Mandolin (Mandi Ohlin) writes...

Greg -

I just got home tonight after working all weekend to finish up my con journal, only to discover that a disk error had eaten half of Saturday and all of Sunday and Monday. I spent an hour trying to retrieve it, drove myself to tears, with no luck.

It's now 11:30 on the 29th, I have to deal with getting my act together for graduate school on Thursday, I still have to find forms and call advisors and find out where the money is coming from, find out where my class is, find out what books I need, and there is no way I can reconstruct the whole thing by Tuesday night.

Greg, I am so, so sorry, but I just can't post the con diary by August 31st. I can't redo all that in time. I'm tired, I'm stressed, and I just can't get down all the wonderful and amusing things that happened in those four days in time for the impatience of the PTB.

I was there, I had fun, I want to retell everything that happened, but I just don't have the time left to do it by the 31st. Instead of a con diary, you'll have to settle for an apology. I can't redo all that in time. I can't.

Again, I am really, really, sorry. Please forgive me....

matt writes...

My Gathering Journal

-unfortunatly i could not attend this years Gathering either. but i felt so helpless about posting Gathering Journals taht i decided to post this just to show people how easy it is to post their thoughts. i'm kinda dissapointed taht we only have a 25% turnout... i hope we see better participation in buying the DVD...

thanks Greg.

Gorebash writes...

8th Annual Gathering of the Gargoyles
Montreal, Quebec, Canada
August 6-8, 2004

My con journal. It's long (winded).

Thursday, August 5, 2004 (Abridged)

Driving from just south of Boston, MA to Montreal, Quebec. Left home around 6:30am. Picked up Vashkoda and her friend Sean (we met at the 2003 con) in the Bronx on my way. Didn't take the I-80 exit in Albany and went 200 miles west through New York before we figured out the error. Drove 200 miles east. Got back on I-80 and headed north torwards Montreal. Got in around midnight.

Friday, August 6, 2004

Vashkoda, Sean and I had breakfast in the hotel restaurant. We then headed over to the registration desk to pickup our badges and materials. We had a couple hours before the first session of the day, so we went in search of a universal remote.

Sean had brought his Playstation 2 with him in hopes of hooking it up to the TV in our room. However the hotel took every step they could to not allow hooking up external devices to the TV. We figured if we got a universal remote, we could then change over to the line input on the TV and bypass the hotel's attempt to stop such things.

Next door to the hotel was a Staples... or whatever it was they called Staples in Canada. No remotes, although I did pick up a silver Sharpie in hopes of getting Keith David to sign an issue of the Gargoyles comic book I had brought along.

We then headed west from the hotel trying to locate a Radio Shack a clerk at the Staples had said was nearby. We didn't find anything and turned around. As we passed under a bridge on the way back I was molested by one of the local fowl, deciding to use my shoulder as a convenient perch. Vash rescued me from the vile creature, and on we went.

Crosswalks in Montreal are much different than anything I was use to. For starters, you didn't have to push a button to get the lights to go red so we could cross. Seems Montreal has a thing for one-way streets, which allows a person to cross on any red light perpendicular to the direction you're crossing. They even provide a little counter on some corners to tell you how much time you have to cross. Very handy.

We then went east from the hotel to check out what was over on the other side. During our trip we found a Subway and a pasta shop, so food wasn't going to be an issue. Vash is big on pasta and so we planned to return later for dinner.

We got back to the hotel in time for our first session of the day. Greg was hosting a session on voice acting, partly in preparation for the radio play auditions that would follow. On our way in I ran into Greg and said hi. At the 2003 con I missed this session because I arrived Friday evening. Now I would finally get to attend the session.

Keith David was suppose to co-host the session, but we learned he had been delayed while shooting for the new film "Transporter 2" in Miami. No worries.

A little ways into the session the DVD film crew showed up. I tried to take it in stride, but was incredibly excited. The presence of the film crew showed that, yes, there really was going to be a DVD, and yes they really are going to do a documentary on the con. Of course we knew this ahead of time, but seeing the crew there in person cemented the reality of it all.

After some stories and a few pointers, Greg had people get up and read from some scripts he had with him. I got in on the last one. After the session ended, auditions for the radio play began. A bunch of us lined up outside of the room while Greg and Crzy Jen set things up. Like last year (and previous cons) four packets were given to the first four people in line. Each packet had a page of dialogged for a single character. As we moved forward in line and copy a copy of this packet, we would have to pick a character to read for when we auditioned for Greg.

With the packet also came a piece of paper where you had to fill out your info and if you could do a certain accent or bark or meow. The bottom half of that paper was for Greg to fill out during the audition. It included spaces to mark how well you performed based on various criteria. It also included a list of all the parts using 2-letter abbreviations to obfuscate which parts were which. It's a fun puzzle to look at those 2-letter abbreviations, try to identify which represent what characters, and figure out what the radio play will be. (Greg keeps the radio play content a secret until the show.)

I saw Q1, Q2, Q3, and Q4 listed amongst the parts and instantly put together that these had to be quarrymen parts. Since the only episode Greg wrote that had Quarrymen in it was "The Journey" I guessed we'd be doing a version of "The Journey". Vash was able to identify far more characters based on the 2-letter abbreviations than I and helped confirm my hunch when she figured out that JC was John Castaway and VG was Vinnie Grigori, aka Vinnie from the episode "Vendettas". Both characters are in "The Journey" so at that point we felt that we had a pretty good guess.

Last year I had auditioned with Xanatos' dialogged, which I had picked at the last minute with no chance to review it to get a feel for the lines. This year I'd have time to prepare. I finally settled on Lexington's lines just as the DVD crew came over and asked if they could film us rehearsing for the audition. I think everyone was a little apprehensive and/or insecure about performing for the cameras, but a couple people mustered up the guts to do it. One of whom had read Lex's lines. Then all eyes were on me to perform for the camera too. WTF? Okay. For whatever reason, I didn't feel I could do Lex's lines since they already had that on tape now. So I switched over to Broadway and read for the camera.

Finally it came time for my turn to audition. I'd get away from the film crew and not have to worry about being on camera. Nope. The film crew followed me into the room to tape my audition. Swell. But I could focus on the script and ignore what was around me, which I did. I thought I did well enough to have a decent chance at getting a part which didn't involve just grunting (as was the case last year).

After my audition I waited around with Vash and Sean while IRC Goliath did his thing. Vash and Sean didn't seem to be into auditioning for the radio play, but there were something like 31 parts, the most for any radio play performed at a Gathering thus far. Several others there as well as myself tried to convince them to audition, but it wasn't happening.

Sean wanted Internet access and rumor had it that the hotel had a couple floors of newly-renovated "premier" rooms that would cost us about 25 bucks more a night, but had Internet access. So we talked to the people at the front desk and got our room upgraded. We were now on the 22nd floor and had a great view looking west from the hotel.

At the Opening Ceremonies, Karine got up and welcomed us to the con and introduced the staff. This year's staff put on a great con, I haven't heard one bad thing. Keeping 200 guests happy is certainly not an easy job. Thanks guys!

CrzyD presented me with this years fan guest of honor award. I had no clue this was coming until about halfway through her intro, she mentioned chat rooms and Vash nudged me. It was really cool, but I feel there are a large number of people who've done a lot more for the fandom than myself, and so I felt a bit awkward. I tried to somewhat convey that in a little piece I said after getting the award. I was trying to acknowledge that s8's 'success' is wholly due to Ask Greg and the content Greg provides to this fandom. It's his willingness to share new insight and information on the Gargoyles universe that keeps the spark alive. And of COURSE it's also everyone who visits the site, who posts to the comment room, who hit the chat room, who post questions to Ask Greg. It's the fans willingness to contribute content, THAT's the other half. I totally missed this while I was at the podium, and realized about 10 seconds after sitting down what an idiot I was. It's Greg and the fans, contributing and feeding off of each other, THAT's why s8 exists in the form it does.

But it was still cool to get the award.

Opening ceremonies got taken over by the clan olympics. The first event was your basic stuff-balls-down-shirt-with-holes sort of thing. The losing team would be eliminated. However a special "7-up" ball (I think... or it may have been a different "power-up" ball) that was found by one team could have been used to save the losing team from elimination. That wasn't happening. Very cold.

I juggled for the cameras.

Chris Rogers got up and talked about what was in store for Gathering 2005. This may have happened after Greg did his stuff because Siryn talked about working on the mascot picture during the Team Atlantis episode... but I'm getting ahead of myself. Gathering 2005 will be in Las Vegas as the Palace Station hotel and casino. Rooms will cost $89 a night. The mascot was created by Siryn with the suggestion of "What would Frank Sinatra look like as a gargoyle?". She calls him "blue eyes" but Chris planned to have a naming contest for the mascot. He also talked about registering the Gathering as a certain type of organization in which membership dues (gathering registration) would be tax-deductible. I'm sure we'll get more info on that in the coming months.

Onto the main course. Greg was about to get up so I grabbed a clean tape and tossed it into the video camera I had just bought, specifically so I could tape the events of the con.

Greg Weisman, creator of Gargoyles, gets up to the podium and begins his intro. He then cuts short and yells out "Ladies and gentlemen, Keith David", directing everybody to the back of the room. Everybody turned and ... Keith wasn't there. A sweet callback to the 1997 Gathering where he pulled the same stunt.

Greg played an audio tape of some people who worked on Gargoyles saying hi to the fans. The people on tape were Frank Paur (producer), Keith David (voice of Goliath), Bob Kline (director), Dave Schwartz (storyboard artist), Troy Adomitis (storyboard artist), Vic Cook (storyboard artist), Ed Asner (voice of Hudson), and Crispin Freeman (voice actor for various animated series). A big thanks to Carol Wagner who was responsible for going around and getting these guys on tape. It was a real treat.

Greg gave us the news on the DVD. He announced the release date, December 7, and that the 5-part "Awakening" would have a commentary track that included Greg, Keith David, and Frank Paur. It would also include a (15 minute?) documentary on the Gathering con, which is why the film crew was there. There will be advertising for the release on Toon Disney and ABC Family.

Greg went into the standard material at this point. The pitch. The re-pitch(es). The promotions leading up to the show. The "it's better than Barney" story. The video pitches for "New Olympians" and "Dark Ages" as well as the lieca reel for "Bad Guys". Anyone whose attended at least one Gathering is well acquainted with this material, but it's always fun to hear the stories again. It's part tradition, part pre-history story telling, and I always enjoy it.

Greg played the voice track for an episode of "Team Atlantis" called "The Last" in which Demona and one of the hunters make an appearance. "Team Atlantis" was based on the movie "Atlantis" but was canceled after "Atlantis" had disappointedly (to Disney) box office numbers. But not before a few episodes were recorded! It was a nice inside-look at the animation process, and especially nice to hear that the grunts and groans we've had to do during past radio plays sound just as funny when done by the professionals.

After Penning Ceremonies, Vash, Sean, IRC Goliath, Wingless, Dan and I headed out to that pasta place we'd found earlier for dinner. On the way I found an ATM machine that was on a network that my ATM card could use and snagged my first bit of Canadian cash. Crazy stuff, especially with the shiny holograms in the corners of the their $20 bills.

The pasta place was really sweet. You picked your choice of pasta from a list of about 20 or so and then picked your sauce from a list of maybe 35 or so. The chef would put the meal together and cook it right in front of you. This night I had angel hair pasta with the Orleans sauce, which was basically chicken in some sort of cajun sauce. The guy gave me a dumbfounded stare at how I pronounced Orleans. Vash, who speaks French very well, would later tell me that it's pronounced a little like "Or-lee-oh" in French. Whups.

After dinner we headed headed back to the room to chill for a little bit until Greg's blue mug-a-guest at 11pm. The mug-a-guest was pretty tame, although some curious screen caps from a couple episodes of Gargoyles were making the rounds. A question about Angela and Gabriel came up but Greg said the two had more of a brother/sister relationship than anything else. Some fun with tails. But for the most part, it was more regular mug-a-guest with lots of stories about the development of the show.

After the mug-a-guest I crawled back into bed and fell asleep quickly.

Saturday, August 7, 2004

I didn't have any plans until the 12:30 Greg Weisman mug-a-guest. Vash and Sean, at some point, took off to attend the radio play auditions that were happening earlier that morning. Vash had finally broken down and auditioned. I met her and Sean during auditions and we three decided to take off in search of an electronics store. Sean was still looking to find a universal remote for the TV in the hotel room.

We set out into Montreal and soon found a computer hardware store. We browsed for a bit and eventually asked one of the clerks if they knew where the nearest Radio Shack was. We were finally pointed in the right direction and made our way to a nearby underground plaza.

Underground?! Apparently this is common in Montreal. You'll walk into the lobby of some nearby building (in our case, the Royal Bank of Canada I think it was) and you'll find stairs or an escalator, off in one corner of the lobby, leading down into the underground mall. If there are signs that mark where these entrances are, I didn't see them.

In the underground mall we found a bunch of shops typical to any US mall I'd been to, including the elusive Radio Shack. Sean bought his remote and I grabbed some lunch at a Subway. On the way back Vash stopped at a McDonalds with a mad craving for fries.

We were back at the hotel in time for Greg's mug-a-guest.

At these types of events, the mug-a-guests, I usually have nothing that I feel is relevant to ask. I much prefer to take the more passive role of sitting back and enjoying the stories that Greg has to tell. But while I was rattling around potential questions in my head, a conversation Vash and I had on the drive up popped into mind.

We had been talking about the Gargoyles:2198 spin-off. I'm mostly interested in the LXMs which I see as having huge potential, both in their concept, and in their use as a plot device. In a pre-Space Spawn world, I see them serving very good purposes and serving very dark purposes. I see a parallel between the LXMs and distributed computing, with all the pros and cons that come with DC. It would come down the intentions of the person who controlled the LXMs. It also rattles the brain a bit to figure out just what the nature of the Lex/Xanatos relationship is or was.

But, more to the point, Vash brings up Nick Maza. Where does he come from? Elisa and Goliath are a couple, and they can't have kids, so who else is there? Beth Maza? I spent the trip up with the notion it could have only been a descendant of Beth Maza. Derek's a mutant. Elisa's parents, we might assume, have no other kids, and we have yet to hear of any cousins to Elisa, Beth & Derek. So I figured it had to be one of the three, and Beth was the only one "available" to have kids. The kink in that idea is that if Beth were to marry, traditionally, she'd take her husband's last name, and so would any kids. So how does Nick get the Maza name?

Then at the blue mug-a-guest, someone had brought up E&G having kids. Vash had brought up in the car that Greg had said (at some point) that E&G would probably adopt a kid, but that the adoption, or the relationship, or something relating to that kid would have sadness and serendipity.. or something like that.

Anyways, Greg responds to the E&G kids question by bringing up the adoption angle, and his response seemed pretty cemented in the idea that E&G would definitely adopt. So as I'm sitting at the Saturday mug-a-guest with Greg, I start putting 2 and 2 together. If E&G adopt, what is that kid's last name going to be? Goliath doesn't have one (...well, not in the sense that I'm talking about). Would the kid take Elisa's last name? How would the general public react to news that she and Goliath had adopted a kid? Some sticky points.

What if the kid takes Elisa's last name? Now we've got a way for the Maza name to carry down a few generations to G2198. So I started working out on a way I could ask this to Greg without being direct. It seems that approach sometimes works better at getting an answer out of Greg than just being direct.

Just as I was putting it together, Carol Wagner came over and let me know that the Gargoyles DVD crew were interviewing fans and that I should probably go see those guys within the next half-hour or so.

But before I left, I asked my question. Does G2198's Nick Maza have an ancestor, born around this time (2004 +/- 5 years) who is adopted? Greg thought about it for a moment and said yes. HAH! Vash was there with me and I think we were the only two who realized what Greg had just revealed. With that I stood up and took off to see the DVD crew. Perhaps a bit too dramatically, but I just had my big moment for the day, so I was buzzing.

