kwills84

After a flurry of activity and the beginnings of serious house cleaning and house packing, along with trip packing - it's finally setting in that we'll be departing in a few days. Thanks again to Fred for helping out

I still have lingering fears over flying, but, the various New Zealand air services are the second safest in the world, behind Finland. So I'm going to shut up and take Valium and sleep on the plane. I have 2 sewing projects to pay with, 'fuzzy' headphones, 3DS, book/kindle, mask and pillow. Most of which I totally didn't pack on the last trip. The Europe flight was so long and smooth, I was able to forget I was on a plane. It was kind of a weird experience. Everyone was so deliberately quiet it was almost like a sleeping spaceship. A weird sort of self-paralysis.

As with Prague, I'm bringing an extra, mostly empty bag for purchases like wine and coffee. We're bringing 4 bottles of American wine as gifts for the people we're staying with. We did it last year with the woman who was our landlord on the airbnb flat rental. She was very appreciative, and we had a wonderful stay. I think we'll be continuing to use airbnb, for just about everything, when possible.

Stuff we're planning to do:

Hobbiton! www.hobbitontours.com/Bookings…

Horseback trail riding in the "dinosaur rainforest", hiking, and glow worm caves

The theme park and aquarium, and a visit to the Sky Tower. Jason still wants to jump off it, but I have serious doubts about my ability to do so too.

Some other touristy stuff, and a glacier visit by helicopter! (ohgodohgodohgodhohgod)

We ended up cutting out a lot of the driving time in favor of more hiking and relaxing. The original plan was to go as far south as possible, but that would involve an extra 20 hours of driving time, if we didn't get lost.

After some luggage wrangling, we said 'fuck it' and bought new, larger luggage bags. We'll need them anyway, and our old bags were getting broke-ass. The new bags were reasonably priced, and about twice the volume of the old ones. 

I'm bringing my 'elf ren fair dress'. I wasn't able to even start on the idea of an Arwen Riding Outfit, but I'm hoping to be able to find somewhere gorgeous, throw on the dress and snap a few shots. I hope I can pick up some elf ears in Hobbiton too. 

Left to pack: 
Contacts, 'bathroom stuff', a scarf, sunglasses, makeup, 2 pairs jeans,.. uhmm.. and a sticky note to leave in the rental car on which side of the road is the 'right' side...

Best moment in DragonCon. 

Jason and I are in line for George Takei's autograph. Jason looks over, points, and says "Look! It's Spartacus". I whip around, and sure enough, the Spartacus actor is standing right there, waiting patiently. Part of my brain is.. damn.. I've seen him naked.. he's hot.. He's shorter than I thought. The other part is completely shut down. Or maybe that's the same part. I'm not sure.

He waves and super politely asks if he can cut in line so he can say hello to George. Of course we say yes. He stops for a second to say hello to us too ! George Takei was wonderful too! he actually stayed later than his signing times, so I ended up in line twice, once with Morgan and once with Jason.

I also got a photo with Brent Spiner! yay! He doesn't shake hands..

I probably got Con Crud from Spartacus.

hehehehhehehe...

Mara made a huge debut. I ended up breaking my rule heavily and wore her most of the weekend. I only wore Journey once, and got the reactions I wanted, which was just me camping out in a spot, out of the way and waiting for people to notice me. Worked well . Jame made a surprise trip down to DragonCon and we got to hang out Sunday night and took lots of photos. A few I'm very happy with, but I'm looking foward to seeing what Fred can do with the same outfits. Every other Mara I ran into, in costume (3 or 4) gave me that look of "Oh god, it's another Mara." Which was weird since that almost never happens to me...

Cursed Midna was a pretty big hit too, and as far as I can tell, I actually was the only one this year. I haven't seen any others yet anyway. There were the usual handful of Link's, but over all, not as much Zelda. Ironically, there were a grand total of three Wolf Links that I saw or found in photos, all solo, and only Mary's has the chain/cuff.

Bringing just 3 costumes made it much easier this year. I didn't spend a lot of time getting ready or changing, since all three costumes were thrown and go- even Cursed Midna only needs around 20 minutes for face makeup, but it helps that most of my face is hidden, besides.

Honestly, I attribute most of my anxiety-free weekend to my therapy. I don't think I realized how much it's actually been helping until this weekend.

This AZ was especially low-stress and low-anxiety. I didn't finish Mara Jade, but I didn't let it bother me, and I didn't stay up until 2 am three nights in a row the week before AZ so I could have a costume I wanted while walking around like a zombie. I'm not 25 anymore. XD

Imp Midna needs a few more touch ups, and I'll have to order yet another roll of reflective tape, if only for touchups and tape emergencies. While I did not anticipate having to tell several people to turn on their flashes, The looks on the faces of people who did and checked their camera was just awesome. I have a huge number of people tell me that was the best Midna they'd ever seen (which means a lot at Animazement) and that was without my arm spikes XD. Several people said my tape idea was amazing and 3-4 asked how I made my helmet. Mary, Chris and I were absolutely mobbed every time we moved - it was amazing, and my neck didn't even ache at the end of the night.

