Aww Here It GOES!

The trip to the con probably began at 7am. i had just barely made it out of town in time to catch the bus to H-ville to meet up with Schu. I had to really work in order to get the time off but I made it and arrived around 3pm and met up. there were a few last minute things we had to take care of and costume parts to pick up so we didn't really get out on the road until 5:30pm. bleh... and it rained....the....entire....way....there. and not sprikling rain, sheets upon sheets of it coming down to no end. it never let up once. the drive went on for quite awhile. Around 2am we picked up the first Real meal at mcdonalds. the lady told us we were about 6 hours from DC. wahoooo; halfway point!. geh... but by the time daylight hit, we were already driving through snow. thich snow with icy bumps that made you scared to make any lane changes because it would risk doing some skid action.

^{Sat morn- Snow…worse. 5 ft}
On arriving to Arlington Schu and I spotted two cold and cute GuityGearX cosplayers out in the snow. we then knew we had arrived. parking was once again plentiful next to the hotel and the snow wasnt too bad then. still cold though. Hotel check-in wasnt until 2pm though. so we had to kill some time.

Canasian was in the lobby and we really needed to shower so he was cool enough to let us use his while we waited on our room. MAN it felt nice to get clean after all that driving and junk road food! thanks again Johnny!

Getting a badge. First things first afterall.

Several people gave us several stories on the location of the gameroom. Which floor, which room, how to get in. there WAS a backdoor but they didn’t have enough staff to keep it open so that was sealed off. So the only way into the game room was by going Through the gameroom. Blah. I managed to get an escort into the gameroom with schu by smooth-talking a staff guy. We had to get to the gameroom. The staff badge awaited us. Sure enough there he was, the con’s hero; Malcolm! He was setting up some games and watching DOA Beach Volleyball and was really cool in letting me use his badge. right then i became staff and I Could Feel The Overwhelming Power Inside Me!!! or not. Game room was kind of empty this early. lots of space here DDR in its respective corner playing DWIs instead of the console games. better song selection i guess. DeadOrAlive: Beach Volleyball was unsuprisingly one of the most popular games (cause we all love the sport of volleyball right?). Game room was definitely spacious but it was in a really awkward location, almost like the warehouse/storage part of the hotel attached to the dealers room. Schu and I wandered around the dealers room next while we still had the free access. Swung by the dealers room. Cybele and Jason were working the Ironcat booth. Got to say hi to her and didn't see anything affordable but I DID manage to buy the totally awesome Luffy One Piece Pirate Flag. The exact same one i passed up buying at Ohayocon. I wasn’t about to let this chance slip by me again. This flag was MINE. Schu bought a mini beer-chan to make up for the one that I wanted back that I left in her car during ohayocon.

By now our room was ready, unfortunately all they had was a 1 Bed King sized room. we took it anyway and ended up getting a SWEET corner room with only one bed but plenty of space. Side-Rooms are always bigger in size than other rooms, just with one bed. so we kinda lucked out. Great view too of the parking lot and snow snow snow.The Luffy Pirates flag was quickly posted in our hotel room right over the bed, along with a disco ball in the corner to fancy things up.

I had been playing phone tag with christina up until the con (called when I got in her area Harrisonburg) and we kept missing each other but now since I had my badge I could meet up anywhere. I told her to meet right in front of the dealers room. When I got there I saw Max and Holly (busterkids.com) and Max was trying to get into the dealers room. I let him use my staff badge and held Holly captive as collateral. Mwah! Anyway I directed them to the artists alley and went to meet up with christina. She was with a few college friends and we only got to chat for a few minutes because she wasn’t planning on staying much longer after the Dual Jewel concert.

Cosplay group pictures were going on downstairs and I made it in time for the giant group picture. Other simular groups paired up too for a good chace at getting photos. Schu somehow made it down in time and was the only FFX-2 Paine surprisingly.

