Ohayocon 2008

As the dance was worthless as always, I retired at the healthy time of 11:30 or so. That allowed me to get a decent amount of sleep so I could be ready to go at ten the next day.

Now that I had a schedule, I had a much better idea of what there was to do around here. And as luck would have it, there were not one but two anime screenings I was interested in Saturday morning. The Fullmetal Alchemist movie scheduled from 10:00-12:00 and the first volume of Ninja Nonsense scheduled for 10:30 to 12:30.

The challenge? Both were slotted in the same viewing room. So either Ohayocon was eschewing schedules because they had gained the ability to warp time, Onsokumaru had used an invisibility jutsu to air his series alongside FMA unseen... or the schedulers had no flipping clue what they were doing.

From Ninja to Yo-ji
Saturday: I'll Take "Tiffany Grant's Stalkers" for $400

After immense concentration under a waterfall, I saw that while the FMA movie said it was from 10-12, its location on the grid suggested 8:30 to 10:30. This would be a more logical fit, so I doubted that it was correct either. My plan was to head to that viewing room at 10:00 and enjoy whichever one was on. Because as much as I want to see the FMA movie, I sure as hell am not getting up at eight for it.

So I wake up at 9:30, before anybody else in the room is up, take a shower, get my gear in order and take the road to Shamballa.

Turns out the grid won; I got there in time to see the ending credits (the 3 Dog Night song was noticeably absent). So ninjitsu won out over alchemy, plus gave me a half hour to get some breakfast and attempt to wake up.

The stairs served as the commons area for the convention, sort of like Otakon's fountain thingy or ACen's ecchi-friendly glass staircase.

Everybody who recommended Ninja Nonsense to me was spot on: it's just a blaze of ninja hilarity and random fanservice. Plus any series where Wrigley Field shows up in the opening gets my vote.

After that was an unproductive trip to the dealer's room, although I did get to chat with the creator of Anime News Nina, that adorable little webcomic on ANN. She said I bear a remarkable resemblance to Kevin. I don't know if that's a good thing.

On the way out, I ran into Tiffany Grant in the hallway. This was just after her Hello Kitty panel and she was talking moichandising with some folk and I joined in. This encounter is a bit murky as per the official "Tiffany Grant run-in" rules which state that I can't go out of my way to initiate the encounter. I mean, this is convention #8 for us and I haven't willingly gone to one of her panels since #2. Of course, I knew going into this encounter that things were a bit complicated this year as she was part of *two* panels that I was really interested in. After the Hello Kitty discussion subsided (which carried over even after the folk left; she relayed to me the story of a Hello Kitty/FMA figure that was actually licensed material), we got to talking about the state of the convention itself (she was surprised that this was my first Ohayocon; by this point she probably assumes that I go to pretty much every con in the Midwest). The big thing I wanted to ask her about was the Con Horrors panel late that night. She gave me a rousing preview and reiterated its "adult only" tag, so you'll be hearing about that later tonight.

The next event on my list was her other panel of interest on the writing and adaptation side of the dubbing process, which has always interested me far more than the recording aspect. That was a couple hours away, so until then, it was time to chill back in the room. Matt was still there working on his cosplay so he was able to let me in. Now my laptop, combined with the hotel's wifi, really came in handy. This is a new additional to my arsenal- a basic used model I had bought through Craigslist for around $200 last November. It's small and not very bold, but does what I want effectively with little protest. MST fans will be happy to know I have named it Blaine.

MST fans will not be happy to know that I didn't get much accomplished. The wifi, though spotty, was enough to let me do the essentials- check the No Brand boards and have a quick chat with Chromus. As he had some Monica Rial stories from his Amecon recap, I asked if he wanted to pass anything on to her (she was also on the writing panel). His message was "Gao." I'm assuming he's not talking about the Eyeshield 21 scanlations.

The ADR writing panel was very informative with great questions from everybody except the guy who assumed that the dubbers would be using the Gurenn Lagann fansubs as reference. As the panel quietly ignored him, we got talks on how messed up the Japanese process is, the difficulty of script formatting, and the one-man shows writers must perform in order to get their scripts ready for the production. I passed Chris's message to Monica; she did remember him and volunteered that Amecon was great. I'm still not going... although that would be a great setting for a Tiffany Grant run-in to rule them all.

I had some time to kill before Name That Tune, so I sat down at the bar and started watching some college football (a low-end bowl game... unless you were one of the passionate Rutgers fans sitting behind me) and basketball. The playoff game between Seattle and Washington started, but something didn't feel right. Richard and Felf weren't there, but more importantly I wasn't in a football mood. I was busy idling between other distractions at the bar

Such as Yoko. Hey, I had to break up the text somehow. Full cosplay in tomorrow's edition.

