The Goldfish's Logbook

Wednesday night we went to dinner with Jenny and Matt at EZ's. It was just something different to do for dinner. Or was it a double date?!? OMG! Anywho, during the conversation(s) I asked, "So what are we doing for Halloween?", to which Jenny replied that our gang already had 2 Halloween parties planned. Ha ha. And here I thought I was the first to suggest something, only to find out they've got it in the bag already. Yeah, they've always got more plates spinning than you can shake a stick at. After dinner we played some Mario Party. Our Team Seaslug (aka Team Lesbos) barely eked out a victory. We would've played singles, but it was a school night so we had to head out early.
Thursday I had the night "off" so I spent the evening at my place playing Civ 4 (I still can't beat it on the "Prince setting, grrrrr) and cleaning the apartment (it really doesn't feel like I live there anymore). By the way, the apartment hunt has narrowed the list down to four properties in the Parmer - Wells Branch area, about as north as we can get and still be in Austin.
Saturday evening was the ACDF anniversary dinner. I was so relieved and pleased that people showed up because if they hadn't, I seriously would've been, "Okay, that's it. I quit." Thankfully though, that didn't happen. Yes, our gang made up the majority of the gathering, but there were enough people there to make it legitimate. It wasn't a gargantuan gathering like we used to have, but the small size worked in our favor, I think (even though it still took an hour for our party of 9 to get seated. WTH?). Since it was a small group we were able to talk to each other, rather than shouting through a crowd (like most ACDF gatherings). I got to meet some of the new(er) members and got to know them better. They're not as bad as I thought; heck, they were actually sorta likeable! ;)
Two things were learned that evening. One, we need to stop going to Kerbey's, tradition be damned. Two, I need to stop hanging out with Jenny, Beauty, and Cat. THEY ARE THE COSPLAY BORG; everyone they touch becomes assimilated into their cosplay group. I was able to wriggle out of their Rayearth group (mostly out of ignorance) but my interest was piqued when they mentioned their Disney villains group. Honestly, I've been anti-Disney for years now but the word "villains" caught my ear. I do like to cosplay bad guys. Still, I might have said no if they hadn't suggested the character they did. "Cody, you should do Hades!"
Hmmm. Flaming glowing hair, contacts, prosthetic fangs, and smoke effects? Sounds like a challenge. I'll do it! (Yeah, I'm a sucker for trying new things.)
So what did we end up doing that night? We watched Hercules and Alice in Wonderland (Liz wants to be the Red Queen).

Getting back to the normal schedule hasn’t been easy. I frittered away Wednesday mostly playing video games. Sure I did some laundry and unpacked and cleaned the pre-con disaster area (my apartment), but it was mostly a lazy day. I went to go see Star for lunch and forced her to eat pizza for the second day in a row, which I’m sure made her suffer terribly. I mostly just skated through work on Thursday and Friday, doing busy work and keeping a low profile so that I could get through the mini-week without any real effort.

Saturday afternoon we went to Inner Space Caverns. I’d drilled a job there about a month ago and the manager had given us free passes, so why not? The place was pretty busy. We had to wait for an hour before our tour started. The tour was okay. The guide was younger than us (I think this was his summer job) so it was difficult to take him seriously, which may be why I kept making wisecracks the whole time. Maybe I was the asshole of the group, I dunno. *shrug* The more extreme tours, the one’s where you actually go spelunking rather than walking on a sidewalk sound pretty interesting but I doubt that’s something that we’ll ever do.

