Fan Expo 2008

So, last weekend was Toronto's 2008 Fan Expo and I had the pleasure of working there at the booth of my old store (from my comic manager days), Planet X. It was a fun weekend, though quite tiring. This is a large convention, covering comics, gaming, sci-fi, horror, anime. There were many guests, including:

• Buzz Aldrin - One of the first men on the moon
• Brent Spiner - Data from Star Trek TNG
• Kate Mulgrew - Capt. Janeway from Star Trek Voyager
• Edward James Olmos - Commander/Admiral Adama from Galactica (new series)
  
• Henry Winkler - The Fonz himself
• Sean Astin - Sam from Lord of The Rings
• Jeremy Bullock - Boba Fett from Star Wars
• Alex Ross - Of comic book fame
• Michael Rosenbaum - Lex from Smallville
• Wes Craven - Of horror movie fame

I met and shook hands with Commander Adama! Awesome! Also, Alex Ross came to our booth looking for an action figure. Good times.

The crowds, shot from our booth.


Me, advertising the Marvel Ties we were selling.

Anyhow, it struck me that there were fewer costumes this year. There was an awesome Ghostbuster! (whose backpack lit up and everything!)

The anime population seemed to have their usual representation, but the comic costumes seemed way down this year. There were A LOT of people with Joker makeup from The Dark Knight, as to be expected, but most didn't bother dressing as the Joker wearing only the makeup with their regular clothes. Weird. I saw a very well done Nightwing (current costume), and a Catwomen (again, current costume).

More Viper pilots from Galactica this year too. I also noticed several Watchmen costumes, something I've never seen before. I guess the hype from the Watchmen movie next summer is having an affect. I saw several Rorschachs, and an Ozymandias.

Star Wars was as usual well represented, especially with the 501st Legion, who usually have a Saturday night march in costume (though there seemed fewer of them than last year).

Getting ready for their march

TIE fighter pilot playing video game.

Sunday night pack up with long. We brought in 7 skids of stuff Thursday night, restocked roughly 5 over the weekend, and left with 6 (repacked boxes, so left stuff than 6 sealed boxes), so that took a while to pack and return to the warehouse.

I got free dinner both nights (Vendor dinner Saturday, and my boss Sunday), and had a great time. Look forward to next year.

Star Trek Voyager

One of my plans for the next year (I know, this is lame) is to watch Star Trek Voyager. This is the only Star Trek series where I have not watched every episode. I seriously disliked voyager while it was on the air. It started out quite strong (my opinion at the time was that it had one of the strongest first seasons of all the Star Treks), but got seriously lame as the seasons went on. I re-watched a bit of the first season a few years ago, and realised that it wasn't as good as I remembered it.

I really don't understand the people who actually like Voyager. In my opinion, it's the crappiest Star Trek. In fact, most people agree with me (except those who hate Enterprise despite never watching more than the first 3 episodes. Seriously, that series got GOOD, especially by the 4th season, which was awesome but unfortunately too little too late ratings-wise).

Regardless, I've decided to watch Voyager objectively and keep an open mind. I'm on the 3rd episode, and my original opinion apparently stands, this isn't bad. Not great, but how many Star Treks had a great first season (try re-watching 1st season of TNG, I dare you). I look forward to this, I think, though I'll see how it gets.

Danger! Danger!

So, my fiancee is in Korea teaching for a year. I miss her very much and am grateful for Skype so that I can at least talk with her cheaply and see her on the webcam.

Anyhow, she has her own blog on the trip, (which isn't published, but if you know her, ask her for the link) and I just had to steal this picture from it to share. It's a warning sign on the elevators of the conference centre she's at for the week.

"Don't lean on the doors or you will fall to your death!"

I love it. I really like the emphasis on the hitting of the head.

Asus Eee PC

By the way, the last couple of posts were written on my new Eee PC 901 that I picked up a few weeks ago. I'm loving the thing. It's super-portable, and while I would not recommend the tiny keyboard for anyone with even slightly chubby fingers, I've gotten fairly used to it fairly quickly. I also have no plans to use it for any hardcore coding, considering the limited screen size and processor, but it's nice to have a computer weighing as much as book with me. Also, 3 USB ports, an SD card reader, ethernet, and wireless-N on something this size. ~6 hours battery life when wireless turned off. Awesome!

A few pictures of my unpacking:
Next to my fiancee's laptop

Be Kind Rewind

Um, so ya. I'm currently watching Be Kind Rewind, a Jack Black movie where, after getting magnetized and erasing all the tapes in the local video store, he goes about re-filming all of them.

Um, not my favourite film of his, I must say. Our friend Daniel has wanted to see it for a while and despite the fact that my fiancee saw it on her flight to Korea (and did not finish watching), we're here watching it now. There are certainly funny parts; the re-filming of Ghostbusters is awesome, but there are also a lot of parts we're not liking so much. I can't say I hate it, but I can't say that it's an enjoyable use of my time.

Daniel is now convinced that the premise is sound, so what we should do is re-film it ourselves and do it right. Hhhmm, a re-filmed film of re-filmed films? Sounds like a winner.

The Lazy Bloggers Post Generator

Post provided by The Lazy Bloggers Post Generator. Really, just for kicks:


Holy Blog Of Doom, Batman! I just climbed out from under my rock and realised I have not updated this since people stopped clapping and Tinkerbell died... You would not believe that my hands were chopped off and I was waiting for bionic ones. Apologies!.

I am devastated with discovering time doesn't stand still, planning my wedding, just generally being the life of the party to anyone unfortunate to cross my path, my day seems to be a litany of stuff and giggles from when the nightclubs close to I run out of alcohol. I am smitten. but never say never.

I solemnly swear I will get online again after this next set. Honestly! Unless of course the pool with the cocktail bar is heated!.

Rain Is Good

So, as anyone living in the city knows, Toronto has been getting record amounts of rain this summer, and will possibly break the year precipitation record considering the amounts of snow we got this winter. While many of my co-workers and friends have complained about the nearly constant storms, I'm personally loving it. Why?

1. It's keeping the temperature down. My apartment is blazingly hot during the summer, but this year has been pretty good except for a week here and there.
2. Rainbows! After going several years without seeing rainbows, I've spotted several this summer, including a double rainbow.
3. Green Grass. After last summers all most record breaking dryness, it's nice to see the intense green of people's lawns. Also, the city doesn't have to waste money telling people not to waste too much water on trying to keep the lawn green.
   
4. Fewer smogs days. The rain and temperatures have kept Toronto's skies fairly clear.
5. Lake levels up. Now, I haven't gotten a chance to go camping this summer, but I'm sure that if I had, I would appreciate the rising water levels getting back to where they were a few years ago (they've been getting quite low the past few years)
   

So, there we are. Now, most the people I know who most vocally complain of this rain, also seem to be the ones who figure they'd rather live in Vancouver than Toronto, so figure that one out.