Creation Con Report
Mar. 22nd, 2004 12:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rusty_haloI haven't read LJ in something like a week. I know, I know, I need to catch up. Working on it.
I got all caught up in helping the Saving Angel campaign. The group was invited to promote, and given a table, at the Creation con in NJ over the weekend. But the only people from the group actually going were me and one other person who could only come on Sunday. So I ended up doing most of it so that we'd be prepared on Saturday.
Friday night, Sharon (![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
rockgoddes), Colleen (redeem147), and Leslie (psubrat) arrived and came into the city to hang out. We went to TeaNY, which has wonderful food and tea and lousy service. jaydk and drujan joined us. It was really fun--I hadn't seen Sharon since DragonCon so it was great to catch up with her.
Sharon took a lot of my Saving Angel fliers back with her that night, so that I didn't have to carry them along with all my own stuff the next morning. (I had a big heavy box of fliers, plus sign stands and photos and all this other stuff, so it was great to have help).
Saturday morning I met up withthefangirl at the Port Authority and we took the bus to Secaucus, NJ. (soulmate815 joined us later and the three of us roomed together). Then we had to wait a half hour in the cold for the hotel shuttle to come get us. (The staff was unbelievably rude at this hotel.) We got there a bit after 11--people were just starting to arrive. So we registered and then went to set up our table (which was right there waiting for us).
I had printed:
500 Saving Angel fliers
300 fliers with addresses (for sending postcards)
400 Saving Angel postcards
1 11x17 Saving Angel banner
And I bought sign-stands myself and printed 8 1/2 x 11 pictures of the billboard truck to put in them. Teep sent a package with a copy of Variety (the Saving Angel ad was on the back cover) and a bunch more postcards. Sharon brought sign-up forms for the email newsletter with the Saving Angel logo at the top. Mary, the other Saving Angel member, brought her copy of the Hollywood Reporter ad on Sunday, so that day we had both magazines, along with the pictures of the truck and all the fliers and postcards.
We put fliers near registration, and asked all the dealers if they'd put them in bags or give them to people as they bought stuff. (Every dealer agreed--they want to save the show too!) We gave out nearly all 400 postcards; about half were returned, filled out, for us to send. (I'm going to buy stamps on my lunch break and send my half today--the other group member, Mary, is also stamping and sending half of them). We collected 115 names for the email newsletter. Sharon did announcements on the stage to tell people to come to our table. We talked to TONS of people. Oh, and a couple of people from the Angel magazine came and took a picture of us at the table for the magazine. :)
It wasn't as big as it could've been, unfortunately, just because the con itself was so small. I'd estimate at most 500 people on Saturday and maybe half that on Sunday.
Saturday I spent almost all day at the table (not like there was much programming anyway). I missed Iyari Limon's talk, but I'd seen her before. I did go to see Nick Brendon talk, though. He was sweet and friendly. Couple of interesting things he said: they were very close to ending the series with Buffy/Xander, but ultimately decided on Buffy alone. They were also very close to killing Xander, but then decided that they couldn't kill a main character and so they maimed him instead. (My aside: #$%$#!!!! God, I wish Xander had died instead of Anya!) Oh, and someone asked him who was hotter, Spike or Angel, and he replied "Spangel."
After the day programming, they had a dessert party at 8pm. Stephanie Romanov and Robia LaMorte were there, going around to each table, talking to people and taking pictures. They were both really sweet. Stephanie in particular was just so strikingly nice (I guess because we were so used to superbitch Lilah). They were very friendly and spent a lot of time chatting with whoever wanted to talk to them. (I got photos with both).
I couldn't eat the ice cream, of course, but I brought a chocolate bar, and had drinks. So I was happy. Iyari came over and ate her ice cream at our table, chatting the whole time. She's incredibly outgoing, and comes across as very young.
Robin Atkin Downes (who played Machida in "Reptile Boy"--yeah, I don't remember either) entertained us by playing piano. (Robin's table was next to ours, so we spent most of our time at the con sitting next to him--he was very nice.)
Someone finally plied Nick Brendon away from the bar and got him to come to the ice cream party, where he played piano with Robin and tried to do some songs. (No one in the audience knew them--we couldn't even get "Hey Jude" going.) Finally they did some songs from the Buffy musical--Nick did Xander's part and the crowd did Anya's. After three false starts they actually got through the first verse. Then Nick and Robin just played piano together, uh, by pressing random keys for about ten minutes, basically. It was interesting.
