Last Week of Summer

Wow, so I pretty much neglected to even humor a post on this for the entire summer holiday of 2012. That doesn't mean that nothing happened, oh no, my summer had a whole lot of stuff to actually make it one of the better ones I've had in my lifetime. I suppose making up for lost time would be the most sensible thing to do at this point, so here I go:




Unfortunately for me (and you (but mostly me)) I never had my camera on me whenever there was a photo op, so this post will be mostly text based. As such I will try to make it an easy read.  Any real blogger would say that not having a camera on me at all times is an epic fail, and to a large extent I would agree. Especially since I made an entire post dedicated to how happy I was to buy the thing. I guess it lost it's "new toy" luster and also that I don't like carrying around expensive electronics on me (some nerd I am, right?).

I'll cut to the chase. The main reason that this summer was awesome was because of Animethon 19. For those of you who are wondering what it is, it's an annual convention based in Edmoton, Alberta, Canada that celebrates and promotes Anime and Japanese culture http://animethon.org/  It is held at Grant MacEwan University (which is the school I currently attend). Simply put, it's probably the most fun I have had at a convention ever, and to my surprise, it was because I decided to volunteer this year. Being my first time (both as a staff member of Animethon, and also volunteering in general), I was pretty nervous, yet excited at the same time because of the whole hyped up atmosphere. As the event drew closer, I was finding it progressively more frustrating to contact the person organizing the card room. First it was communicating I was interested in helping out, then it was running around trying to contact him regarding what was happening and times and other event details. This persisted until the last two days before the thing. Eventually though, through the aid of my friend Yves, everything was confirmed and ready to roll.

It was also a time where I could see the friends I normally don't get to see on a regular basis. Since, unsurprisingly, most of my friends are into anime and planned to make an appearance. I met up with my friend from Calgary whom I met at couple Animethons prior for a few hours to catch up and just hang out. It was a strange feeling going to a place where there are so many strangers, yet so many familiar faces. It's like you don't know anyone in this sea of people, yet you know everybody. Every couple of minutes I would see someone I knew and gestured a greeting with a smile, and show and telling what the other person bought from the vendor hall, and subsequently being totally jelly.

Again, with the camera thing; basically what would have been shown is cosplays that I saw here and there (and were actually good). But for the most part I either didn't know the character/series they were going for and/or it was some incredibly generic shonen manga superpopular character that wasn't really worth the time or effort. Speaking of cosplays, I went to see the cosplay contest with my wonderful friend Graham, whom (deserves his own paragraph honestly) was my escort and companion for the three-day adventure of sweat and wallet pulverizing. The cosplay contest was very VERY mis-judged in my opinion because what won was basically a Castlevania Talk Show skit thing with Alucard and some other person I can't remember the name of. The "talk show" was pretty much an interview showcasing what felt like an overdose of bad vampire puns. Like, it had no bite to it. Hell, you could easily tell after they walked off the stage that the audience didn't find it particularly amazing. The other ones that won the other categories (those being best costume, audience favorite etc.) were things like a Warhammer infantry unit, and a Hello Kitty samurai (yes, actually).

Anyways yes, Graham. We arrived at the card gaming room on Friday and I told him I was volunteering for some undisclosed amount of time. He just went with it, and went to buy his weekend pass and came back to wait around until I was free to go and participate in all of the festivities with him. Graham, despite having next to no interest in card games decided to help move some (heavy and expensive) merchandise to the room from Shane's (the main guy I couldn't contact) vehicle a long hallway, 2 flights of stairs, and 2 pairs of heavy glass doors away, out of boredom. In doing so, he unintentionally found himself doing basically the same work I was doing, and that landed him a volunteer pass (which saves you from paying $45 for a non-volunteer pass for the weekend). Unfortunately, he had already bought his pass, and couldn't return it thus wasting a bunch of cash. He ended up giving it to a friend though so it felt a bit less devastating. I suppose that will be a story for the dinner table.