After the caverns we went to Star’s parents’ place. No reason really except that we happened to be in their area. We had dinner and chit-chatted about random stuff. Also, I finally scolded Star’s mom for teaching her daughter to read and talk. Now she won’t stop doing either one. ;)

That evening Star revealed which costume she’s decided to do next. There had been a couple that I’d been secretly rooting for, so when it turned out that she’d picked one of those, I was very pleased. The costume is very armor-heavy so that means I get to be really involved in this cosplay of hers. I kinda want to go to Dallas to see if we can find the right color of vinyl for the vinyl/foam method but we’ll probably just go with reliable fiberglass instead. I’m thinking this costume could be done by the end of the year for not too much money. However, it’s got an assload of detail work, so we may lose our sanity by the time it’s done. Coincidentally, I’ve also chosen to do a long-term costume. For the time being I think we’re both tired of rushing to crank out a new costume for each con; we’d rather take our time crafting an epic cosplay. After building Pucca and Garu and GIR I’m content to ride out the rest of the year without worrying about meeting another con deadline.

I spent Sunday morning getting some cosplay supplies and getting started on my own project. That afternoon we went to go see Wall-E again and this time around I cried a little. That’s why I usually don’t watch anything remotely romantic/tragic more than once because I get more emotional the second time around, like when I took my anime club to go see “Grave of the Fireflies.” I started getting teary-eyed at the very beginning of the film, before any bad stuff had even happened simply because I was thinking, “Oh, they’re so happy now, but they’re all going to die. Even the little girl. It’s so sad, so sad. Waaah.”

This weekend we’ve got some summer fun stuff planned. It’s an extra-ACDF event. ( ACDF rambling )

Speaking of events, I had been kicking around the idea of a pre-Batman movie get-together, to watch the new animated Gotham Knight DVD (and maybe Batman Begins) before going out to watch The Dark Knight. That was before I remembered we already had something going on this weekend. But regardless, I’m gonna find time to watch that movie this weekend. I’m half tempted to go to the midnight showing on Thursday. Naw, it’s probably a better idea to wait till Sunday. That way I can spend Sunday afternoon in a dark theater, applying aloe vera to my pinkness from the day before. 

Woof. What a weekend. Since I'm still tired, I think I'll make this an abridged con report.
( Con report GO! )

I barely made it out of El Paso on time Thursday. I was about a minute away from missing my flight; they were calling my name out over the PA and closing the door to the plane when I got there, that's how late I was. The flight home seemed to take forever, but hugging Star in the airport terminal made up for the lousy week I'd been having up til that moment.

JB invited us over for dinner that night, where she regaled us with tales of faraway lands, plied us with fine food and wine, tempted us with exotic sweets, and otherwise rubbed our faces in the fact that she was major-awesome. Ha ha ha. But seriously, the grub was tasty and the TV was funny. It was good to hang out with a friend.

 Friday Star had to work so I slept in, played some video games, then went to see her for lunch. We stuffed ourselves at Gatti’s till we could barely move. After lunch, I cleaned up the apartment a bit and worked on some cosplay.

Saturday morning we spent trying to get a bunch of stuff done. We swooped down upon the Goodwill and Halloween stores for some non-Halloween costume shopping stuff. Then we transplanted some of Star’s stuff to my place. She’s not moving in, but there were a few more things she needed to be comfortable and cosplay-productive while she’s house-sitting.

Saturday night was the ACDF birthday/anniversary, roughly one year since our inaugural meeting. I’d say the organization is maturing well, though I can’t quite say yet what direction/form it will ultimately take. Sometimes I worry about it, but those moments are rare. As is tradition, we gathered at Kerbey’s and overran a dining room. There wasn’t any agenda (or order, for that matter) to the meeting, but after weeks of not seeing the ACDFers, it was satisfying enough just to socialize with one another. Two of the members had arranged slideshows for the dinner and it was pretty cool to reminisce about all the things we had done together. It made me really optimistic about the year to come.

After the meal we reconvened at Main Event. And as was precedent (again), that mostly consisted of hanging out near the DDR machine. Except for us adults, that is! Some of us hung out at the bar and tried some new drinks. The bartenders didn’t know a Gorilla Fart, so I’ll keep looking. I’m starting to lose hope that any drink with a name is worth drinking. They may be tasty, yes, but never seem to pack any punch.

