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Obsessively Detailed Dragon*Con Report, Wed-Thu
The laundry is in the dryer (wash ALL the things) so it's time for me to start on this year's Obsessively Detailed Dragon*Con Report! (Yeah, I know I haven't done CV yet. Or SDCC. Or SYTYCD. Or summer camps. Or Children of Eden. I will though, I promise!)
Right so! Our tale this year begins on Wednesday, since we had a redeye to Dulles, and thence to Atlanta, so that we could arrive early on Thursday. Actually, it begins on Tuesday, because I didn't sleep on Tuesday night, so really Tuesday and Wednesday were all one long day. I was desperately trying to finish the Pink Dress of Doom for our Gaga Glee group (MUCH more on that later), and I needed every last second to get it done.
Somewhere around 5 am Wednesday morning, I was ready to start pinning on all the silver stuff that goes around the outside of the dress (I ended up using Rigilene, sprayed silver-- thanks everyone for all your suggestions!). But I needed to put the dress on the dress form in order to arrange the boning properly, and my dress form was just way too big in the bust and shoulders for the dress to fit. "Hmmm," thinks my overtired brain. "It's made of foam. Serrated knives cut foam. We have bread knives downstairs." Two minutes later, I had my dress dummy gripped in my left arm and was sawing maniacally away with my right. It's probably good that no one but the cat was around to witness the foam carnage that ensued.
Forgive me, Anne Cordelia Mark II-- your boobs were just too big.
. 
So anyhow, I (mostly) finished the dress with four hours to go before our flight left, and we started throwing stuff into our suitcases and hoped like hell we hadn't left anything off the packing list, because otherwise it wasn't coming with us. We managed three suitcases again-- 49, 49, and 50 pounds. Plus carryons, of course. Our redeye was actually remarkably pleasant; they didn't put anyone in the middle seat between us and we both slept straight through the entire flight. (We did stay awake long enough to hear some hilarious announcements from our pilot, Captain Bubba Ransom. Yes, that was really his name. It was exactly as awesome as it sounds.) The IAD-ATL flight was nice and easy as well, and we MARTAed to Peachtree Center without any issues.
We knew checking in at the Marriott was going to be interesting, since we were joining Bryan and Jen in their room, which had been booked as a king. Bryan had called ahead of time and the guy he spoke to assured him he would put a note on our reservation and it wouldn't be a problem to switch to a double when we got there. We were pretty sure that was patently untrue, and we did have a backup plan, but we were still hoping we could somehow talk the checkin person into giving us a room with two beds.
Oh boy howdy, did we ever luck out. The checkin lady was very sympathetic and accomodating, and after first suggesting a rollaway, and checking whether we could get two rollaways (no), she said, "Well, we do have a room that has a Murphy bed and a pullout sofa. You could look at that and see if it works for you." Sure, we'll go take a look, right? Meanwhile we're thinking, what the hell kind of room only has a Murphy bed and a pullout sofa? We get up to the 45th floor, and we discover the answer is "the central room of a suite." When they book it as a suite, there are bedrooms on one or both sides, but if the bedrooms are separately booked, it can function as a regular hotel room by itself.
THIS WAS THE BEST ROOM EVER. It was *huge*, which is the most important thing for a costumers' room at D*C. And it had a GINORMOUS closet-- *tons* of room for our costumes:
. 
Apparently we didn't take a picture of the whole room? I'm sure someone did at some point. The only real downsides to the room were a) not enough light in the bathroom, and b) not having real beds. But really, who comes to D*C to sleep? Seriously, by the time I get to bed, I'm usually so tired I could sleep on concrete if I had to. ANYWAY. The room was amazing and we're looking into how to get it again (possibly as an actual suite) next year. Stay tuned.
Right so! Thrilled with our room, we left all our stuff and headed for the Sheraton to pick up our badges, stopping at the food court on the way to pick up some tasty Moe's to eat in line. We got in line at noon and finished around 2:20, which is one of the shorter waits I've heard of. We totally failed to bring something to do in line, so we amused ourselves with people-watching. Many people were jealous that we had thought to bring food. About an hour into it, we looked back down the line and saw Derek! We exchanged semaphore signals and managed to convey that we were very happy to see each other and that he was now engaged. Yay Derek!