After moving everything to the room, the work mostly consisted of taking people's money and putting it into the cash register every time someone bought something or wanted to enter the Yu-Gi-Oh! or Cardfight! Vanguard tournaments. So that was quite easy, and I was able to attend the con for free! Can't beat a free pass :D

I entered the Super Smash Bros. Brawl tournament at some point during Saturday. I was both mentally (and probably physically) prepared to get my ass kicked due to the lack of contact with the game for the majority of the year. WELP, it didn't even matter because I missed my match because I was having too much fun buying junk in the vendor's hall! I mean, really I can get my ass kicked in Smash Bros. any time right? RIGHT? (desho?). Admittedly though I was rather excited to see how far I could have made it in the tournament despite having not practiced at all in recent memory. Oh well OTL

Now I mentioned wallet massacre earlier. Yes, we spent a TON of money on stuff in the vendor's hall. I normally wouldn't spend this much (some $300; perhaps that is very little to some of you reading this) at a con, given a big chunk of the stuff is bootleg truth be told. Admittedly though, the things I bought (whether bootleg or not) look pretty damn awesome.. This, at least, I will be able to take some pictures of and upload them later for your viewing pleasure (or possibly dismay). The not having to buy my way into the con somehow made me felt like I had more money to spend than I actually did. As a result I just splurged and gave less fucks that day than I normally would have. I feel that is one of the main reasons this was a great con. Simply buying things you want, and now you're happy. It's honestly much better than sulking about how poor you're going to be if you buy this or that. You're only young once, do enjoy it now than later (because you'll be old later ahaha! xD)

Lastly, we went to see the AMV (Anime Music Video) Contest:

[WINNER: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Is1cJhq2zi8&feature=related].

There was some absolutely incredible work being showcased in the 50 some medley of AMVs. The winner, however, in my note (ha, ok no) was not one of them. The win is calculated based on the number of audience votes it acquired. Now the problem is that the whole My Little Pony fandom has bled it's way into the weeaboo culture (which, at any North American anime con, there are sacks full), and as a result, shit like this happens. That not only makes me ashamed that people literally thought that was the best one, but it also squanders many of the other contestant's more deserved recognition. I don't even.

After the three very long and exciting days came to a close, we drove towards home base with the trunk full, wallets empty, and huge genuine grins welded onto our faces. I had to work the dreaded 8 hour shift at work the next morning, but it didn't matter. I felt so content, so satisfied with how great the weekend was, that there was almost nothing that could offset my mood. That being said, it is now the last week of summer.

What goals have I accomplished...

Well for starters, I finished my driver's ed course finally. Though I'm unclear as to whether they actually passed me or not. I'm thinking no because they never explicitly said I passed, but they probably also didn't want to explicitly say I failed so as to not make me feel bad. Nevertheless, that is done for now, but unfortunately I am unable to take the driver's test because the car I was going to use for it died. By died I mean I was driving to work one afternoon and it just stops right in the middle of an intersection \o/ GG

Aside from that, summer has pretty much just days of rain, days of sun, and tennis every Monday with friends. Oh, and of course ebay shenanigans.

School starts next week, and I feel as though that by now, after 15+ years of doing it, I have come to peace with the fact that summer must end, and school must begin to pry my sleeping body from my bed every morning. It'll feel strange to walk the very same halls that carry such fond memories in nearly a polar opposite context; I don't want to say that it will be outright depressing, but it is what it is.

Unfortunately, this might have been the last Animethon due to the short staffing issues that are threatening the infrastructure of the con. If that happens, I suppose I'll have to go to other cons in Alberta (namely Otafest in Calgary) or even Anime Evolution in Vancouver, OR if I'm feeling particularly bold, Anime North in Toronto! But those will be saved for another entry some day.

Though it's not quite 4:55AM (it's 3:36AM), I think I'll close the garage door on this one as it is getting unbearably lengthy. Pictures will be coming soon, so stay tuned!