Thursday:

Well, I guess this really starts on Wednesday.  I haven’t finished any artwork for the art show, I needed to meet up with Izobel to pick up her artwork for the art show and I needed to go to some “Country Home” Tupperware on crack thing that my sister in law was holding.

Izzy lures me into meeting her in Valencia after the Country Home party and twists my arm to take me to see ‘Lilo and Stitch’.  (Yeah… like it really took a LOT of twisting. NOT!)  Great movie, gonna have to go into that one more later.  :)

So, it’s Midnight before I get home and I still have to pack.  GO ME!  I also have 8 auctions that closed that night that I should write.  By the time I finish getting stuff together, it’s 3am and I have to be up and running at 6am.  I’m already off to a good start.

Thursday Morning, 7am, we are off to the airport.  Alan slows down to 30mph and shoves me out.  I have to stand in line for nearly an HOUR just to get through security.  It’s a good thing I worked hard to keep from having to check any baggage, or I would have been pushing my luck time wise.  

The plane takes off early and I am off to meet up with Patrick in Cleveland.  I am sitting next to this nice old couple that want to talk my ear off.  They are ‘born again’ and I have a feeling they are a bit concerned about the naked Gargoyle I was drawing in my sketchbook.  So, yeah, no sleep for Jen on the plane.

I land in Cleveland only to find that the plane that we are supposed to take to Richmond hasn’t even left its original destination yet.  3 hours later, they finally give up and get another plane and crew.  We are late, but finally on our way to Richmond.  I am really worried about the people that were to meet us at the rental car counter.  We had no way of contacting them and just had to hope they were bright enough to stay put until we got there.  They were, and they were also nice enough to wear Gargoyles shirts so we could spot them in the crowd.  (Although, Patrick walked right past them.)

We get the car and head off to Williamsburg.  Now we find out that apparently there is some odd law in Virginia that prohibits clear posting of STREET SIGNS!  Even the best of directions are impossible to follow in this situation.

After getting to the hotel (which I think we found more by LUCK than anything else) I spot Mara and Aaron in the lobby.  Well now!  This calls for some molestation!  They have just checked in so I sneak up and grope them.  Mara has a fun pic of Jericho for me and as we all sit and chat, more people show up.  The Greg’s and Kathy have arrived (obviously held up in the weather like we had been).  I had told Greg W. that I wasn’t going to make it to the con because, well, I wasn’t!  Patrick ended up buying my plane ticket so we decided to just not tell Greg and surprise him.  It made things much nicer for me to not have to worry about some plan for this surprise.  Kathy and Patrick thought up some cool ideas.  But him just catching me hanging out in the lobby was much preferable.  (Not to mention that he didn’t really seem all that jazzed about it anyway… so a big planned surprise would have been sorta… dumb.  Guess my spell has finally worn off of him.  After all, you can only make someone go against their true nature for so long… thus saith the Weird Sisters).  ;)

It was great to see Kathy again.  She’s like the big sister I never had.  We are a lot alike and it is fun to get together and scheme evil things.  It’s always nice to have someone that you can just LOOK at and they know what you are thinking…  of course, then we start laughing… and then Patrick goes “What did I miss?”  The tough part is that he didn’t miss anything but Kathy and I exchanging a knowing look.  ;)

We decided to go to Denny’s and pack up people (The Greg’s, Kathy, Patrick, Kyt, Sapphire and Siryn) and head out.  Just the drive was an adventure (see above comments on road signs).  The service was scary and I wasn’t hungry, but I had a soda and Kyt shared her bacon with me.   ::feels the love::

I feel like I am forgetting something that happened once we got back to the hotel.   O.O  brain damage.

Friday:

I wake up and get hustling over to help Greg with Radio Play Auditions.  There was a pretty decent turn out (nothing like it had been the first few years, but better than 2000 had been where we were begging people to try out.)  I am officially jealous of Zehra.  I wish she were a bitch or something so I could hate her!!   :)  She is talented, beautiful and terminally sweet (I also loved her hair color).  Damn her.   :)  

I set up Izobel’s art in the art show…. But the prices she had set her stuff for was way over what the rest of the art was going for.  So she will probably kill me, but I lowered the starting prices.  I still don’t know what they all sold for, but half of them did sell.  

