Opening Day!

I woke before my alarm went off … ready to head to start the day and be a kid all over again! Its amazing how quickly you can revert to your childhood in situations like this. Of course that can be a good and a bad thing! Lisa and I got ready, talking about how fun it was going to be, what we wanted to see, and how much fun we were going to have (did I already say that?!).

But we weren’t starting with Comicon! Believe it or not, our first day, and our initial thoughts of excitement were going to start outside of Comicon! We had decided since the convention actually opened its doors at 2:00PM and we arrived the night before, we’d spend some time elsewhere. There’s a lot to do and see in Seattle, and though we were there primarily for the convention, we were there for the rest of Seattle too!

Saftey Tip: Part of surviving Comicon is to not get caught up in the convention at the expense of everything else. You need to give yourself room to breathe! Believe me, as much of a geek as I am, I can only take being pushed and corralled with people who haven’t bathed in days (yes, there were people like that at day 1), and weren’t aware of anything other then their cellphones and a camera op who tended to block the paths, bump into you and otherwise make your experience a little less enjoyable.

We started our day by meeting up with our two friends who drove up with us and heading to the Space Needle. [insert image of space needle] Lisa and I had been there before the previous year, but our friends hadn’t and they were really excited to see and go up in it. Lisa and I planned to go to the EMP Museum (http://www.empmuseum.org/) which was at the base of the Space Needle. So off we went.

Safety Tip: If you buy your tickets to the EMP Museum online, you’ll save $5.00! Unless you are made of money, you’ll want to save where you can! You also don’t buy them for a specific day. Its valid for whatever day you decide to go, though you have three months to use them! Also, watch your bank statement. For some reason a glitch occurred and I was sold four instead of two tickets. They quickly refunded me the money within a day, but I think you should verify that the amount charged with any online purchase!

Lisa, Dan and Brian riding the monorail! Picture by Skipper McFarlane

The four of us met at Westlake Center to catch the monorail to the Space Needle. Westlake Center is basically like any other mall, although, unless you live in a big metropolitan area, it has one store you may not. Daiso Japan, a Japanese store with tons of cool products. Both everyday and not. Including some interesting snacks from Japan! Its much smaller and not as exciting as it was when it was on the basement level, but its still cool. Of course, if they had import toys, it would be even better! The store is also a little cramped so don’t go in with tons of bags and cameras! So we made a dash up to the third floor to the monorail station to find that there was no line. In total, there were about four other people wanting to ride. Not bad for 9:30 on a Friday morning! If you haven’t ridden a monorail before, its fun. Just look at Dan’s face in the picture above! Its also a great way to get a higher vantage of the surrounding area and see what’s there! There’s an Elephant Carwash that you can see and I’m really tempted to go there one day! The monorail ends your ride by moving through the EMP museum to the station. Interestingly, as noisy as it is in the museum (yes, its noisy, its all about music!), you can hear the monorail inside the building depending on where you’re at!

Structures outside the Space Needle. Picture by Skipper McFarlane

When we got to the Space Needle, we were about 15 minutes early. The Needle was actually letting people buy tickets and head up, but the Museum was still closed. So the four of us explored the area around the bottom of the Needle. It was part of a Worlds Fair so there are some pretty cool leftover structures to look at! Like these tall arches that are part of the Pacific Science Center! They were behind gates which is good because there was a large Orca Whale and a Stegosaurus in the pools behind those gates!

There was also a sign announcing the King Tut exhibit would be showing. We were too early. It runs from May 24, 2012 to January 6, 2013. Its also supposed to be the last showing of the exhibit in the US. I’m thinking a Summer trip is in order. I’ve been wanting to see King Tut’s exhibit since I was a kid! Especially after reading about Carter’s experiences of finding the tomb, the supposed curse and watching Indiana Jones!

