Here We Go.....Again!!

So, after two heinous tries, the silly people that rule at Comic Con are trying to figure out how to get all this huge mass of people registered. Two times they have tried with two different companies and both times the companies' servers crashed. So, here we are mere months away and we have to come up with all our outrageous sums of cash in a simply silly way which is to use two different people and pay a service fee.

It must be nice to hold all these people's fun in their hands and screw everything up just to have a good time. Isn't that always the way. It is a non-profit after all.

We will see what happens come this Saturday when registration begins.

Little-by-Little The Information Is Coming Out

So, I talked to a friend who talked to a friend. They said they heard about some of the guests at Comic Con that might be there. I was very interested to listen. While last year there seemed to be the "Big Bang Theory" guys there was even Leonard Nimoy. I am VERY excited. I would love to meet Johnny Galecki, having been a fan of his since his "Roseanne" days. I would also like to meet the rest of these guys. Their characters remind me of me and many others I know. I would also like to meet Leonard Nimoy. I have been a fan since the original Star Trek days.

I am hoping the stars of "Chuck" will be there. Nothing would make my day than drooling over Adam Baldwin. What a hunk!! I would like to see stars from some of my other favorite television programs. I remember being at Haunt X a few years back and passing Robert Englund. He was not a very nice person. His entourage had to clear the way and he would not make eye contact or even say hello to anyone. He was there to do his bit and leave. Such a shame. Many people came to see him and he doesn't seem to be a very personable guy. I was a shoulder's length away and he wouldn't even smile.

I am sure that there is nothing worse than being gawked at, pawed at and drooled over but sometimes that's what you have to do when you're a celebrity and put yourself out there. I, myself, come across as Jim Carrey did in "Ace Ventura, Pet Detective" and was looking to find the people who were wearing the Super Bowl rings. He portrayed himself as a pimple faced young kid giving a thumbs up at an autograph signing and looking shy and excited. That's me!!

I can't help it. I am well aware that they put their clothes on as most people - shoes, one on each foot; pants, one leg at a time, etc., but it's still a thrill. I hope these celebrities know that it's still a thrill and don't be a "Robert Englund" so that we will continue to be willing to see them all and it's still a thrill!!

So What Is Going On??

So, here we are about a month and a half or so until the internationally famous Comic Con. I am very, very excited. I'm not excited about taking the 8-10 hour trek to San Diego but it was my choice to drive, but I am excited about going and the chance to see Stan Lee and Ray Bradbury. These two men composed my life in an outwardly sort of way to what it is today.

Stan Lee had everything to do with comic books. Comic books are something that I grew up with in my family home. My father made sure to have plenty of Donald Duck, Batman, and Archie comic books to help us to learn to read but also, to have something to read in the bathroom. He was not into porn like most guys today. He read comic books. He had a lot of comic books. One whole shelf in the middle closet was dedicated to comic books. This was right across from the bathroom and that's where everyone looked first before entering the throne room. They picked their choice of books and then sat whittling away the hours doing their business and learning to read. I have to have a chance to meet Stan Lee for my father who is now deceased but would have loved to go to Comic Con but also for myself to thank him for all he did for my dad and our family.

Ray Bradbury backed up my love for ghost hunting. It was his books and the occasional television special that wrapped up my desire for what I now do as a "job". It was from this man's mind and books like, "The Martian Chronicles" that gave me something to read and build a fantasy from. It was with those fantasies that I was able to mold myself into the ghost hunter and paranormal researcher I am today. All those stories enabled my mind to become open and wonder what else there is in the world that I want to learn about and become. He taught me from these writings that I can do whatever I want to do even though it is not within the norm of today's life. I learned from him. I would like to thank him personally.

I am excited about Comic Con. To this point I have not found too much to get excited about. It has been a voyage filled with glitches and problems. I have not been happy about purchasing tickets almost a year in advance. I have not been happy about the hotel rooms, how we had to acquire one, the cost which was a third more than you could get them online, the fact that you couldn't get them online, just from the company they assigned, the fact that you had no choices even though they gave you choices you had to get what they gave you not what you may have wanted. The negative side of that being that if you didn't opt for what they gave you, that's just too bad because then you don't get a hotel room at all. I still haven't heard back from the hotel company regarding my second hotel room so I guess there will be none. I am concerned about what I am going to be up against once I get there considering the hundreds of thousands of people that will be there and that Comic Con can't promise anybody anything.