After I posted Izzy’s cels, I ran into Nick Sharpe.  I’ve seen him a few times on Station 8 Chat.  He runs up to me… looks at my name badge and says “Jennifer Anderson?  I won’t hug you, you scare me”.  FINALLY!  The plan has worked!!  Now if I could just get the people I WANT to hug me to do so, then life would be good.  :P

The rest of the day is a blur, until Opening Ceremonies.  

I really liked the OC’s this year.  Siryn was as cute as she could be and Sapphire had a great poem to read in regards to the fandom.  Hudson stood up to talk and Siryn really nailed him on a few points.  It amused me greatly.  >:)

I was suckered into “Clan Olympics” by Kythera (AKA, the Lackey of DOOOM!).  “Jen!  Be on our team!”  “um… okay.”  “OH!  BTW,  you are the team captain!”  O.O   It was like a Coyote/Roadrunner cartoon… I had just walked off the edge of the cliff, was standing there… and then realized I had walked off… ::holds up the “Mommy?” sign as she falls::  

Clan Valkyrie teammates:  Nikki (AKA ‘Hecate’ and ‘keeper of our red hair dye’) Kyt, Erik (AKA Zaius and 10 other names).  Being that Erik was the only guy on the team, he was dubbed “Team Bitch”.   I think he liked it.  :P

Greg W. announced that Disney is planning on releasing Gargoyles on DVD next year.  If this happens, I will just do back flips for a week straight.  I am not going to hold my breath, but I am hoping this dream comes true.  

The hand count of Gathering newbies was AMAZING!   They had a lot of new faces at the convention and I was really impressed.  FRESH MEAT!!  This fandom sorely needs it for a variety of reasons.

Another plus was that Toon Disney sent the convention a ton of STUFF!  Shirts, hats, sweatshirts.  Very cool.  At least someone out there has finally noticed we do this thing.  We really need to keep making noise!!!

Greg had a late night Mug a Guest.  So we all headed down to sit around and listen and ask.  Trouble with me was that I was SO DAMN TIRED I couldn’t keep up.  So I got up and went to the other side of the room and lined up some chairs to lie down on.  Siryn and Sapphire came over and we chatted about the trials of running a convention.  I love those girlies… it was a good talk.  :)  Of course, at one point, I finally had to tell Greg to keep it down he was interrupting our conversation!!  How dare he!  LOL…  I’m sure this just endeared him to me more.  :P  cest la vie.

Sapphire wanted to talk to me in private and I wanted to go to my room, so we headed out.  Sadly, this was not the weekend for ANY privacy for me.  (Example, there are 50 chairs in a room and 3 people.  Why the hell do they all have to sit RIGHT TOGETHER!  Spread it out before I get claustrophobic, people!!!  This was a real problem for me.  To the point that I wanted to kill the people doing it to me even after I OBVIOUSLY wanted some space).  So Sapphire and I head to my room.  I was hoping we would have more than 5 seconds before we were followed, but that was not gonna happen this trip!  NO WAY!  But we did get to talk, and now she has me all worried about her.  I love you, Kellie!!!  I hope I was helpful.

Saturday:

As is tradition, I was late in getting to the Radio Play Auditions.  Greg was sitting there waiting but didn’t say anything.  For him NOT to say anything is probably a bad thing.  Another strike for Jen.  We got a few more auditions in and then headed off to cast the play.  After we finished casting everyone, we remembered that we HADN’T cast one major character.  GO US!  Duh.  But this worked to my advantage, because I got my pick for that part.  Neener neener!

I told Greg he didn’t have to cast me in a big part… in fact; I would have been content to just go take a NAP (which is what I should have done).  Instead I got a whopping one line (two whole words) and had to be awake for the next 3 hours.  (On the upside, I got some education on the French language from Karine since I like to actually KNOW what it is I am saying for my entire two words of radio play performance!).

We posted the cast list and headed over to the pancake house next door for some lunch.  (FYI… there are 5 MILLION pancake houses in Williamsburg.  This is NOT an exaggeration!!)  Then we went back for Radio Play rehearsals.

