Daijoubu

Saturday morning I returned to the con a little before 8 AM. There was, of course, already a line, but nothing like the line that discouraged me yesterday. By 10:15 I had my badge. I had some friends coming from Connecticut too. I should have called them the night before to warn them about the lines (sorry guys!). As it was, I called them after I got in line and they’d only just left home! (Oooops!) I think they had about a four hour wait when they finally got there! So how was my one real day at Anime Boston?

Lusting After Konata
So I went and bought Hinano’s doujinshi (and later I got a print too). Next up was in the dealers room. I thought I’d make quick work of it, seeing as how I had no money. But the dealers accept credit cards, so I was screwed. I love Sasuga cause they they have the most books and manga. I got Megami Deluxe 10 (and then some more stuff the second time through!). Sasuga has this narrow space you go through stuffed with manga and artbooks. As I was going through, the guy ahead of me (dressed in an Ouran uniform) had this artbook in his hands for Gurren Lagann’s Yoko (they had a big stack of them). Then I noticed he had left it partway through next to some other books. “Why did he carry it for so long and suddenly put it down,” I wondered. “What could havbe induced him to surrender a book dedicated to Yoko’s voluptuousness?” I soon had my answer, for in his hands I could clearly see that he’d replaced his GL artbook with one for Lucky Star. From the cover of this book, a large moemoemoe Konata was staring at me, and I knew right away she had to be mine! “Where did you get that?” I asked. And he said those dreaded words, “It was the last one.” Noooooooooo!!!, lol. And what was worse, I had to spend several more minutes in line with that Konata staring at me, as though taunting me: “If you had been just one person ahead of this guy, I would have been yours!!!” >:(

But this story has a happy ending. When I went back later, I assuaged my grief by buying this manga-style Konata box with a little figure and other goodies in it. And then, when I was walking around with my friends from Connecticut, one of them found a copy of the book at another dealer. He said, “You guys can fight over it,” but there was no contest. I seized the book and clutched it tightly in my sweaty hands! XD OK, enough with this sordid story, how was the rest of the con?

The Rest of the Con
You have to realize that, after all my walking around Boston the day before and waiting in line that morning, I was tired. And my feet hurt. I had to focus and summon the energy to move one foot in front of the other. And the place was humid and packed with people. Lots more people than I’d ever seen at AB. There were lines for everything. My friends wanted to see the Pillows, but by the time they registered that was impossible. They did wait in the autograph line and one of them got his CD signed. I saw parts of three panels: the Higurashi panel (I missed the first half, which I heard was the better part — they had a trivia contest; I did see the batsu game where a Keiichi cosplayer had to put on maid outfit and cat ears) the Greg Ayers panel and the ADV panel. Again, I did not take as many pictures as at other cons. This was so packed it was less fun than other Anime Bostons. I asked one of my friends what his verdict was on this year’s con. He said, “The End.” Something tells me he’s not coming back!

Mr. Wildarmsheero
I ran into wildarmsheero a few times. He had a microphone and was recording for a podcast, so my voice may end up on part of it — just keep in mind I was tired and out-of-it! At one point, I was waving to my CT friends coming out of the ADV panel and I discovered I was waving to him too! I messed up introducing him to them though, ’cause I didn’t want to mangle or mispronounce his real name, but I felt odd saying, “This is Mr. Wildarmsheero” (Mr. Heero? Wild A. Heero?), so I mentioned Mistakes of Youth, but these guys (except one) don’t really read blogs. Oh well, (sorry Mr W.A.H.!)

Hinano, JP, & the End of the Con for Me
So I had dinner with Hinano and JP at the Legal Seafoods. Then I got to see her doing her blogging on a laptop. She types very fast. Then they watched Rosario + Vampire on Nico Nico (that’s the show with all the big boobs and panty shots). I think they pay more attention to the user’s comments than the episode itself (well, they are more entertaining!). Then they showed me all of these crazy Nico Nico memes. That site is really a meme-generator. I was lost after awhile, particularly when someone puts up a comparison video with like ten different parody versions of something going at once. And so that was it. I left about 11:50 PM. Will I go to AB next year? Who knows, but if I did I’d have to arrive a hell of a lot earlier. I wonder how they will handle the Sunday gripe session, with all the complaints they’ll be getting about the long registration lines?

I’ll probably take some loot pics later on…