In the ballroom where Opening Ceremonies were held, the DVD crew had setup a white screen which they were interviewing fans in front of. I arrived in time to see one guy (whose name I'm blanking on, even after I had time to talk with him after the masquerade... DOH!) take of his shirt and reveal the Demona tattoo across his chest. Those of us watching all bet that that particular moment will be making it on the DVD.

A couple more people went up for interviews, including Becca Morgan. The DVD guys started talking about breaking for lunch, but were able to get me in before the took off. There wasn't anything big about the interview. Just typical questions that they seemed to ask all the fans. I'm guessing they'll have a quick montage of responses to their "Who is your favorite gargoyle?" question. I said Broadway, and when asked why, quoted Broadway's "slow and steady" mantra. But I doubt that'll make it on the DVD as I stumbled across the words.

They needed a separate "Who's your favorite bad guy?" so I could go off on Fang and how much I love that character. Jim Belushi's delivery, and Fang's great one-liners combine to make some of the most memorable moments in any Gargoyles episode. (Probably overshadowed by only the "Here's Puck" scene from "The Mirror").

So after the DVD bit, I headed back up to catch the tail end of Greg's mug-a-guest. I was feeling overly-confident in my earlier success that I tried to get Greg to answer whether or not Fox is alive in G2198. I did so by asking if Alexander Xanatos IV's mother is alive in 2198. AX IV is the same as baby Alex from the original series. Remember that Alex is 1/4th fae, and as such, has a different 'life cycle'. Fox is 1/2 fae. So if 1/4th fae can have an extended life, wouldn't 1/2 fae mean twice as long a life? (Assuming no unnatural causes in death.) Then it would make sense that she's alive in G2198, and Greg's lack of an answer makes me think that she is, but that she's in some kind of ... odd situation or position. Because I don't see why she wouldn't get involved in fighting the Space Spawn if she were alive, but we get no mention of her in the G2198 synopsis Greg's provided. So her role is either subdued or simply not there because of some other, unknown, factor.

And I think that Fox's position in G2198 somehow relates to what Titania whispered in Fox's ear somehow. But... theories aside...

Greg wouldn't answer my Fox question. So I was batting .500, which is better than I expected.

But in my own head, I think the answer is "Yes" followed by a very big "but".

And way back in the dark recesses of my mind, the alternate answer to "What did Titania whisper to Fox?" is something to do with Titania's past relationship with Xanatos.

But Greg's right. Leaving some things unanswered can be more fun.

So after the mug-a-guest came the radio play rehearsals. I was lucky enough to get selected for the radio play this year. While a group of us were waiting for Greg to show up I got to be the meat in a Siryn and CrzyD sammich. Very nice.

Jen later (post-con) showed me an old pic from the 98 con where I was also the meat in a S&C sammich. Of course I was in drag, Jen had body paint, and Siryn had a horn. At the rehearsals, Jen didn't have body paint, and Siryn had no horn.

Greg showed up and handed out scripts to everyone for "The Journey". My earlier hunch had been proven correct. I was given the part of Matt Bluestone. No grunts and growls for me, this year I had real words! Vash got the part of Maria Chavez and so we had a scene together.

We went through the script once with Greg providing feedback on our performances.

Then it was time for the show. Greg had been worried that with 31 parts, there'd be nobody left to attend the show itself, but we had a great turnout. Riverdale did a great Vinnie and easily stole the show. The guy who played John Castaway (was his name Eric?) nailed his performance of John Castway and the scenes between him and Riverdale as Vinnie, I thought, were some of the best we've had in any radio play.

After the radio play we headed back to the room to get ready for the banquet.

At the banquet there was still no sign of Keith David, although rumor had it that he was on his way and would make it in time for the masquerade. At our table was Vash, Sean, IRC Goliath, Silver and her mom. The banquet started off with a shrimp cocktail which only Sean ate. I inspected mine, but I'm not a big shrimp guy. But we did have some dinner rolls the rest of us filled up on them. We think one of the roll types served at our table had bits of olive in it. And we think those olives caused a green discoloration on the outside of the rolls. This is what we think. But we also think we may have had a small anti-biotics factory in our bread basket as well.

There was also a salad, which I'm told the hotel does not normally serve with the dressing that came with it. Apparently, while taste-testing things out, the con staff enjoyed the salad we had, but liked the dressing from another salad they had taste-tested. The hotel was willing to accommodate. Pretty cool.

The main course was quail, which was very tasty. During this time Keith David arrived! He was seated and the staff began to serve him his meal. Greg started moderating questions for Keith, who would answer between bites. Greg was also willing to take questions, but I think everyone was focused on Keith. I found Keith to be incredibly open, willing to share, and very very friendly. The guy could read names out of a phone book and I think we'd all still hang on his every word.

Dessert was either with "seasonal fruit charlotte strawberry coulis" or "three-chocolate Bavarian cake with raspberry coulis" depending on .. luck, really. I had the three-chocolate one and it was damn nice. Best dessert I've had in a long time.

All throughout dessert Keith David continued to take questions. In the ballroom next to ours there was another party going on, during which they broke out the karaoke machine. So while we were all trying to listen to Keith talk, we were subjected to some less-than-stellar karaoke performances, barely muffled by the partition between the two rooms. At one point Keith yelled out "Somebody kill that horse!", during (I think) somebody's rendition of that Celine Dion song from Titanic (and, holy crap, was it bad).

We got to hear the story about the origins of Jalapena, and how there was a mini-revolt among the production staff to stop Greg from using it, lead by Frank Paur (I believe). Keith gave the name of the singer he got "Jalapena!" from, but I've already forgotten it. I wish I'd brought my video camera with me to the banquet.

After the banquet we had a break while the room was cleared and prepared for the masquerade.

The ballroom's lights were dimmed for some reason (maybe at the DVD crew's request?) so what I was able to video tape came out particularly odd (in terms of light).

I grabbed a seat to the side of the area where the cosplayers would be performing. The judges for the masquerade were Greg, Keith, the hotel manager and his wife. The hotel manager seemed to get really into it. The manager's wife seemed like a deer in headlights.

During the first skit, I discovered I was in a crappy place to video tape from. All I was getting were peoples sides. So I moved around to the back of the ballroom and started taping from there. I was in a nice place as I was able to get people as the entered and stood on stage.

Loopy's costume of a character named Korul, and his performance done to his song "The Gargoyle Who's Afraid of Heights" stole the show. It was a great costume, with functional wings, and the performance was fun. Jade Griffin came in as Elisa in her yellow (Belle) dress from the episode "Eye of the Beholder" and wowed the crowd as she tore the skirt off (nice) much like Elisa in said episode. Flanker came in as the Hunter, complete with a sword (a fencing foil I think). There was a Fox/Xanatos couple where Xanatos carried Fox down to the stage area. Their costumes were also from "Eye of the Beholder" so Fox was in just a trench coat while X had his jet pack on. There was a classy looking Fox in a black evening dress played by Annie (I think). There was an Ophelia who I think showed up late and missed the judging portion. Patrick Toman was done up as Puck. Karine (con-chair) was done up as pregnant Fox from the episode "Walkabout". Karine, herself, is a few months pregnant. Siryn was dressed as young Tom (the only one in drag this year, I believe). There was a sweet Echidna costume, complete with snake tail and a snake-form of danglies (old school s8 chat ppl knows about danglies). Cindy was done up as Titania (who knew Titania could sing?!), a Princess Katherine, and a Macbeth and Gruoch. There were some original character costumes whose names are just absolutely escaping me. One was a nurse; there was a gargoyle lady who had these spring-loaded wings which were sweet, ... I'm easily missing at least 10 more people. Sorry, my memory is crap.

After the masquerade, things transitioned into a sort of karaoke/dance party. This is probably the part of the con I most enjoyed. I got to meet and talk with a ton of other fans, many of whom I've met only online before this night.

Keith David came back down and did a song for us acapella. He said during the banquet he's wanted to always do a movie about Nat King Cole, and he could! It was a great song to listen to, and very memorable moment, made all the more so by Arno getting grabassed while slow dancing with another guy during the whole thing. Oh, and that's on camera too. Nice.

One guy got up (is this Eric?... someone was named Eric, and it totally threw me off) and did a parody of "Blame Canada!" from the South Park movie called "Blame Gargoyles" which was hilarious.

MAui is crazy. At some point she convinces somebody to play YMCA and tries to get me up to dance. Feh! I don't dance, at least there aren't any videos to prove it, despite urban myths of a certain "goats go to hell" song. Anyways, I didn't know the words to the song (as people started singing along) nor did I have any clue what the 'dance' was. Batting .000, finally back to my normal average.

But I wasn't the only one. And very quickly, the lyrics we sang became "something" for every word besides the refrain. Ah, mass crazy. This is what the con is all about.

A lot of people stuck around well into evening. Just before I left, Greg went over to this giant sketch pad (if you can all it that) and drew a gargoyle in orange marker. Where this thing is now I'd love to know. I think it was his own misc. gargoyle, although it did look like Brooklyn, wearing a pair of sunglasses.

Finally exhausted from the day, I headed back to the room to sleep.

Sunday, August 8, 2004

Having stayed up until 2am the night before, I slept in late on Sunday. I woke up around 10:30am. Vash and Sean had already woken up and taken off for who knows where. I was left to fend for myself. I got myself together and headed down in hopes of catching the first of two Keith David mug-a-guests.

The mug-a-guest was to take place in the same room where the art show and dealer room were located. When I showed up I discovered Keith had missed his first mug-a-guest. Later I was told this happened simply because he hadn't been informed about the mug-a-guest and didn't know he was scheduled to show up. No worries, there was still the afternoon mug-a-guest, and Closing Ceremonies.

I still hadn't found Vash and Sean and I wasn't up for lunch, so I decided to hit the art show. The art this year was some of the best stuff I've seen yet. Even Greg's kids got into the act and have a few pieces on display. The "wtf" of the show goes to Stormy's 'Caught in the Act'. Basically she took some of the Kenner Gargoyles figures and put them in dresses. Odd? Shocking? Different? I don't know, but I sure as hell won't be getting THAT image out of my head anytime soon. A lot of the con staff are exception artists and more than once I had to be reminded by IRC Goliath (who was there checking out the art as well) that I couldn't vote for them. I dug the etchings which I believe were made by Y2Hecate. I was very close to buying one and trying to put that in as a window on my computer case. I definitely wanted to buy a piece of art this year. I had a few extra bucks and I wanted to do my piece to support the artists in the fandom, so I was on the hunt. Most of the art that was up for sale were done through silent auctions. However the piece that caught my eye wasn't, it had a flat buy price, and so I quickly snatched it up. It's a profile of Demona's face done by Andrea Zucconi. I'd love to know what Andrea was thinking as she drew this. (I should probably e-mail her.) What I see when I look at it is a moment of vulnerability and perhaps sadness in her face. It's one of those things you just really never see or expect to see from Demona, which makes it all the more interesting. When I'm looking at it, I don't see the cold-hearted, walled-up Demona seen throughout much of the show, but someone who actually feels emotion. I dunno. I dig it. I've got to take it to a place and get it framed.

Still a few minutes before the mug-a-guest so I headed outside the door, onto the terrace, where I saw BrooklynX. I finally got a chance to check out BrooklynX's stash of cells. As he told to me, what Vic Cook (storyboard artist for the show) said at last year's con was true, he has more Gargoyles cels than Disney. BX even has the cel used in some marketing materials that shows the main cast lined up together. It's the same image of Owen, Xanatos, Demona, Goliath and Elisa that I've had on the front page of s8 for the past couple years. Incredible. He also had a couple cels from "Eye of the Beholder" which is a personal favorite of mine. He also has another book of cels from other shows and artwork that he's either commissioned or had given to him as a gift. The guy knows his artchicks.

Karlyl and Silver were also there and I sat down and hung out with them for a few. There were some oddball balloons floating around so I grabbed a couple to give a minor reenactment of the '98 con. Although these balloons were a bit on the large size, not that I minded, much.

I headed back into the art/dealer room to await Keith's eventual appearance. While I was waiting I was finally clued into who the line of 10 or so people sitting behind one of the tables were. They were the authors of the Phoenix Gate Anthology and they were signing copies of the book. Never one to turn down the chance for a good souvenir, I grabbed myself a copy and proceeded down the line getting autographs of all the authors. Stormy and Whitbourne were both in line and I they really made it an especially treasured souvenir as they both wrote comments about how they met each other through s8 and that they're planning on getting married. It's especially cool to hear about people who met through the fandom and developed a close relationship. I wonder, 20 years from now, how many kids there will be simply because this fandom exists. (Not to put any pressure on Stormy and Whit, hah.) And do we include Keith David's kids in that? He and his wife had their first date during the first Gathering back in 1997, as Greg tells it. Pretty cool.

Keith showed up to the mug-a-guest and went around the room shaking hands, checking out the artwork that was on display, and talking to the Phoenix Gate Anthology people. He was a real class-act, taking his time to meet everyone in the room. He seemed genuinely interested in the artwork and PGA stuffs. Very cool guy.

I was too busy paying attention to my camera, trying to get everything on tape, to hear everything he said. And I am presently away from my tapes of the mug-a-guest, so I don't have much to say about what was said. I can say that Keith was very open, very willing to talk and go into great depth on whatever he was asked. I remember his first question was about the cologne he was wearing, which a lady or two seemed to enjoy. He said he couldn't remember every show specifically, when asked about his favorite episode. He said one of his favorite lines from the show was "I've lost everything, even my revenge!", which Goliath yells out in Awakening (part 2 I think). He talked a bit about his interpretation of the line and what it meant to him. He also talked about the lack of killing in the show and how important he felt that was. "We beat [the bad guys] up pretty good, but we never killed anyone.", I think was what he said. He talked about other movies he's been in, told a story or two about filming "Men At Work" with Charlie Sheen and Emilio Estevez. He was very cool, very willing to talk, and it was really enjoyable.

After the mug-a-guest I caught up with Vash and Sean who had shown up for the mug as well. I paid for the art piece I had bought and we went back up to our room for a few minutes while we waited for Closing Ceremonies.

This would be the first time I was able to attend closing ceremonies as at previous cons I would have to leave early on Sunday to catch my bus or train home. Since I was leaving on Monday, I could stay and catch all the Sunday events. Karine got up and said a few words, got the crowed pumped for the 2005 con, and thanked the con staff and volunteers. The whole crew really did a great job putting together and managing the con. Greg wasn't around for the closing ceremonies as he had to leave early to be with his family and celebrate his daughter's birthday.

After closing ceremonies, Keith was available to sign autographs. I had brought with me a copy of issue #1 of the Gargoyles comic put out by Marvel, with the giant Goliath on the cover (and a bumpy cover too). I also had with me one of those new silver Sharpie markers that I picked up at the Staples (equivalent) next door to the hotel. I handed him the book to sign and he took a few moments to look through the comic. He seemed to get a kick out of it. I then asked him for a second autograph for a friend, and to sign it "Hey Dave, where were you?!!". An odd request no doubt, but he was very cool and signed it. It's for a friend whose autograph collection is made up of those collected by his friends, each one saying "Hey Dave, where were you?!!". It had started as a goof when he missed a signing by Kevin Smith way back in the day, and it's just snowballed since. He's got a Captain Atom book I had Greg sign last year as well.

Vash and IRC Goliath also had things to get signed. Vash had her picture taken with Keith, as did IRC Goliath. He gave Keith a t-shirt as well. I forget which one it was, but it had a line-drawing of a gargoyle (Goliath?) on the front. I think Step L.. I can't spell her last name, Raptor Woman, I think she had drawn it.

Anyways, with our autographed swag in hand, we got together, (Vash, Sean, myself, IRC Goliath, Wingless and Dan) and we headed out to the pasta place for dinner, again. This time through I ordered angel hair with the teriyaki sauce, which had dark-meat chicken in it. It was mighty tasty.