After rehearsals, we had about 45 minutes before we had to be back for the play.  I went to go drop some stuff off in my room and the next thing I knew it was play time!  I made the HUGE mistake of falling asleep for those 45 minutes.  That short of a nap did nothing but put me in a worse mood.  Great.

The best part of the Radio Play was the part that we didn’t do.  Greg brought a tape of the actual recorded script and we listened to that.  Great stuff… oh yeah, and it got to be auctioned off too.  Wonderful.  Something else I will lust after and never have.  I wish I had cash!!  L

After the Radio Play, I head down to change for dinner.  (I had MEANT to change before the Radio Play, but the sleep faeries proved to have other plans for me).  After I changed and caught up with Kathy and we found a spot in the corner of the restaurant.  Hot dogs and hamburgers were not what I was craving at the time… so I swapped my hamburger for Mooncat’s Mac and Cheese!  Later, I found out they had put out veggie plates, I would have much rather nibbled on some cauliflower, but Sapphire told me later that the carrots were slimy, so I was thankful I had been spared.  

Dinner was over and it was now time to get ready for the Masquerade.  I felt REALLY stupid painting on my goatee, but after I was done, I was a little disturbed that the likeness was there.  I mean, at least Patrick doesn’t get told that he actually looks related to Laura San Giocomo!!  I had people telling me I had an eerie resemblance to Jonathan Frakes.  Great, just what every girl likes to hear.  O.o  On the upside, I did get a very naughty proposition from Lanny and extra flirt points from both him and Derek!  GO ME!!

Sara took a large group picture so that she could blow it up and send it to Toon Disney and Disney Japan as a thank you.   I understand the Toon Disney thing… but Disney Japan?  With animation turn over, what’s the point??  Anyone who worked there when Gargoyles went through certainly won’t be working there now.  I think she should have decided to send the other pic to Disney DVD.  But I’ve learned my suggestions to her are seen as threats of some sort.  So I bit my lip.

I couldn’t wait to get that stuff off my face, so after the picture, I headed out and changed clothes and such.  I felt so much better, but this was start of a bad night.  I was very tired and feeling VERY claustrophobic when people stood too close to me.  Unfortunately at least ONE person wouldn’t leave me to my own for more than 5 seconds and I was really getting pissed off about it.  There were 150 + people at this convention, there were plenty of other conversations going on… why was I being targeted as the only person to hang on/around!?  I put Kyt on “Buffer Zone” duty for the rest of the con.  

As is the norm, we eventually all congregated into a semi-circle and sat around to chitchat late into the night.  Problems, I was freezing AND claustrophobic.  So I finally got up to get some air, but SHOCKER… was followed.  So I had to dodge into the women’s restroom to get some alone time.  Ugh.  I would walk back into the room and stand outside the circle, and would be fine for a bit.  I finally thought that the perfect solution would be to sit in the stacked chairs outside of the circle.  That way I would be above everyone and a bit away from the crowd.  Until people decided that sitting in the other chairs next to me was a good idea… I bolted for the door again.

Now, you would think that if someone keeps getting up and saying “FUCK!” every time you sit down next to them, you would eventually get the picture that you DON’T WANT ANYONE SITTING WITH YOU AT THE MOMENT!  Not so in this case.  I was really starting to hat the fact that I was there at all.  I finally took my chances of passing out and sat down next to Greg again.  Of course, I sort of felt like I was having the same effect on Greg as these other people were having on me.  So I felt bad for putting him through that just so I could escape it.  

We finally got kicked out of that room and headed up to my room.  We found a pizza place that delivered late and got some food.  We then proceeded to scare some of the newer folks (Zehra and Gabriel) with stories of conventions past.  Also called “When Demona May Attacks!”  :)

Sunday:

I wake up REALLY wanting to go to the Starship Trooper’s panel.  But I had to go to Clan Olympics again.  OY!  So I drag myself downstairs.  I got to see part of the panel, but at least I was there for the Voice Acting seminar.  Greg had us read a snippet from “M.I.A.”  I got to read Una.  The direction he gave me after the first read was that Una’s motivation was that she was in love with Griff and that’s why she wanted him to stay home.  So he wouldn’t be hurt.  I SERIOUSLY considered laying on a thick Marilyn Monroe impersonation or Mae West or something for the 2nd read…. Just for giggles.  But decided I would annoy rather than amuse and let it go.  