Later, some peeps moved on out to karaoke, but me and Star headed home for the night. Why, because we’re old, duh. I say that and yet, the night didn’t end until we’d been running around the apartment, crashing into each other and walls and otherwise not acting our age. And someone who will remain nameless drooled on someone else. Reeeeeal mature, there.

Sunday we went to a movie, Stardust. We hadn’t been to one in a while and I was itching to go see something, anything. I liked it. More than MirrorMask, but not as much as Pan’s Labyrinth. I think I'll see 3:10 to Yuma this weekend.

Monday morning sucked, of course, since I was leaving. The departure wasn’t nearly as difficult this time, but I’m by no means comfortable with these partings.

It was a good weekend, most definitely.

Star and I headed out together, arriving at Cat’s at 1 pm. We sat around her apartment (it nearly burst at the seams with all our cosplay awesomeness) for about 1.5 hours as we waited for everyone to show up. A few new people showed up along with the usual main corps of ACDFers. I think about a dozen people showed up, which was a good turn-out.
After about another hour of parking-lot and innertube confusion at the river, we FINALLY got into the water. Almost all of us had tubes so we formed a big cosplay raft of sorts and drifted downriver. It was funny whenever the current swept our group under a bridge. Almost always someone would crash into the piers, resulting in much panicking and hoopla. I wasn’t content to just lazily lie in the water all day (I can do that in my bathtub) so my tube was constantly circling the main ACDF flotilla. I probably wasn’t acting my age out there. I was the only one with a squirt gun, I often left my tube for swimming and shark attacks, and with other kids like CC and MoB egging me on, I was all sorts of hyper. Luckily I didn’t have any goggles or snorkel, otherwise I would’ve been up to some real mischief.
So yeah, floating was really lots of fun. Although there were lots of other people, it didn’t seem crowded on the water. The banks were green and lush, providing us both scenery and shade. The weather was great; sunny enough that the water was the right place to be, but not OMG-I’m-gonna-burst-into-flame hot. The only detractor was the "tentacle-rape" weeds (as they came to be called) growing in the water, which discouraged swimming for most of the float. After about an hour of floating we reached the park at the end. Most of the people decided to walk back and float again, but Star and I had the charcoal and other important stuff needed to start the picnic, so we had to go.
Like the river, the park was packed, but by the time we got there some other ACDFers had already occupied a table and grill. Way to go, guys! Our table was a small island of anime soundtrack music surrounded by Tejano. We got things fired up and the rest of our navy soon showed up. We had to wait for the veggie-burgers to cook before us carnivores could eat, lest we contaminate the utensils (we could’ve wrapped the spatula with foil! ARGH!) This sort of potluck-ish dinner was odd. We had stuff like baby-bananas, donuts, and curry along with the typical hot dogs, hamburgers, and watermelon fare. It was only when the last bun was being eaten that I noticed that we were running out of hamburger buns (which I was responsible for). So I made a tire-squealing dash to the nearest gas station only to find regular bread. But when I got back I was glad to see the people had been smart enough to MacGuyver the hotdog buns to fit the burgers.
After dinner we horsed around and talked. I mostly just continued to orbit the group and take pictures, though I did get drawn into some silliness. I probably went too far when I started putting watermelon down people’s shorts. And being on the receiving end of some wrestling holds helped me decide to leave the horseplay to the younger kids. It soon grew dark after that, signaling the end of the ACDF Float.