It is something that will require navigating once and then return the next year so that you get the proper experience. This is obviously something you can't get right the first year. It begs of being allowed another year to get it right. I will make it a point to try this and we will see how it works.

But, for now at least, I am at the mercy of trying and re-trying to get it right this time. It has been disappointing but we'll fumble through this.

There have been no reminders, alerts or anything to let us know if anything new has happened or is happening but going to their website can be confusing. There are last year's things on it and instead of taking it off or just posting it to it's own page, you have it there and think you are looking at the current year's postings. Not so. You need to read and re-read everything to be sure where you have navigated to and what you need to know.

I'm still waiting to see how this all pan's out. It will be a pain but a pain I'm willing to take on at least once.

The Difference Between Hotel Rooms

As I've stated, the Hilton is NOT my first choice nor would have been my choice at all for my stay during the Comic Con convention. Now don't get me wrong, having stayed in a Hilton before, I'm well aware of the Hilton being a nice enough hotel BUT they don't offer anything a regular traveler attending this type of conference needs.

So what do I need to have a satisfying stay? I need all the regular, simple items. I need a refrigerator for my water and juice drinks and possibly to store my leftover dinner foods. I need a microwave to reheat them for when I'm ready to eat them. I need regular grooming amenities such as shampoo and soap. I need a non-nickle-and-dimed breakfast. A continental breakfast would be a great addition.

What I don't really care about is the view. Who needs a view when I am going to Comic Con??? I don't care about the 600 thread sheets or special robes. I don't care about the mattress types and the oversize room. Does this matter? No. I need some place to sleep and put the stuff I buy from the vendors in the convention. I would much rather stay at the Marriott that offers all the things I need. There are a few other hotels in the distance that offer the same thing such as Best Westerns, Holiday Inns, etc.

Due to the massive confusion of merely trying to get a hotel, again, stuck with the Hilton. Indeed, not my first choice but beggars can't be choosers. At least, I guess, I have one.

So What's Next??

I am getting VERY excited. My daughter and her guy went to Wondercon. One day mind you, but the excitement in the air, the thrill of the pictures, the very Wonder of Wondercon made me wish that it was tomorrow. I've never been to Comic Con but my son has talked about it for years. I told him I would take him this year and began making plans last year. I have kept myself abreast of all the RSS feeds, the Twitters, the information being released about who will be there and what to expect.

While there have been these mishaps concerning the sold out tickets (and having to buy them almost a year in advance), the hotel rooms (I have one and am on a "waiting list" for the next) and the distance of having to walk from one venue to the next (bought brand new Dr. Scholl's comfort shoes), I am SO excited and getting more so from day-to-day.

While I don't think I will get another hotel room and that's fine for me, I do know in the back of my mind that there are probably many, many people who won't have one unless they are going to auction off hotel rooms on Ebay, which of course, wouldn't surprise me in the least. I think I will have to check on that.

Having looked at the pictures and saw all the excitement, creativity of costumes and all the fun that was being shared I have decided on no uncertain terms that I want that fun. I want to be in the midst of all the loony, creative, fun-loving people and enjoying myself. I must admit that I really don't like crowds. People get pushy, mean and you see the ugly side of them but knowing that these people are already expecting that, I want that fun!!

Here is the link to my daughter's guy's pictures and they are really good:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tcaserza/sets/72157623644283293/

I did put a couple of comments such as the one for Jake Gyllenhall and for the most exceptional Adam Baldwin who happened to be there. Adam is a guy I can definitely watch all the time and "Chuck" is one of my favorite programs. I hope he makes an appearance at Comic Con. They will have to remove me from the large lake of drool and bring in the sump pumps to remove any excess!!

I will wait for the next bit of news from the direction of San Diego!!

The Dreaded Waitlist

So, as I stated before, I had originally put in for a hotel room for Comic Con. Their way of getting a hotel room is/was as daffy a scenario as I could possibly concoct but it was the only way of getting a hotel room as you could try to check Expedia or one of the other search engines for hotel rooms and try to reserve one (which I tried a few months back) and you only get the "sorry, no available rooms for that date" box.

In the ongoing saga which is the additional hotel room scenario, I received an email for the email address I used when asking for an additional hotel room at 10:30 a.m. the day of reservations for hotel rooms off the Comic Con site.

