Month: July 2007

comic-con Sunday

Well, comic-con is over and done with for this year. Today was pretty mellow. I went to three panels — a DC panel, the second Cartoon Voices panel, and an “Art of the Cover” panel. All were great. Only the voice panel was uncomfortably crowded. I didn’t buy anything at the con today though, other than coffee. I feel kind of bad about that, but really, I’ve got plenty of stuff in my reading pile at home right now. The last thing I need is more books to read! Over the course of the con, I think I bought just three trade paperbacks, and several toys, most of which are for other people. I think this is the least amount of stuff I’ve ever bought at the con.

The NY Times actually has an article about the con. A decade ago, I wouldn’t have imagined an article about comic-con showing up in the NY Times; now, it’s really not that surprising. The article concentrates on the Hollywood stuff, mostly, which I completely skipped out on this year. I didn’t go to either Stargate panel, the BSG panel, or any of the movie studio panels. I never saw the inside of Hall H or Room 20 at all this year.

comic-con Saturday

Once again, I seem to find myself back in my hotel room early. I went to Mark Evanier’s “Quick Draw” and “Cartoon Voices” panels this morning. Both were great. Neither was overcrowded, or hard to get into. There was a DC panel right after the Cartoon Voices panel, in the same room, and I was going to stay for that, but I decided to make a trip to the bathroom, then try to get back into the room. That was a mistake; there was a big line to get into the room, so I gave up and wandered the floor a bit. Then, I went upstairs to try and get into a different panel, but I got there a few minutes late, and they’d filled the room already. I wandered around some more, then decided to go for a late lunch. I got myself a turkey sandwich and a beer, then headed back to the hotel, and here I am, blogging and enjoying the peace and quiet.

There’s an interesting article about the fire marshall over at Sign On San Diego. The photo they ran with it is a bit misleading, though. At first glance, it looks like she’s dressed as Prof. McGonagall. When you look at the picture more closely, though, you realize that she’s in the background, wearing her uniform, and the woman in the foreground is a random Harry Potter fan. (They couldn’t have managed a picture with the subject of the article in the foreground?) Either way, they’re doing a pretty good job of crowd control at the con, given the circumstances. I have to admit that I long for the days when I could just walk into any random panel five minutes late, and still get a good seat, though.

comic con – Saturday morning

I’m not sure whose wifi I’m using right now, but it’s working OK, so I’m spending a bit of time this morning browsing the blogs and news sites. A lot happened at the con yesterday, apparently. CBR has a whole bunch of stories up.

I have no idea what I’m going to do today. There are probably twenty different panels I’d like to attend, but, like yesterday, I’ll be lucky if I can get to two or three. Hopefully, I’ll have more energy than I did yesterday, though.

comic con day two

I had a pretty light day today. I gave blood in the morning, then went into the con and saw Paul Dini’s panel. Then, I wandered the floor a bit. Later, I went to Neil Gaiman’s panel. I was tired after that, and things were getting crowded, so I gave up and went back to the hotel, stopping for a burger at the Hard Rock. I was going to go back to the con for some of the evening stuff, but I’m just too beat right now, so I’m hanging out in the hotel room watching Torchwood. I guess the blood donation took more out of me than usual.

comic-con, day one

The first day of comic-con was pretty cool. I didn’t spend a lot of money, but I went to some interesting panels, and generally had a good time.

I went to the Torchwood panel. They showed a long clip from the first episode. I think I was the only person in the room who hadn’t seen the entire series already. It looks interesting, but I don’t get BBC America on my cable system, so I’ll have to wait for the DVDs, or maybe just watch it the way everyone else apparently has — good old BitTorrent. I loved the Q&A session. A lot of people who’d clearly seen season one wanted to ask questions about season two, but obviously didn’t want to admit that they’d watched season one via pirated DivX files or whatever. They all pulled out the “I’ve got a friend in England and he sent me the DVDs” line. (OK, maybe a couple of them really *did* have friends in the UK.)

I also saw The Pixar Story, Leslie Iwerks’ documentary about Pixar. Really good, fascinating, stuff. I’ll have to see it again when/if it gets a theatrical release. If not, I’m sure it’ll be on DVD at some point.

Later at night, I went to Ric Meyer’s Kung-Fu clip show thing, which I’ve done every year since he started doing it. I only stayed for the first half-hour. It started at 9pm, later than usual, and I was getting pretty tired by then. (I’m still mostly on east coast time.) He concentrated on TV shows rather than movies this time, and I have to admit I wasn’t that interested in the stuff he was showing. I guess that’s partially because I was sort of worn out by then, but also I’m just not that enthusiastic about the TV stuff.

Verizon

I got my Verizon bill today, the first bill since I got my new phone. Hoo boy. I’ve been on a $15, 25 minute per month, plan for the last few years, and that’s generally been enough time for me. Sometimes I go a bit over, but usually not by more than a few minutes.

I went a little nuts with the new phone though, and racked up $75 in additional charges. Since it looks like I’m already well over the 25 minutes for this month, too, I’ve decided to switch to the $40 plan, which gives me 450 minutes. That ought to cover any ridiculous amount of phone usage I can manage, and it’ll let me use Mobile Web with (relative) abandon.

The $15 plan, though, was some kind of special plan that I’ll probably never be able to get back into, though, so that’s a bit of a pain. And I’ve always been kind of proud to have a calling plan that was cheaper than anyone else’s. Well, I knew it wouldn’t last forever!