1) So they gave me a press pass at HalCon because I was tagging along with the Where Monsters Dwell crew, not because they recognized my Eisner-nominated journalism.
What do you have to do to get a press pass at HalCon? Ask for one. That's all we did. We said we wanted press passes, and then the woman took out a marker and put our names on press badges. That's it! Granted, she spelled Remy's name wrong on his, but it still get you from Point A to Point "Inside the Con" for free. If you're looking to save money next year, just tell them you're press. They didn't even ask us what media we were representing, she just went straight to the markers. Awesome.
2) If you want to hang out with Ryan Howard, you had better work on your cardio. He'll get you there, but he's getting there as though he was shot out of a cannon. You need to work to keep up, is what I'm saying. He would have beaten Lewis & Clark to the west coat by six weeks, is what I'm saying.
3) Costumes at the con? There were a metric ton of them. There were pieces of time where 30-40% of all attendees were in some form of costume. And some of them would just slap a pink wig on their head and go as Alterna-whores, but many of them were intricate and awesome.
The most prevalent costume was "Star Fleet Officer", which plays right into Canadian women's predisposition toward wearing hooker boots at all times. We had our picture taken with a hot vulcan nurse, or at least that's what we were calling her.
I said "She's probably like - I've received no medical training at all, you jerks, I'm the helmsman, goddammit!" She just looked at me like I was complete idiot and replied "No, I'm a science officer." Duh!
Best costume at the Con was a zombie nurse on Friday night. Her makeup was impeccable....skin peeling off of her face, creepy contact lenses, the whole thing was top notch. She also had two accessories. One was a zombie baby with disgusting gray veins in its head. She could move it around like a puppet, it was most unsettling. The second accessory was a douche bag with the word "security" written on the back of his shirt. One of the accessories added a lot to her costume. One was a douche bag with the word "security" written on the back of his shirt.
We've got a group photo of all of us with zombie nurse "coo-chie-cooing" the undead rugrat. It's suitable for framing, I'm sure.
4) Fun times at Strange Adventures! I was shopping for TPBs when somebody whispered that "Steve" was here. Steve of course was Steve McNiven. Things happen at Strange Adventures that just don't happen where I live.
I overheard a lovely young clerk talking about playing "Truth or Dare" with the other help:
"I almost always played truth. I only played dare to make other girls kiss me."
Pray continue, lass! Pray continue.....
5) So I asked Darwyn Cooke about Payback, because it's one of my all-time favorite films and he's currently adapting the Westlake novels into comic books for IDW. Cooke fidgeted a bit, measured his words and said that he far preferred the director's cut to the theatrical version. Perhaps sensing some latent disappointment that he didn't like it as much as I did, he admitted that it wasn't bad for a "metrosexual" adaptation.
Then he put his fingers to his head as though suffering a great headache and said "But.....it's fucking Mel Gibson!" And we all did laugh a great while at that.
6) Monster Mike routinely sports gray Crocs, and puts ketchup and maple syrup on his potato chunks. Just sayin'.
7) Remy sneezes in fours. Every time.
8) Talked a little bit with Conor McCreery, and he's just as engaging as Anthony Del Col. It would have been pretty easy to cut bait emotionally on that Con and sulk, because it turned out not to be an ideal situation for selling an indie comic.
He was always upbeat and professional, which for him means sitting at successive chairs on stage at the panel and adopting separate personalities. He had a Kill Shakespeare pumpkin at his table which looked delicate as silk and expensive as gold. Naturally, Remy set to poking it immediately.
9) I made a few nice purchases, none at the Con itself. Strange Adventures was wise to load up on Sci-Fi comics and gadgets/toys - they could see what the Con had morphed into and planned accordingly. That Cal character is a shrewd cat. They sold four Dr. Who "sonic screwdrivers" for $40 a throw inside of a couple of hours.
At any rate, I scored a couple of nice Amory Wars books and very nice copy of X-Men: Blood of Apocalypse. You know you've got a real comic book shop when you're looking at the shelves and they demonstrate conscious planning about what's carried. You know you've got a bad ass comic shop when you see stuff like the Rocketeer Deluxe edition and a boxed set of EC War Comics on the shelves. If you live near a Strange, consider yourself very fortunate.
10) There are a lot of homeless people on the streets of Halifax providing varying degrees of entertainment. There's a particularly good character hanging outside the liquor store bellowing a continuous stream of friendly mush out of his mouth. Mike bought a poppy from the guy, who then invited him to engage in a fist bump.
On the way to the Con, we were continuously assaulted by a guy hawking Street Feat magazine, "the magazine of the poor". Given the quality of the sales pitch, one can understand how they got to poverty.
The best part of the trip was meeting the WMD crew, who took me into the fold immediately, like I'd been part of the family for years. I laughed my balls off that whole trip, and no matter what we were doing, (or not doing, as often the case was) it was always fun. And we only scratched the surface, really. On the way back, I was thinking to myself "DOH! I never asked about an Erin update, or stories about Dr. Mortula!"
Ah well, there's always next time...
- Ryan
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