A bunch of cosplayers were still doing pictures in scattered groups. Cybele (costuming as Yuber) and another girl who did an excellent Tir McDohl costume paired up and got some cool duel poses. None of Cybele’s friend and especially Cybele had eaten much of anything all day. Instead of ordering Chinese take-out or trudging through the snow to get food, we ate at the hotel’s restaurant. It was Cybele, John?, Nicole, Shadrad, and I who went and we got the only thing on the menu; the buffet. It had already gotten way too cold to walk out anywhere so we grabbed a table. The buffet was alright but kind of pricey at $12.50 each.  It didn’t look like much at first but they had a great selection of food. I try to stay away from meats at cons, but the spaghetti and chicken here looked too good. We could NOT get Nicole to eat! Arrgh! We nearly had to spoon-fed the poor girl. We all were looking off the balcony at some giant Cereberos cosplayer. it was funny. Dessert was great too. Also, none of us could figure out what kind of pie they were serving. it tasted like a cross between cherry, raspberry, and something else. Bread Pudding was nice though. Some dark Kyo cosplayer and her mom started talking with us before we left.

I met up with Holly and Max again in the gameroom playing N64 Tetris attack with the sign "GET 0WN3D IN TETRIS ATTACK" by where they were playing. Max had just finished totally 0wning the girl staying in our room, Mori. I was up next and was doing a decent job (umm suuure??) of Owning and I was just about to really begin playing but they pulled the plug on the game for something else..For the record, Max and I are 0 versus 0, mwah. DDR tournament was going on downstairs. They picked a dark section of the warehouse game room so it was all on projected screen. Malcolm was keeping track of score, players, and songs on his laptop using Excel. Some GuiltyGearXX tournaments were going on right next to it. Kind of exciting but the smell was its usual stink. we caught up with Lindze who was at the artists alley and Allison was with her wearing a really cute Beer-chan hat The official con dance was much much worse smell than DDR though. It was packed completely to the point they weren’t allowing any more entry until some people left. The music was decent. I think Rob Lantz hosted it and they played a lot of variety. Usual breakdance circles were formed but it was so musty and sweaty and just going in, circling, then exiting took me about 15 minutes. I didn’t see -anyone- I knew here either. Its just like a giant flood of sweaty guys came to the con just to come to this.

^{Sat Eve- Blizzard}
In the lobby the guy who usually does a Perfect Silent Bob costume and character was holding "Tryouts To Be Jay" where anybody could come up and try to run a line from any of the Jersey series films (Clerks, Mallrats, Dogma…) and play the part of Jay. A bunch of people went up. Some in costume too! Like Pac Man and a giant mecha from Five Star Stories. Other people went up and did the dance. Dan T recited a line perfect from Clerks. It was really cool and totally unexpected.

Virginia was having her party about now, so we went to check it out. A couple of big names there and plenty of food and drinks but unfortunately no alcohol. That’s when Genki Gang stepped in. all at once the entire group came to the party and the hotel room filled its maximum occupancy. Nobody in costume either, they were all there just to hang out. Neil brought my attention to something else in the Genki Gang room down the hall though; JUNGLE JUICE. Oh man it was nice too. Like a fruit punch explosion with a hella lot of alcohol… but you couldn’t taste any of it. An Orange got stuck in the funnel so I only downed one cup. Somehow it got finished within an hour. Bleh.

54! =]

^{Sat Night - worst snowfall since 98, predict closings}
Parties were ending a bit early, especially for people leaving the next day. Marissa’s weather prediction couldn’t have been more on target. She was saying that if you were planning on flying home, then you should go right away because they were announcing most airports would be snowed over and closed by morning.

Max, Holly, and I found Michelle, this really cute asian girl who knew Elfeater and brought her up to our little party. She probably thought we were crazy because we made the usual crude jokes and stuff. She laughed at them but we’re sure she was worried for our sanity. Donkey Punch! Caca! The bald guy and Mona never showed up that night. Schu either but apparently they found another room to stay in. so I got the bed allll to myself!

SUNDAY

^{Sun morn- all airports closed, metro closed}
Sunday morning was filled with both panic and uncontrollable acceptation at the same time. People flying out just laughed off the fact that airports were now ghosttowns and there was no way in hell they were getting home. Drivers were really hesitant on what to do but most stayed on the side of caution. People taking the train home had to find the right time to head home because the metro only ran a few times that day. Schu and I… we just said Funk It and payed for the extra night in the hotel. Some people were hunting for places to stay and stash their stuff so I offered an open invitation to whoever. Die was worried that I wouldn’t have enough room for her Hex-winged (6!) costume but I told her he had plenty of space and would love to haave her visit so we could make more funny quotes to late night cartoons (See Ohayocon3). She found someone else to stay with though. Max & Holly needed crash space though. They only had bare minimal stuff with them too, so I gladly let them stay.