The email I received stated that we still cannot find you a hotel room but you are now on a waitlist. They go further stating, we know you want to have a hotel room and we are sure that many people made duplicate hotel rooms until they found their perfect hotel room and will be canceling the duplicates. However, since we made the new policy of paying for an evening's room and tax, we are not sure exactly how many are duplicates but you are on a waitlist anyway. If you don't want to be on the waitlist (and essentially don't wany any hotel room within 10 miles of Comic Con), then let us know and we will gladly take you off.

So what is a person, who placed their reservation order at anywhere from 15 minutes (or 9:15 a.m.) on supposed to do if they want a hotel room and there are none available? Perhaps not asking for 12 responses in hotel rooms or finding another way to do this might be in order. I'm sure that the reserving of hotel rooms is NOT Comic Con's problem and I'm sure they take great strides to make sure that their paying guests find hotel rooms because it would not make sense if they didn't considering the number of people who obviously attend this convention every year, but what is a person supposed to do if they can't find adequate room and board?

I can talk like this because I do have a hotel room reserved but for those poor souls who don't and are traveling to get there (we are traveling for 8+ hours), they should have some place to stay. While San Diego is a big city and there are numerous places to stay, this is terrible for someone who wants to join this convention and would have to travel miles just to go every day, let alone have to find parking, pay for the parking and then travel back to their hotel room.

The dreaded waitlist saga continues. Let's see what they'll do next to accommodate us shall we?

Difficulties Along The Way

While I have started this blog a bit on the late side, only two things have happened thus far. I have paid for our tickets to Comic-Con and just made hotel reservations. Both were as difficult as getting into the inaugural ball at the White House. I have had trouble getting tickets to places before such as concerts and movies but this has been the most difficult for something as simple as a convention.

I paid for our tickets last year around October. I was not surprised at how quickly they went after talking to my son who is one of this conventions biggest fan even though he's never gone. He has talked about this for a few years and finally I decided I would take him. The tickets were sold out in a matter of a day or two. He said it would be like that but I didn't really believe him, however, it was true. We got the complete package. I wanted the full experience.

This last week I made our hotel reservations. What a pain in the behind. I have never had such a terrible time making hotel reservations for something like this. I figured if purchasing the tickets was bad, this would be worse and I was right.

I think I have a pretty fast Internet connection with Comcast, had a shortcut already logged in and just needed to wait for the time to come. I had the option to call or do this online. I opted to do it online knowing my computer, that everything was set up and thought I would be okay.

At 9 .m. when we were able to get online and make the reservations, I was not able to get online until approximately 9:05. I was very, very frustrated thinking it was my computer or the connection itself. It wasn't. I finally got online and into the reservation area but then I didn't know how they had set it up never having done this before. What a complete joke. You had to specify 12, yes, that is twelve places for hotel rooms. I knew ahead of time having read and re-read all the information and knew what to do just not how to do it. I could feel my fingers flying along with buttons and handling the cursor with ease. Unfortunately, I did it backwards which took more time. What felt like hours took three minutes total. By 9:08 a.m. I was pressing the "submit" button and waiting, and waiting. And waiting some more. It took what seemed like forever for them to have my reservation.

Then I had to wait again. I had to wait for them to give me a room. I wondered what would happen if I didn't want to have that hotel or that room. What then? I emailed them regarding that question using a different email address. I didn't want to screw up any karma regarding my first reservation. I got an automated reply back. They were supposed to let you know about any hotel reservation within 3-5 hours.

I got my hotel reservation by the 4th hour. It was my second choice. Not the one I wanted and none of the others. Not the most expensive but nearly. There were two others that were $50-75 dollars more than that one. I was not happy. I was lucky but not happy. I had to keep convincing myself that it was okay. That this hotel would be all right. It was, after all, a hotel that was one of the adjacent hotels but still, it was not the one I wanted.

Another four hours went by when I began receiving emails regarding the email I sent. I had sent along another hotel reservation application citing all the same hotels to see what would happen. The emails began telling me that whatever hotel they put you in was the one you got. They also sent me emails telling me there were no other hotels and we didn't get a reservation for any of them but that they would keep me informed if one opened up. I was happy because I had a reservation, unhappy it wasn't the one I wanted, happy I had one that was close, unhappy that they kept sending me "thank you but no thank you" to my email.

I know it sounds like I'm being a stupid girl but you know, you spend this kind of money to go to something like this and everything seems to be out of your control. This is not okay for someone like me that is usually in control of everything.

So, for now, I have my tickets and my hotel reservations and we are good to go. I am waiting to see who will be showing up. So far, Stan Lee is the one autograph I'm going for but I know there will be more.

I'll keep you posted.