After the party we went and hung out at the bar--Nick was there, very drunk. We got pictures with him which are going to look awful.
Then we just hung out and partied.nautibitz, lovebytez, and vixkitten were there with friends--and they brought Devil Piglet! She wrote one of my all-time favorite stories, Roundabout, and has many other wonderful fics. She's also one of the nicest people I've met in fandom. It was so incredibly great to finally meet her. I wish we'd had a chance to talk more, but we did get to talk for a while about fandom, fic, conventions, that kind of thing.
Also, she is obsessed with snack food, so at some point I told her that when I finally met her I was going to have her try vegan Cheetos. So I brought a bag for her (the brand name is Tings). She said they were a success. ;)
So, we were out pretty late Saturday night at the bar. Then Sunday morning I had to get up early to go set up the table again. (Well, early for me--I got up around 9:30).
The other Saving Angel member, Mary, got there around 11:30 and brought her own box of fliers. (We had enough, so she ended up giving them to this other woman at the con who volunteered to give them out at a con that's coming up this weekend--I-CON I think). Mary turned out to be really really nice and helpful and friendly. I was sort of nervous because she's, like, a B/A fan who posts on the Babble board and stuff, but we both were Angel fans so everything was fine.
Sunday I saw Robia LaMorte, who was interesting. I probably won't go see her again, though. She's a seriously, um, devoted religious fundamentalist who has apparently taken convention appearances as an opportunity to share the message about god. She gave out tapes of her telling her personal story of finding god, and even gave out her personal email address so that people can write to her to talk about god. When asked how she felt about Jenny being pagan, she said "I try to ignore that stuff and pretend it doesn't exist." She said that she was very upset about "Amends" and wouldn't have done it if possible, because her role was glorifying Satan. Um, okay. Anyway, like I said, she personally was nice, but I wouldn't go see her again. (Since, y'know, an atheist like me is damned in her eyes anyway.)
She did talk somewhat about the show--she said that the essence of Jenny is her sarcasm and quick wit (seen in her bantering with Giles). And she talked about her experiences touring with Prince.
Stephanie Romanov was very, very cool. She talked a lot about Lilah as a character--how much good or evil is in her? (She said she believes that everyone is fundamentally good, but that Lilah is on the wrong path and doing really evil things). She said she imagined that Lilah was powerless as a child, so was trying to get as much power as she could as an adult--but that pursuing power for power's sake is wrong. Also that as a woman in a man's world, she had to work even harder than the men and so was even more tough because of that. She liked "Billy," because in that episode Lilah got to be the hero. She said that Lilah really wanted Angel, but since she couldn't have him, she wanted to kill him instead (that was her fanwank for why Lilah wanted to kill Angel so much). She said that Lilah/Wesley seemed to spring up out of nowhere, but that she loved it--although the scenes with Alexis were very awkward because they'd known each other so long. She also said that in season two they were going to make Christian Kane a regular and get rid of her, but contract negotiations failed so they kept Lilah instead of Lindsey. She also said that they killed her because they couldn't afford to keep paying her. She was asked directly if Eve was just a poor replacement for Lilah and said she didn't know because she doesn't watch the show anymore. She pretty much seemed to have moved on from the whole Angel universe--she also talked about her experiences on "Models Inc" and stuff she's working on now.
All the guests personalized autographs. Stephanie signed my AtS S1 DVD, Robia signed a cute picture of Drusilla-as-Jenny with Giles from "Becoming" (I'm going to get ASH to sign it too), and Nick signed the Xander centerfold that was in a recent Buffy magazine issue. Stephanie was also selling (and signing) pictures of Lilah dressed as Fred--I wish I'd bought one of those!
So after it was over, we packed up the table and sorted through the postcards. (I can't tell you how many people don't know how to fill out a postcard! We'd even had a sample at the table to show people how to write one. So, we wrote in addresses on all the cards that weren't addressed to anyone.)
The trip home was a pain--we had to wait a half hour for the hotel shuttle, which took us to the bus stop (it was SO COLD!), the bus took us to NYC (we took up a whole extra row of seats with all our bags and the table stuff), then I got a cab home.