^{Sun noon- now illegal to be on the road in DC, Maryland, virginia. You will be ticketed and towed}
We decided that we needed to get food. Virginia and her group amazingly got Chinese Delivery to the hotel. It seemed almost impossible with the blizzard happening but they said the delivery guy even refused a tip, wow! The restaurants weren’t too far from the hotel that we couldn’t just walk to them. So we grabbed a local, Jian.The snow was definitely worse by the hour. We were trudging through about 2- 3 inches of snow trying to find an open place to eat. On the way, we saw Ollie, Jenny, Christy, and Marty (riding piggyback) heading back to the hotel. Max made like he was going to throw a snowball at Ollie when Marty got pissed off screaming "Oh No You’d Better Not!". She jumped off Christy’s back and lunged at Max, full force, Max pushed her back and she tumbled into the snow. She started bawling and didn’t get back up and everyone aside us whent to her aid. "Shes just overreacting" Holly noticed, and sure enough she started limping along like we had just broke her leg. She mc donalds fries laid all over the snow though. The underground mall was closed so we went by the nearest 7- Eleven to a nice Chinese restaurant. Almost nobody was there and the people were really friendly. We all got something different. Holly had brought the baby doll from the Mortal Kombat cosplay group and we covered it in chinese food. We had an even better plan though. It involved Sweet & Sour sauce, lots of it. Before leaving we took Funny Hat picture since everyone had the coolest hats. Stopped at the 7 Eleven and got some alcohol for parties later on. Right outside of it we commenced our plan. We slammed the baby into the snow and just Covered it in Sweet & Sour sauce, then kinda kicked around some snow on it. It looked so horrible but was so funny too. The pictures don’t do it justice, haha. On the way back we came across a double street and the median had almost 5 feet of snow piled up. Holly was more than waist deep in it! We made a midway stop off at a videostore just to heatup and get dry.

Hung out with Joe for awhile. Didn’t buy anything in the dealers room but I finally got a chance to get a custom badge drawn by robert dejesus. Man the guy did an amazing job! The badge totally kicked ass. I talked to his wife emily while he drew. Shes really friendly and we got to talk about video games and bobs history with banzai chibi-chan and import games.

^{Sun eve- predict clearing Monday, but Tuesday for soonest halt storm headed north}
Max, Holly, and I managed to find Jian again and went back to watch tv and drink. The 300th episode of The Simpsons was on! After the a full MarriedWithChildren Reunion. Quality FOX programming fellas! We mixed some Sour Apple Pucker and Sprite together and Max threw in a lime gummy fish so we named that drink Stalefish. Kev showed up for a bit and we asked if we could use his boombox to play music downstairs but he said Virginia was sleeping and not to wake her up. Kevin Bolk showed up later too and watched Married With Children with us. Man that show brought back memories. Amazing its been on so long. Kevin had gotten a really cool collection of stuff from the guests. Autographs, model, some hentai and other stuff

Sunday night was real great. They HAD to entertain everyone somehow since at least half of the people from the con were still stuck here. They played invader zim unaired episodes in one of the video rooms. Where the art auction was for the con, there was now artists, gamers, con suite, some guests… everyone. All in one giant room. The bemani people set up a projection screen in the corner, playing PopN 7 and IIDX games, which was where I was most of the time. We got to introduce SO many people to Pop’N Music! It was great! Another corner, a group of people were dedicated enough to RENT a TV set and bring it in to play games. Mostly fighting but later they set up DDR and ParaPara. Holly and I pulled a really cute freestyle where we just did dorky dances during the long pause of the song MitsuriJapanStandardLittle. Artists all over had their stuff set up on tables. Some were doing sketches for anyone on comission others just drew for fun. Shawn The Touched had his laptop on him and I got to see the newest Pink Lemonaide movie he had finished. I really need to read more H.P.Lovecraft to get his joke tho…but I caught his theyMightBeGiants joke! Around midnight the con suite brought its food down to us. Soda, cheetos, chips & dip. The works. Virginia showed up too with her boombox. Apparently she didn’t care if we had woke her up earlier and grabbed it. Dawh.

