From July 21 - 29 I went to California with my friend Chasity.
I left work around 2pm on Tuesday and my friend Joanne drove me downtown. From there I took the bus to the airport. It was crowded on the bus and with a carry on suitcase and backpack it made it a little hard to maneuver the seats and people but I managed. =)
We flew Jet Blue to San Diego. Jet Blue was nice although those satellite tv's had some trouble working. You can get unlimited # of snacks and they are nice snacks too! We stayed with Chasity's friend Joanna's family. Joanna was already enrolled in med school at UC Irvine and was away in Fresno for the program she is part of.
The Hernandez family, especially Aunty Lupe were the best hosts! We felt right at ease with staying with "strangers" Aunty Lupe took us for a quick night tour of San Diego on the way home from the airport,which was really nice.
Wednesday morning Aunty Lupe made us breakfast, pancakes to be exact. She was so wonderful. Chas and I planned to be living off Luna & Nutrigrain bars on our trip so pancakes were a nice substitution. Since our day started so early (we were up at 7am), Aunty Lupe offered to drive us to the convention center. She drove us by her work first and showed us different parts of the Chula Vista on the way there.
We arrived at the convention center at 8am. The Comic Convention didn't actually start until Thursday but those who bought the 4 days pass were invited to "preview night" on Wednesday. That didn't start til about 4pm but we wanted to stop by to see what the convention center set-up was like. We planned to camp out that night because we knew there were going to be a lot of CRAZY Twilight fans camped out to get good seats for the New Moon panel on Thursday afternoon.
Our plans for the day were to check out the layout for convention center, go to the San Diego Zoo, go to the Invisible Children headquarters and then come back to the convention center and get in line for Hall H where the panel was to be held.
WELL.......
Our plans were canceled when we walked by Hall H and to our horror saw that a line had already formed for Twilight.
Let me rewind a bit, it's WEDNESDAY at 8 o'clock in the MORNING. The New Moon panel wasn't slated to begin until THURSDAY at 1:45 in the afternoon.
The line wasn't that long but there were a good 50-75 people in line already. We decided to go wait in line as well. The line wasn't too bad, it just made me irritated to see people revolve their life around Twilight. I mean, I enjoy it and may be "obsessed" in some people's eyes but I know where to draw the line. Sometimes it's blurry ;) BUT I know where the line is. I'm so glad I backed off Twilight before I came too. I think my head would have exploded if I didn't.
We had to join the crazies to get a decent spot in line. Maybe we turned crazy in the midst of it too. ;)
Chas and I weren't even together for the majority of the day because she was waiting in another line to get her passes for the conference. I took some naps in the hot sun. Luckily I had my umbrella with me. California residents had it easy cause they brought their cars in which they could bring chairs and beach umbrellas.. I had my backpack and a beach towel for the night.
"Why wait in line?" You may be asking...
Well, the auditorium where this panel was to be held seats 6500. There are different panels held throughout the day. If you want good seats, you can chance it by waiting for someone to leave or by getting there early. If you wanted to see something in the afternoon but wanted good seats, it's better to sit through all the panels than try to get in later.
Anywho- some highlights is that we ended up meeting these wonderful people in line, especially these sisters from Texas. They were so nice and southern =) Chas and I were refreshed by them because I could tell they were balanced people and it was nice to be in their company.
So 26 hours later, we were finally let into Hall H at about 10:30am. I had about 4 hours of sleep. I think I was able to keep going because the day was so busy and because of the anticipation of seeing the cast. I think I also concluded that random trips to Vancouver were necessary in the fall. I tried to do the whole "respecting boundaries" thing but that only got me 26 hours of waiting in line with crazy fans and 15 rows back from the cast. Let's see what 4 hours of driving will get me. ;)
Ha ha. I kid....
;)
To Be Continued...
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