So Judy and I went down to New York for the big hoo-ha 1st Annual Yadda Yadda New York Comic-Con. I've been to San Diego for the past two years and Judy came along with me last year, so I think she was hoping it would be something like that. We had a lot of fun in San Diego last year, she got to meet a bunch of cool comic creators like the guys who do Patrick The Wolf Boy (Art and Franco rule), and she got really excited about all the free stuff and contests she could enter. Basically, we had to borrow an extra suitcase from my brother to bring everything back because we got so much stuff between us (I mostly spent a lot of money and she mostly got every free thing possible). She had a great time and she doesn't even read comic books.
So then, New York.
I told her it wouldn't be like San Diego.
And I was right. But we still had a good time. Here's why:
(1) We got there at the perfect time. I had applied as a professional via e-mail because both Judy and I are educators and unlike San Diego, educators were supposed to get in free at the New York show. So we would have ended up with Professional badges and been allowed to get in during the trade show on Friday. Even though we applied several weeks ago, we never received e-mail confirmation, so we decided just to go down for Saturday (which made it easier on my parents as well, since they were watching our two kids while we were going to be geeking it up at the con). I voted for taking the train from Wassaic to Grand Central, but the stupid train schedule meant that we'd have to leave our house at 6:30 AM, and that was just a little too early. So, instead, I woke up at 6:30 and we left at 7:!5. Not a big difference, right? But it was an extra 45 minutes of sleep and since I didn't end up getting to bed until 4:00 (for no good reason), it helped a lot. So anyway, we pulled into the parking lot across from the Convention Center at 10:15, and the guy said it would be $40 in advance for parking and I figured that was steep but fine because it was such a convenient place to park and it would only have been like $10 cheaper on another street anyway. So right after I pay him the $40, he tells the guys behind me it will be $45 even though they have the same size car we do. I guess he decided to jack up the price as the cars kept on a'comin'. So good timing there. Then we waited in line only about 30 minutes to get our wristbands (they didn't have our names in the computer, so my online registration didn't go through--no wonder we didn't get the confirmation e-mail--so we had to pay the $25). So by then it's almost 11:00 and they're letting people on to the convention floor. Except the only way in is down the stairs, because they're saving the escalators for the important people. And there's a line that's half a mile long winding up the stairs and around and around and around. So my wife decides that she needs to find a bathroom first and I go to help her find one. We find, instead, THE ELEVATOR. So we take it down. And there's the bathroom, right there, and there's the convention floor right there. And we could just walk right in. So we bypassed the entire stairs/escalator problem and relieved ourselves in one fell swoop. The lesson to be learned here is that when you're given a choice between A and B, choose C.
(2) We got two cool gifts for our kids. We bought Andrew a cool Ugli Doll (which he's wanted since we saw Zathura on dvd last week), and we bought Lauren a Mr. Toast plush toy because she loves toast! And it's one of only like 20 words she can say, so now she runs around the house saying "Toast" and hugging her toy. It's cute. I like cute.
To be continued...(naptime for the kids!)
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