Walk Softly and Carry a Big Schtick

Photos online. And most of them have captions. Help me fill in the gaps!
LASFS/Aftermeetings part 354: Coral Cafe (18-Jun-2009) et seq.
LASFS/Aftermeetings part 356: Coral Cafe (25-Jun-2009) et seq.
Irvine Cosplay Picnic at Mason Park (20-Jun-2009)
Anaheim Gardenwalk and the Anaheim Marriott (21-Jun-2009)
Napmobile and a fenderbender (21-Jun-2009)
Anime Los Angeles 6 meetings part 2: Exec Dinner/Meeting (26-Jun-2009) et seq.
Anime Los Angeles 6 meetings part 6: General Meeting (27-Jun-2009) et seq.
Moving Melissa (28-Jun-2009)
Victoria's Picture Gallery: Anime Expo 2009: Saturday (04-Jul-2009)
Melissa and the Fan Gallery cases (11-Jul-2009)
Anaheim Marriott Tour (16-Jul-2009)
La Verne Cosplay Picnic at Las Flores Park (18-Jul-2009)
The picture of neo_serenity is from the exec dinner.

( Losing my camera at Anime Expo really rocked me back... )

Oh, there's more going on than just my emotional state, of course. I've taken more photos since Anime Expo, but the photos in the queue have been on hold because of other non-photo, non-blog reasons. Family health issues and household management issues, and if I can be discarding and shredding old papers any of that comes before puttering around on my website.

I've just spent a few nights (in my copious free time) captioning some of the backlog. I think I've got to stop taking so many group photos -- they slow me down so much in the captioning phase!

I've been putting a few inconsequential updates on my facebook. Nothing major, but I wanted to repeat here the bigger items that I've mentioned there.

( The Potluck Party Room at Costume College was a big success, so we'll do it again at PMX... )

Between now and PMX: I'll be at Tiki Oasis this weekend (just for fun), Anime Vegas (in a convention center), and a small anime convention at CSU Northridge. So PMX is the next opportunity to do any kind of hospitality beyond giving away granola bars and candy at our table.

For loscon, I'm hosting a Confirmation: Westercon 63 party. "Poofy dresses (especially white ones), shirt and tie, or school uniform" will be the dress code. We're toying with the idea of using a "Confirmitzvah" theme, stay tuned for that.

( Some small convention news... )

I mentioned last month that I've purchased a new camera. I haven't found the "sports" setting yet, but I've started playing with the High ISO option for available light shots. You can see I've started posting the first crop of photos from the new camera.

Photos now online: FanimeCon 2009 part 56: Sunday (24-May-2009) et seq.

( Notes I don't want to forget, from the coin locker place... )

I've talked before about the FanimeCon venue. I want to mention the pocket program: Many people were pleased with how small and pocket-sized it was. Our days of a single folded-up sheet paper for animelosangeles may have to come to an end. And they had a little one-page restaurant guide in it! Good work on that.

( Notes about daughters of various people... )

little_serenity, magi_sammy, and tenkuudragon were again a great help to have at the table on Sunday. And the sisters are definite draw to have at the table -- people came over to look at them, and in fact Caitlin got compliments on her turquoise wig all day as long as she was wearing it. (right)

( One of the things that nagged at me regarding the Artist Alley was the way that the badgers at the doors were blocking two of the fire exit doors... )

The table was a fair place for people-watching and costume-watching. daoutlaw came by, as a shark, for example. (left)

I say "fair" because a lot of the people and costumes we saw were people who were coming specifically to find our Animé Los Angeles table.

( Sunday was Disney Princess day... )

With the increasing overlap between our staff and FanimeCon's (as well as others, of course) it means that attending other conventions becomes more and more valuable for keeping in touch. We have two Divisions and one major Department run by NorCal people, for example Gary de Guzman here in the white chauffeur's cap is in charge of Programming/Live Events at FanimeCon, and our Exhibition Division at Animé Los Angeles. (left)

As I mentioned in an earlier post, the Artist Alley was open most days until 8:00 pm. A grueling schedule, and when we left for the day we were all ready for dinner, or a nap, or both. (right)

I was struck by Stephanie's "campaign" bag -- she has a tote bag for "Mario and Luigi '08." (left)

Once we'd had dinner, we went back to the convention center. ( Lindsay and Lynn helped me set up the Peanut Butter and Jelly Party... )

On the way to the elevator at the end of the night, I took pictures of the various signs that the second-floor Marriott departments had...

