Dragon*Con: The Recap (Part III)

Saturday (Day Two)
The hotel screwed up our reservations. We were supposed to get a room with three beds, but when we arrived, they said that wasn't possible, as a roll-away would constitute a fire hazard. They failed to mention our room had a small purple couch, so in the end the bed situation didn't matter, but as way of apology, they offered some free breakfast vouchers.

Since Lynn is a vegan and Kalika usually sleeps late, I got to enjoy two of the vouchers. I win! It was a breakfast buffet, nothing worth writing home to mama about, but the only thing better than breakfast is free breakfast, you know?

Anyway, after eating and dressing, Cakey and I did our thing all afternoon. Oddly, some of his biggest fans include middle-aged women, furries (maybe they think puppetry is one step away from being a furry?), and porny ladies. Cakey reaches across the entire spectrum, apparently.

I also spent some time at the merch tables (there were at least three huge rooms of merch, maybe more) and bought my goggles and computer game. I'm not that into merch (do I really need a t-shirt of some cult movie?), so it's easy for me to not spend money, but there was one Year of Yes moment that might have been a fail, and that moment had to do with a leather mask dealer.

I'm not in dire need of a leather mask (imagine what a superhero would wear over his eyes), but I'm not opposed to them, either. The cheapest of these was $45, which is expensive, and it didn't look great on me. I figured if I ever needed a mask like that, I could get a cheap plastic one at the costume store.

BUT... they had these $20 Mystery Boxes, each of which would hold something worth considerably more than $20. I saw them sell two, they had maybe eight left, and both people got nice, expensive masks. A bargain! I love bargains! And I love mysteries!

But I thought... do I need to buy this? And what if it isn't even a mask, but a leather collar or wristband or something useless that I couldn't even give as a gift? I was still undecided, so I decided to continue walking around, and circle back. About 10 minutes later, I decided, "Eff it, I can spend $20, and I'll totally use that mask for something" and walked back, only to find all the Mystery Boxes had been sold.

It still haunts me to this day.

That night, I changed into my (maskless) priest outfit and made my way out for the big Saturday fun. I had high hopes, since Friday was a pretty good time, but I have to say, Saturday kind of sucked.

The lines for just about everything were ridonkulous, but we did get into some burlesque show. I've seen literally over 100 acts of burlesque; I performed in the 1st Annual New York Burlesque Festival, so it takes a lot to thrill me. And this particular show... wasn't my cup of tea (read: good). We all left during the second act. A man in the audience, seeing a priest leave, asked with genuine concern, "Are y'all offended?"

Nope, just bored.

I finally opted to see The Rocky Horror Picture Show at like 2:30 a.m., about an hour behind schedule. They had a lot of trouble getting the DVD to play (which led to some pretty great catcalls). I've seen Rocky... too many times, and I was hoping the Atlanta cast would knock it out of the park, but they didn't.

In-between all the shenanigans and failures, I kept returning to the event where I should've been all night. It was in the huge ballroom that held the previous night's rave, yet it was mostly empty - less than 100 people were ever in there when I checked in.

And all night, they were just showing random TV clips. Something with Ricky Gervais, then some You Bet Your Life bits with Groucho Marx and Jack Benny, then an insane preview of a sitcom starring Mickey Rooney, Dana Carvey and Nathan Lane. Random stuff. It was insane and mesmerizing and very entertaining. And I bet it would've been life-changing to someone who was high.
At one point they played the old Tootsie Roll commercial, and everyone started singing along, myself included.

I should've stayed there longer, I hit this weird hypnotic state of tranquility while watching Lurch from The Addams Family sing a song while backed up by dancing cuties.



And, really, that was how I ended my Saturday night, alone and dressed like a priest, still awed by the glowing randomness that is television.