On our way back, we ran into a bunch of people!![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
my_belle_ and padawansguide and Christina and penwiper337 on the street, and then laughingmagpie and a bunch more folks inside the Marriott. (Sound off if you remember seeing me then, because I forget exactly who I ran into at which times.) Back in the room, we unpacked a bit, and Rogue took a nap while I started working on the hem of my pink dress. (Like I said-- *mostly* finished.)
At 4 pm we had our first Gaga Glee rehearsal on the 10th floor of the Marriott! I had only managed to watch my tutorials, not dance them, so Amber took me through the dance for a few minutes and then we rejoined the group. We worked for a couple solid hours and everyone did a really great job, although we agreed we wanted to have more rehearsals to get everything completely solidified. Apparently we provided great entertainment to people on nearby floors and in the elevators-- among others, Daniel Logan watched us from the spiral staircase for awhile (J9 actually called out to him, "Hey Boba, wanna dance with us?") and I heard that Richard Hatch watched us for a bit as well. (It's entirely possible that some of this stuff actually happened at Friday's rehearsal. I've conflated a lot of stuff in my head.)
Here we are practicing the "walk walk" part:
As we were leaving practice, we were completely shocked to seebarbossas_wench show up! SNEAKY GIRL had been pretending she couldn't come to D*C at all and then she surprised us! So there were lots more hugs all around. People were going to various places for dinner; I elected to go back to my room and try to get my Gaga Quinn finished. Bryan and Jen had arrived by this point and approved the room as well, so it was officially ours. Jen had lots of sewing to do too-- she was trying to finish her Ice for our Renaissance Justice League on Friday afternoon-- so we sat and sewed and talked, and the boys got us food court dinner. I finally finished the Pink Dress hem around midnight and went to bed! I completely missed wicked_swann's Viking party, which I felt bad about, but I hadn't had a solid night of sleep since Monday and Fiver's Flamingos were going for a run at 7 am the next morning.
Okay, so Thursday was not particularly interesting. I promise the next four days are WAY cooler!
Right so! Our tale this year begins on Wednesday, since we had a redeye to Dulles, and thence to Atlanta, so that we could arrive early on Thursday. Actually, it begins on Tuesday, because I didn't sleep on Tuesday night, so really Tuesday and Wednesday were all one long day. I was desperately trying to finish the Pink Dress of Doom for our Gaga Glee group (MUCH more on that later), and I needed every last second to get it done.
Somewhere around 5 am Wednesday morning, I was ready to start pinning on all the silver stuff that goes around the outside of the dress (I ended up using Rigilene, sprayed silver-- thanks everyone for all your suggestions!). But I needed to put the dress on the dress form in order to arrange the boning properly, and my dress form was just way too big in the bust and shoulders for the dress to fit. "Hmmm," thinks my overtired brain. "It's made of foam. Serrated knives cut foam. We have bread knives downstairs." Two minutes later, I had my dress dummy gripped in my left arm and was sawing maniacally away with my right. It's probably good that no one but the cat was around to witness the foam carnage that ensued.
Forgive me, Anne Cordelia Mark II-- your boobs were just too big.
. So anyhow, I (mostly) finished the dress with four hours to go before our flight left, and we started throwing stuff into our suitcases and hoped like hell we hadn't left anything off the packing list, because otherwise it wasn't coming with us. We managed three suitcases again-- 49, 49, and 50 pounds. Plus carryons, of course. Our redeye was actually remarkably pleasant; they didn't put anyone in the middle seat between us and we both slept straight through the entire flight. (We did stay awake long enough to hear some hilarious announcements from our pilot, Captain Bubba Ransom. Yes, that was really his name. It was exactly as awesome as it sounds.) The IAD-ATL flight was nice and easy as well, and we MARTAed to Peachtree Center without any issues.
We knew checking in at the Marriott was going to be interesting, since we were joining Bryan and Jen in their room, which had been booked as a king. Bryan had called ahead of time and the guy he spoke to assured him he would put a note on our reservation and it wouldn't be a problem to switch to a double when we got there. We were pretty sure that was patently untrue, and we did have a backup plan, but we were still hoping we could somehow talk the checkin person into giving us a room with two beds.
Oh boy howdy, did we ever luck out. The checkin lady was very sympathetic and accomodating, and after first suggesting a rollaway, and checking whether we could get two rollaways (no), she said, "Well, we do have a room that has a Murphy bed and a pullout sofa. You could look at that and see if it works for you." Sure, we'll go take a look, right? Meanwhile we're thinking, what the hell kind of room only has a Murphy bed and a pullout sofa? We get up to the 45th floor, and we discover the answer is "the central room of a suite." When they book it as a suite, there are bedrooms on one or both sides, but if the bedrooms are separately booked, it can function as a regular hotel room by itself.
