Guess it's about time I wrote my con report, eh?

The moment I got to the lab Monday morning, I've been slammed with work. Work that involves things like having to get up at 5:30 in the fricken' morning. Ugh.

Anyway, onto the report.



Friday the 8th, after I took my third physics exam, I headed home where I ran into road construction. They had the whole highway on either side of my driveway blocked to traffic. I stopped and waved over one of the crew and pleaded to be allowed to drive through to get to my house. Apparently it was a big deal cause they had to stop some trucks or something. Sheesh. Got home, packed changes of clothes and whatnot, checked flight time, and left for the airport. As I was flying the day after London I left for the airport early in case security was lengthy.

Yeah. Security took all of two minutes. So I got to hang out in the airport for an hour and a half. I people watched.

Had a lay-over in Denver, saw the beginnings of a funnel cloud as we landed. Weather passed without incident. From Denver I flew into Burbank at about 9:30. Gods I was tired at that point. mithrandir202 was waiting to pick me up in the airport and we managed to get out of there and into Burbank and to the hotel.

Hotel was nice. More or less like any other hotel. *shrug*

I crashed pretty soon after we got the hotel, it was an hour later according to my brain.

The next morning I woke ridiculously early. It's a room sharing thing. I always sleep light and wake early when sharing a room with anyone. Drives my friend Grace nuts. "Go back to sleep! It's 6am!" *g*

I got up, showered, and put on my IManiCon tee.

mithrandir202 got up and got ready and we ventured down to the restaurant for breakfast. As a small-town Montana girl, damn things are expensive in Cali. *g*

We ate, killed some time, and then went to the "ballroom" where the con was being held. There was an "official hotel sign" outside the door proclaiming IManiCon 2005. Damn, I should have taken a picture. Oh well.

The con organizers were just about done setting everything up and a couple other people had drifted in. Around ten o'clock almost everyone was there. Darien's Muse (Brenda) was in transit with her family (they're on holiday in America from Holland) and krpm1 (Kelly) was held up until later that day.

Once it was decided that everyone who was going to show was there- Joyce (I-Mom), Cheryl (Underdog), Bryan (CoolB), Leigh (TheMalteseHobbes I think...Leigh, little help?), Kirsi (from Finland), Chris (Jonesy/mithrandir202), Amanda (VisBall), Pepper, Oskar, and their adorable baby son Alec (gotta start those I-Man fans early), Nell, and the other Kelly- we played the traditional IManiCon game "Fricken' Friend." I had half of a Lexus dealer business card. I matched with Bryan.

After that we moved onto Match Game. Only Kirsi and I signed up as contestants. Wonder of wonders, with the answer of "SWRB," I won. In fact, I won a full sized poster from ABC's "The Three Stooges" in which Paul performed. And later signed.

I'm getting there.

After Match Game we watched the tape from ComiCon 2001 I think it was, with the Invisible Man cast on a panel. Many, many laughs.

If I'm remembering events in order, shortly after watching the tape, Cheryl got a hold of Mike McCafferty on her phone. She managed to get it on speaker and the collective "we" talked to Mike for a few minutes. Actually, he mostly talked. He was in...blanking...help...Michigan?...for a play and therefore wasn't in Cali. He told us to be guardedly optimistic about a possible I-Man movie. *BG*

After we "talked" to Mike, Amanda tried to call Vince (who was in Louisiana filming his next movie) but all we got was voicemail. "A" for effort.

Either shortly after the call from Mike or right before, Brenda (Darien's Muse) arrived with her family. Heh...at the moment I can only remember her brother's name, Stephen.

We broke for lunch after the phone calls and everyone decided to walk down to The Cheesecake Factory. Omg they have good food. Chris and I ended up being seated with Brenda and her family. Her parents are wonderful. Her father is a pharmacist in Holland and he has a wonderful sense of humor. I really enjoyed eating lunch with them.