Lisa, Dan and Brian in the Peace Garden at the bottom of the Space Needle. Picture by Skipper McFarlane

Though we couldn’t get into the Pacific Science Center, we did manage to find the Peace Garden. Its a nice garden area on the South side of the Space Needle. Beautiful and restful. I only wish it was a bit larger, but as you can see, its a nice little place to stroll and gather your thoughts. Or perhaps, after coming down from the Space Needle to get down and kiss the grown that you are so thankful to be back on! In our case, it was a nice place to get away from the kids! There were several kids there on a field trip that kind of swarmed around us!

Safety Tip: When possible, plan your vacations when schools and organizations are not planning a mass exodus of kids! I love kids, but they kind of dominate an area when they’re in it in large numbers! If you don’t have kids, or you’re trying to have a quiet vacation its worth taking note of!

Lisa, Dan and Brian in the Peace Garden at the bottom of the Space Needle. Picture by Skipper McFarlane

Look how happy Lisa, Brian and Dan are in the Peace Garden! Of course, the boys haven’t headed up to the top of the Space Needle yet! I have to admit, I had to have a bit of fun with Brian before he went up and talked about the glass floor that he would have to walk out on. Hey, what are stepbrothers for after all if not to tease each other! Dan and Brian were debating about how much longer to wait before going up in the needle, but then they saw those hordes of kids swarming towards the Space Needle ticket booth and the decision was made. They sprinted for the ticket booth, Lisa and I began to meander towards the EMP Museum. We still had about 10 minutes to wait, and spent that time watching the elevators go up the Space Needle, wondering which one Brian and Dan were on, and if they were having fun yet!

Entry Theater at the EMP Museum. Picture by Skipper McFarlane

EMP Museum - Tower of Instruments! Photo by Skipper McFarlane

For those of you who haven’t been to the EMP Museum, all I can say is GO! Its really pretty cool, especially if you like music! We were hoping the Battlestar Galactica exhibit would still be in full swing, but it wasn’t. It had moved on. In its place was an exhibit for Avatar and Horror Movies! Those were the two rotating exhibits. They have a permanent collection on Jimi Hendrix, and various grunge bands. Two things that Seattle are known for.

When you walk in, you first encounter the Gift shop, but just to the right is the main entryway/theater. Its pretty awesome in all its purpleness, with undulating jellyfish like elements on the ceiling and a large screen showing you videos and clips of interviews with various musicians! You can even learn how the flaming guitar came about by just sitting and relaxing! Pretty impressive first site! Just outside where they have the Jimi Hendrix exhibit is this cool piece made up of various instruments … largely guitars, but there’s some banjos, accordions, keyboards and a few other items thrown in there! Floor to ceiling, two levels .. pretty awesome! Note that blue guitar front and center? It is really a different guitar with a lot of attachments. Looks like some mad scientist added a bunch of electronic components to make it a weapon of mass music!

Jimi Hendrix Mechanical, EMP Museum. Photo by Skipper McFarlane

The Jimi Hendrix exhibit is also pretty cool. Its filled with images, original music sheets, album artwork and a mixing board where you get to mix four or so of his songs and listen to them as you create them. I personally enjoyed the original sheet music written on hotel notepads and other scraps of paper as well as the mechanical. With my background as a graphic designer, I’ve always thought these mechanicals were works of art worthy of being displayed in a gallery after their production use was over! It was nice to see someone else thought it was worthwhile. Some of the other exhibits had similar items that showed a bit more of the conceptual process of making a album cover which was also very cool! I think Lisa enjoyed the mixing board quite a bit. She’s worked in LA doing audio engineering for commercials, TV and albums so it was probably a bit like going home! Unfortunately the picture I took of her with headphones on and a big grin was blurry … one day I’ll learn how to take really good pictures!