I realized what I needed to handle the football/anime blend- the Devil Bat hat. But with the elevators getting full use and me lacking a key card, I had to hope some friends would stop by.

As luck would have it, Eric, Matt, Dani and some of the other Team 2 girls were nearby and we all headed up to our rooms. I got the hat, but that was a moot point as I ended up spending another hour talking with Eric and the girls. I mentioned that hanging with the girls was more fun than the empty Team 3 room, which got me a hug for some reason, as if this was a difficult choice. One of the subjects was the music selections on the way here. While we relied on mine and Richard's CDs (which wasn't as much anime as we would have liked), Cassie blared her iPod the whole way, including an interlude of Phantom of the Opera. As anyone who has followed the *extreme* depths of my fanfic career may know, I am a fan of a couple musicals myself. So I laid the threat to Eric- behave or Car #3 gets Jesus Christ Superstar on the way back. The girls practically demanded that I play it regardless of behavior... and despite not being in the car themselves.

Name That Tune was next, and I was using it mostly as a way to gauge the differences between my format and other alternatives... and clean house if necessary. Turns out the only innovation this one had was buzzers. Three individuals playing at a time, determined by who was the fastest to name a preliminary song (which worked great for moderately obscure stuff; not so much when it's Hellsing). Despite three rounds, I was never fast enough to get on there- my closest being a half second late on the Ranma ½ opening (to give you an idea of the competition- it didn't even get to the "yappapa" part). But yeah, mine was better, as it's not much fun waiting for three people to try to remember the opening to Those Who Hunt Elves.

Richard and I returned to the bar in time to catch the second half of the football game. No Brand Nick joined us, as did a crowd surprisingly partisan towards Seattle (and one lonely Redskins fan next to us). We were just cheering for a good game, which Washington eventually provided. Now that I had my Devil Bat hat, I could concentrate a little better on the football, even as Bryce walked by. Then Dani. Then Cassie. Then Matt Greenfield from ADV. Matt headed over to the table behind us. We turn around and who should be sitting there but his lovely wife Tiffany Grant.

You know, in case the first one wasn't good enough for you. She was as shocked as I was, and my Devil Bat hat put in overtime following the game while partaking in the conversation at their table (which also included Mike McFarland and a couple other industry types). Once they left for dinner, I turned to Richard and said, "Yeah, that was a good one." He just nodded in stunned silence, now starting to appreciate the magic of these things.

Next up was the Ohayocon Game Show. The thing with game shows, particularly general anime trivia game shows, is that there's about a 75% chance of them sucking something fierce. Questions too difficult, questions too easy, no audience participation... you name it, it's a trap. So we were fully prepared to ditch it midway, especially with the fanfic panel starting in its final half hour. The preliminary seemed like fun at the time- everybody stood up and gestured either an O or an X in response to true/false questions. Losers sat down until the four participants were determined. A great and fair way to decide the competitors! I was one question away from getting up there, gosh darnit!

The game was a standard Jeopardy format, only the categories were lotsa fun- taking classic silly Jeopardy categories and creating some good ones. Such as Portmandon't, which gave a synopsis of a series whose title is the name of two series combined. Such as Ash, Pikachu and Suezo journeying through the monster realm- Pokémonster Rancher (bad, I know, but I couldn't remember the synopsis for Gurenn LaGankutsuo or Powerpuff Girls Z Gundam). Or Video Game Console Rhyme Time- combining the name of an anime character with a gaming console (an obscure one, as the obvious choices had already been used) like Gendo's Nintendo. Where in the World is Ryoga Hibiki won on nostalgia alone.

The problem, we soon discovered, is that the preliminary questions were too hard and too obscure- everybody guessed the whole way, which gave no accurate indicator of who knew their stuff. For example, none of the four contestants had seen Chobits (which was possibly the only show that had two questions). Perhaps if the questions were standard fare to weed out the n00bs instead of trying to trick people with questions about series nobody has seen like Gigantor, Doraemon and Kaleido Star.

Still, the questions were funny and challenging, even with the inevitable "audience scoring higher than the contestants" result.

Somewhere during this time, Dani and Tony decided that switching outfits would be just delightful. Scarier than that is that I know them well enough to not bat an eye at it.

Moving on, I flew solo to the fanfiction panel. As I'm thinking about starting one up at No Brand this year (after the successful try at Geek.kon), I was naturally interested in checking out Ohayo's edition. It didn't even bother me that I was the only guy waiting to get in. When the line of girls explained that it would likely to be an hour-long yaoi discussion, I turned to my tried and true line: "That's okay, I have nothing personal against yaoi. I just haven't written it... much." That 'much' seems to crack so many up, even if I'd be lying if I didn't include it. Again- *extreme* depths of my fanfic career. And don't try digging now!