After lunch we returned to the hotel and the ballroom. Unfortunately, I had left my convention goodie bag at my place and it disappeared while we were out. Was very strange. It luckily wasn't anything horribly expensive and there were a few extra items available for mementos. *plays with grenade-shaped squirt-gun*

After everyone collected and settled down Cheryl organized the scavenger hunt. So with digital cameras (almost everyone had one or a phone that took pictures) off we went into teams (I was with Chris, Brenda, and Stephen) with a bizarre list of items to collect. Some were easy. Hot tub? Of course the hotel had one. Corn? Cheryl accepted a package of Corn-Nuts. *g* Pot holder? Well we tried at a small, Chinese I think I was, restaurant but I think we had a communications break-down and the guy behind the counter shooed us away. I ran up to the hotel room for eye drops and maps of Cali while the rest of them ran down to the other end of the street from the hotel to the mini-mart to get a picture of imported beer. I wasn't there, but apparently they got yelled at/shooed out of there as well. My team collected 22 items but the winners collected, uh, 25 I think. Running around the hotel looking for scavenger hunt items was a hoot. I think the staff was ready to ask us to desist.

I think this was about the time Kelly (krpm1) arrived. Kelly's great. She's an aspiring actress. Lovely and exuberant. I told her when she's famous I'm going to tell people I knew when she was just working indie films in LA.

I'm blanking about the intermittent events between the scavenger hunt and Paul's arrival. I think we watched the I-Man compilation vid made by CircleCity. Damn she's good at her work. Wish we could have seen all of it.

I was talking to Brenda's father when Paul showed up so I didn't see him come in. My first clue was the sudden silence in the room. Turn around and...whoa.

It was one part total fangirl squeee warring with another part of be calm, cool, mature. Once I remembered to breathe, life was good. Joyce lead Paul in and started making introductions all around the room. I don't remember if she introduced me as Beth or Tara but I could really care less. *g*

It was nearing 5:30pm when Paul showed up and our group dinner reservations were at 5:30 so Joyce organized an incredibly quick autograph and picture session. I had Paul sign the poster I won and the program from the convention. I also got a picture with him. My hair looks funny.


Paul and Me

Moment of reality? I was wearing sandals that give me maybe a whole half-inch to my 5' 5" frame and Paul was wearing boots. *shrug*


Program


After a "Are you coming or not?" call from the restaurant we scattered from the ballroom to put con goodies in rooms and grab purses etc and collected in the lobby to walk down the street to the restaurant. The Sicily Italian Kitchen I think it was. Very nice place, lovely atmosphere. I'd love to go back someday if I'm ever in Burbank again. They had us in our own little private room with one long table that wasn't long enough so they brought in another leaf. My grandmother had a table like that. Just kept growing and growing. *g*

At the restaurant the collective we (again) met Eddie Jones and his lovely wife Anita. They had been waiting. Oops.

We all moved into the room and found seats.

Fate's funny. She often has a sick sense of humor. Things like me having not one successful PCR for almost three months. But that Saturday, she was feeling generous. I sat next to Paul. Paul had sat at the middle of the table and Eddie across from him. When people stared sitting the chair I was standing behind was right next to Paul. Oh darn.

We ordered meals and drinks and had little conversations among ourselves. Paul and Eddie talked about their respective projects and careers. It's an interesting world they live in. I don't think I could handle it. I'd snap and kill my agent or something. *shrug*

Eddie, for his gruff exterior, is a teddy-bear of a man. Don't tell him I said that. And his wife has a great sense of humor and a quick laugh. They were lovely dinner mates.

After the meal Joyce, con organizer extraordinaire, arranged for photos and autographs with Eddie. I had forgotten my con program but I was still wearing my ID badge. So I had Eddie sign that. When it was my turn for a photo I sat down next to him all polite and proper and he laughed and pulled me into a hug. Couldn't help but grin.


Eddie and Me


Badge

After pictures and autographs there was more chatting about random things. There were also completely decadent desserts. Bring friends if you order the Angel Kiss. Good grief.