Can't Look Away Exhibit. Lisa on the floor. EMP Museum. Photo by Skipper McFarlane

While there, we took in the Can’t Look Away, the Lure of Horror Film  exhibit. This was pretty amazing. I love horror films, and since we missed the Battlestar Galactica exhibit, this was definitely a good door prize! You reach the exhibit by walking down this spiral cement staircase, like walking into a basement, lined with black and white photos of people screaming. When you reach the bottom, its darker with red illumination coming in. Walking in, you are greeted by text and images projected onto the floor. This projection looks kind of like a bloody puddle. Of course, being who she is, Lisa quickly threw herself to the floor and layed in the image that was projected. It was pretty cool and I kind of wish I’d done the same thing after her! I believe the whole quote by Stephen King that is projected over Lisa and the girl from The Exorcist is “Monsters are real. They live inside us and sometimes they win.”

Moving through the display, they had smaller areas that were separated by “thorny” walls playing various classic horror films and interviews with the directors. In another area they had the top 100 movies you should see before you die (I’ve seen many of them and there were only a few I’ve never heard of). This exhibit was a bit creepy. I started taking pictures of the timeline and as I moved downward towards the end, I hit one area with a picture of a ghost child’s face. Every time I took the photo my camera asked … did someone blink? I decided after my third try I was done!

In another area, they had a Scream Booth. Basically you go in, scream as loud and hard as you can and get your picture taken! I’ve not received mine yet, though supposedly they email you a copy!

Gillman Mask. EMP Museum. Picture by Skipper McFarlane

After the Scream Booth you move into an are of movie artifacts! This was cool as they were actual props from movies and had Mr. Pointy from Buffy, the giant Alien from ALIEN, and I actually got to see an actual mask of the Gillman … from Creature from the Black Lagoon, which was for me, personally awesome! That’s one of the classic horror films from my youth and one my dad liked also. Though I was a bigger fan of the original Frankenstein, this was one of the horror movies we bonded on! I still remember visiting my grandparents and having them pull out an old 18MM film projector and the Creature from the Black Lagoon! I remember thinking how cool it was for my dad to have grown up with these films and being able to watch them in his house! This was about the time HBO started and before VHS and Beta tapes … wow! Years later, when we lived in Colorado, I remember we watched it on TV in 3D for the first televised 3D broadcast back in the late 70′s, early 80′s. You had to wear the red and blue glasses and I remember my dad explaining to me how they worked as we got ready for the movie to start!

Shaking hands with an Alien. EMP Museum. Picture by Skipper McFarlane

Next they had an interactive wall that caught your silhouette and modified it with some interactive shadows and creatures that grew out of your shape. The best part was when I walked out. I quickly reached back out into the field and from my shadow hand came a couple little blobs that then drifted away and vanished. As they launched themselves from my hand, it sounded like there was a “Burp” sound. Awesome exhibit!

After finishing up at the EMP Museum, we met up with our friends. They were hanging around inside, and at one point were allowed to sit in the main entry/viewing area and watch the films. Later, another employee made them wait in the shop.

Safety Tip: If one of the employees let you in without a badge, don’t leave until you’re good and ready as another may ask you to wait in the gift shop!

After meeting up, we decided it was time to find some food and then head back to the convention. It was about 12:00 so we still had two hours before the doors opened. We decided to walk back from the Space Needle and head towards the bay. It was lunch time and we thought we’d find some good fish! We ended up passing the Seattle Art Museum, or SAM (I love that! For some reason it makes me smile to see “SAM” on the side of a building!).

Brian and Dan ordering lunch at Lowels. Behind them is large letters "LOL"! Picture by Skipper McFarlane

Brian and Dan also wanted to see the Pike Market. Lisa and I did also, but again, we’d been there so though it wasn’t a big priority, this was the best time! The convention center is just up from the Market on Pike (maybe six blocks). We figured we’d walk down to the wharfs, eat at one of their restaurants, then head up to the market and continue up Pikes to the Convention Center. In the end, we ate at the market. Lowell’s Restaurant & Bar.They had the most wonderful Alaskan Cod fish and chips! Yum!

