the effect was lessened, but it was still fun to wave them ironically.

After midnight we left. I walked back to the hotel and crashed on the fold out bed in the front room. In the bedroom on 2 queen sized beds and an air mattress were 6 other people. 6. That kind of occupancy I had not put up with for years and years. We used to pack 6-8 people in a room and take turns sleeping ont the bed in some combination of people. Thank god I had the front room to myself.