Comic Con, part II

I know I lead a pretty limited life. There’s lots and lots out there that happens without my ever seeing it or hearing it or even knowing about it. Like truck rallies, and lesser known sports like curling and skeet shooting (okay, I know they exist, but I don’t know anything about them). And life on Caribbean islands, and great wealth. Also things with which I am unfamiliar.

And Comic Cons.

I mentioned last week that Kevin and a friend were coming to the Heart of Texas Comic Con in Waco to sell their Team S.L.U.G. (family friendly) comic books, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. They did come. They (along with April) dressed up in their comic World War II gear, set up their booth, and spent many weekend hours hawking their wares. They made enough money to more than cover their expenses, selling individual books, sets of books, badges, and grenades. (Originally, they bought dud grenades as part of the staging at their booth, but people kept wanting to purchase them. So now, they take a bunch of grenades and usually sell out.)

Saturday morning, David took Peter to visit the Con, then came home, and Peter had lunch and went down for a nap. Then I went over. And it was a world apart from anywhere I’d been before.

There’s a costume contest, but hordes of guests dress up just for the fun of it. All sorts of folks, adults to little bitty kids, are in costume. As groups walked by the booth, I would ask who they were portraying. Kevin and Shannon and April knew. I recognized some of the names, but not all. And I never guessed a one of them. At one point, I gestured to a young man in red who was sitting a few feet away from us.

“At least I know he’s a Power Ranger,” I said.

“He’s Flash,” they said. That’s how totally and completely out of my element I was.

April and I went to hear Nichelle Nichols (Lt. Uhura from “Star Trek”) speak.

Then Kevin walked me around, to see and experience all the interesting parts.

I didn’t even want to stand beside this guy. But, he was just a guy attending the Con and it was fine with him for Kevin to take our picture. I’m not quite so fine with it.

“WHAT’S THAT!!” Maybe I didn’t shriek, but I was, well, not terrified, because he was walking around and other folks were walking around, and no one else was shrieking, but I really didn’t like the look of him. Kevin said it was Predator. I don’t actually know who that is (not having seen any of the movies), but he was scaaaaary looking. Kevin said, “Let’s go have your picture made with him.” I did, but I didn’t enjoy it.

Then April and I went to the costume contest. The winner was someone portraying the character “Cinder” from the novel of the same name. I have in fact read the novel and the other two in the series (Scarlett and Cress) and am eagerly anticipating the fourth one, Winter, next fall. So I’m not completely out of everything. ( The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer)

Lots of pop culture fans come in complete costume and just walk around, for all three days, soaking up the atmosphere, meeting vendors and entertainers, and letting total strangers have their photos made with them. (There also are professionally dressed-up characters with whom you can be photographed, but for a price.)

This was my favorite costumed character. She portrayed “four color printing” and won Second Place in the costume contest. That “Oh, my” thought balloon is attached to the side of her head.