Brian under the Pikes Market sign, outside of the Fish throwing booth! Picture by Skipper McFarlane

We explored the market, I finally made it into the magic shop I’d wanted to look in for a couple of years (it was always closed when I was at the market), tried various samples upstairs (including Chocolate Pasta – which wasn’t bad, but is probably better when cooked), and got Brian to pose under the Pikes Market sign. For some reason he just wasn’t into posing! Unfortunately, all he got to see them toss were bags of clams. So we’ll have to make another trip so he can see them toss the fish!

We got up to the convention center around 2:00. There were quite a few people streaming in in costume and not. It was odd though because another conference was occurring as well. So as you walked in and rode the escalators, some people were all “geeked out”, while others had suits and briefcases! I’m sure we made quite a scene for them!

We headed straight for the booths in Hall B to get our passes. Though we had pre-purchased (which saved us some money) we still had to get our goodie bag and actual pass that let us into the convention. We were shocked to find the line reached all the way to the door. Last year the line was probably about half that. Either we got there earlier or a lot later, or … there were a lot fewer people on Friday!

Luckily the line moved pretty quickly and we had fun chatting and looking at all the costumes. Our other two friends had gotten there about 10 minutes before us so they were about midway up the line when we first got there!

But let’s talk the line! Think cattle. Really. They had us fenced in wrapping back and forth with about five or six people in width. The Minions (as they’re called) kept yelling at us to fill all empty space so at any given moment you could find yourself behind someone who came after you or in front of someone who had been in front of you. The frustrating part of all this was to look over at the lines for day of purchases. Six booths, empty. Three of them sometimes saw people, but there was no waiting. It took us a good 15-20 minutes on the low end to get through our line.

Safety Tip: Unless you really need to save the money on pre buying, or you’re just afraid they won’t have tickets, buy your tickets early at the gate. They had no waiting the first day. Six booths, only three seeing anyone come to them and no waiting!

So we made it to the booth to get our badges and goody bag. The bag was almost empty! Last year there was a lot of freebies and coupons. This year … not much. That seemed to be the case in the convention too. I may have missed them, but I didn’t see much in the way of free comics and what not. Even the DC booth, which last year had a lot of free comics seemed to have very little. So much for the free swag!

Lisa with Fry, Bender and Leela. Picture by Skipper McFarlane

We spent our initial hour walking the floor, getting a feel for where people were and what booths were present. I was hoping to find Karl Kessel present again, but alas, he was not to be found. I did however, find Matthew Dow Smith http://matthewdowsmith.com/ who among other things, is the current artist for Doctor Who comics with IDW. He was awesome. I can’t say enough about his friendliness, and humbleness. He and I chatted for a bit, and I was captivated by the pages he had for sale. Have I mentioned I’m a big Doctor Who fan? I am, since the late 70′s, early 80′s when my best friend in Junior High (Christian Link - http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2542759/) introduced me to the show. Turns out Matthew Dow Smith has been a fan from about the same time! Needless to say we had some geeky moments where we started talking about the narrative flow in the first episode of Matthew Smith’s introduction as the character. The end where within about one minute, they give you everything in a neat little package culminating with him stepping through a sphere of previous Doctors and claiming the mantle.

Brian with a robot figure. Picture by Skipper McFarlane

I left with Lisa to head to the Falling Skies panel thinking I should have gotten a piece Matthew’s work. The panel was OK, though they seemed to start late, and ultimately, it wasn’t that great of a panel. They didn’t reveal much before we gave up and left. Maybe they did all their reveals after we left? There was no real previewing (as we were lead to believe unless it also occurred after we left) and since it was a show we weren’t familiar with, we ditched it. I promptly went back and bought a page of Matthew’s work. He doesn’t fully ink his pages by hand. Meaning he inks them, but leaves the large black fields until he gets it into his computer. So we arranged for me to return the next day after he had an opportunity to ink in the larger areas. YES!!! I really love his work and will soon have it framed along with my page of Karl Kessel’s inking I bought last year!