When we got back there was a group of people trying to get 30+ people together for a game of laser tag at a nearby place. But I declined. I wanted to get to bed fairly early so we could leave early the next morning. On our way back to the room, IRC Goliath stopped by the con suite to see if he could swing a couple of non-staff passes into their postmortem party. We continued on to our room. IRC Goliath showed up an hour or two later. We hung out for a while, then IRC Goliath took off, I watched TV for a little while, then went to bed.

Monday, August 9, 2004 (Abridged)

Drive home was fairly uneventful. Left Montreal around 11am. Dropped Vash and Sean off in the Bronx around 6pm. Got home just before 10pm. Slept. A lot.

Spacebabie writes...

Tuesday Aug 10

We woke up to the sounds of popping. The early risers began to pop their knuckles and joints, waking ever one else up that joined in on the popping. After getting dressed and last minute packing done we carried ours suitcases down to the basement and placed them into Hyena and Mafia Cruiser.

Before we left the city we filled up the cars with gas and bought breakfast snacks.

We thought they were hard on us going into Canada. They were even harder on us coming back. We watched as they waved Emambu's car to the side. We were slightly worried, but the questions were a bit tougher but they did not wave us off.
As we drove we saw the Mafia Cruiser join us on the road and we regained contact via the walkie-talkies. We were informed the department of homeland security was interested in Lynati's tail.

Except for a stray backpack set on attack mode near the lovely town of Coxsakie, the trip back to Gregx's house was relatively dull.

We helped to take Grex's and Alex's suitcase out of Hyena and into his house before were retreated to the deck and enjoyed sodas. It was a cool and comfortable evening, made pretty by the candlelight and fireflies. Grex's and Alex's mother is an excellent cook. She fixed us a meal of pasta, delicious beans with bits of chicken and black olives. Sliced tomatoes with thin slices of cheese and slices of bread.

After dinner we watched the Buffy musical and some hilarious downloads before we retired for the night.

Wednesday Aug 11.

After waking up we brought Aaron and Mara's stuff into Hyena and gave Erik some of the snack foods. After a few last hugs and goodbyes we were on our way to Texas. We decided to avoid the most of Tennessee.

Emambu and Lynati separated from us when were in Pennsylvania. We continued to drive south passing through Maryland, the Virginias and into North Carolina where we stopped at a Denny's. I ordered mushroom Swiss burgers with seasoned fries.
We decided to keep going. I think the day officially ended somewhere in Alabama.

Thursday Aug 12

I kept weaving in and out of consciousness around the south. Waking up in Louisiana before drifting back for a brief nap before we entered Texas.

We returned to Revel's house around noon. We unpacked and set bags down around the house. Nearly everyone checked e-mail and took a nap. Aaron and Mara had to return to San Antonio around four. We had our goodby hugs with the promise to keep contact over IMs and LJs.

Revel and I had sandwiches before we did some drawing and went to sleep.

Friday August 13(No wonder it happened)

I woke up feeling sick from a head cold. Luckily I packed cold medicine for just in case.

The two of us left messages on messages boards before we did some more drawing and started on our gathering Journals.
That evening we ate fast food from Long John Silvers. I had a cup of fried shrimp with fries, a diet soda and some hush puppies.

While watching television we switched to the weather channel and saw Hurricane Charley bearing down on Orlando. I called my family and talked with everyone including my brother. The power went out at my house during mid conversation. We kept trying back every hour before we went to bed.

Sat Aug 14 (Why do I have to go back?)

Woke up and did some last minute packing. Revel and I both decided I should leave the art I won at his house and he could mail it to me.

We tried calling the house and no answer…tried everyone's cell and no answer.

To pass the time we watched Gargoyles on ABC Family. The episode was "Turf".

I checked on my flight to make sure it wasn't canceled. We did some more drawing and journal writing.

The power came on my house around 3:pm (My neighborhood is lucky) we called to confirm when my flight was landing and where I would be found.

We went to the airport around 5:00 and I said goodbye to Revel around 6:00.

Flight was uneventful. Ate a snack pack thing of a little sandwich with pretzels and a tiny candy bar. It is good to have a window seat when you are flying at sunset and at night. The fading colors are beautiful and the land below looks like various Light Brite sets.

There were plenty of lights in Orlando, but also a lot of dark patches. For anyone who flew in for the 2000 gathering might remember how the airport was designed. Imagine stepping off the plane and immediately walking down a narrow path created by a velvet rope. On either side where the chairs are there are chunks of ceiling scattered about and patches of water soaked carpet.

They told us it might be 45-minute wait for our luggage. I waited only about 20 for both of my suitcases. Stepped outside and my father had just pulled up to the curb in Riker (His white Sport Track)

After I returned to my house (And saw the broken fence) I greeted my mother and the animals. Reset my clock, gave Zelgadis's keyboard a tap and checked to see if it was working, called Revel to let him know I was home and then crawled into bed for much needed sleep.

Spacebabie writes...

Monday: Aug 9 (So embarrased I got the previous date wrong)

Slept in in again. Revel and I barely had enough time to get dressed and ready to go down stairs into the lobby to meet up with the gang heading towards La Ronde. Revel called the other people who were rooming with us that night. Lynati was the first to show up and I gave her one of the two keys. We kept the other one.

Karine lead us through the labyrinth like path to the Metro and paused at McDonald's to get breakfast.
The metro was unique in that it had rubber wheels and wooden tracks. As we rode Sapphire lead the group in reciting the intro lead of Gargoyles.

I was feeling a small headache developing. (Maybe it was because of the lack of coffee or food) I wasn't in the mood for some of the big coasters. Revel and I rode a couple of rides, including a small coaster with the carts designed to look like toboggans.

We met up with the others for food. Instead of combos they have trias. Either phrasing makes sense if you think about it. I had a chicken sandwich tria.

After we ate Revel and I rode the monorail around. It was a descent post lunch ride and we were able to hold hands and enjoy the scenery.

We exited the ride on the other side of the park where there was miniature golf. We played a half round: nine holes of the game on a course with a Camelot motif.

We went on several more rides, including my favorite: the swings and snacked on Dipping Dots. Before we left the park we bought a couple beverages. Just my luck I bought a soda from a machine that wasn't working properly. It was warm. Luckily we took it to the front desk. Told them where the defunct machine was and I was able to exchange it for a cold one.

While waiting for our train. I noticed my arms were a little burned. I broke out in laughter over the fact I have yet to get burned this summer in Florida but I get burned in Canada.

Nobody was in our room when we returned and we were hungry. We went to the McDonalds. I still had half a cold soda in my room so I didn't order a tria. I ordered a chicken nuggets and a small fries and a Mcflurry (They were out of yogurt parfaits.

The rest of the rogue squadron was back in our room when we returned in addition to Kathy. We chatted while we ate. Mandi came in and joined in the conversation while she groomed her Banshee wig.

Alex played a homemade video he downloaded of clips of Cowboy Bebop with Denis Leary's "@$$hole song")
We talked about fic, next years con. This years con and the possibilities of where 2006 might be.

Eventually we all grew weary. Kathy and Mandi left and we squeezed three people per bed with the Bishansky brothers on the floor.

Next up: The long voyage home.

kathy writes...

Hi Greg,

No blow by blow Gathering Journal from me this year, just some comments:

Gatherings are never long enough. There are too many people to catch up with.

Creton (pork pate) is good for breakfast. Sugar pie is better than it sounds. Cheddar cheese should never be used on anything claiming to be Italian food.

I want Keith David's jewlery. Not to wear, just to take out and admire from time to time.

"My Heart Will Go On" should be banned from kareoke for all time.

Have I mentioned I enjoy our post-prandial racewalks through strange cities?

Viva Las Vegas!
kathy

Norcumi writes...

2004 Con Report
(apologies for the length)

WEDNESDAY AND THURSDAY
Quindar and I headed up to Canada by car, thankfully without too many wacky hijinks ensuing from my mutual inability to drive OR navigate. Coming from the lovely and way too large state of Pennsylvania, we only got in around midnight through a single lane highway bordered by concrete barriers that looked like they'd been painted black by the same lunatic that put together the very strange road signs. (yes, I've already been told that they adhere to international sign standards whereas the U.S. doesn't - but I also swear the next time I go to Canada, I'm wearing a shirt that says "Sorry, I'm a stupid American" in several languages). While we were checking in, a group of gargy people were hanging out in the lobby looking strangely out of place. The hotel was outright beautiful - sadly enough, we didn't get any pictures of that - and my first impression was "swank.... how'd we get away holding a con here???"

Being tired, we headed back past the group of garg people - Greg included - to the ridiculously expensive parking garage, hauled luggage to the room, and returned to find people gone. :( Still, that meant at least some decent amount of sleep that night.

FRIDAY
I had my first encounter with the row of elevators that faced the outside of the building and thus had a glass outer wall. I'm sure it was fairly amusing - door opens and innocent garg fans step inside, one wandering over to the fantastic view from the 21st floor, the other only going about halfway before the doors close, the elevator starts to practically freefall, and viewers find me plastered back against the door with appropriate "eeep!" sounds. Quindar seemed to enjoy the view the entire time, though. I will admit I really did like that they designed the hotel with the indoor pool viewable from those elevators, but trippyness aside, my fear of heights did not enjoy it enough to ever manage to comfortably stand next to the window. It did make for an interesting personal challenge throughout the con, though.

Found the registration desk and got a chance to talk with BrooklynX and Abe Wintersmith while signing in. Saw a few more gargoyles fans, and then we decided it was finally time to take a look around the city.

Well, actually it was more like a hunt for a place to exchange money, but this sounds better. The concierge gave us directions to I still don't know where, but it sure was pretty walking the few blocks looking for it. Aside from some gorgeous architecture, local interest was found mainly in the fact that one of the streets we were traveling was reserved for a movie shot later in the day. Sounds boring, until you realize that the city had pre-made signs for this purpose. Also, one of the trees growing from the protective grates had been removed, soil and all, and replaced with a mini-telephone pole. I guess just because.

I'm also silly enough to find it very amusing that there was a guy with a "Movie Surveillance" jacket watching over everything, mostly because I literally only know about 7 phrases of French, most of which I was mentally confusing with my 7 phrases of Spanish. Public education and the mandatory 3 months of assorted languages didn't help me much. I'll admit, as lovely as the location was, the French thing intimidated the heck out of me. There's just something about knowing that if I somehow get separated from known locations that it's even odds anyone would even be able to understand me. Due to nerves from that, I tended to make sure that every time someone spoke to us, I used specifically English phrases - it's a spiffy trick of all the waiters and service people have. Go up to helpless English speaking tourist, and a "Bonjour hello," and they take the cue of how you answer to speak whichever language.

We ended up wandering down into the subway system, a nifty little set of actual train and underground walkways. Beautifully kept up - though everything was pretty much monolingual, including a sign for either a movie or play about the life of Elvis (...) - and the walking part was intriguing. The thing that kept striking me about the city as a whole is they put a lot of work into making things aesthetically appealing, as compared to most of the US, where once you get past the Victorian period, architecture tends to be utility based. I mean, the subway system had sections that were clearly there mainly for art purposes. Pretty spiffy, all told.

After an interesting encounter with an overly helpful local and a map, we finally had lunch in a McDonalds in the underground area just by the hotel. - the first and only McDonalds I saw the entire time. We actually tried to go to the Subway (yes, the sandwich place - who says restaurants don't have a sense of humor?) first, but the person behind the counter just looked at us blankly as I gave my now standard introduction of "Hi, do you speak English?" Since we figured we could at least figure out how to order a large fry from a French only menu, we headed next door. Which was all well and good, but after getting food, I realized that I had neither been charged for nor gotten my drink. Rather than deal with the snarky mainly French speaking McDonald's person, I decided to wander back to the Subway. A different person was manning the counter, and he managed to speak - barely - some English. With a lot of gestures and many sheepish variants on "I'm sorry, can you repeat that?" I finally managed to get a bottle of Coke. Or, as he seemed to put it, "Cocola." Very nice guy, though, and I think I thanked him profusely enough about that.

Quindar and I somehow ended up finding ourselves randomly sitting next to Yggdrasil, so we had a spiffy chat over food about gargs, biology, politics, and a few of the con panels. Pity we didn't get a chance to pester him some more over the weekend. After watching lots of people in con paraphernalia brave McDonalds for food, we all headed to Opening Ceremonies. Lots of fun, and Greg seemed to be having a wonderful time - both with the good news about the first season coming out on DVD (December 7 is about a week after my birthday.... I know what I'll be getting from everyone I know!) and the Keith David gag. I also entertained myself by watching the DVD crew taping the documentary. It was amusing to watch the cameraman try to figure out what to film, and the expressions on all three of their faces when the crowd let loose with "It's better than Barney!" were absolutely priceless. They apparently didn't see it coming, even after Greg called OC the garg version of the Rocky Horror Picture Show.

The other highlight was a tape of hellos and good wishes from assorted people who'd worked on Gargoyles but couldn't make it. I honestly can't recall everyone on there, but both Ed Asner and Crispin Freeman had wonderful and touching things to say. It's good to hear that everyone, fans to voice actors to producers, loved this show.

And Vegas.... wow. That is going to be... interesting. Chris Rogers certainly knows how to put together a presentation. I've been turning over the idea of the Gathering in Vegas since I heard about it, and at first I had very mixed feelings. With the realization that the DVD will have documentary of the con, and going out there into the world, well, that means a pretty hefty increase in attendance, no matter what. And Chris really seems to not only have that well in hand, but any other random ideas that seemed to have been thrown at him. He had a really terrific talk about con plans, and it looks like it will be really cool.

I'm looking forward to Vegas, actually.

I think after that, another foray for food, a bit of time in Mystery Garg Theater, and then we headed up to the con suite early to see if anyone was there. Due to that, we got to hang around, listen to people chat about random things and Leo's strange screen shots, not to mention we actually snagged some chairs. Blue Mug wasn't too blue, but it was really amazing, because it's 30 odd people crammed into a room, and basically hanging out with Greg. Totally different atmosphere from Greg being the guy standing up in front of the crowd and talking - much more relaxed, cozy, and overall just very fun. This of course went until the wee hours of the night, until Karine kicked us out.

Happy thoughts and good wishes to Liz Chesterman's friend, who was not only a con virgin but hadn't made his way through the whole series, and so left early due to getting some massive spoilers during the blue mug.

SATURDAY
We slept in a bit, and wandered around the hotel looking for people to chat with. I think somewhere in here we spotted the DVD camera crew talking amongst themselves, and I nerved myself up to talk to them. I asked if they were still looking for stories, and there was an exchange of looks before the camera guy told me they already struck the set. The director, however, asked what it was. Given it was Quindar and myself standing there, I guess he suspected another "couples" story, so as always I enjoyed myself too much pulling out the classic of "I got cancer in '96, gargs helped see me through to remission, Make-A-Wish sent me to 2000, been coming back ever since." Then add in Quindar's quiet "we met in 2002, and been together ever since," and I think we kinda surprised them with that. There was another, different look, then the director told us to check for them around Masquerade time.

That done, and having carried out part of Greg's mission (go forth and spread the word of gargs, and talk to the camera crew!), we finally headed out to the radio play, and what an event!

The talent in this fandom never ceases to amaze me. The script was for The Journey, and it was incredible. Rob St. Martin made for an incredible Goliath, Zehra once again portrayed a spiffy Elisa, and Vinnie, Castaway, Macbeth and Margot Yale all shone as well. Heck, EVERYONE rocked. As an interesting side note, Greg mentioned at some point that the lovely line of Macbeth's - "Madame, they burned witches like you in the middle ages!" was actually an improvisation by John Rhys-Davis. So when I got home I checked the 2000 Journey script, and found that the original line was "Madam, you are the most narrow-minded--"... and one can only wonder what word would've followed. Margot's return shot of "Mister, you are living in a fantasy world!" still makes me giggle immensely.

We headed down to the banquet after that, but people were preparing the room itself, so we hung around outside with assorted people. Then the camera crew showed up and started taping mock convos between people, trying to get real, lifelike interaction to tell personal stories to people that... probably knew at least some of it anyway. We spotted them, and so bit the bullet again and went up once they were done.

