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So I'm currently burned-out, awaiting the beginning of a new school term and trying frantically to actually keep this monstrosity of a site updated.
Hasn't exactly been going well, has it...
Then again, last year I was bitching throughout the winter over a lack of updates, so I guess this time I'll have plenty of stuff to add. That is, of course, if I can remember any of it.
A quick word 'o warning; there will be no gallery for this report; just the photos I include in the event report (and those I send out to the people I know in the pictures). That being said, I only took a few pictures of people I didn't know, so I can't see many people exactly freaking out over their inclusion.
A secondary word of warning; as usual, I have no idea what I'm actually going to talk about in this report yet. Due to relatively crappy life circumstances during the middle of the con, this report may stray into the land of mope for a bit; going to a family funeral on the saturday afternoon will do that. Once again, you've been warned. Note that also by my lesser attendance I'm also going to make this a shorter report, but I'm sure most people won't mind that part.
Finally, some people may not like my opinions; only got one real piece of pissed off mail from last year's report, so this isn't likely to get any more though, especially since this time I didn't hand out the URL to every semi-sentient being there. They're opinions, deal with it.
This report will be updated as I have time, or have more boring things to put off doing, but hopefully I'll get together all my rants for people to read soon enough; there will be one for the masq attendees and participants that, in my own unhumble opinion, should be read by those who were there.
So instead of starting a new page, I'll just start below with the report for this year's ExploitCon when I've got it...
(And yes, I know CNA isn't a convention, but I'll get to that...)
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See, after my choice remarks concerning last year, you might be hard-pressed to wonder why on earth I'm even attending this year's CNA. Well, there's a couple of reasons. One: I'm not paying to be there, since the only event I actually want to attend is the masq and I'll be slightly busy there as a stage ninja. Two, knowing that there's nothing to do set plans in motion to have fun independantly of the event itself. Third, I've set my hand on fire on more than one occasion, so clearly I have value judgement issues to bein with in the first place.
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As I approached the convention centre, a strange wind was blowing inside; it was running through the halls, drawing the air into the convention centre. It was as if there was a large degree of sucking coming from CNA...
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Aren't I subtle?
So, I needed to sign-in as a stage ninja; after getting a bunch of runnaround, they directed me to the media room, where I found that the lists weren't ready yet, so no passes for the time being. No big deal, but I started to notice small children being pulled into the centre from the sucking.
With no badge I was left with zero events to attend, as opposed to one. Lucky for me there were more in the same boat, as well as others just hanging out, so on with the non-show...
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For no good reason, we decided to kill some time by pointing guns at each other. They weren't real guns, but instead were those throwbacks to childhood that actually look like guns and haven't seen the racks of reputable toy stores in years. After trivializing devices that spread misery and pain to innocents everyday, we decided to play with them some more. Amazingly enough, this got boring so it was decided to do a lap...
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...and in our display of "sour grapes" we decided to see how absurdly long the dealers' room line was, just to convince ourselves that we didn't want to be in there anyway.
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It didn't take much work. The line stretched on; I'm not talking "opening night" linups. Not even "Amber Benson autographs" lineups. We're talking images of a refugee state populated mostly by middle-aged men in clever-sounding t-shirts and inhabitants of some fucked up anime fantasy world. We walked, out the doors, past the vulture-picked bodies of those who just weren't strong enough, up towards the skydome, and past Planet Hollywood before coming to a gap.
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Only that wasn't the end of it either; it was merely a break, maybe to avoid being classified as a soverign nation seekinig refugee status.
It continued back down the stairs, finally ending with the sad soul you see in the photo. See, it was his job to be at the end of his line, but I have no idea what possessed the others to wait there.
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Upon returning, more people were around. Minako was still waiting to unload her gargantuan cargo of costumes, while Louise was already enjoying her stint as a character from Prince of Tennis, I have no idea which, though the character was probably angsty.
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We get back, and get even more great news: apparently our passes will only cover Saturday, which is especially grand since I wasn't even going to be around for most of it and all of us would be generally busy working. That, and it'll mean that going to any anime-themed event on friday or sunday would require a weekend pass anyway, so effectively we're being screwed...
By now small cars were being pulled into the lobby by the force of sucking.
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So, feeling generally pissed off, we decided to get away from it all; not like we were going to miss anything.