Safety Tip: Bring comics or items you want autographed, but be ready to find that surprise artist that you weren’t expecting, that no one seems to be homing in on, and take advantage of the time (in a friendly and not creepy way)!

 So Next we headed into the Seattle Superstorm preview. This was a new movie, that takes place in Seattle, so of course a lot of people present were excited to see it. My wife loves disaster flicks. This one, taking place close to home and involving aliens was going to be awesome! Or so we thought. Basically they were showing it before it was released on the Syfy Channel (syfy.com). We managed to get into line pretty early and patiently awaited them opening the room. As it turns out, there was a person dressed as … well, I’m not sure what he was dressed as but he had a big hammer. I mean big. Not a Thor hammer, some dorky anime style hammer and as he was messing around with it in a crowded space of the line, he managed to catch my wife with it. Not hard, but in a rather impolite place. I let her handle it, but let me tell you, I was about to deck him when I saw the look on his face like “Yea, that’s cool, look where my hammer went”. But we started to head in and I let it go. Unfortunately that damn hammer was a pain yet again, as he sat in the front row and it stood there, in the middle of the screen. A stupid hammer … sigh. That said, as the days progress, more and more rude people appeared. This was just the beginning.

Safety Tip: If you see someone with a large hammer, stay away from them. More then likely they have no clue how to handle it. Even if they did, they’re such dorks (I won’t honor them with the term Geek) that they’ll be rude with it and you’ll want to grab it, bash them with it, and then be ejected from the convention. That said, a small taser would be awesome! There’s another time I wanted one of those on Day 3!

So we got inside, waited way longer then we should have, for them to get their act together. I’m sorry, I know its a large convention, but as they pointed out several times, they’ve now done this for ten years. Some of the stuff that happened (consistently at all the panels we attended) shouldn’t be happening anymore. It was frustrating. The lights dim, the movie start and …

The first page I bought from Matthew Dow Smith on Saturday. I just love the new Silurians! Doctor Who, Issue 14, Page 19. Art and Inks by Matthew Dow Smith.

Let me put it this way … people laughed for the first several minutes. Not just a “Oh how funny” sort of laugh, but a “Really? You thought this was a good idea?” mocking sort of laugh. I lasted about 20 minutes before I decided to return to the floor, walk around a bit and return to Matthew Dow Smith’s booth. It was nice talking with him, and a little with the guys in the booth next to him. I was amazed though, how few people seemed to be at his booth, while other booths were overloaded with people. This guy’s work is awesome and he’s an incredibly friendly and humble guy. So Matthew, if you’re ever in Eugene Oregon, my wife and I would be happy to have you over for dinner. Heck we have a guest room you could use for a short stay like we do with our musician friends who pass through town!

I spent about another 40 minutes wandering the floor and noticing how many people don’t understand the idea of “flow”. Its one thing when people stop to pose and take photos. You expect it. Heck, you want it! But when someone walks out of a panel into the middle of moving people staring at their cell and then stop causing people to trip and crash … that’s just not right.

Safety Tip: Tasers can clear blockage as long as you’re able to step over the convulsing bodies.

So 40 minutes later, my phone rings. Lisa and Brian and Dan are ready to leave. Lisa’s not happy as we need to leave so we can get dinner and go on our Market Ghost Tour that we’d scheduled. Well, what she wasn’t happy about was that the preview started so late due to technical issues that she didn’t catch the end. I didn’t see why that mattered as it didn’t sound all that good, but she loves her disaster flicks, including the bad ones. We headed down Pike to a Mae Phim Thai Restaurant. This place is really good, and affordable. We’d eaten there last year and found that we got our money’s worth in quantity, and it just tasted great!

Lisa photographing the Gum Wall, Post Alley, Pikes Market. Picture by Skipper McFarlane

After dinner, we headed to Post Alley, South of the Gum Wall to get our tickets for the Ghost Tour. If you don’t know what the Gum Wall is, be prepared. Its literally a wall, covered in Gum! Fascinating and disgusting at the same time. People have actually made images in their gum, or stretched it out so it hangs from window ledges. It goes about 8 feet up (or more) and is … well, different.