Noel Leas and her friend (apologies, I know I've seen you before, but I never catch your name!) were randomly snagged to try to talk to us about our story. I had my usual case of stage fright, and so I have no idea what I said AT ALL, other than WAY too many ums and ahs in there. Sigh. Ah well. Did our duty, told our story, and could therefore just chat with the film crew a bit before they moved on to their next group. I'm afraid I also don't recall what anyone else said.

Meanwhile, the room had finally opened up to let us in. The banquet followed, and was really, truly stunning. Admittedly in several different senses of the word, but I had a lot of fun. I'm afraid I don't recall who all we sat with, other than BrooklynX and Lynati for the bits when she wasn't working on her costume. There was a one day con-goer, to her first Gathering with her father, who looked a little overwhelmed by the insanity, but incredibly proud when his daughter went and gave Greg a picture of a gargoyle she'd drawn. I think that really made her night, if not her con. If she sees this, apologies for not remembering her name, and hope to see her next year!

The other person at our table was a Canadian fan, whose name I also didn't catch. Eeek. Sorry! He was also incredibly nice, and not only put up with Quindar, BrooklynX, Lynati, and myself talking obsessively about the con, but he also humored me and answered Stupid American General Questions About Canada. One of the most interesting threads was actually about the con shirt design. To paraphrase, there's the grinning Mountie beaver - Canada - riding along top the symbol of Quebec, which is a silly looking dog. I totally forgot about Quebec talking about secession a few years back, but with that in mind, I can see why he commented that it'd be a cute shirt for a kid, but not something he felt comfortable wearing. ::facefault:: One of those interesting commentaries about how different cultures lead to misunderstandings.

The other major interesting bit to the meal actually involved the menus. Yes, the menus. The cover was a nice Delta logo, the inside had the expected menu, but the inside of the cover had a picture of Goliath (picture 8c in the S8 misc image archive), above the Garg logo. When first seeing them, I think everyone made awed noises, and then moved on. I'll admit I did a bit of a double take at the logo, because I could see the classic clawmarks in the name - marks from the logo with Goliath standing above the letters. I'll admit I thought it was odd that a) the con mascot wasn't used and b) the normal logo wasn't used, but I figured what the hey. They're still darn pretty. More on this later.

Keith David finally arrived near the end of the dinner, and it was fascinating to just listen to him - the content was interesting, but it was the rumble that's naturally in his voice that really is nifty. I'm also rather proud of the fact that when he left the room for a few minutes, I noticed the waiter clearing away dishes - including Keith's! I snagged the man and told him that at least Keith was still eating, so he put the dishes back - and when Keith returned a moment later, he double checked to see if his food was still there. Glad I could help with that before anything happened!

Let's see... all else I really recall of the Q&A was that Greg didn't answer many questions, but I at least got to ask him about his project with Vic Cook that we heard about last year. Stuck in the cogs of the machine is the quick answer, unfortunately. After the Q&A broke up, Quindar and I got recruited to help move tables and chairs. I finally got to meet Ian "Sir Rowan", whose art I've been watching (and drooling over) for a long time, and he seemed happy to know there's a fan of him out there. Unfortunately I was too caught up in table moving to remember to mention I'd been hitting his Elfwood site for far too long, and could only tell him that I'd really enjoyed the comic he, Kanthara, and friends worked on.

Due to chair rearrangement, we got good seats right up front behind the judges. Which was interesting, because soon after we sat down, the hotel guy who'd been running interference with the Godawful Karaoke (tm) next door sat down at the judge's table. He was pretty hyper, grinning and clearly having the time of his life, especially after A Fan came up (wearing a suit and a Delta name tag of Daniel) and asked if he wanted his glass filled with water. They had some nice banter going, but unfortunately all that I remember was Fan recommending the Hilton across the street. Basically, the hotel person was almost giddy and clearly having a blast. When Fan finally wandered off (to stand by the door and try to help guests there), the hotel guy finally turned around and just had a bit of a ramble/conversation with us. Turns out that Daniel was the hotel contact person, and had been interested in the con from the get go, which is somehow (I'll admit to not knowing entirely how) related to him becoming a judge for the Masquerade. But he was really enjoying things - the strangeness, the energy, the fun. Then he proceeded to get up and grab one of the spare menus for himself, after all he did with it. He sat back down, turned around, and proudly showed us how he wanted to do something spiffy and special for the menus, so he went online to the Disney site, and picked up the garg logo, but that was black and white, so a little boring - so he cropped that, and snagged the Goliath picture to put above it.

I love this man. He is so cool. Then, when Greg finally came in and sat down next to him, Daniel asked him to autograph the menu. Greg did so, and Daniel turned around and gave us the niftiest thumbs up, "this is great!!" expression.

You can find it at http://norcumi.gargles-fans.org/photos/con2004/20040808_214602_1406 thanks to Quindar being quick with the camera. :) Daniel was not expecting that, so he just flopped over the table laughing, and went back to talking with Greg. We caught him later, and Quindar got a business card, so we will be sending on the memento. He was also kind enough to later pose for the camera with his menu: that one's also available at http://norcumi.gargles-fans.org/photos/con2004/20040808_224402_1433 :) It was also cool to have things from a non-fan's perspective as the people paraded by in costume, and Daniel would lean over and ask Greg if each of them was from the show or not. A little different type of attention for Greg!

The masquerade itself was awesome. The cosplayers themselves were stunning, the staff was clearly having fun (pregnant Kanthara as pregnant, Walkabout Fox was rather inspired), and the audience was highly dressed up and spiffy to boot! I have to make an offhand comment about why on earth did Cat as Hecate's Heccy (I think?) not join in??? Especially with the big battle-ax o' DOOOM? Also, there were several very nifty versions of the Eye of Odin running around, which really impressed me. Well, that and scared me, but right now I'm going with impressed. Beyond that, however, I'm still just too stunned to make much commentary. That, and I have no idea who people are in costume. ^_^; Sorry!

Single commentary: Ethan, Sapphire, and Chameleon Girl put on a hilarious and wonderful performance of the opening monologue that has to be seen to believed. Hit s8. S8.org is our FRIEND!

Once the judges adjourned to talk about costumes, the masquerade people were free to drift out into the hall and have their pictures taken, of which there were lots. The most memorable bit of that to me was the group photo after awards, when everyone in costume grouped together and let everyone take several dozen shots. And they vamped nicely for the cameras - including someone who was taking pictures with several cameras, clearly belonging to people IN the shot - until they declared they would be leaving in five... four... three... two... ONE! and just streamed out amongst the picture takers like some movie shot or something you'd see on camera. I have no idea if the DVD crew was still around for that. I hope they got it, but if not, it made for a fun moment anyways.

Quindar and I had finally managed to catch Lynati, and promised to kidnap her after the masquerade, and "hanging around for a few minutes for something." So we were right there as Emambu got up for karaoke, and did Lynati's filk of Blame Canada: Blame Gargoyles. Now, it's very strange to me to realize that when Emambu was doing his spiffy intro talk, Greg was busy chatting with someone, and utterly oblivious to the fact that someone was trying to get his attention. So Quindar went over, got his attention and told him he was wanted by people at the front of the room, and THEN Greg was noticing what was going on.

Blame Gargoyles, simply put, is stunning. In a very, very good way. All I really know what to say is, if you haven't seen it yet, go to s8.org and check the archives to see it. Thank you, Gore! You totally DO deserve the fan guest of honor award!

After this, Lynati went off to get less green (her Ophelia costume was amazing), then we all tromped back downstairs because Lynati had an art project to share. I'm still not entirely sure about the details, but she made several glass, wood backed friezes of the con mascot, and she wanted to give one to Greg. Since we found out during dinner that he'd be leaving very early the next morning, she wanted to catch him then.

We made it back to karaoke just in time to catch Keith David singing acapella - and my word, that was amazing! We just stood quietly in the back and listened, like everyone else... aside from Arno and whoever grabbed him for a dance. Heh. When that was done, Lynati snagged Greg and wowed him with her gift, which he really seemed to like.

Then we finally got to kidnap Lynati and talk until the wee hours of the morning.

SUNDAY
So because of going until the wee hours of the morning, we decided to just get sleep. We slept late enough that we pretty much passed on the events, but were up and about to keep our appointment for dinner with BrooklynX, because both Quindar and I are finding to our amusement that the con is more a family reunion and a chance to get together and see people than about the panels - which is fun, no doubt about that, but the main thing is the people. It's strange how the fandom and the con become a strange but nifty mix like that. Anyway, we had a good meal and a nice chat, with a bit of ogling BrooklynX's cel and art collection. Lots of talk about gargs,, the DVD (of course!), and life. After unknowingly keeping the restaurant open a bit longer than they expected (in our defense, con time or no, they closed ridiculously early), we headed back to the hotel and went off to do our own things. Quindar and I ended up wandering around the hotel and finally trying to look at things - what we found was the Mezzanine level Muzak volume knob. No, seriously, we did. There's pictures of it, even. We considered playing with it, made jokes about how it was good that it hadn't been publicly advertised during the con itself, and then went off to write a note to Lynati. After all, the girl had gotten no more than 5 hours of sleep (I think rather less) because she had to be up for a biology panel, and it was late enough in the evening we figured it'd be good to make sure she knew how to contact us, considering she was visiting us at home post-con. So we wrote and dropped off the note, then wandered back down to the lobby - only to discover a very sleepy Lynati sitting and waiting for Aaron and Hudson to come back from laser tag.

Since talking helped keep her awake, we joined her and started chatting. We tried doing a few walks around the lobby itself, and while that didn't help her, we did pass Keith David coming out of an elevator, and he said hi. Then back to the chairs, and we talked. Mara and Emambu came down eventually to tell Lynati she had a note left under her door, then they sat down and we did this fun mixed convo that floated between all of us. Eventually, most of the laser tag people came back - but not the segment that had Aaron and Hudson, which had gone off for drinks and food. So we talked some more, as CKayote joined us, and maybe GregX, until the second group straggled back in. More talking, with Aaron (and GregX if he wasn't there before), and basically we were there until 3 am.

I love con time. It doesn't work like real time, but it's way cool. Things went until everyone was too tired to really hold conversation anymore, so everyone went to bed. The noon checkout time was not fun.

MONDAY
However, that meant by noon we were out of our room, stuff packed in the car, and saw us sitting with all the other non-park people who were waiting for the parkgoers to get back, so they could hit the road. It was an awesome group get together, with random people talking about anything and everything. Chris Rogers discussing next year's con, Kathy Pogge talking about the joys of con running, random American politics, and all sorts of other cool stuff I've unfortunately totally forgotten.

The part I keep forgetting to write down that WAS fascinating: at some point, while we were all hanging out, Keith David wandered by with drink in hand and at least one kid in tow, and he stopped to say hello to the group. That rather predictably led to him and his family being sat down for pictures of the group, before he wandered off, telling us that he was really looking forward to the Vegas con.

He. Is. Awesome. Unfortunately, I have no idea who the heck TOOK the photos! If they see this, or someone knows, could they please pass a copy of the picture my way? I'd love to add it to the con photo album, with appropriate credit.

We stayed around as long as possible, just hanging out, until it was clear we had to hit the road. Then heading back across the border - the stop at the border itself was interesting in two ways. One, the mail in rebate for Canadian taxes was interestingly with a massive cut (20%?) for the company doing it, rather than getting total back at the border itself. Which is just evil. Two, the bored guy quizzing us to see if we were legitimate enough to get back into the states asked us some questions. Why we were in Canada - for a convention - and what was it about - the show gargoyles - and while he didn't seem any less bored or uncaring, he did comment that he remembered the show.

.... and Disney canceled this WHY?

Anyway, there were more crazy hijinks with my lack of navigation, but in the end, we made it safely to our destination. It was interesting to check into the hotel that night. I was doing my typical thing of advertising post-con with the 2003 shirt, and as I finished signing us in, the night clerk did a literal double take at my shirt. "Where'd you get that?" After a strange moment of not getting how weird the universe is, I jumped right in to my spiel about the con. He seemed impressed, and while he laughed politely at my talk of Vegas, he did in fact write down the date of DVD release....

I love this fandom. It always amazes me how almost anyone I talk to that ever saw Gargoyles, says something along the lines of "Oh yeah, I remember that! I loved that show!"

Great con. For those interested, pictures can be found at http://norcumi.gargles-fans.org/photos/con2004 - pictures taken by Quindar, because my camera decided to die on me literally the day before the con.

My favorite picture of the lot: http://norcumi.gargles-fans.org/photos/con2004/20040808_230946_1452

Here's to Vegas, and the DVD!

Quindar writes...

GATHERING REPORT 2004

Greg, I know you wanted Gathering reports posted here, so here's mine. It was good to see you and everyone, and as always, thanks for sticking by the show.

I wrote up the original report with links to photos. Since I don't think Gore accepts HTML, and I didn't want to interrupt the purported narrative with URLs, I've removed most of these links from the text of the report. Photos are available on Norcumi's site at http://norcumi.gargles-fans.org/photos/con2004 for anyone that's interested. No, that's not a typo.

FRIDAY
Norcumi and I got into Montreal on Friday at about 2 in the morning. Apparently MapQuest had underestimated driving times, because we had been /planning/ to get in earlier the previous night. The last 45 minutes' drive inside Canada proper was largely composed of road construction, replete with signs politely warning us in French that we were to beware of the tigers. Or something. I remembered enough high school French to get by, but I think the signs made Norcumi's head explode. But to me, the really funny thing was the customs agent at the border. The Gathering site had led me to expect the usual bilingual thing, where everyone who works with tourists greets them in both languages. Many of the store clerks and waitpeople in Montreal did indeed do that, but the customs agent didn't, so my ear didn't process her greeting the first time around. The conversation went like this:

Her: "Bonsoir."
Me: "...say again?"
Her: "Bonsoir."

At which point I got it, but I thought it was rather interesting that she didn't switch to English once it became apparent that I spoke it. She simply repeated herself. Har har.

Anyway, since we arrived so late, we looked at the schedule and figured that none of the panels on Friday looked interesting enough to lose sleep over, especially since the Blue Mug was scheduled for that night. So we slept in, and Friday afternoon we went out to wander around Montreal a little. Nice city, though the fact that all of the signs were in French was consistently, and unduly, intimidating. At a square around the corner from the hotel, there were a couple people with a table and a sign bidding all passersby to "IMPEACH CHENEY". There was also a lot of nice architecture, some of which was nice enough that they were shooting a movie with it a couple blocks up the street. We didn't see the actual shoot, just the no-parking signs and a couple Old West-style telephone poles which had been cemented into tree holes on the street.

That part of Montreal has an interesting system for its subways. In order to reduce the number of subway stations while still making them easily accessible, they have an underground grid of walking tunnels which connects to a subway station every few blocks. Makes sense, given how far north they are. We didn't actually take a train -- we got as far as the station and turned back -- but we did wander around, and get lost in, the tunnels. Ultimately we followed the signs back to the hotel and wound up in the food court vaguely underneath it, where we ordered from Subway and McDonald's in a combination of pidgin English and gestures. (I was loath to use my high-school French, probably because I was afraid I would mispronounce stuff. I tried, but wasn't able to work myself up to it.) While we were eating in the (beautiful) food court, a random Gargs fan who turned out to be Yggdrasil struck up a conversation with us. (Maybe he noticed Norcumi's shirt? Or did we just look like the con type?) It was his first con, so it was interesting to get his impressions of it, though we mostly ended up talking about Canadian gun control laws.