It was so great to see everyone--I'm sad that it's over. The con itself was lame, but the company was wonderful.
I got all caught up in helping the Saving Angel campaign. The group was invited to promote, and given a table, at the Creation con in NJ over the weekend. But the only people from the group actually going were me and one other person who could only come on Sunday. So I ended up doing most of it so that we'd be prepared on Saturday.
Friday night, Sharon (
rockgoddes), Colleen (redeem147), and Leslie (psubrat) arrived and came into the city to hang out. We went to TeaNY, which has wonderful food and tea and lousy service. jaydk and drujan joined us. It was really fun--I hadn't seen Sharon since DragonCon so it was great to catch up with her.Sharon took a lot of my Saving Angel fliers back with her that night, so that I didn't have to carry them along with all my own stuff the next morning. (I had a big heavy box of fliers, plus sign stands and photos and all this other stuff, so it was great to have help).
Saturday morning I met up with
thefangirl at the Port Authority and we took the bus to Secaucus, NJ. (soulmate815 joined us later and the three of us roomed together). Then we had to wait a half hour in the cold for the hotel shuttle to come get us. (The staff was unbelievably rude at this hotel.) We got there a bit after 11--people were just starting to arrive. So we registered and then went to set up our table (which was right there waiting for us).I had printed:
500 Saving Angel fliers
300 fliers with addresses (for sending postcards)
400 Saving Angel postcards
1 11x17 Saving Angel banner
And I bought sign-stands myself and printed 8 1/2 x 11 pictures of the billboard truck to put in them. Teep sent a package with a copy of Variety (the Saving Angel ad was on the back cover) and a bunch more postcards. Sharon brought sign-up forms for the email newsletter with the Saving Angel logo at the top. Mary, the other Saving Angel member, brought her copy of the Hollywood Reporter ad on Sunday, so that day we had both magazines, along with the pictures of the truck and all the fliers and postcards.
We put fliers near registration, and asked all the dealers if they'd put them in bags or give them to people as they bought stuff. (Every dealer agreed--they want to save the show too!) We gave out nearly all 400 postcards; about half were returned, filled out, for us to send. (I'm going to buy stamps on my lunch break and send my half today--the other group member, Mary, is also stamping and sending half of them). We collected 115 names for the email newsletter. Sharon did announcements on the stage to tell people to come to our table. We talked to TONS of people. Oh, and a couple of people from the Angel magazine came and took a picture of us at the table for the magazine. :)
It wasn't as big as it could've been, unfortunately, just because the con itself was so small. I'd estimate at most 500 people on Saturday and maybe half that on Sunday.
Saturday I spent almost all day at the table (not like there was much programming anyway). I missed Iyari Limon's talk, but I'd seen her before. I did go to see Nick Brendon talk, though. He was sweet and friendly. Couple of interesting things he said: they were very close to ending the series with Buffy/Xander, but ultimately decided on Buffy alone. They were also very close to killing Xander, but then decided that they couldn't kill a main character and so they maimed him instead. (My aside: #$%$#!!!! God, I wish Xander had died instead of Anya!) Oh, and someone asked him who was hotter, Spike or Angel, and he replied "Spangel."
After the day programming, they had a dessert party at 8pm. Stephanie Romanov and Robia LaMorte were there, going around to each table, talking to people and taking pictures. They were both really sweet. Stephanie in particular was just so strikingly nice (I guess because we were so used to superbitch Lilah). They were very friendly and spent a lot of time chatting with whoever wanted to talk to them. (I got photos with both).
I couldn't eat the ice cream, of course, but I brought a chocolate bar, and had drinks. So I was happy. Iyari came over and ate her ice cream at our table, chatting the whole time. She's incredibly outgoing, and comes across as very young.
Robin Atkin Downes (who played Machida in "Reptile Boy"--yeah, I don't remember either) entertained us by playing piano. (Robin's table was next to ours, so we spent most of our time at the con sitting next to him--he was very nice.)
Someone finally plied Nick Brendon away from the bar and got him to come to the ice cream party, where he played piano with Robin and tried to do some songs. (No one in the audience knew them--we couldn't even get "Hey Jude" going.) Finally they did some songs from the Buffy musical--Nick did Xander's part and the crowd did Anya's. After three false starts they actually got through the first verse. Then Nick and Robin just played piano together, uh, by pressing random keys for about ten minutes, basically. It was interesting.