When things started to break up and we had graduated from sitting to standing and milling (there was jockeying for position to take pics) I was standing back behind my chair, trying not to be run over, and Paul stood to say his good-byes, thank yous, etc. He saw me standing there and gave me like a half-hug. *big fangirl squeee dies*

After Eddie and Paul left the collective we wandered back to the hotel. There was a TV and DVD player in Joyce's room so we made plans to gather there and watch the pilot epi since Kirsi hadn't seen it! I went back to my hotel room and dropped my purse and shoes and whatnot and Chris and I joined the group in Joyce's room. You can fit about ten people into one room to watch DVDs. It was fun. It's always fun to watch a well-loved show with a bunch of other people who appreciate it as much as you do.

After the pilot many of us, myself included, were drifting in and out of consciousness. After many hugs we all broke up and returned to our respective rooms. Still slightly wired on adrenaline I tossed and turned for a while before I fell asleep about 1am and still woke up at like 7:30am. *sigh*

Chris and I hit the hotel restaurant for breakfast again and then we checked out and he negotiated traffic back to the airport. We got there, said our good-byes and I plunged into the masses at Bob Hope airport. Found the United counter and pushed all the right buttons on the electronic check-in and went to my gate. Flight 6753...delayed.

*headdesk*

I think not ten minutes after I got there, there was a PA saying my flight was going to be about an hour delayed coming in from San Francisco. Peachy. Got a lot of reading done that morning.

I had two lay-overs, on in San Fran and one in Denver. Joys of flying cheap. My lay-over in San Fran was memorable if only for the killer salad dressing I had. And I don't mean killer as in "omg good" I mean as in jumped off my salad container and tried to kill me. Splashed dressing all over my right calf and foot. Wasn't I a sight walking across San Francisco International with salad dressing remnants on my leg as I walked towards the woman's bathroom. It was an oil-based dressing too so even though I wiped off the obvious traces it left a nice oil stain. I was featuring the latest in Italian dressing fragrances for the flight out of San Fran and on through Denver.

Boarded the plane in San Fran and then got a message from the pilot. There was a "scratch or gouge" on the rear of the plane by the luggage compartment loading door. They had mechanics checking it out to see if it would affect plane safety. Should take fifteen minutes.

Hour and half later with two more PA's from the pilot saying we should be leaving shortly, we were taking off. There were concerns about making connecting flights in Denver. We were looking to arrive in Denver about 8pm. My connecting flight was at 8:30. There were some other people on the plane whose connecting flight was 8:12. We landed at five after eight. By the time we taxied and they made the announcement that those who weren't trying to make tight connections please remain seated so that others could leave quicker, and made it to the gate, it was 8:08.

Since I was flying into tiny Missoula, the flight attendant had no idea which gate my connecting flight was at. So I nearly run off the plane, find a departure screen...Missoula, Missoula, Missoula....gate B57. Only 22 gates away from where we landed. I ran. Partially. B57 there's a sign: All flights from this gate are departed from gate B59. Ack! Pop over to B59 and the door to the gate is closed. There's a woman in a United uniform. *pounce*

Me and two other women were checked in on printed flight lists since the computer was already logged off and rushed across the tarmac to our little plane to Missoula.

Thank you United for letting us on the flight. *hugs*

That flight was uneventful. I slept intermittently.

I was really glad to be home though as we flew over Missoula.

Went home, crashed. Got up Monday morning and went to work.

More pictures:


Eddie and wife Anita


Paul, Pepper, and baby Alec- the collective we joked when these pictures were being taken that they'd make perfect blackmail material against Paul- "National Enquirer: Paul Ben-Victor's Secret Love Child"


Eddie and Kelly


Paul and Brenda


Eddie and Chris


Poster


Convention Room with (right to left) Nell, Cheryl, Bryan, and Chris



I need more I-Man icons. Hmm.