My Saturday, that is. But that's cool, I wasn't gonna eat it anyways.
Let's see . . . things started getting busy a little after noon. I went to JB's to help with her move, although by this point my awesome gunships weren't really required. Ha ha. So we spent a few hours moving odds and ends and scraps and notions, then poked through her belongings for curios and anything else of interest. I got a tacklebox out of the deal. Yay. And I've found I have perfect comedic timing when it comes to the camera. There goes my career as the next Ansel Adams. Oh well.
( ACDFers make lousy movers )
Then later we all regrouped at Peter Pan's Mini-Golf for Douglas' birthday. Not really, but if we'd found that kid, he would've had the weirdest birthday ever, guaranteed. "Who are these people, mom?" "I don't know, but don't make eye-contact!" And why didn't someone tell me that place was BYOB? Man, that would've really ramped things up! But as hyper as I was, it's probably good that I had no booze. There was an assload of ACDFers, OMG. Like 20+. I daresay it was the biggest turn-out we've had since the inaugural meeting last year. Or maybe it just seemed like a big group because Pan's was such a small place (sorry Pan, no offense). We had to split up into teams just to keep the place from choking on the cosplay. I'm glad I didn't wear any costumes; wearing any of those bucket-heads would've reduced my fun intake by 60%, easy. Damn, but there was a buttload of us. After the boys team finished their course and began watching the other team play, it was just this mob, no, herd of cosplayers slowly inching its way across the putt-putt plains. Even though not everyone played and the place didn't have much in the way of photo-ops, it was still uber fun.
Next was Kerby Lane for dinner, of course. And again, due to our party's size, we got split up. And again, that didn't seem to interfere with our fun! Yeah, I got stuck at the kid's table :P, but it was like a game of musical tables. "Let's go see what they're talking about at this table . . . an anime con? Boring. Next table . . . Polygamy? All right! . . . . etc" Yeah, it was fun, until my food got stolen. What the hell? I bought queso for the neon-glo table, then turn around to find my pasta penne was gone. I was about to blame the moody waitress for taking it when I noticed most of the cosplayers were giggling. Devious bastards. And although I wasn't able to see most (any) of the strawberry bruschetta lovefest, my brain is very creative at filling in the gaps, so those images will warm my nights for a very long while. Yes.
Our last stop for the night was JB's apartment for more Roastbeefy funness! If there had just been an eensy bit more furniture, it probably would've turned into a slumber party.
Phew! Too much fun in twenty-four hours.

Praise RaptorJesus!


( P.S. )

I use quotes because I cannot, in good faith, call that event a "convention". The mall (yes, I said mall) where it was held was so empty and quiet that you could actually hear it dying. And Chimera, oh . . . , it was equally sad and lonely (and it smelled, but that might've been from something/someone else). As an anime/manga fan and cosplayer, I KNOW that gamers and LARPers are our cousins, but still . . . that con was giving me the heebie-jeebies. I tried not to let it creep me out too much. After all, ACDF had been invited there to flex some cosplay muscle and promote a future con in the area.
But first . . . ( 300! )

I brought Slade to Chimaera. I didn't want to waste a new cosplay on such a little con, but he was the easiest/fastest costume to put on. I was the last to get ready (of course). By the time I got out, the ACDF girls were getting interviewed on camera; I didn't catch where that video would be aired, if anywhere. Ukyo in her Mai costume was undoubtedly our best "recruiter." (T&A FTW!) Ha ha ha.
The cosplay contest began shortly thereafter. We were ringers, so we couldn't participate. There were only 4 cosplayers and two of those were store-bought Star Wars costumes. The winner turned out to be a cute gal in a Pyramid Head costume. Yay! (I'm soo glad I decided not to wear my PH; I would've annihilated her humble cosplay.)
After that we went to IHOP to eat. In costume, yeah! It wasn't Kerbey's, but not every city can be perfect ;). The place was deserted but the staff got a kick out of seeing us weirdos, even if they had no idea what we were. There were plans to go drinking or a slumber party or raiding someone's house afterwards, but the group pretty much disbanded after the pancakes were gone.
And so ended the Austin Cosplay Defense Force's first campaign into foreign lands. We may not have brought back slaves or plunder, but that doesn't matter. Chimaera was a good excuse to get together and have fun in cosplay. Because that's what we do! Woo!