Anyway, the panel was very good, even if it was bookended by internet forum phenomena, starting with an honest-to-goodness application of the corollary to Godwin's Law and ending with an honest-to-goodness troller who just arbitrarily shouted that there was no basis behind shipping Heero and Duo. He was sitting behind me; I ducked and covered my head.

Besides those incidents, the panel was nice and I've realized that I've started attending these things to impart wisdom rather than receive it. Comments on original characters, summaries and pre-fic "warnings" and the general crappiness of Digimon Frontier went over quite well. That last one came out when two girls asked what I wrote.

"Digimon."
"Which season?"
"All of them... well, except four."
"Yes! Season four sucked! Where's your stuff? I want to read it."

Good thing I had plenty of MST booklets left in my bag. I found that it's a neat trick to write on the back of one when giving contact information... although given how dumb Bryce is early on, maybe I shouldn't have given one to the Team #1 member with the same name. Gonna be in even more trouble when a character named Richard shows up in chapter 11. Neither characters are named after said friends, but perhaps it's time I should go back to borrowing names from family members. I doubt my parents, Barb and Terry, are going to read Grim Reality or Level 1.

Tiffany Grant's "Convention Horrors" panel completed the trifecta of win.

These were stories of some of the worst experiences our esteemed guests have had with hotels, fans and other guests. Along with Greenfield, Grant and McFarland is Brittany Karbowski (whom I realized only after the fact was Himeko in Pani Poni- an incredible performance) and Jan Frazier. The introductory round involved them complaining about the elevators here. I brought up Anime Iowa '06; Jan pointed at me and nodded repeatedly.

As they don't want to step on anybody's toes, I don't want to share their other stories, but if you're a convention regular and this panel is ever available, it is a must-see. Doubly so if you've ever been to A-Kon in Dallas.

The line to get into the late-night rave, and the ball game that emerged from it. Later in the night, Tony and I went in there to fetch some water. We barely escaped with our lives.

Since Midnight Madness (it and Anime Hell apparently play here too) were packed, and playing Redeath for the umpteenth time, I needed another activity. I found Mike of Team #1 idling nearby with a bag, looking a tad pensive. After talking to him for what was likely the first time all con, he said that the bag was Matt's. Matt had said "watch my bag, I'll be back in a second." That was a half hour ago. I had found my activity... attempt to secure a replacement key card. I announced my intentions to Mike, noting that if I found Matt's card, I was taking it. "Go for it," Mike said.

> search inside bag
You found a wallet! Take wallet? y/n
> n
You close the bag.
> search outer pocket
You found a key card! Take key card? y/n
> y
Key card added to inventory.

It's amazing how petty theft seems justifiable when written as a text adventure.

Anyway, my new key card meant I could stay as late as I wanted and return home at any time. So it was time to scrounge up some fun.

Tony and Cassie were fighting off the need to sleep with the help of some strange people that insisted on making faces for the camera. Good enough for me. I didn't say much until one girl there started singing a song playing on her MP3 player. It was "Girl All The Bad Guys Want" by Bowling For Soup. I knew this song and started singing along. Before long, we had a nice duet going. Further attempts to replicate the effect proved unsuccessful as I didn't know the songs on her playlist.

For some reason, we headed upstairs to a more common area where we could watch people wandering the halls while listening to a nearby table playing anime music in hopes of advertising their convention. We paid them no mind as more joined us, mainly fascinated by Tony's attire. Then she succeeded in finding a song I knew.

It was the "Elephant Love Medley" from Moulin Rouge.

In spite of the sappy love songs, I was obligated to sing Obi-wan's part. It was awesome.

For the heck of it, Tony looking totally emo with a cute plushie in his pocket.

We just sat there and hung out for a few more hours. Gradually, I heard a familiar, nagging anime song from the nearby table. Somehow, despite not having seen the series, I recognized it, walked up to the table and said, "Wedding Peach?"

"OMG!" they replied, having just had a discussion about nobody being able to recognize that song.

This turned into a great talk about various conventions, with rounds of Name That Anime Opening: The Home Game interspersed throughout. Naturally, I always seemed to be able to answer the really dirty series like Hanaukyo Maids and Iketeru Futari (which despite its awfulness has an awesome opener).

This lasted until four o'clock, with Dani, a few cosplayers, and other random visitors coming and going. Around there, I finally conceded that some sleep would be nice for the ride home, and retired using my newly acquired key card.

We didn't hear from Matt again until Sunday.