After the party we went and hung out at the bar--Nick was there, very drunk. We got pictures with him which are going to look awful.
Then we just hung out and partied.
nautibitz, lovebytez, and vixkitten were there with friends--and they brought Devil Piglet! She wrote one of my all-time favorite stories, Roundabout, and has many other wonderful fics. She's also one of the nicest people I've met in fandom. It was so incredibly great to finally meet her. I wish we'd had a chance to talk more, but we did get to talk for a while about fandom, fic, conventions, that kind of thing.Also, she is obsessed with snack food, so at some point I told her that when I finally met her I was going to have her try vegan Cheetos. So I brought a bag for her (the brand name is Tings). She said they were a success. ;)
So, we were out pretty late Saturday night at the bar. Then Sunday morning I had to get up early to go set up the table again. (Well, early for me--I got up around 9:30).
The other Saving Angel member, Mary, got there around 11:30 and brought her own box of fliers. (We had enough, so she ended up giving them to this other woman at the con who volunteered to give them out at a con that's coming up this weekend--I-CON I think). Mary turned out to be really really nice and helpful and friendly. I was sort of nervous because she's, like, a B/A fan who posts on the Babble board and stuff, but we both were Angel fans so everything was fine.
Sunday I saw Robia LaMorte, who was interesting. I probably won't go see her again, though. She's a seriously, um, devoted religious fundamentalist who has apparently taken convention appearances as an opportunity to share the message about god. She gave out tapes of her telling her personal story of finding god, and even gave out her personal email address so that people can write to her to talk about god. When asked how she felt about Jenny being pagan, she said "I try to ignore that stuff and pretend it doesn't exist." She said that she was very upset about "Amends" and wouldn't have done it if possible, because her role was glorifying Satan. Um, okay. Anyway, like I said, she personally was nice, but I wouldn't go see her again. (Since, y'know, an atheist like me is damned in her eyes anyway.)
She did talk somewhat about the show--she said that the essence of Jenny is her sarcasm and quick wit (seen in her bantering with Giles). And she talked about her experiences touring with Prince.
Stephanie Romanov was very, very cool. She talked a lot about Lilah as a character--how much good or evil is in her? (She said she believes that everyone is fundamentally good, but that Lilah is on the wrong path and doing really evil things). She said she imagined that Lilah was powerless as a child, so was trying to get as much power as she could as an adult--but that pursuing power for power's sake is wrong. Also that as a woman in a man's world, she had to work even harder than the men and so was even more tough because of that. She liked "Billy," because in that episode Lilah got to be the hero. She said that Lilah really wanted Angel, but since she couldn't have him, she wanted to kill him instead (that was her fanwank for why Lilah wanted to kill Angel so much). She said that Lilah/Wesley seemed to spring up out of nowhere, but that she loved it--although the scenes with Alexis were very awkward because they'd known each other so long. She also said that in season two they were going to make Christian Kane a regular and get rid of her, but contract negotiations failed so they kept Lilah instead of Lindsey. She also said that they killed her because they couldn't afford to keep paying her. She was asked directly if Eve was just a poor replacement for Lilah and said she didn't know because she doesn't watch the show anymore. She pretty much seemed to have moved on from the whole Angel universe--she also talked about her experiences on "Models Inc" and stuff she's working on now.
All the guests personalized autographs. Stephanie signed my AtS S1 DVD, Robia signed a cute picture of Drusilla-as-Jenny with Giles from "Becoming" (I'm going to get ASH to sign it too), and Nick signed the Xander centerfold that was in a recent Buffy magazine issue. Stephanie was also selling (and signing) pictures of Lilah dressed as Fred--I wish I'd bought one of those!
So after it was over, we packed up the table and sorted through the postcards. (I can't tell you how many people don't know how to fill out a postcard! We'd even had a sample at the table to show people how to write one. So, we wrote in addresses on all the cards that weren't addressed to anyone.)
The trip home was a pain--we had to wait a half hour for the hotel shuttle, which took us to the bus stop (it was SO COLD!), the bus took us to NYC (we took up a whole extra row of seats with all our bags and the table stuff), then I got a cab home.
It was so great to see everyone--I'm sad that it's over. The con itself was lame, but the company was wonderful.