I inadvertently networked this weekend XD.

I caught up with Jenn, whom I haven't seen since Wake Tech, more than 10 years ago, all three days i was at AZ. It was really wonderful to catch up with her, and the more time I spent with her over the weekend, the more I realized her ex was full of shit. I'd seen him at gaming sessions a few times, and I know I'm a bit biased, but she melded right into our group at AZ, talked anime with Mary, goofed around with the rest of us, and it was like we'd never been apart for a decade. She's going back to school for 2D and 3D design, and I'm becoming convinced that I need to go back to the main campus and take similar classes.

Jane absolutely loved the Luke Skywalker ROTJ I made her. I have to go back and adjust the collar that I accidentally made it too small, but that's an easy fix. I also have to adjust the front closure and make sure the grey/white lining isn't visible when the shirt/jacket is closed at the edge. This was her first AZ, and she had a wonderful time. This was her first outing as her Luke too, and she was mobbed herself.

I randomly talked to some dude who made a metal-bending character from Korra. He had the same armor that I want to do for Lin Beifong, and he loved my helmet, so we talked construction for thirty minutes or so and exchanged information.

The Zelda photoshoot this year not only had a great turn out, but Mary ran into an old friend from Middle School, of all things. This hulking dude shows up in red/orange dread wig, grey bodysuit and paint and grey and silver armor with an amazing sword prop. He dashes into the Zelda group 20 minutes in and starts posing. He says hi to "Wolf Link". Mary says her name, He looks at her and goes *Last name????* and she goes "TERRANCE???????" Much hugging ensued and the nearby crowd went nuts XD.

Mary's roommate Michaela ended Saturday night on a high note by dressing up as Luke from a Tales of- game (I forget which) and throwing on a feather boa and Kanye shades. Before she left, we made her put on Ganon's helmet and a pair of fairy wings and pose. We were laughing so hard we were crying, including Jenn. Michaela told us to knock it off before she completely ruined her makeup, but hammed it up all the same XD. As she was headed out the door, we heard from the hallway Random person - "OH MY GOD!..... .. Can I touch you??" And we were dying again.

The only panel I made again this year was Anime Hell, but most of the weekend was taken up by just hanging out with old and new people and posing in costume.

Jason bought me a box of color dry erase markers and I'm angling for a plastic ruler.

I posted day 14 of my dry-erase comic .. strip for lack of a better word. I have had multiple co-workers tell me they love what I'm doing. Several people have either caught me drawing or came over to my corner in graphics to say how much it brightens their day at least a little bit. It's officially going on for almost three weeks (counting work days, not days off) and not only have I not missed a day, but I re-drew a few boards for cleaner lines.

It's very encouraging. I'm letting my personal humor slip in here and there, and more people laugh at my jokes than I thought. I haven't seen anyone scowl at my scribblings or otherwise complain either.

Rule still applies. I have to draw something every day, and it has to only take up to five minutes, or at least as long as it takes to brew a new pot of coffee in the breakroom.

Here's my tumblr link again:

www.tumblr.com/blog/lastpotbre…

I haven't really talked about it much here, mostly because part of my brain is going "this isn't going to work, the plane is going to explode, something bad is going to happen, etc etc etc"

But I feel comfortable in going "YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY"

Husband, ElfGirlMChan, Jason Greene, his gf Nicole and I are all jetting off to (can I use that expression?) PRAGUE. NEXT WEEK.

WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

A couple of weeks ago, I did several hours of research and found us a 3-bedroom apartment in Prague that we paid up front to rent for 10 days. Much much cheaper than a hotel for the same amount of time, plus, it has a kitchen. I got the landlady to knock a couple hundred bucks off the fee as well, so that's awesome. The location is good - at least google maps says it's in a decent looking multi-floor building and not a shack in an alley or something.

I have reservations for a tour in English at the Spanish horse school in Vienna- where they train Lipizanns. We found a number of aquariums that we'll try to visit at least one of, hopefully two or all three. Nicole has about a zillion castles she wants to see, so if we get to go to  see an average of one a day, I'll be happy. We found a dedicated gluten-free restaurant five miles from our apartment that looks divine.

We have hotel rooms booked  in 2 of 3 other countries we'll be visiting and staying overnight in. After some serious debate on rental car vs. rail passes, we opted for the car. It'll cut our (train) traveling time by half, and we won't be restricted by a train schedule. We're getting a minivan for half the cost of all of us getting rail passes. Granted, someone will have to be driving instead of all of us resting, but we get to go off path more often and go exploring. Google maps, again, says we should be nearly only main roads for most of what we want to do.

We've found tons of ways to say 'please don't kill my husband with wheat products' in multiple langauges, so we should be good there too.

I'm going to bring my 3DS and rack up all kinds of new countries and Mii's .. hehehehehe.. I'm also retraining myself from stuffing a lightweight costume in my bag.  We aren't hitting Itally, but the Padme dress would be awesome in Prague..