I didn’t want to attend the auction.  There was a ton of stuff I wanted and I am broker than broke, so I just meandered around until the final Clan Olympics event.  The Scavenger Hunt of DOOOOM!  I was perfectly content to lose just so I could sneak a nap.  We did find all the items, but I still can’t believe I didn’t find the Bonus item after checking the video room TWICE!  I didn’t know I had to FRISK people.  :)

Then it was off to Closing Ceremonies.   Sara wanted to try to take another group picture outside, but no one had the energy to move.  Clan Valkyrie came in 2nd place.   We worked hard for those plastic metals!!  

Volunteers got MORE free stuff.  GO US!  So I got a large shirt.  I was a bit miffed about the fact that I PRE-ORDERED a large convention t-shirt and they hadn’t set aside shirts for the pre-orders.  So I get there and they tell me they are OUT of large shirts.  Duh… if someone orders something early, you SET IT ASIDE.  Seems simple, huh?  :P  So I felt a LITTLE better about it by getting one of the freebie larges.  

After the Ceremonies were over, we all changed clothes and headed down to the lobby.  Karine, Adam (who is a TOTAL doll!  Love you Adam!), Mandi, Greg, Kathy, Patrick, Lanny, Derek and I all went to dinner then on a tour of Yorktown.  The drive was NOT fun.  (Again, see above comments about street signs)

I think Kyt and I freaked out the tour guide when I was tugging Kyt around on her leash.  (HEY!  The leash was HER idea! LOL).  We caught up with some other people from the convention on the tour and made ourselves one big group.  The tour guide asked us if we were some Fraternity or something (musta been the collar thing) … but Kathy comes back with “No, just a … Family reunion.”   So later, the Tour Guide asked Kyt and I if we were cousins!  LOL… I am sure she suffered an aneurysm trying to figure out how we were all related.

Kyt and I got to see our very first Fireflies!  It was like… DISNEYLAND!  :)  So we stopped on a bridge back to the car and oogled them a bit.  

On the drive home, Mandi took the lead and we made good time home.  I went up and got Izzy’s pictures from Sapphire.  She was busy doing art show clean up stuff.  I dropped them off in my room and when I went back up to Sapphire’s room, I noticed the rest of our crew (who had promptly ran from us once we got back from the tour, so I figured they weren’t interested in hanging out) come running out of the con suite.  It’s amazing how the theme of this entire con for me was “God that’s so funny that it pisses me off”.  

I was burnt out… tired of having no personal space… and figured if the gang had wanted me to hang out with them, they might have waited for us to get out of the car in the first place.  So I intended to just go to bed.  I DIDN’T, but I should have.  (Hindsight is 20/20 after all)  I had the same issues all over again by staying up.  No matter where I moved in the room, people would move to touch me… Even if I would say something about it… it didn’t seem to faze them.

As Derek, Lanny and Greg got up to leave, I was INFORMED that I needed sleep too and that I should go to bed.  That was just about the last straw.  I am 31 years old and I do NOT need my MOMMY to tell me that I have to go to bed simply because THEY have to go to bed.  So everyone left and Kathy and Mandi were good enough to me to let me rant it off.  (LOVE YOU GUYS!)  Poor Mandi looked so tired too.  I felt bad for keeping her up.  Going back to my room was no longer an option.  I get that way. “You MUST do this!”  “well… I’m not gonna!  I’m gonna have a sandwich!”  (Eddie Izzard in-joke).  

At 6am I was up and packed…. So we could hurry to the airport and wait two more hours.  The airport was ARCTIC too… brrrr!  I fell asleep on the floor in the corner.  

Hours later, I was home and being pampered by Alan (which I SO needed).  Too bad he’s in trouble today and I don’t want to see his face.  UGH!  

Gathering 2002 staff - You did a FANTASTIC Job!  Congrats on a successful convention!  Hope to see you all next year.