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We decided on a circular booth dubbed "the mafia table" (at least by us) at some Whatever and Firkin pub. It seemed like a good place to vent and scheme as well as get away from it all, possibly with the aid of certain beverages. Like beer.
It was good; we could all use the break, and we were all entertained by Neko's tale of her quest of getting a "really nice couch" across town at 2AM, as well as the miniature tacos that Louise was eating.
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In all our Mafia talk, we decided that we needed Gord. See, he was like the Con Don, which eventually sounded like the ConDom once we had some drinks. Sure, it wasn't the same, but both would protect us while we were being fucked by CNA, at least. How right we were...
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Upon returning, we were greeted by the news that the ninja would in fact get passes. This was greeted by guarded optimism, and the cars stopped being sucked into the place, mopeds were still at risk.
We found out later that yes, in fact, it was Gord who got things fixed. Accoring to Gord, it was just a mixup in communications, but I prefer to think that Gord opened a ninjarific can of whoop ass and went to town on the con.
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He'd rappel in from the roof with his microphone and MC action grip. After garrotting the first few sentries with his tie, he'd distract the rest with his dancing, knock the final boss dead with a killer comeback, snag the passes and say "I love my job". Then, he'd find me imprisoned in the bedroom and...
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...er, uh, ignore that last part. Hey look, shiny! Over there!
We had our badges, our impressions of the con were improving slightly. As the improbability drive burst into flames behind us from overheating, we beat a hasty retreat up to the dealer's room to have a look.
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Now last year, I'd made mention that the dealers room was selling collapsible nunchaku, which are illegal weapons in Ontario. Not so this year; they were just selling regular nunchaku, which are also illegal. Details details, right? Chucks were mostly banned because stupid people were whipping them around after watching Bruce Lee, not because they were particularly lethal. You can see the padded ones on the right of the picture, and the not-so-padded ones in the centre. They weren't heavy, but they were solid enough to get someone arrested.
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So it's a stupid violation, but one nonetheless. Then I saw the balisong...
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...also known inaccurately as butterfly knives, these little babies are very illegal in Canada; another stupid law, perhaps, but illegal nonetheless.
At 35 bucks a pop, they must've had some idea that these were hard to come by, since there's no other justification for that price. Now, I'm sure they'll call all their illegal weapons "replicas", given that their weapons were generally pretty crappy. But a crappy illegal weapon is still illegal, not a replica.
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Very bad form on the part of CNA for not making sure the vendors are following the rules, which you would think include these crazy little things called "laws", since all it takes is one person who assumes that something you can buy publically is *gasp* legal to carry.
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Allright, I'm done being petty and pedantic for the next paragraph or so. Besides, by now CNA is basically over for friday, save for some all night viewing rooms.
And that means Tim Hortons lies on the Horizon; land of caffene, sugar, weird looks, plots, manga reading and general venting. The extended crowd of people gradually trickled in; new people were met who were tagging along with familiar faces, and the angry mob that is bitter fandom grew a little.
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As usual, a fun time was had; some photos were taken, random comments suddenly became funny for no discernable reason and moods were generally lifted, since there was more spirit of fandom in that place than anywhere in the convention centre, and that's what these things are really about.
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The place was crowded with fanboys and fangirls not willing to sit in a cramped dark room watching barely visible anime. Especially since it only takes one person who hasn't showered in a few days to make the entire room, well, pungent, and that is not cool. Instead, social interaction wins the day, as people mix and mingle and the Tim Hortons staff get overwhelmed at what is probably a normally sedate time.
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Besides the obligatory pictures of plushies obeying their slavish fangirl masters to do terrible things, most of us bounced from table to table and anti-socialized, providing much-needed insight and venting.
People came, people left; the Fushigi Yuugi people, though they had cute costumes, left quite a mess, which really isn't cool for either the staff or people looking for seats...
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...I mean I could see Nakago doing such nasty things, but Chichiri? Be nice folks.
I had to go; morning commitments and a long day lay ahead on Saturday. I had a strange day ahead, what with the mixing of a family funeral and CNA. Don't worry, I'll spare you all just about all of the whining, but I guess I have to mention it, since it did put a very definite tone (and perspective) on the weekend. Regardless, that's it for now, and what's upcoming will hopefully be done this year.
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Part 2: Coming Soon
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