Every hour or so, someone would go and check on weather forcast conditions and bring us any news. There was a posterboard with the latest info. Max, Holly, and I pitched our own poster saying ALL ROADS CLEAR! I-95 NOW OPENED! To see if anyone would be stupid enough to believe that. Sure enough stinky boy came in made the "Big Announcement" in which everyone game him a dumbass look. We laughed our heads off.

Sun night- possible chance of clearing, slim to none.
Unfortunately we couldn’t get michelle to party with us Sunday night. She was driving home just like the rest of us were attempting to. Max, holly, and I still had a small party though in the corner of the room.

MONDAY

The beginning of KatSNOWCon/BlizzardCon but the end of our little adventure. We had to get out of here or risk cabin fever and angry bosses when we don’t show up to work Tuesday. Schu was already late by one day but thankfully it was only a training day she missed of her job.

Max & Holly slept in while we bundled up and dragged our stuff to the car. We got the cart and left it in the lobby. The next step wasn’t quite so easy. Getting the car out of the lot. The 6 feet of snow made things extremely difficult. Through the weekend we got to see other cars get stuck in the snow from our whotel room window. Other cars were just igloo’d to the point you couldn’t even SEE the cars. The cars that did get out slipped and slided along the ice roads. Well now it was our turn. At first the car didn’t budge. There were a lot of helpful people and one guy let me use his shovel which helped budge the car back a little bit. What we needed now was brute strength though. The bald roommate from earlier showed up then and even though he was beyond pissed at Schu, he was willing to help out for my sake. People called him a monster because MAN… it was like he nearly lifted the car out. He really helped us there, and so did a lot of other otakus. It was really great to see how friendly everyone got in this rough situation. I still don’t see how the girl in the skimpy biker shorts didn’t freeze to death. We were finally on our way out (nearly hitting Malcolm and Parnell too, heheh). Loaded up the car and were on our way to the snowless dirty south. We had two spin-outs. The second one sliding 3 lanes across but no injuries or car damages. Just a ton of snow. Thoughout the state of virginia there were accidents every half mile. It was rough. The first WaHo we saw was completely out of meat and we nearly got stuck in the parking lot, but people there helped too. A couple of miles away the waffle house actually had been cleared (redneck style too! Pickup truck + Snowshovel!) and we got our final real meal of the trip. Up until about Atlanta the snow was still around in traces.

Arrived home around 5am thanks to excessive caffeine kicks and a double dose of No Doze. It was pretty hard to sleep this off. Schu came down with all sorts of illnesses the next day. I was just worn. At the same time I felt 100%. It was overall a great weekend!

+GOOD+ Friends! Definitely lots of great meetups and get together. Hotel was particularly friendly in the unfortunate situation. $1 Pocky

-BAD- Bad Game Room location. Totally unorganized. Con Staff Nazis

~Ugly~ More pathetic; French Fries buried in the snow or a car buried up to its hood? You be the judge

"This is just like on…The Bouncer" - Jian's comment while trekking through the underground tunnels of DC

"Youre just like, SO short. Can I hug you?" -Lupin fan to Holly

"I LOVE Lupin! Did you know that’s the longest running anime series ever? Favorite character! Goemon! Yea he kicks ass!" -Lupin Fan

"I am the #1 Pucca Pucca Fanboy" - Joe/Sugar

"How do we get rid of all these Otaku?!" -Me
"Have you tried Soap?" - One of the guests

"You don’t happen to have badges for Monday do you?" -Me

"Wondertwin Powers, Activate!" -John
"Form out, and acid trip!" - Me
"Form the shape of... BLADE OF DEATH!" -John, refrencing WonderTwins and their lack of vicious weapons, usually resulting in shape of a box or something mostly harmless

"Grandfather B?" "Granddaddy B?" -In refrence to the Married With Chldren nickname of Bud's GrandMaster B

"Those…BRITS"
"Woah there with the racial stereotypes!" -Cybele's suprising remark on French Vs Britian