THIS WAS THE BEST ROOM EVER. It was *huge*, which is the most important thing for a costumers' room at D*C. And it had a GINORMOUS closet-- *tons* of room for our costumes:
. Apparently we didn't take a picture of the whole room? I'm sure someone did at some point. The only real downsides to the room were a) not enough light in the bathroom, and b) not having real beds. But really, who comes to D*C to sleep? Seriously, by the time I get to bed, I'm usually so tired I could sleep on concrete if I had to. ANYWAY. The room was amazing and we're looking into how to get it again (possibly as an actual suite) next year. Stay tuned.
Right so! Thrilled with our room, we left all our stuff and headed for the Sheraton to pick up our badges, stopping at the food court on the way to pick up some tasty Moe's to eat in line. We got in line at noon and finished around 2:20, which is one of the shorter waits I've heard of. We totally failed to bring something to do in line, so we amused ourselves with people-watching. Many people were jealous that we had thought to bring food. About an hour into it, we looked back down the line and saw Derek! We exchanged semaphore signals and managed to convey that we were very happy to see each other and that he was now engaged. Yay Derek!
On our way back, we ran into a bunch of people!
my_belle_ and padawansguide and Christina and penwiper337 on the street, and then laughingmagpie and a bunch more folks inside the Marriott. (Sound off if you remember seeing me then, because I forget exactly who I ran into at which times.) Back in the room, we unpacked a bit, and Rogue took a nap while I started working on the hem of my pink dress. (Like I said-- *mostly* finished.)At 4 pm we had our first Gaga Glee rehearsal on the 10th floor of the Marriott! I had only managed to watch my tutorials, not dance them, so Amber took me through the dance for a few minutes and then we rejoined the group. We worked for a couple solid hours and everyone did a really great job, although we agreed we wanted to have more rehearsals to get everything completely solidified. Apparently we provided great entertainment to people on nearby floors and in the elevators-- among others, Daniel Logan watched us from the spiral staircase for awhile (J9 actually called out to him, "Hey Boba, wanna dance with us?") and I heard that Richard Hatch watched us for a bit as well. (It's entirely possible that some of this stuff actually happened at Friday's rehearsal. I've conflated a lot of stuff in my head.)
Here we are practicing the "walk walk" part:
As we were leaving practice, we were completely shocked to see
barbossas_wench show up! SNEAKY GIRL had been pretending she couldn't come to D*C at all and then she surprised us! So there were lots more hugs all around. People were going to various places for dinner; I elected to go back to my room and try to get my Gaga Quinn finished. Bryan and Jen had arrived by this point and approved the room as well, so it was officially ours. Jen had lots of sewing to do too-- she was trying to finish her Ice for our Renaissance Justice League on Friday afternoon-- so we sat and sewed and talked, and the boys got us food court dinner. I finally finished the Pink Dress hem around midnight and went to bed! I completely missed wicked_swann's Viking party, which I felt bad about, but I hadn't had a solid night of sleep since Monday and Fiver's Flamingos were going for a run at 7 am the next morning.Okay, so Thursday was not particularly interesting. I promise the next four days are WAY cooler!
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Yay!
Oh, and what you did do your dress dummy? Hilarious!
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Out of curiousity, did the Gaga group practice up there on Saturday morning as well? I noticed that the Doctor Who group had sort of crashed on something else when we took our group photo... oops.
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Yeah, we were practicing up there Sat morning too. We ended up moving way far down as the Who group got bigger and bigger! *g*
I'm not terribly worried about my dress form as it's not too hard to build them back up-- when I worked at a costume shop we used to pad up dummies to be the exact shape of whoever we were fitting. Lots of batting and fiberfill. :)
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Your pink dress sounds like Matt's Riddick last year, the days were blending together thanks to no sleep..
Thanks for posting up about D*C, it's great for those of us who could only watch this year.
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I hope you can make it next year! We all have to hang out LOTS!
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I can't believe your sewing marathon!!!
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The sad thing is, that's not even the worst sewing marathon I've done. It's not even the worst one I've done this *year.*
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Was the ComicCon costume you were working on when I saw you in San Diego one of the other marathons???
I guess it helps to have mad skillz like you do...:D