After that was Opening Ceremonies. It was pretty much the usual, though they held the first Clan Olympics event /during/ OC. It wasn't very well planned (http://norcumi.gargles-fans.org/photos/con2004/20040807_174126_1382), but it was amusing, and the sign trick they pulled at the beginning was cute. Greg announced that the first-season DVD will be out December 7, and introduced the camera crew that was filming a Gathering documentary for the DVD. He read some PowerPoint slides that had been conveniently overnighted to him on pieces of paper, raving about how great the show was -- it even had a yearly convention attended by THOUSANDS OF FANS. Heh. (Though we had a surprisingly large number of con virgins this time, as it turned out.) Chris Rogers gave an impressive talk about 2005, and then Greg did his song and dance. I've seen the leica reel three times now, and this is the first time I understood all of the action in it; the animation can be pretty jerky at times. They also played an audiotape made by a bunch of people who worked on the show who weren't able to be at the Gathering. One of those people was Ed Asner, and something in his message jumped out at me. I wasn't taking notes, so all I can give is my impressions rather than direct quotes... but while everyone else on the tape was talking about the show as something in the past but somehow still in existence, Ed was very definitively talking about the show as though it was finished, dead, never to happen again. The finality of his tone really took me aback. Thom, Keith, and Greg are all realists, but they all seem to think of Gargoyles as having some sort of existence outside of, or alongside, reality: that it's about more than 65 episodes which aired from 1994 to 1996. Ed doesn't seem to think that way. I don't mean to say that it was deliberate. It didn't seem to me that he didn't enjoy doing the show, or that it wasn't very important to him at the time. Mostly it felt to me that his method of dealing was to move on. But I don't think he was aware of the discordant tone of what he was saying.

After OC we wandered around. We dropped in on MGT3K for a while, but the room was too big and it didn't seem like anyone could hear anyone else. So we headed to dinner in the hotel restaurant -- very good food. Nice clam chowder.

Then we went to the Blue Mug-A-Guest. Like last year's, it wasn't very blue, and there weren't any major revelations this year, but the Blue Mug is always fun because of its informality. It was held in the con suite, presumably so that we wouldn't be kicked out the way we were last year, but there wasn't really enough space to go around. Norcumi and I got there early, so we had seats, but most of the people ended up having to sit on the floor. It came up at some point that Owen was Puck, and there was a con virgin sitting next to us who hadn't gotten that far in the series and was really disappointed in the spoiler. We both felt bad about it, but what are you going to do? Greg also made an interesting comment about this idea for the Korean gargoyle clan: what they protect is an idea, and the idea is justice. But not in the way the Manhattan Clan does: the Korean gargs believe in poetic justice, meaning that you get what you deserve. Apparently they never were able to fit that into the World Tour, but it's an interesting idea nonetheless. He also explained TGC: apparently the people who worked on TGC had just come away from working on /X-Men: The Animated Series/, and didn't have time to come up to speed on Gargoyles before starting to write for it. Thus things like putting Goliath on trial: it made perfect sense to these people that the existence of gargoyles was accepted, because they were thinking of them in terms of mutants.

After the mug, on the way out to the elevator, I pinned Greg Weisman and told him that Norcumi and I had first met in person at the 2002 con and that we had been together for two years. ("You're probably not collecting these anymore, but...") He congratulated us and told us to tell the film crew about it, and we all went to bed. I hadn't been able to get up my nerve to mention that to him at 2003, so it felt good.

SATURDAY
Saturday we slept until the radio play. Before they opened the doors, we hung around the mezzanine waiting for the play to start. We went through the art show; very nice work. I enjoyed all of it, but particular kudos to whomever did the Mary Sue piece. We talked to BrooklynX some, got big hugs from A Fan, and I determined from another staff member that the schedule was in fact correct: Greg would /not/ be at Closing Ceremonies. Nice of them to keep us in the loop and everything.

The radio play itself was a modified version of The Journey. It was fun, though I do wish Greg would return to using non-Gargoyles scripts for the radio plays. If we're going to the Gathering, we've probably already seen the episodes, and IMHO it's much more fun when we don't already know what's going on. It makes sense, what with Keith David (who ended up not making it in time for the radio play anyway) and the film crew, but still. Nonetheless, the (huge) cast gave a very nice delivery.

After the radio play we wandered out to find the film crew. Given Norcumi's story and mine, we figured they might want an interview, so we asked them about it. Apparently they had already struck the set they used for interviews, but they told us to find them during the masquerade and they'd interview us somewhere. We headed up to the con suite for a while and then went down to wait for doors to open for the banquet, only to run into the film crew again. They ended up doing a couple interviews right there (including ours). They were done in the style of a fake conversation: grab some random fan and bore them by telling them your story for the cameras. It was fairly annoying, actually. The interview before ours was pretty good, but I'm not at all sure (and was not at the time) that we gave the film crew anything usable. The fake-conversation device was just so /awkward/. Maybe the part about Norcumi coming to G2K on a Make-A-Wish grant was usable... anyway, we did our Honorable Duty, and if they don't use the footage I'll probably be happier anyway. I looked like an idiot.

Then came the banquet. This was a delicious five-course meal which started with shrimp cocktail and a salad and then went on to stuffed quails. I ended up eating Norcumi's shrimp cocktail as well as my own, not that I'm complaining. We ended up sitting at a table with BrooklynX; a French Canadian fan; and a girl from Vermont and her father, who were only there for the day. Apparently it was the first con of all three of them. The girl from Vermont had seen the website and convinced her dad to come out to Montreal for the day. She ended up giving Greg a piece of art she made, and he really seemed to appreciate it. It was really sweet.

BrooklynX, Lynati (who was in and out; she had to work on her costume for the masquerade), and the two of us ended up spending most of the meal talking about con politics; hopefully that didn't distress the other occupants of the table too much. The Canadian added an interesting point, though: the con T-shirt shows the Canadian beaver riding on top of the Quebec mascot. He said: "This shirt would be fun as a gift to a child or something, but I would not wear it." Apparently it's offensive to Quebec separatists. I doubt this occurred to anyone responsible for the shirt; it's just interesting how politics always come back to bite you.

Keith David had been scheduled to be there for the entire convention. Apparently his movie got behind schedule, so he wasn't able to leave for Montreal until Saturday morning, and then he had delays at the airport. He showed up at the end of the banquet, and so everyone ended up grilling the poor man while he attempted to eat dinner at the same time. Unfortunately half of his comments were inaudible, due to the tenor of his voice and the bad karaoke sounds coming from the next con over. ("Somebody shoot that ho!" -Keith) But he was interesting. On more than one occasion his answers were so profound that everyone erupted in spontaneous applause. He delivered the most spirited, considered praise of gargoyles as a species that I have ever heard. It was clear he really feels the characters; the extent to which he personalized Goliath was heart-warming. And, on a personal note, when he had to duck out he asked me where the restroom was. It was the extent of my interaction with him, really, but it made my day. Isn't that sad? (While he was out, Norcumi managed to save his meal from destruction by the hotel's Plate Retriever Person, so we both have a really bad story to tell.)

After the banquet, BrooklynX grabbed us to help rearrange tables for the masquerade. No one knew what was going on, but it got done, and at the very least it meant we got front-row seats for the masquerade itself. We therefore got to see the saga of Daniel the hotel coordinator, who was sitting at the judging table right in front of us. He had done up the banquet menu himself, complete with Gargoyles logo and a screenshot from the Disney site. He was really proud of it, telling us all about how he did it, and very enthusiastic about the con. He was fun. When Greg came in he had him sign a copy of the menu, and while Greg signed Daniel turned around and gave us an exaggerated thumbs-up (http://norcumi.gargles-fans.org/photos/con2004/20040808_214602_1406). That's gotta be the best photo of the whole con - Greg, seriously, check it out. I ended up getting Daniel's email address to send him a copy of the photo when we got home.

(He also let A Fan borrow his hotel nametag, which Fan used to do his butler routine and stand next to the door. Fan was even waiting on Daniel, getting water and such. The whole thing was a blast.)

The masquerade was truly amazing. Apparently everyone was hamming it up this year for the film crew. The photos tell more than I possibly can, but it was just amazing. We even got a guy in who is apparently an amateur master costumer of some sort; he goes from con to con showing off his costumes. He won Best Costume, of course.

After the masquerade we hung around for a while. Lynati wanted to give some art to Greg, since he was leaving the next morning, and so we chased around with her for a while as she got everything together. I wound up sitting in the hallway outside Lynati's room, waiting for people and chatting with Aaron, who was trying to get into the room to get his shoes but didn't have a key. Then we went back downstairs, Lynati gave Greg her thing, Erik sang "Blame Gargoyles", and Lynati and the two of us headed up to our room to talk until about three and a half.

SUNDAY
Sunday, because we had been up so late, we missed everything again. We seem to be making a habit out of this; it happened last year too. (We both seem to be going more and more for the people, and less and less for the events, as the years go by.) We got downstairs in time to catch the middle of the 501(c)6 organizing meeting, which was not nearly as fun as a KGB meeting nor as well organized (!). Then we met BrooklynX for dinner, which ended up being at a diner nearby. The food was decent, but it was outside the hotel and wasn't McDonald's, so no complaints. We came back to the hotel and hung around for a while, but Norcumi wasn't feeling well so we headed back to the room.

Eventually Norcumi started feeling better and we got bored, so we went out to look for Lynati. Though we didn't find her we found a Muzak knob next to the mezzanine elevators, which was cool enough that I had to go back to the room to get the camera. Got camera, took pictures, went down to the lobby and promptly ran into Lynati, who was waiting for people to get back from laser tag. So we ended up sitting around the lobby talking to Lynati until several in the morning. And playing with the camera. Over the course of it, Emambu, Mara, Aaron, CKayote, and GregX were there for various periods of time. There was TGS, there was Aaron telling stories about driving down the highway with his foot out the window, and there was a long, animated, highly amusing discussion between Aaron and Emambu over the quality of recent seasons of MST3K.

Eventually everyone that was left (Lynati, Mara, Aaron, and Emambu) decided to go bug Hudson and we decided to go to bed. Yet for some strange strange reason, instead of going to bed, we went along to bug Hudson as well. Mostly this consisted of hanging around in the hallway listening to rants about MST3K while Mara and Lynati went to see if Hudson was presentable. Apparently he was not, and by the time he was, everyone wanted to go to bed. Thus we stood around watching Hudson watch everyone drift off to go to bed. I decided I had had enough, told Hudson that we hadn't been able to sleep without him, and went to bed. The whole thing was worth it, just to be able to deliver that line.

MONDAY
Monday we checked out. We had been planning to wander around Montreal a little before heading out in late afternoon, but we were too tired from all the late nights. So instead we hung around the lobby. A bunch of people came and went -- there's no way I'm going to remember who-all was there, so I'm not even going to try -- but mostly I listened and wished I had the camera again. Chris Rogers was there, and so I aired a few things I had wanted to mention for next year's con, but mostly it was just sitting there hanging out. Keith David came by wearing a bright blue suit and posed for a picture with everyone. (By the way, whoever took that picture, please get in contact with Norcumi or me. I'd like a copy.) Ultimately we decided we had to head out. We had another meal at the lobby restaurant (while watching the public works department pull up all the manhole covers on the street outside, look underneath them, then close them again) and then headed for Connecticut to visit Norcumi's parents.

One final note on the organization of this year's con. I thought the con went really well this year. The hotel was terrific, the location was great, and organization was good. The hotel staff were incredibly tolerant of con craziness; it astounds me that they even let us make nuisances of ourselves in the lobby as much as we did. The schedule was overly light and had some timing problems -- three of the four interesting events during the day on Saturday were scheduled during the 12:30-1:45 time block -- but that was my only major complaint. Except for this: the staff had a persistent us-against-them attitude which I found highly distasteful. The staff was highly defensive, and anything that looked like it /might/ be a criticism was jumped on with all four feet. During Opening Ceremonies, someone said that they missed Thom. It wasn't a gripe about the con staff, it was just the sort of thing people say when Thom isn't there, just the sort of thing they said at 2002 -- and suddenly Karine was at the microphone berating people for wondering why Thom had been cancelled at the last minute. That's the first example. The second example is the way Keith's schedule was handled. Again, his travel delays weren't the staff's fault, but neither was the staff particularly communicative (though they did try) about what was going on. And finally, to my knowledge, it was /never/ announced that Greg wouldn't be at Closing Ceremonies. I figured it out by looking at the schedule and then asking a staff member, only to get snapped at for my trouble. Now, I don't think /anyone/ would object to Greg leaving early so that he could be there for his daughter's birthday. I don't think anyone would blame that on the staff. But I /do/ think people wanted to know that, so that they could say their goodbyes or whatever. But I never heard it announced. It should have been. The con staff was too busy defending their turf to keep people in the loop. Folks, you can do better than this.

Next year's Gathering looks to be a fun one. The staff really seems to have it together, and the schedule and location should make for interesting times. Honestly, my biggest fear is that we'll be completely overwhelmed. Even if the DVD sells very badly by Disney standards, the Gathering documentary will send lots of new recruits our way, and in the worst case I fear that we'll be completely overwhelmed by con virgins next year. Not that that would be bad from a financial perspective, but the smallness of the Gathering seems to be a major attraction these days. Many of us don't come for the events anymore, but for the people. And if the people have trouble finding each other, it'll be a very different con. We could certainly use some new ideas and new blood, though, so it'll be a mixed blessing no matter what happens.

Spacebabie writes...

Sunday Aug 6

Slept in and woke up in time to get dressed quickly. I slipped into a pair of jeans and my Samwise shirt. I didn't have time to eat. I didn't want to miss Allaine's panel.

Allaine had set up a tape recorder to record our voices for Mooncat who couldn't make it this year. We wrote down names of the characters and mixed them up before he selected a couple. It went well and we decided to use the end for an upcoming fic challenge. With a few extra minutes left Allaine read his entry for the canceled reading challenge. It was funny and the way he read it made it even funnier.

After the panel. Revel and I went to look for Chris Rogers. He wasn't in the dealer room, although I did manage to buy a Brooklyn and Goliath dangler. Now my Lex Dangler won't be so alone. We found out Chris was still asleep.

After he, Kaelyan and Hudson had fully woken and dressed we went to seek food. First place, no food. The sign pointed to the revolving restraint at top. Gregx, Aaron, Mara and eventually Dancer joined us.

After a small wait we were seated and we received our beverages. I had ordered coffee of course. We loaded up our plates with food. I had a croissant, a little cup of blueberry yogurt, scrambled eggs, bacon, crepes, and some potatoes. Mara discovered the chocolate milk at the juice bar and Aaron found the desserts. After eating I reloaded my plate with some cantaloupe, a piece of cake, an éclair, and a slice of raison bread with some chocolate spread.

We ate and talked while studying the scenery. We saw the dome shaped frame that was once part of the expo center, a strange structure that was part of the 1976 Olympics and a large crane with a potential jumper. The police seemed to talk him out of it. Chris agreed to cover the bill as long as we paid him back later. I gave him my last 20 Canadian dollars and promised to pay him the rest back later.

We were rejoined by Lynati in the basment and gathered around a small table while Chris showed us how to gamble via cards. He showed us the positions of the game table and told us when would be a good time to fold. We used the hotel candy as chips to mock gamble with. We played a few rounds until Closing Ceremonies.

Closing Ceremonies is always a depressing time for us. It is a sign the gathering is officially over. The medals were given out to the winners of the clan Olympics and ribbons were given to the artists. We were reminded to prereg for next year before they gave us the official farewell.

After it ended I pre-regged on Chris's laptop. It's been a whole year since I used a laptop, but I eventually figured it out.

After pre-regging I went to exchange some more American cash for Canadian and returned to the art room to see if I won the art I bid on. I did! I won the lovely ink drawing of Demona by Karine and a beautiful marker picture of the trio and Puck riding a shopping cart by Eden.

With my newly acquired art safely placed in Revel and my hotel room I took a small nap while Revel paid for his meal and repaid the rest I owed Chris. After snoozing for a couple of hours Revel and I went to look for people to hang out with before we searched for food. Couldn't find anyone.

We decided to find a Subway and walked along ways to find one. I ordered my favorite combo: Teriyaki chicken with a diet Pepsi and baked lays. We returned to our room and ate while leaving the TV on for background noise. We also watched an episode of South Park and King of the Hill…the voices were waaaaaay off.

Next Up Monday: Theme park day.

Ellen writes...

