Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Comic Con 2008

We had a great time. Amy and I got in with my Professional badge, and while it didn't create an instant parting of the crowd like I'd hoped, it did cause a few artists we spoke with to ask what we did.

We were only able to go for part of Friday, and all of Saturday and Sunday. Friday we drove down after work and got there about 4:30. We cruised the floor for a bit, said hey to Doug TenNapel and Sean McGowan, and ran into a few other forum friends (Erik "Lars" Brown and his wife, and I think Eric Branscume). Stopped by Eef's booth at Slave Labor, but he wasn't there. We ran into him on the way over to Bad Karma's booth, though. Said hi to Eric Peterson and Val at Bad Karma. (Yes, three Erics in one night.) We met up with Frankie and his friend Melissa, too. Some of us wanted to go to an MST3K panel they had, but when we got up there an hour and a half early, the line was all the way down to the street level, so we said forget it. We wanted to go get dinner with everyone (including the Mulhollands), but it didn't work out, so we had a group of six (Eef and his brother Isaiah, Eric Brown and his wife, and Amy and I). We went to Rockin' Baja Lobster, if I remember right. Had some good carnitas tacos. We went up to my folks' house for the night, and Ian came down and met us.

Saturday was more cruising the floor. Picked up some books and talked to some artists. Got to meet the artist who created Korgi. He was a nice dude, and he had some of his original pages for us to look at. I went to Rob Schrab's booth to say hi, and it seemed like he remembered us from last year and Doug's house, so that was cool. I bought an original Scud page from him! It's gorgeous. I'll post a picture when I get the chance. Dan and Doug Heder stopped by while we were there (and Dan remembered us too!), so we said hey.
We went by Doug T's booth again and Angie was there, and we got a big hug from her. We chatted for a bit about the bewildering experience that is the Comic Con.

Amy and I ran into Scott Adsit on the floor, and got a picture with him. I put my hand on the small of his back without thinking for the picture and felt awkward about it for the rest of my life.
While searching for Ian (whose iPhone had died) I ran into Robert Smigel doing a new Triumph the Insult Comic segment (horrible pictures to come). Amy and I also saw Matthew Fox walking to a signing booth, which was cool. We met up with Josh Kenfield for a bit as he waited in line to get some MST3K guys to sign a poster.

Elizabeth Starks also came Saturday and joined us for a good part of the day. That night was the TenNapel Forum Hodown, and Tawney Smith and bf Tony came, which was great. We had a good time seeing the Westhavenbrook guys and other forum friends (Ruiz and gf, to name a pair), and eating more good Mexican food. Frankie bailed because there was a magical cat giving out free wands somewhere.

On Sunday Eric Peterson and Isaiah and I went surfing in Carlsbad. It was Eric's first time. Isaiah took off to the main lineup, having had a lot of experience up in Oregon of all places, while Eric and I stayed on the inside. Eric was fine at catching waves, but standing up presented more of a challenge. He made it to one foot up by the end of the morning, and I'm sure he'll get it if he goes again. We made it down to the Con in time to get into the room to wait for Sockbaby 4 to premiere. (It's available to download on Sockbaby.com now!) It was great! Doug even gave a shout-out to all the frogmen in the audience, so Eric, both Adams, and I all got to take a bow. The panel afterwards was pretty funny. Jon and Dan Heder were there, as well as Rob Schrab, his girlfriend Kate Freund, John Soares, Justin and Cody Spurlock, and even Isaac Singleton!
It was a fun year!

10 comments:

Ian said...

You meant Jon Heder right meng?, not "Doug Heder"?

Ryan said...

No, it was Doug Heder! He's the other Heder that was there. Doesn't look like Jon. Or Dan for that matter.

Unknown said...

I realized when I got down there on Wednesday night that I had no way to get a hold of you. If I was smart I would have called Jeri, but you know how it gets down there. Next year, definitely. Glad you guys had fun and you didn't come down Thursday so you missed the traffic insanity that Phil got caught in.

Ryan said...

Yeah, I realized the same thing! (I was also supposed to meet up with the Digital Bits folks just to finally meet them, and forgot to get contact info.) I thought I might run into you, but I didn't go to many panels, so that might have hurt my chances. Next year! Next year also I hope to go for all 4 days, so we can hit some panels together.

Brian Miller said...

Glad you had a good time! We'll have to plan to meet up next year so we can cruise some of the floor with ya! I think next year I might try to go for the full thing - or at least a portion of the weekend.

Ryan said...

It'd be great to see you and Hethe for Geek Time. Next year!

lightyear8 said...

Sorry we never connected down there. We were really hoping to. Glad you had a good time though. We'll have to get together soon!

Ryan said...

We miss seeing you guys. I'd like to hang out soon too!

Anonymous said...

I put my hand on the small of his back without thinking for the picture and felt awkward about it for the rest of my life.

Aha ha ha! Dude, you made a terrible mistake! Maybe he thought it was Amy's hand and you don't have to keep waking up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat reliving the moment.

Ryan said...

Nobody, that's exactly what I'm hoping. Amy's hand was higher than mine, and who can tell whose hand is whose when it's on your back?