( Chimaera pic )

I hosted the xpvc workshop today. It was a small turn-out, three people, which was just about the right size. More people would've been funner, but I didn't really have the tools or space to accomodate many more. And I'm glad that now a few more people have gotten some experience with XPVC. That way I won't seem like such a raving loon for always gushing over it.
About mid-day we went to go take some pics of Team Sugoi. It was a short shoot and the wind and sun didn't help much, but it was a novel outing. Afterwards we did Kerbey for dinner (of course), then resumed the workshop. For awhile the tables were turned and I became the student; they tried teaching me about sewing. I know they were speaking English, but I didn't understand any of it. Oh well. The girls were alot more enthusiastic about the workshop than I anticipated. I certainly didn't expect it to run from noon till nearly midnight. Heh heh. Wow.
So now it's up to some other ACDFers to host their own workshops! I've done my part! I sleep now!
( pic o' the day )

P.S. And damn CC for showing me pics of Hyung Tae Kim's work. Agh! Don't tempt me woman! I don't need more cosplays to do!
But . . . they ARE pretty . . .

A mildly frustrating day. Even though today was part of my alleged 4-day weekend, I had to work, which stunk. After work I was going to go to an ACDF anime showing thingie. It took me an hour just to go 7 miles (less than 1/4 of the total trip) at which point I lost my patience. "Screw it! I ain't spending all night stuck in traffic!" So I turned around and went home. I love driving, but _HATE_ rush hour. That's the main reason I live so damned close to the office, so that I don't have to put up with it. Sorry for leaving you without a ride, Tommy.
So when I get home, it's like, "Okay then, let's do some cosplay!" I was about ready to put the legs onto the Catbus when I realized that all 16 of the hips are 4" too short. Crap. There goes yesterday's work. I mean, midget cats may be cute, but . . . the Nekobus ain't no midget cat! So instead I spent the evening dismantling it and remaking the hips. . . . I wish it would get really cold tonight so I could build a fire and get rid of all these scraps.
I hope I'm able to attend at least a little bit of the ACDF picnic/photoshoot this weekend. At first I wanted to go just to take pics, but MoB's gonna be doing a Terra cosplay from Teen Titans, which would be a fun excuse to wear Slade again. Wee! But pesky work probably won't allow me. And it'd probably be poor form to ask for someone to cover for me again, so soon after Ikki.
Hmm . . . .

Woo, what a day. I almost feel dizzy with so much going on. A very weird shopping list to take care of, I met so many new people and entities, and trying to stick to a very fast-paced schedule . . . @_@. I'm proud of myself since I managed to hit (or at least bunt) every curve ball thrown at me today. I'm not gonna screw up this job. Even if I've gotta hang on with my teeth and nails, I'm gonna ride it to the end. Today was recon with the bigwigs, tomorrow I'll be doing the macho thing, clearing underbrush with a chainsaw.
That mild sense of accomplishment was muted tonight when I looked at the calendar. I realized that this new work schedule will also prevent me from going to the ACDF Valentine's photoshoot. I didn't know whether to be angry or disappointed; apparently those emotions nuetralize each other. Even though I don't have any costumes that would've fit in with the setting, I was looking forward to the shoot as my Ikki-con substitute, in a way. Oh, and that's not all. This job is also gonna to prevent me from attending that Japanese for Beginners night class I just signed up for. I've been trying to get into that for over a year. Most times my schedule didn't allow it, or I was out-of-town, or I would simply forget to sign up when the semester started. Last semester, the class was full, but this time I got in. Last week's class was cancelled due to the icy weather. Now though, we'll be working from sun-up to sun-down. There's no way I can get to UT by 6 pm.
So no Ikki, no ACDF, and no class for me. I feel like I should be allowed to be angry about this but that won't make it any easier to go to work tomorrow, so I'll just put that feeling in a box, duct-tape it shut, and shove it in the closet. I won't allow myself to be angry, but I do permit myself to sulk.
Just to be spiteful, I'm gonna eat something tasty and fattening for dinner and this weekend I'm gonna have so much fun I'll explode! Watch "Smoking Aces" for starters and after that, do anything I want! I'm gonna be irresponsible and selfish! Yeah!

( Trinity Blood work )