GATHERING JOURNAL, PART THREE (CONCLUSION)

SUNDAY

Sunday morning brought with it the luxury of sleeping in till 8:30, as opposed to 8:00. Good thing, too; at this point, I needed that extra half hour to prepare for the day. I got to the mezzanine in time to get a couple of authors' signatures in my anthology, then repaired to Allaine's adult round robin. Maybe it was because I knew what to expect, maybe it was because we were all in the same boat of abject exhaustion, but this time around it didn't seem as difficult as the first time, last year in New York. (That happened to be the greatest challenge of my entire writing career, such as it is. There's something about composing prose on the fly, without seeing it or being able to revise it, that frightens me.)

We moved the story along tastefully and seductively, and ended with a neat cliffhanger that we decided would make for an ideal complete-the-story challenge for the sorely-missed Mooncat's Gargoyles X forum. Allaine wrapped up the session by reading aloud a little tale he graciously penned at my urging earlier this year, an account of a sudden-death playoff hole at the British Open golf tournament between Hudson and (if I recall correctly) a "Kim Possible" character named Duff Killigan. Many of you know that Allaine can pen dramatic dialogue with the best of them, but how many of you are aware of his talent at *humorous* dialogue? I laughed so hard I had to wipe tears from my eyes.

I decided then that I needed sustenance to remain vertical for the next few hours, and was happy to find that Kathy and Princess were willing to accompany me upstairs for brunch at Tour de la Ville. We found lovely things to eat and once again had a very enjoyable conversation, with me often gazing glassy-eyed at the handsome city outside as the view gradually rotated around us.

When we went back downstairs, I was dismayed to find that I had missed a substantial portion of the anthology-signing session. However, in retrospect, I would have been far less functional if I hadn't taken time out and eaten something -- again, those trade-offs. Upon joining the group, Christine immediately presented me with a stack of books that I gratefully signed. Just the idea of scrawling my signature upon a story of mine in print, even on as amateur a basis as this, boggled my mind.

As our book-signing wrapped up, Keith David began a question-and-answer session in the same room, in the area where we seated. As he had the previous night, he enthusiastically answered our questions and generously regaled us with tales about his work, and all present listened in rapt attention.

After a while, Karine quietly came up behind us and had us sign, one by one, a copy of the anthology to present to him. "What a nice idea," I thought. As I accepted the book from her and began to open it to my story, I was struck by the irony that I should be signing an autograph for Keith David, as opposed to the other way around.

And then I looked down at the title page of my story, and it hit me: Not only was I signing an autograph for him, I was signing it to a story I had written *entirely from his character's point of view.* From a purely creative standpoint, this was more than big. This was definitive. My story would be read by one of the *co-creators* of this character we know as Goliath.

My hands started trembling.

I took a deep, calming breath, and commenced writing. "Mr. David," I inscribed, "this one's for you. I hope I got it right." I signed my name, handed the book back to Karine, and simply sat, silent and outwardly calm, waiting for the feeling to return to my extremities.

The closing ceremonies had a relaxed feel to them, with the con staff clearly seeing the light at the end of the tunnel and all of us running on empty rest-wise. Mr. David reiterated his intention to attend the next Gathering in Las Vegas, delighting all present. The con staff got nowhere near the applause they deserved (but then, this would have been impossible under any circumstances), and the proceedings wound down in a relatively low-key manner.

I had to bid farewell to Dylan and Stormy at this point, unfortunately. The time with them went entirely too fast.

My two objectives now were to preregister for Las Vegas and to obtain an autograph from Mr. David, who remained his amazingly personable self as he patiently and jovially signed pictures, programs, books, and whatever else we fans scrounged up. He had smiles for everyone.

I had brought with me a black-and-white press-kit sketch of Goliath for him to sign, then it occurred to me: What was there of mine for him to sign, really, but my anthology story? When my turn came, I recounted my earlier experience of signing my autograph to this story in his copy, and his reassurance in reply convinced me that I had nothing to fear from his judgment. Leo was kind enough to take a picture of the both of us. It turned out great.

Once I had preregistered, Allaine, Princess, Leo, Alex Garg, Kelly, and I headed over to the train station for some supper. It was nearby, sure to be open, and relatively inexpensive, but I regret not returning to Movenpick, where the food was far superior. This was negligible, however, in light of the pleasant company. We had some passable sustenance and good conversation. Then Leo, Alex Garg, and Kelly obliged me not only by waiting patiently for me while I changed into my walking shoes back at the hotel, but by letting me haul them up to the top of Mount Royal. I knew *I'd* enjoy the view, but would *they* consider it worth the trek (some of it on rather sketchy trails through the woods necessitated by the reconstruction of the steps to the top)?

They insisted that they did, and the exclamations I heard from them when they first beheld the panorama of the St. Lawrence River Valley made me believe they were being honest.

We enjoyed the view of night settling upon the city, then started downward. We took the long way this time, walking down the dark but wide main path. I took my companions on a shortcut through the McGill campus, then was indulged by them further when they allowed me to buy them a round at one of my old student haunts, an Irish pub farther down University, on our way back to the hotel. Through sheer dumb luck, this little detour delayed us just long enough to enter the hotel lobby about two minutes after my husband did. I made introductions, then bade goodnight and farewell to my fellow hikers.

I took the husband upstairs so that he could drop off his bag, then accompanied him back down for a tall cold one. While we were in the bar, we were joined by a small group that included Princess, Kathy, and Chyna Rose. We enjoyed a conversation that involved immersing my hapless better half in the wonderful world of Gargs fandom in general, and Garg fanfic writerhood in particular. He did fine -- if he was scared, he didn't let it show.

We stayed up well past our bedtimes once more, then shuffled upstairs and collapsed.

MONDAY

The following morning, we slept late, and it felt simply grand. Through confusion and missed communication, however, we failed to join Kathy, Mandi, and Princess for breakfast. I met up with them later for long enough to apologize to them, and then Kenn and I were off to walk the streets of Montreal.

The weather was perfect that day, and I amused Kenn by saying over and over, "I can't believe that I don't have to *be* somewhere in five minutes!" He had (quite accurately) described me as being in "college final-exam all-nighter No-Doz mode" when he met up with me on Sunday night, so this opportunity to wind down was welcomed by both of us. We strolled up St.-Laurent north of Sherbrooke, looped back down St.-Denis a little ways, stopped at Schwartz's for smoked meat, wandered back downtown, and found a lovely little sidewalk café on McGill College. We sat, enjoying the weather, the scenery, the rush of people around us, and the fact that we weren't among them. It was at this point that I felt truly unplugged from the glorious but frenetic Gathering scene.

ET CETERA

Highlights from then on would be of little interest to those reading this account, but they included, in chronological order:

-- Dinner at Gibby's in Old Montreal on Monday night

-- A visit to the Museum of Fine Arts on Tuesday afternoon

-- Dinner with a good friend Tuesday night (the one, ironically enough, responsible for the humorous anecdote with which I regaled Maestro David in the bar)

-- A visit to the basilica of Notre Dame de Montreal on Wednesday

-- A visit to the Montreal history museum in the old city

-- A one-night delay in getting back home, thanks to the hurricanes and what-not obliterating flight schedules up and down the East Coast.

One last Gathering-related anecdote: On Wednesday as we were checking out, we ran into Keith David once more, in the hotel lobby. I introduced him to my husband with the line, "Kenn, this is Goliath," which elicited chuckles all around. Mr. David mentioned that he had begun to read the anthology, and that he was impressed with the quality of the writing and artwork featured in the book. (He mentioned that he was just about to read my story. From this I surmised that he'd read Dylan's by that time, and evidently -- and not at all surprisingly -- liked it.)

When we were finally airborne Thursday morning, I mentioned to Kenn that I was having to put some thought into how I'd respond to the people back home who'd ask me, simply, "How was your trip?" I decided that the most accurate answer to that question would be, "It was an alternate universe." And I have the con staff and my fellow writers and Garg fans, as well as Greg Weisman and Keith David, to thank for that. You folks are something else.

See you in Vegas!

MooncatX writes...

My "ALMOST A GATHERING JOURNAL" Journal =D

Firstly, I have been to previous Gatherings (VA and NY) but wasn't able to attend the Gathering this year in Montreal. Of course I wanted to, because the Gathering is really a wonderful experience for anyone in the Gargoyles fandom. All the ones I've attended have been warmer, friendlier, more fun than anyone could hope for. It's like the ultimate family reunion where you all have these great common interests and are all so happy to get together and have a good time and enjoy the company of people you only get to meet up with in real life at these special Gatherings.

It's not just your fellow fans who are warm and accessible, but the industry people, like Greg Weisman, who is so friendly and outgoing and willing to share his personal thoughts and good humor, that the experience of a Gathering is extra special and memorable.

In any case, I would have loved to have gone, but unexpected family and financial emergencies kept me at homebound for this year. But even though I was many miles away, in Kansas, I didn't feel forgotten or left out. Special friends of mine in the fandom, people I've only met in the flesh at previous Gatherings, were doing their best to catch and save a bit of the event to send to me in a WONDERFUL package I got just the other day. So a most special THANK YOU to Allaine, Princess Alexandria, Seri Wavelength, who called me from the Gathering itself in Montreal to give me updates on everything going on at the convention, and super special thanks to Allaine who went above and beyond the call of friendship to audio tape portions of the convention for me, the round robins and the mug-a-guests and the opening and closing ceremoies... All of which I'm listening to with a very loved feeling and happy heart. I couldn't go to the Gathering, but my friends managed to send a bit of it to me *^_^*

Along with these great tapes, Seri sent me a wonderful piece of art from the convention, whee!!!, I got one of the Gathering schedule booklets which is just grrreat! And most wonderfully Allaine picked up my copy of the Phoenix Gate Anthology and got it signed by everyone there who participated in the book. Which by the way, I've read most of now and it is TOTALLY KICK ASS!!! Art to die for, and some of the best writing I've seen fan or pro, and all terribly enjoyable. If anyone hasn't gotten a copy yet, see if you can because it's so worth it =D

Besides the much appreciated care package, other fans have put up picture galleries, vids and audio files that are so fantastic, and help the fans who didn't get to go have virtual peek at the Gathering. And the Journals, the wonderful, wonderful Gathering Journals, which gives even people who were there an even broader knowledge of events and a richer experience. For those of us who didn't get to go, it's pure gold, every journal eagerly sought and devoured.

So, I'd like to give a big THANK YOU for everyone writing a Gathering Journal and posting it, because it's such a neat opportunity for others to experience through you some of the Gathering. It's so very appreciated.

Well, I'm definately going to be going to the Las Vegas Gathering in 2005, barring having an anvil dropped on my head... Already making plans and preparing for the trip, because I don't want to miss another Gathering if I can possibly get there at all. Viva la Gargoyles!

MooncatX
>^,,^<

Nezumi writes...

The Gathering is one of the most fun conventions I've ever been to. When David and I showed up Friday morning, there was none of that awkwardness that I've felt at other cons. People I'd never seen before online or off invited us to join in their conversations right from the moment we showed up. I never had a chance to be shy.

We disappeared into the dealer's room to set my stuff up for the art show for about an hour. While we were there, Maui showed up to ask people to join the Clan Olympics. I volunteered myself and the boy, but we didn't know anyone to be the other 2 members of the team. Maui solved that problem by giving us to another pair of homeless players. This turned out to be the best thing to happen at the con. I love my clan. We met Reusch and Top Man for the first time that morning. By the end of lunch you couldn't tell that we hadn't been friends for years. And the woman at McDonald's was our arch nemesis. I still wish Reusch had actually tried to eat that salad with the plastic knife or maybe even both forks. We went to some different panels, but our team spent most of the weekend together.

David and I had a blast at the Life Drawing panel. It was very relaxed and there was a lot of fun conversation going on. At least until the TV crew showed up because that's when the reclusive artist instincts seemed to kick in for all of us. If you keep quiet and don't look up, nobody will notice you ^_~ I'm only sorry that we had to miss the second session because of the Hunter's Moon Dash part of the Olympics.

The cosplay was great. There were such cool costumes! The Bronx was my favorite and all because of that little waggly stump of tail on her costume. I went as Anastasia Renard… but nobody noticed. It's not exactly a costume that stands out as one. And really, of everyone at the con only David would know how strange it is for me to be in a dress. I'm glad I dressed up anyway. It was fun ^_^

Spacebabie writes...

Saturday Aug 7

Woke up and washed and dried my hair. I decided to wear my Pirates of the Caribbean shirt. I joined Ellen in the restaurant downstairs and ordered pancakes and a cup of coffee. They placed a variety of fruit on my pancakes including kiwi. The two of us went over our panel notes while we ate.

Christine and our audience were already waiting for us. We assembled at the table and the panel began. We want through various examples and brought up several movies that highlighted our examples before we asked questions.

After the panel I went into the art and dealers room. I voted on the various subjects and bid on a couple of pieces. I went to Alan's table and bout a G200f shirt, pin and Phoenix Gate Anthology.

Next thing I went to was the auction. It was fairly entertaining despite the lack of stripping. One highlight was Siryn chasing after Taras. I managed to win the following: a gargoyles binder, a coloring book, and three action figures: Xanatos, Elisa, and Brooklyn aka No Neck

I had enough time to put away my stuff and come back for the Radio play. Mara sat next to me and I had something to drink and a bag of Crispy Minis to snack on. There was a huge cast this year. The play was the Journey. Michael McAdam was an excellent Vinnie. Revel sounded a whole lot like Broadway. Jen and Ethan played off each other well and so did Chris and Cindy. They earned that huge applause. When Dylan (As Brooklyn) read out his line at the end of the Broadway and Angela kiss there were a few sympathetic awwws. Zehra was an amazing Elisa and Rob made a sessy Goliath. Emambu as Castaway was breathtaking. At end a few audience members wanted to sign up as Quarrymen because of Erik's performance.

Revel:" I told you she would love it." Revel to Erik about his performance. I was the She since I have the same feelings for Jon/Canmore/Castaway as Siryn does for Vinnie. It's scary, I know.

The lighting in the room for the banquet was pretty dim and the candles did not help. It was almost as dark as the banquet from 2000. Revel and I sat at a table with Seri, Chynarose, Kathy, Yrrgdrsl and I think Mandi

The banquet was amazing. We had tasty rye rolls with butter and some water to munch on before the appetizer. I loved the menus and placed mine in my bag to keep as a souvenir. The appetizer was interesting. It almost looked like a work of art and wondered how I was supposed to eat it. I took a picture of it because it was so pretty. I managed to nibble around the edges, eating the large shrimp and the olive before I dove into the shrimp and avocado sauce. I'm a shrimp whore. The salad was good and I loved the dressing. The main course was pleasing to all of my senses except for hearing. I can't remember the last time I had quail. It was hard eating the legs but I managed the veggies. The veggies were good and I loved the round potatoes served in a tortilla shell. The dessert was a perfect finish. I had the fruit charlotte with strawberry coulise. Hmmm it was like a tiramisu.

As were eating our desserts Keith David arrived. The poor guy barely sat down to eat when we began to fire questions.
That was when it started. We were trying to have a Q and A when they decided to strangle cats next store. That was when it sounded like when the group next door made their tragic attempt at Karaoke. I know I can't sing, but these people made could make me sound like Amy Lee from Evanescence.

"Could someone please shoot that horse?"- Keith David

Revel and I left around 8: 15, giving us 45 minutes to change for the Masquerade. Revel draped himself in a towel and sat in the tub while I sprayed in the dye. I used the white for the streak followed by the black on the sides.

I quickly slipped into my outfit: white skirt, peach colored shirt, and a white button up blouse to use as a nurses jacket. I attached the badge on my blouse and slapped band-aids on my heels (to prevent blisters) before I slipped on my heels. I felt sympathy for Eden, Lynati and everyone who put on body make up and rubbed on body shimmer over my shins, arms and dabbed a little on the apples of my cheeks.