There's a place for a sign in the first two photos that might have used one. Just as here, under the venue's sign that says "Meeting Room B1" there's a signholder where the convention's own sign could have been slipped in. (right) Although I suppose they probably considered that superfluous, given the size of the big sign in front of it!

(Continued...)

( Photos now online: FanimeCon 2009 Saturday, through Masquerade Entry 25... )

Saturday at FanimeCon. The furry ear people were at the end of the row from us -- Bay Area Animation Society, I think -- so we shopped for new fuzzy ears for library_lynn. We ended up buying one pair (above right), and special-ordering another pair with fur that Lynn liked.

That morning, I'd gone on the shopping run by myself, to get more bread, peanut butter, and jelly. I stopped at Las Flamas, a Mexican restaurant on Market/Monterey, to get a chorizo and egg burrito to go. It was very tasty. (left)

( I'd managed to talk to the Masquerade Assistant Director on Friday about giving some Anime Los Angeles memberships as masquerade prizes for some of the winners... )

Evan James, our Creative Director, was serving as one of Julia's seconds. Julia Ha is our animelosangeles Events Division head, and she has a similar post (Extravaganzas Director, I believe) for FanimeCon. Our new status as a Masquerade sponsor got me and Hillel a special perk -- we got to sit in the reserved seating area. (Row 3, to be exact.) Evan, Julia and Jinni (Julia's other assistant) were outside the auditorium, and showed us to our seats. (right)

The emcee for the event was Ric Meyer, who kept snagging props from masquerade entries to hold for a while, by grabbing one before the appropriate ninja was able to remove it. (left)

( Something that FanimeCon does is put the entries with the larger costumes or props towards the beginning of the evening... )

In any event, one of the entries that I wanted to make absolutely sure I didn't miss was the one that little_serenity and magi_sammy put together. (right) Unfortunately there was a lighting miscue, and I wasn't able to get a picture of divine_sage who played the part of their punchline!

(Continued...)

Photos now online:
Melissa helps out (13-May-2009)
LASFS/Aftermeetings part 344: Coral Cafe (14-May-2009) et seq.
Secura Coin Locker (16-May-2009)
California Strawberry Festival, Oxnard (16-May-2009)
Mother's Day (Observed) at Faire (17-May-2009)
The picture of missmea is from the Faire.

Things I've done recently: Went to the Strawberry Festival. On the way there, we stopped off at Secura Coin Locker in Chatsworth and looked at their products. We're probably going to buy a dozen coin-operated lockers, to use in the animelosangeles game room.

On the next day, went to the Renaissance Faire. This was our traditional Mother's Day trip, delayed a week because of missmea's work schedule.

The following week, ala_mokita and I met up with Joyce Hooper and Evan James, to talk about the job of "Creative Director." Evan's going to be approving the designs for all of our convention publications. In the past, he's done all of the design. Going forward, the Publications Division and other divisions with other publications to design will work out the preliminary designs, then forward them to Evan for tweaking or approval.

To aid in this, Publications Division now has a copy of everything that's passed through Evan's hands for the convention, including all of the signs and publications produced -- so there's a thick file of sample designs.

Our Publications Division head, Arianna, joined us as well, and we talked briefly about what her team is going to do. Some of those are graphic designers yet to be recruited. We're going to post "Help Wanted" notices for her division on the website, and she's going to join us at Anime Expo to talk to potential volunteers (mostly, artists) for her division.

Then it came time to go to FanimeCon. We had our "Peanut Butter and Jelly Party" (or Frenzy) on the ConCourse each night. Staff aren't allowed to bring in food to the concourse; we're not allowed to prepare food; we're not allowed to sell anything, or take donations or deal with money in any way, out on the concourse. Fortunately, we weren't in violation of any of those rules: we just put bread, peanut butter, and jelly on the table and let people make their own sandwiches. Over the course of the weekend we went through 28 two-lb. loaves of bread -- which is the equivalent of about 37 ordinary one-and-a-half-pound loaves. Lots of sandwiches.

This past weekend we sponsored a picnic at Lake Balboa Park, where 82 fans signed the sign-in sheet. Recruited a few people to help with the convention in a number of divisions. We now have a Gaming Department head. I am pleased by how many departments and divisions showed up -- we had representatives from departments in all of our divisions.

And Sunday, yesterday, I collapsed with dehydration sickness. Too much sun[burn] and not enough water on Saturday resulted in a daylong headache and much sleeping on Sunday. I've got to watch out for that in two weeks, when I'm going to attempt back-to-back picnics in Fresno and Bakersfield!