When we went in to exchange our online purchase receipts for our tickets, I mentioned I’d also bought the book (you got a couple dollars off by buying it online with your tickets). As I was getting the book, the woman behind the registered mentioned I could get the author to autograph it for me if I wanted to wait for her to get off the phone. Sure enough, behind me was a woman talking on the phone who not only turned out to be the author, Mercedes Yaeger, but also the owner of the Market Ghost Tour. She was very kind and touched that I’d want her autograph. I very nice person who urged us to keep an open mind on the tour and see what happens. Our guide was going to be a gentleman named Christian who would meet us up by the Gum Wall in about 15 minutes. We chatted a bit more, and eventually, because of what happened on the tour, have spoken several times since via Facebook, email and one phone conversation. It turns out she does a tour also, but her’s are from the perspective of a medium. Christian does his from a more scientific perspective. So back to the Gum Wall we went to await for Christian. As it turned out, the group con sited of the four of us and one other person! Awesome! We basically had Christian to ourselves!

Butterworth Mortuary Orbs. Picture by Skipper McFarlane

Of the tours they have, we chose the Chapel Tour. Its the one that takes you on a brief walking tour and then ends in the old Butterworth mortuary which now has Kell’s Pub in the basement. Once there, you get to do an investigation, using recorders for EVPs and other “Ghost Hunting” equipment. You can also bring your own equipment. The place is actually pretty creepy. I got a couple pictures with “orbs” or “dust” as my friend points out. We did have a rather creepy moment at one point involving a ball. We were told there were ghost children in the mortuary and that sometimes they will play with toys, such as balls. My friend Dan was given a ball to put on the ground for the Ghosts. He rolled it and it went into the next room. Our guide asked if he could get the ball as he wanted to just have the ball on the floor so we could watch it. Dan went looking, others walked around looking for it but with no luck. I then said “Well, if you want to play with the ball, maybe you could find it and put it where we could find it? Maybe even right here.” Well, nothing happened and about five minutes passed before I decided to walk into the next room. I just walked through the door, not even as far as my friend had and there it was … sitting by the leg of a chair. Not hard to find … so either my friend and the others missed it … or … the ball was moved where we could find it, just as I asked!

I had shared this with Mercedes and it ended up in a phone conversation where I put her on speaker phone ask that my wife, Dan and Brian could all participate (they were all on the tour so it was a full circle). Turns out about two weeks before our tour, someone had taken a ball with them to give to a friend. The friend didn’t want anything to do with it and the person who took it would wake up in the middle of the night to a voice saying “I’m here”. She tossed the ball and a week before my tour called Mercedes to tell her about it. The ball is apparently something liked!

Safety Tip: Don’t forget your cameras! You’ll need to turn your phones off on the tour, so bring a real camera … if possible one with a infrared light and filter so you can take all the pictures you want. Your own voice recorder is good too! They’ll post what they found, but it only gives you more options!

After the tour we headed back to the convention. There was supposed to be a Karaoke night. The way it was worded, we thought it would be an adult event with karaoke singing, maybe drinks, etc. But no, it wasn’t. It was really bad, people were dressed in costumes like we war informed, but if they didn’t sing, you only saw them sitting and it was a bit of a letdown. That said, we left when Fry got up to sing. We had met up with two other friends, and all four of us decided it was time to head to Von’s and get drinks! So off the six of us went to find something a little more enjoyable.

Von’s is just a couple blocks from the convention center … a block or two North and one or two South. It tends to get crowded, so be ready to wait. They have a large wheel on one wall that they spin every half hour and it tells you what the special will be. It was a nice way to wind down the evening. Kicking back with some friends, talking about the day and planning the next!

We headed back to our hotel room, to be greeted by what smelled like urine as we walked down the fourth floor hallway, climbed into bed and went to sleep at about 1:00AM. Tomorrow would be another wonderful day!