We gathered in the room on the left of the banquet. There were many amazing costumes. There was a Fox and a Xanatos from "Eye of the Beholder". It went well with Jade-Griffin's Elisa as Belle. There was an Elisa and Dracon from "Protection." Becca was an adorable Bronx. There was also an Elisa-goyle, Thailog, Banshee, Renaissance Hunter, Quarryman, and Ekidna. Dancer was a princess and Caille as Argentina.

Sapphire's Cosplay was first and I wish I could have seen it. Dancer was next and then it was my turn. I'm getting used to the masquerades. I didn't feel any bit nervous and actually enjoyed strutting my stuff while Jen shouted, "Work it girl."
I sat next to Dancer and took more pictures of the others as they took their poses. The last was Loopy in his AMAZING gargoyle costume and filked "Rubber ducky" as the gargoyle afraid of heights.

During intermission we all waited outside and took more pictures. I interchanged between cameras in my skirt pockets.
A variety of prizes were given out in the forms of ribbons, medals and trophies. Lynati arrived in her Ophelia costume and holy cow it was cool! I won third place for Noncannon.

After the prizes were given out we started to mingle some more, took some pictures. Sapphire and I got onto the dance floor and danced a little bit before Revel and I returned to our rooms. Revel to slip out of his costume and wash out the dye and me to change into some pants and clean off some of the shimmer.

We returned in time to see Keith David finish singing and Watched Allaine sing. I never expected Allaine could sing so well. A pity we missed Erik's singing. I sat next to Mara and I was already feeling my energy had been used up for the day. When the YMCA dancers gathered both Mara and I just placed foot on the floor and tapped along with the music.

"Young man, something, something, something."

Next up Sunday.

Spacebabie writes...

Friday August 6
I forgot what time I woke up but we had a few hours till registration opened. Showered and selected my Ravenclaw shirt and khaki pants to wear. After I exchanged some American for Canadian money Revel and I went to search for food. We found a nice lil café. I had a muffin and a bagel with some coffee.

When we returned to the hotel we ran into Cindy aka Eden, Patrick and a handful of fandom artists. They needed a few hands. We first came in with panel boards followed by the poles. Assembling the poles reminded me of a giant Kinex set.

Several people were gathered around the registration tables and I noticed some familiar faces including Chyna-rose, Seri-wavelength, Allaine, Ellen, and Dylan and many more. I was reintroduced to Dylan's fiancée" Stormy", and Chameleon girl. It was great getting reacquainted with everyone I have talked with via e-mail, message boards, chat rooms and instant messengers.

I was pretty amazed with the program. They were beautifully done and well organized. I noticed my panel was bumped up to noon, giving me a few minutes to glance over some off the program.

I noticed the candies they had set up for the panel table. I had a good number of attendants. The whole panel got turned into a running gag about Macbeth and his dinghy.

Shortly after I glanced back into the dealers room and bought a few books from Tim Morgan. Christine was there to sing them including the gift for my father. I came across Karine in the room. She asked how my panel went and I told her it was great and I apologized about not finding any Shock Tarts for her. She was able to find some in Montreal.

The Next panel I attended was Greg's voice acting seminar. That was when the DVD camera crew arrived. Greg was instructing the crowd how to voice act and asked CrzyDemona's help to read for Demona. She did that too well. He gave the script to Seri and he gave a few pointers after she read. The other scenes performed were form M.I.A and Awakening pt1. Greg even told a story about Carol Channing and a chiffon blouse.

Afterwards it was Eden's costume panel. I learned how to take care of wigs: create wings, tales and brow ridges. I also learned two good kinds of body paint to use.

I was starving afterwards. Revel ad I walked uphill to find a place for food. We found a McDonalds and to my disappointment a quarter ponder with cheese is not a Royal with Cheese. It was still food and the fries were a bit salty but it was good to have something to nibble on during opening ceremonies.

The welcoming pitches were excellent and for the 2005 pitch Chris looked sharp in his suit. The clan Olympics took everyone by Surprise but they were fun to watch. It is always great to see the newbies and the spin off pitches again.

The evening ended with "The not quite so blue" Mug a guest. It was hard to squeeze all who wanted to come on the room, but we managed. The highlights that were included were:
Several details about the DVD.
The fact "Angels in the Night" could have been much worse.
CrzyJen making fun of Erik's soup.
Greg making fun of Liz falling asleep.
Siryn crawling under my legs to get under the table.
My own legs falling asleep.

I had to leave early to get a good night's sleep to prepare for the next day.

Next up Saturday

Abram WinterSmith writes...

Here is that last chunk of it...sorry about that.

Everyone who approached me to sign their Phoenix Gate Anthology, thank you for giving me the privilege of scrawling my name and heartfelt thanks in there. Writing for that book was a big step for me, and to know that there are people out there who are enjoying that story is enough to keep me inspired, and to continue plugging away at something deep down inside I truly love. To Cindy for encouraging me to gather up the courage to write that story, and to Christine Morgan, who helped me refine it.

To Kythera, thank you for giving me something of your heart, I consider that a privilege and a wonderful distinction. Love you much, sis.

To Greg Weisman and Keith David. Thank you both for making the trek to Montreal to attend this year's Gathering. Greg, I don't usually get a chance to speak with you all that much, but when I do it's fascinating, entertaining, and thoughtful. You're a great gentleman, and it just wouldn't be the same without you. Keith, it was pleasure to see you again, and a great honor to meet your family. After seven years, despite the changes in your life, both personal and professional, you've remained the same down-to-earth, wonderful human being (or gargoyle) that I met back in 1997. Bless you both.

Last and not least, to everyone who came to the Gathering, to each and every one of you whom I've had the pleasure and joy to meet and speak with. It's a moving feeling to know that one is welcomed somewhere, and despite the dark hours, one is truly never really alone. Thank you for your companionship, kind words, cheers, jeers, and laughter.

Now THAT'S it…nothing left to say except for:

SEE YOU IN 2005! VEGAS!
DREAM WELL!

Scott "Abram" Rogoff

Abram WinterSmith writes...

Greg, you asked for a Gathering 2004 Journal. Here is my contribution:

The 8th Annual Gathering of the Gargoyles
A Convention Journal by Scott "Abram" Rogoff

This is the fifth Gathering convention that I have had the pleasure and privilege of attending, so I figured it was about time to start the tradition of writing a Gathering Journal. I'm not entirely sure why I decided that this was the right time to do it…being someone who is somewhat good with the written word, it would make sense to write something about a convention that I've grown incredibly fond of. Add this notion to the fact that I've been regularly updating a LiveJournal for over two and a half years and it's pretty much a no-brainer at this point. I know that I've got a lot of mental notes of the other four Gatherings that I've attended in 1997, 1998, 2000, and 2002, but I will wait just a little while longer to write about those. The matter at hand (or talon in this case?) is to relate what happened in the most recent past. Sit back, and enjoy the read…I hope this proves to entertaining.

"Hey! You Could Fly Over Here and We Can Drive Up!"

I met Shaun "BrooklynX" Donagher at the 2000 Gathering, but for the life of me I couldn't remember what he looked like until this weekend. I think I ran into him in Sapphire's Raptor Chat and we began to talk in there, and then over AIM, and eventually we added each other to our LiveJournal Voyeur's lists. Being writers, we both seemed to be full of all sorts of zany and cool ideas, which culminated in the creation of several storylines, though I'm not sure if any of them will make it to a more public forum. We've been having fun with it, and exchange the frequent smart-assed remarks back and forth…this sort of behavior often marks the start of a good friendship.
We were talking about the 2004 Gathering and discussing matters such as rooming and transportation. Originally neither of us had any room mates picked out, but we both needed to find one in order to make the hotel price a bit more on the reasonable side…so we decided to room together. (Flanker and Mike would later join the mix). I figured Shaun already had his plane ticket to Montreal already purchased, but he then mentioned to me that he hadn't…so drawing from my innate like of road trips, I offered to drive him up to the Gathering if he flew into Rochester. The move would actually save him over a hundred dollars, and it would be a lot of fun too. So before I knew it, I had a travel buddy. So already this was going to be fun trip, and it was going to start a little earlier than the Gathering.
At this time Siryn was still in Rochester and I think I extended the offer to her to drive up with Shaun and myself, and then I found out she was moving away from the area. However, she did offer to get me in contact with Sarah McEvoy…AKA "Sarah the Great". After spending five days traveling and hanging out with her, I know she's fitting of the namesake; a wonderful and funny person she is, and a great travel buddy as well. We spent some time making phone calls to one another and planning things, and before we knew it, everything was set up…our Journey to and from The 8th Annual Gathering was to begin on the 4th….

Wednesday, August 4th - Yes, It Started THAT Early…

It's funny how at the Gathering and the events leading up to it I'm suddenly willing to wake up extremely early to get things done. When the alarm clock buzzed at 6:30am I practically jumped out of bed, full of energy. Shaun's flight was to arrive around 10:40 and there was no way that I was going to be late to pick him up. I quickly prepared a sizable cue card and wrote "SHAUN PUP" in big green and silver letters, a very quick job, but it was quite noticeable. A few businessmen gave me a few funny looks and an older woman asked me if my dog could actually read signs. I shrugged and told her he was a German Shepard, so he damn well better be able to read. She made a funny noise and walked away, about ten minutes before Shaun actually came walking up the ramp, I knew him from the Weird Al shirt. Leaving the sign behind we started on the pre-Gathering preparations: The procurement of chocolate and Pocky.
We headed to the Asian Food Store in Henrietta and grabbed about five boxes of Pocky, and a bottle of ginger dressing that Liz requested, the keepers of the store asked us what we were going to do with all that stuff and we mentioned the Gargoyles Convention…they were pretty keen on that. Next was to Godiva Chocolateer to pick up the order I placed with them…some 75 bars of their chocolate on sale, all varieties…sadly only one white chocolate bar left in the entire store, but milk, dark, raspberry, and almond bars filled the order out nicely; they would do for the little surprise I had planned for the Convention Staff…anybody who is reading this knows full well how evil I am.
Mwu. Ha. Ha.
It was about 3pm by the time Shaun and I got back to my place, and he was pretty exhausted, I was beginning to feel tired too, so we chilled out a bit. He had picked up Doom 3 at Best Buy on our way home so he was busy installing that, and I went out to go get some preparation stuff for dinner. Sarah the Great arrived shortly after that, and we got to meet each other for the first time…again. She presented me with a bottle of raspberry wine, which was very sweet of her. We woke up Shaun and we got to catch up with one another, we talked a lot about politics, some Gargoyles stuff, and basically got all bouncy about the convention. Dinner was good save for the sudden attack by a juice-spitting hamburger as I was grilling it, but the clothes got washed and everything was fine after that. We kept on talking until a little before sundown and then grabbed some Seneca Farms Ice Cream for dessert. Anyone who visits my place during the Summer will almost certainly wind up coming to Seneca Farms either for ice cream, fried chicken, or both.
After some more talking, Shaun decided to offer up a movie, and we all watched "Hellboy", which was cool for the visual effects, a little thin on story, but still a good film…I'm going to see it again with Leva, and I'm still looking forward to it. Funny how it took a Gathering to finally get me to hook up my DVD Player. ;) We then went to pack the car, having decided to take just my Neon….at first it seemed like a bad idea, but we fit all of my stuff, all of Sarah's stuff, Shaun's equipment and prints, and the Clan Olympics crap into the thing, and still had room for ourselves. HUZZAH! We all then headed to bed, for we knew we were going to have one heck of a day ahead of us.

Thursday, August 5th - I Wanted to be on the Metric Clock: 100 Hours a Day…

Waking up at 7:30am, we all headed down to have some breakfast and get our final trip preparations set up. Sarah took the front seat, she was going to be my navigator because of her fondness for maps, of which I had absolutely no argument against. Shaun took the seat behind and was…Color Commentary…because all road trips need one of those. Before we knew it, I had burned a bagel, Sarah had the trip planned and I was ready to start driving. We were OFF TO CANADA!
Trip went extremely quickly, we got to the New York State Thruway and covered the first 70 miles or so in a little over an hour before hitting Route 81 North right up to the Canadian Border…but we needed to stop at the Duty-Free Shop for the obligatory alcohol purchase. About the only time I will purchase hard liquor freely is when it's not taxed, and I found some Godiva White Chocolate Liquor…HAD to pick up a bottle of that stuff, but decided at the last minute to put it toward The Evil Plan. We each picked up a bottle of booze, Shaun picked up one for Karine, and Sarah grabbed some for herself. Always a nice way to shop, beats the local liquor store.
Customs was pretty routine, but I was nervous. After all, I hadn't been to Canada in four and a half years. I knew I had to have a passport now, and had that out of the way. After the questions were answered, the Canadian Border Patrolwoman told me I should sign my passport before going back to the United States so I wouldn't get into any trouble. We're pulling away and out of the blue I half-yell "Suckers!", not knowing that Shaun had not yet rolled up his window. Luckily, no flashing lights or sirens were following the car, so I think the little faux pas went unnoticed, though we all shared a pretty good laugh over it and then pulled into a Service Centre for a Wendy's run…I did some Instant Lottery and found out that the terminals play a jingle when you cash in a winner. I already knew I was going to play, since going to the Casino Montreal was more than likely not going to happen. Besides, I put a sum of money aside just to play with my Latex Fixation (one of these days, this may lead to pointy ears, gargoyle feet, and other stuff that may lead to a costume…).
We arrived on the outskirts of Montreal around 2:30pm or so, and we began to search for the Hotel. Shaun pointed vaguely in the direction of the Live Meet Location, so that was cool. After passing that we began to get into the more stop-and-go traffic of Montreal heading toward Center-Ville. After overshooting the hotel by about ten minutes we backtracked and made it to the Delta Center-Ville, our home for the next five days and four nights…in a real nice section of downtown Montreal. It was weird to finally be back to this city after four and a half years. From 1997 to about 2000 I would visit Karine, Genvieve, and that whole crew on a pretty regular basis, usually during the Spring. I remembered Rue University, old Montreal (which I regrettably didn't get to see much of this time), and LaRounde. This was the first time that I was going to stay at a hotel and enjoy the hospitality of Montreal, and after the four nights were up, I can say that it was one of the best hotels I've had the pleasure of staying in.
Shaun and I checked in, and we ran into Cindy, Talyesin, Karine, Karlyl, Sapphire, and a few others over that afternoon. Finally got to meet Kaylee too, which was very cool; always a wonderful feeling to put a face and voice behind the online persona. Old favorites soon followed up, like Crzy Demona, Siryn, and Liz. Gatherings are like family reunions in a way, only you don't necessarily want to kill the people you're meeting, and your cheeks don't get pinched nearly as much, if at all. The convention staff all went their ways to get things prepared, and I went up to the 14th floor to claim my bed…and shortly afterward met John Clemens, AKA "Flanker", he and I hit it off right away and I spent a lot of time just hanging out with him over the four days up there.
Since I brought my Gamecube up, as per the plan with Sapphire, I decided to hook it up and practice (if Liz was a good as she said she was, I would need it!)…and it was one of THOSE television sets…the ones where you couldn't hook up a game system without a special plug. No problem, went up the mall on St. Catherine's and got one at Radio Shack, also had a late lunch with Flanker as well. Subway is good in any country. We walked around, got used to the uphill/downhill trekking, and made it back to the hotel. The 'Cube began to work, and I enjoyed some MarioKart for a little bit before wandering around and exploring the hotel some more.
Sarah the Great joined Flanker and I as we began to explore Montreal some more and we wandered about into old Montreal, which was just as pretty as I remembered it. We caught a few of the sights, contemplated dinner at one of the fine restaurants, but decided against it, and just wandered around some more until we hit the fine cuisine of Tim Hortons, a place which I will probably go out of my way to eat at from now on. The three of us discussed a few topics, mainly politics and the state of affairs in the United States, Bush Worries, and other things. Three Gargoyles Fans and not a bit of discussion on gargoyles, go figure, but it was a liberating experience to be able to talk current events without getting my head bitten off for saying the "wrong thing". Good food, great friends, and awesome conversation…who could ask for more?
We all headed back to the hotel afterwards, and I caught up with Wingless, Seth Jackson, Kyt-Sis, Norcumi, Gorebash, and a few others (if I forgot your names, I'm sorry, there was just so many of you!). Found out that Kyt was rooming right next to me, so she and I went back up to my room and I presented her with the copy of "Final Fantasy: Origins" I was hoarding, and the hint book that went with it. It was worth seeing the look on her face. She and I talked for a bit, and then we headed back down to do some more catching up. Seth and I talked video games, Wingless and I spoke a bit, but I mostly just basked in the happiness of seeing old friends, and being in the company of new ones.
MAui, Arno, and Dubble all came by shortly afterwards, and shortly after, MAui and I began to plot and plan for the first Clan Olympics event; as in how we wanted to pull it off and get it done. We also brainstormed on just what in the Hell the event "A Shot in the Dark" would entail. As we plotted in the hotel lobby, I believe Jade Griffon ran up to me and gave me a hug, we spoke briefly then and there too…and Gorebash and I caught up a little. By this time, I was going into sensory overload, but in an extremely happy way. Eventually, MAui and I went back to my room and I showed off my work on the Clan Olympics, and she showed me the cards she worked on…everything looked awesome: so well-done and professional-looking. She really outdid herself on that, and I think her efforts really made this year's competition special.
At this point, I remembered that our 4th Roomie, Mike Cohen, was probably downstairs in the hotel lobby, probably about ready to lynch me. I made it down to the lobby and began looking for anyone with an orange shirt…and lucked out, for Mike was the only one dressed in orange. I led him back up to the room, helped get him settled in and then went back to planning and plotting with MAui until we both got tired. Shaun Pup eventually came back from the Con Staff dinner with Greg Weisman, and we settled down for bed, knowing that at about eight thirty in the morning, we would be all out and about.

