Sister and I, of course, hit up the Calgary Comic and Entertainment Expo. We met John Barrowman and Nathan Fillion who are both impossibly better looking in person than on TV. The were both also very funny and nice guys. Nathan even remembered Sister and I later on when we went for a photo-op because we have different spelling names. That was cool. Also there was Micha Collins, Jonathan Rhys Davies, Norman Reedus and oh so many more cool people. I think though, the best picture from the whole weekend is this one:
My sister got a pic with Norman Reedus and they got photo-bombed, by Steve Yeun.
The Expo's site is at:
http://www.calgaryexpo.com/
They have just started announcing 2014 guests, but sister and I are already stoked as Bruce Campbell will be there!
Sister and I went to New York and attended NYCC. It was amazing. This was one of my favourite things that I saw:
Okay, okay there were a lot of amazing things to see, but the bronze Alice in Wonderland was a cool thing we stumbled across, in the warm rain, that we didn't know was in Central Park.
I had booked us in to Maze, by Gordon Ramsay, which was a hell of a good meal. We also had kick ass seats for the Book of Mormon. We laughed our asses off.
We spent 4 days exploring New York, and then had 4 days at NYCC.
So there was this:
I met the very friendly Liam McIntyre. I loved Spartacus so this was pretty kick ass for me. I was also happy that he got the joke on my t-shirt. (It's Jupiter's Cock! - which was a swear on the show).
I got to meet the gents from 44Flood, after I was invited to a gallery night (at Last Rites Gallery). I had sponsored Tome, a beautiful art collaboration they had put together. For me, meeting Ben Templesmith and Menton3 was amazing. I am a huge admirer of their art and comic books. These two guys are super friendly and very kind (Menton3 gave me any 2 free prints, of my choosing, as a thank you for the support I have given to them and for coming all the way from Calgary to New York to see them).
Below is my Templesmith / Menton3 wall. The zombie print is by Ben Templsmith and the other two are the prints I got from Menton3.
Ben customised the blood splatter on the zombie print, which makes it unique. The top right image is from Menton3's comic series The Memory Collectors which you MUST check out. It is truly one of the coolest and unique books I have read in a long time. The bottom middle is his take on the Red Lady from Game of Thrones.
I love them!
To then skip to my other nerd-personality, it was damn cool for me to meet Dan Slott who writes Spider-Man now. He signed a couple of my books. There was a huge amount of talent at NYCC, I had taken 2 comic holders filled with books to get signed and got nearly all of them signed by the artist and the writers.
I also attended a bunch of panels. I really enjoyed the Marvel panels along with the Lost Girl panel. I later was also able to meet Rick Howland and Paul Amos. I joked with them about coming all the way from Calgary to meet them and they gave me a free t-shirt! Woot! Free phat lewt!
Sister hung out in the gaming section more, and took in a lot of the championship matches. I did sit with her and watched the StarCraft world championships. That was pretty cool, our brother was watching it Calgary and saw us on the big screen. Guess the camera man thought my sister was cute lol.
I also bought these:
I am so excited to have them in my house, signed by Stan Lee, I smile when I think about it.
As an update on the book I am writing, I am STILL working on it. Editing is way harder and more time consuming then hammering out a first draft. I got some feedback from my sister but am waiting to hear from my brother who is brutally honest and critical. I am hoping he can give me feedback somewhere between uncontrollable sobbing but stopping short of wanting to throw myself off a bridge.
Sister and I attended 3 cons this year, the last one was in the City where she lives and it was their first. It was quite a change coming from the massiveness of NYCC to the one room, 2 media guest Con in Lethbridge BUT I think it was a success for their first con and in a small city.
Sister did get me tickets to the con and for a pub night with actor Aaron Douglas for my birthday. The night with Aaron Douglas was AWESOME. He is fraking hilarious and does genuinely come off as a nice guy.
