Dragon*Con Approaches

Current Tunes: Behemoth – Of Fire and the Void (KILLER RIFF!)

It’s kind of like a new apartment now. Appearance-wise anyway. Entirely new carpet in the commons area, they ripped it up and replaced it in a matter of maybe three hours. It’s not as soft as the old carpet, but it’s not something to complain about, is it? Most everything has been cleaned up, put away, shined and glossed over.

New roommate as well; that’s one sure-fire way to mix things up and ring in a new day. I don’t know much about him so far, but he doesn’t seem like a serial killer. That’s kind of disappointing; never a dull moment with those serial killers… and their crazy antics….

My favorite bit of news for the day was that Mastodon and Dethklok are going to tour together starting this October. If I were smart, I’d get my ticket right now. I bet you anything that it’ll sell out. A quick prediction on that as well: at the Atlanta show, which I’ll obviously attend, I would imagine not only will some footage of the show end up as a bump on Adult Swim, but certainly a few “special guests” will stop by, maybe some of the guys from Aqua Teen Hunger Force or something along those lines.

Getting super drunk was far too much fun the other night. I see a similar event happening in my near future. Hope something can come together Friday or Saturday night. Hint-hint for you Atlanta people.

Wow, Dragon*Con is only one month away. It’s poised to be the best one I’ve attended yet. Last year was especially wonderful, lots of great sights and panels. They haven’t released a schedule yet, but for the fun of it I’m going to run down some of my more anticipated activities for the Con of Dragons this year:

- Meeting and getting the autograph of, Terry Gilliam, my favorite film director.
- Meeting Patrick Stewart and Leonard Nimoy; going to all the main “Star Trek” panels for the great honor and even greater stories.
- Enjoying a “Firefly” panel as a first time fan of the series
- Enjoying any possible “Dollhouse” panels as well, presuming those Whedontrack people get on it. I certainly hope they do.
- The always enjoyable “Lost” panel that’ll crop up on the X track. I’m sure this year will be especially meaningful, given that the final season approaches. So much to discuss this year; there could be a war between opposing factions. I’m siding with Locke, of course.
- Contemplating pre-registering for a D&D event, likely a 4th edition game. This will require one important component however: a character. Not a piece of paper with ability scores and equipment on it; an actual, three-dimensional character.
- I’m going to make an effort as well to sit in on at least one comics panel, preferably one about “Batman” or “Watchmen.” The “Watchmen” panel I saw last year, wow. I had almost forgotten about it. Besides the panels with Avery Brooks & Michael Dorn from “Star Trek: DS9,” that was the best panel I saw last year.
- The parade. Three times I have gone to Dragon*Con and I have yet to actually watch the parade. I will rectify this. Maybe I won’t watch the whole thing, but I’ll at least see some of it.
- Watch a full set of a musical act of the medieval/folk genre. Absolutely NOTHING though with the word ‘gothic’ in the descriptor, however.
- Try to spend as much time as possible viewing films that’re part of the film festival. A smart person would try to parlay this into some sort of writing/publishing opportunity.
- Attend at least one panel on zombie survival/literature.
- Wear a costume. Maybe. This all depends. No promises.

And now, for part two. Things I’ve done before that I will avoid this year:

- ANY Cruxshadows concerts. Good lord, that garbage… Just, never mind.
- Wasting hours playing way too much hackysack in the lobby.
- Carrying my laptop with me. Maybe a backpack with a pen and some paper in it, but no laptop this time. Hardly got used, not worth risks involved.
- Go into the showrooms/dealers hall more than twice over the course of the whole weekend.

I’m hoping for another fantastic year, but I’m certain I won’t have to hope very hard.