Friday, August 6th - We Have Infiltrated…

MAui and I woke up early to walk up to St. Catherine's and search for Cheap Plastic Award Medals…a mission that ended in failure, but it gave us plenty of exercise. We walked around the Eaton Centre and searched through those teeny bopper shops, but nothing really jumped out at us. Oh well, one would figure that this being an Olympic year in general they would be easier to find. Note to self: buy them in bulk…
Since we only got one team to pre-register for the Clan Olympics, we decided a few days before the convention, along with Liz, to set up a table for prospective teams. I sent out Sarah the Great to cull the Gathering Attendees and find some suitable quartets. It didn't take long before the first of seven teams to register, and the mix was very impressive; the 2005 Gathering Staff put up a team, a few teams of Con Virgins, and the Arcadians all put up their bids for the cheap non-metal medals this year. I brought out "Billy" for the first time (he's that ridiculous-looking grinning kid, he probably weaseled his way into a bunch of photos…). We had a full compliment of teams by about 3pm or so, which made me a very relieved man. Also over this time I got to talk a little more with Talyesin and enjoyed speaking with him. Tried badgering CrzyDemona into putting up a Clan Olympics team this year, but she turned me down, and also chatted with people in general, which is always a fun thing to do at a Gathering.
In the middle of all of this, and preparing for a couple of the games, I heard a guy ask what this was all about, and wound up face to face with one of the Disney DVD Cameramen. Brain goes on automatic and I just start calmly stating how the Clan Olympics started, what they were all about, and how it all worked…and blabbered about how good the fandom was in general, being so tightly-knit and all. Honestly, I haven't the slightest clue if I actually sounded decent or wound up being a bloated moronic ass about the whole thing. It seemed to last much longer than it did, mainly because of being nervous as Hell...after all, when one could potentially be speaking in front of thousands of people who buy the DVD on December 7th, 2004, one tends to get a bit scared. I can only imagine how Chris Rogers, Hudson, Karine, and anyone else who got interviewed would feel. But what are you going to do, run away? Become silent? Nah, just say what's on your mind and let the viewers in on the fun, and who knows…maybe we'll get a bunch more people in on the Gatherings in the coming years.
Around 5pm or so I manage to track down MAui and we decide to finally look at the room where the Opening Ceremonies are…and that's when everything began to sink in, we were going to steal the show in the middle of everything. Now I know Liz, Anne, and I all planned this ahead of time, and the staff also knew what we were up to. However, as the two of us worked on walking to the sides of the dais in unison and then went through our cue cards, I had one overriding thought going through my head: "They are SO going to kick our ass about this!" When you plan on flinging some 400 balls around a room in front of a live audience and in front of the people hosting the convention you're attending, there was call to be nervous. In about thirty minutes, we both felt somewhat comfortable with what we were doing. Even if we weren't, it was way too late to back out now.
I run up to grab the ball pit, MAui grabs the sunglasses, and we take our seats at the back of the room, and when Liz spoke the pre-determined trigger words, we slowly walked up, circular cue cards in hand, and just lurked on either side of the dais table. We take one look at one another, give the thumbs up sign like a pair of blues brother-and-sister, with some Matrix-like flair, and we hold up the first cards…and then drop them to reveal our first words. I didn't expect the crowd to react like they did, but they genuinely seemed to like what we did.
I introduced the teams for the Clan Olympics, and they all came on up, cheered, and whooped it up. Then many of them went into semi-shock when we announced that the first event would be RIGHT NOW. MAui grabbed the Holey Shirts, and I wheeled the balls to the center back, and before long, everyone was psyched up to do the event, and the crowd got to see first hand what this was all about. In two minutes it was over, and we were counting things, determining the first team to be on the chopping block. We took our "victims" out of the room and said "we now return you to your regularly-scheduled Opening Ceremonies…" I think the audience and staff really liked it…and then our first eliminated team began to smile when MAui and I let them in on the secret that they would be able to come back as "Spirits" and haunt the surviving teams.
After briefing the Dark Knights about their new role, I went back into the Opening Ceremonies and watched Greg Weisman speak about the whole Gargoyles phenomenon and he shared with us the original pitches for the show, pitches for some other shows, and audio tapes of Ed Asner, Greg Guler, and a few others. Another treat was an audio tape of the Atlantis series, which had Demona in it…and for some strange reason it sounded a lot like an erotic fantasy…but then again I think my mind was in the gutter…as were others. At the end of the presentation, the message was pretty clear: tell friends about Gargoyles, let them, know that the DVD comes out on December 7th, and that this is the last chance to push it…make or break time. The Opening Ceremonies concluded and MAui and I presented Greg with eight bars of Godiva Chocolate, since no team won that prize, and there was more than enough to go around.
I flitted about with the convention goers for another hour and a half or so, met a lot more people and was able to pal around some more before needing to pick up everything for the second Clan Olympics event. I managed to sneak in on the tail end of Jade Griffin's "Mystery Gargoyles Theatre 3000", an event which I wish I had attended because I LOVE that sort of thing. However, there was more work to do…fun work mind you, but still work. Got about half of the ballroom cleared out and set up our "Shot in the Dark" shooting gallery. The first quartet of Spirits made their way into the darkened room, grinning evilly, and were anxiously awaiting their first opportunity to mess with Clan Challanged: Part Duex…the team that refused to save them from elimination.
The surviving teams found out that the Dark Knights had crossed over to the Dark Side of the games, and were going to be trying to keep them from scoring points. The twist seemed to work quite well for that event, and it was enjoyable. People were throwing Koosh Balls around, the Squishy Soccer Balls saw some action…one guy was whipping them clear across the room and hitting targets…a real deadeye there. In the end everyone seemed to enjoy it, and the Defective Gargoyles got eliminated, Clan Challanged refusing to save anyone again. That's how the cookie crumbles, and they seemed to have some evil plans set up for the next event, which would take place the next morning.
Alright, survived the first day of Gathering, made it through the first two events, and things are going great. Everyone is having a good time, I'm feeling pretty damn good at the moment, and aim to find something to do. Originally wanted to do the Blue Mug-A-Guest, because I never really got a chance to do it before…wasn't going to happen this time around because the room there was PACKED, you couldn't even open the door…I knew this from Shaun, who was sitting propped up against the wall, waiting to deliver a VCR to the con suite. It was right then and there that I realized that I hadn't eaten a damn thing since last night. That was bright….so I'm looking around for people who hadn't gone to sleep or out to see Montreal at night, wind up saying hi to the crew in MAui's room, asked someone to walk with me to Tim Horton's…just didn't comfortable walking alone at night in the city, even one as nice and clean as Montreal…my New York City heritage rearing its ugly head.
Originally, no one was able to join me, so I wandered about, tried the "Liquid Dinner" thing and realized that wasn't going to work all that well…I really needed someone to walk with, and share dinner with. Countess then decided to join me, and I was very grateful for that. Got a chance to get to know someone new, and found out she lives in Montreal, which was good to know. We also talked about my past, explained where I came from, how I got to be, and all that…mainly just rambling, but she either really enjoyed getting to know the man behind Abram, or was just humoring me for the hell of it. In any case, I was appreciative for the company, and we left back for the hotel with much milk in hand, a rarity at most conventions.
Countess went to bed, I wished the Arcadian Room goodnight, and I plodded back up to my room, and ran into Kythera, whom I gave my last chocolate milk to…she's a major fan of the stuff like I am. ^_^ We shared a milk and some tired friendly grunts and words, and then decided to collapse…Shaun was already in bed, and the VCR was in tow. Flanker and Mike soon made their way back and we all finally wound down for some much-needed rest….

Saturday, August 7th - Breakfasts of Champions, Spirits, Pictionary, and Shyness.

At conventions, you don't sleep…it really doesn't matter if you're on the Convention Staff or are a Program Presenter, or if you're new to these get-togethers. Either you have something to do or somewhere to be, or you actually want to be up early to enjoy being with friends for as long as possible. At Gatherings, I'll happily wake up at 8am, or even seven or six in the morning if it meant hanging out with good people. So when that alarm rang I was all ready to go, and had all my stuff ready to go for the next Clan Olympics event.
Ran down to Arcadia Room to grab MAui, who was still asleep, so I simply went ahead to set up for Trivia Torture, the third event for the weekend. The first people who entered the auditorium were the members of the Green Dragons: Sapphire, Chameleongirl, Karlyl, and Kyffin. I don't know what it was, but that really made my morning when they came in and took their seats. Of course I was still setting up, running late like I usually did. MAui soon joined us, and then my co-host and I set everything else up as the other teams filed in for the Trivia Torture, with Billy grinning like a constipated evil genius behind me.
The event was pretty well-received, especially the torture part of it. MAui and I took turns reading the questions and teams scrambled to "Buzz In" by writing their answers on pads and hoisting them into the air as quickly as possible. Bonus cards were picked by teams, who earned points, all while ripping off targets from their opponents. Lanny actually came up and grabbed a pair of cards, which put another member of his team on the chopping block, and then he picked the "Abram 1-up", which put ME on the chopping block with his two hapless teammates. In the end, one of the 2005 Con Staff got her hair colored, Lanny got to enjoy toothpaste with an orange juice chaser, and I discovered the culinary perfection which is Godiva Chocolate dunked in Montreal's Finest Bleu Cheese Dressing. It wasn't all that bad, except for the whole chocolate and salad dressing part…I think there are some blackmail pictures floating around of me with this horrible disgusted look on my face as I choked my punishment down.
We're all having a grand all time, eating toothpaste and orange juice, sucking down Godiva and Bleu Cheese, and spray-painting our hair for a good hour, and it came down to the Green Dragons and Arcadia International. Both teams had a major shot of winning this event until one of the Spirit Teams decided to screw over the Dragons…which didn't sit well with them. (Frankly, I don't blame them). Since I already laid down the ground rules on Friday I really couldn't do much about it without upsetting someone, so like an yutz I let it stand. The last thing I ever want to do is upset people, so seeing the event end on such a sour note made me feel bad…things got smoothed over a bit after a while, and at the very least I know that rules will need to be streamlined a bit better. Live and learn, I suppose. Also have to make it clear that the games are spectator-friendly; people -can- come in and watch the proceedings and root teams on. That was one of my "Stupid Guy Moments."
I spent some time wandering around the convention afterwards, checking out the artwork in the show and looking at the dealer's room booths. Took some time to vote on the art show awards and place my ballots out. A lot of excellent illustrations this year, it was hard to pick winners for all the categories that were given. I did the best I could and went ahead and voted for what I thought deserved it, only way to do it, really. Oogled over Liz's artwork, marveled at Karlyl's, and Jade Griffen's…and Karine's and Talyesin's…so much wonderful work, so little time. Maybe next year, if I keep myself on schedule, I'll have the first of my "Talon-Etched" pots to throw into the mix. However, illustration still remains a medium that I continue to admire, and give praise for where it's deserved…and practically everyone in that show did.
It was about this time that MAui and I walked up to Eaton Centre to try to find those elusive Cheap Plastic Gold Medals, but we merely wound up finding chintzy crap that didn't suit our needs. Kind of sucked, but what can you do? It was a good walk, anyway. MAui went to Tim Horton's, and I went back to the hotel to prepare for the next event, and to regroup a bit.
Really Difficult Pictionary was a hit at the 2002 Convention, and this year I happened to be extra evil and got some true doozies for our surviving teams to sketch out. I think the best score was 4 out of 10, so I felt a little guilty about that, but not too much guilt since everyone had an awesome time. The "Secret Bonus Event" was revealed as a version of the "Three Strikes" game from the Price is Right…and a bit of "Press Your Luck" thrown in for that. I'm a sucker for game show references. In the end, it was Arcadia International, the Mexinadians, Clan Challanged: Part Deux, and Team Canadian Body Massage going to the final four…and they got their Collection Bins to prove it. The Final Four got a chance to decorate their boxes with team logos and pictures. "Poutine Grande" is an image that will be etched into my head for the rest of my life…and one of these days I will serve Poutine in a Taco Shell to Top Man, whom I believe was the person who dreamed up of that monstrosity. Funny thing is, it might actually taste pretty good…stranger culinary feats have occurred, after all.
Robert and Flanker asked if they could do the rest of the Really Difficult Pictionary sets and MAui agreed to it. I busied myself throwing out paper and trash that had been amassed by our drawing antics…when I got back up there they were still at it…and Robert celebrated in his ability to get all ten of his clues in the four-minute time limit. Either a sense of pointless pride or a need to be included overrode me and I stepped up to the drawing board…and also managed to get 10 out of 10, and in slightly less time, proving that I can play the games as well as organize and make them up. There were some 30 or so people in La Terrence playing Pictionary and having a blast, that was the main point of the whole thing, and the spirit of the games definitely seemed to be with us.
Just as we finished cleaning up our mess and putting back huge pads did Talyesin call out and ordered us all to the auditorium for the Radio Play, something I was looking forward to. In 1998, I actually auditioned for Greg's radio play and got a minor role (which eventually led me to find out more about Spike than I bargained for…one of the funnier convention memories I hold, but that's for another Gathering Diary). However, I haven't quite worked up the courage to try out for another one yet, and Clan Olympics takes up a big chunk of my time anyway. One year I may go for another Radio Play role. When I got into the auditorium, I was actually pretty glad I wasn't part of the play, but only for the reason that the entire front area in front of the seats was PACKED.
There were some 30 roles in this year play, and it was based on "The Journey" I believe…everyone did an excellent job, especially Talyesin as Goliath, and the guy who played Vinnie. A lot of other friends were involved, and honestly every last one of them really made it a success. The whole thing kicked major butt, and being a spectator to it was a great break from all of the running around. Already looking forward to what will happen at the next radio play.
I was invited to dinner by the Arcadia Clan…those whom I remember the names to are MAui (of course), Arno, Beedoo!, Dubble, Countess, and Robert, those whose names I don't remember, I'm sorry…but if you tell me, I -will- edit this. ;) We all took the trek to St. Catherine's and eventually found the Hard Rock Café of Montreal…in the middle of an open-air street festival which was rocking and hopping. We all got some inside seats and socialized to the music. I scratched Beedoo!, chatted with Robert, and laughed as Arno suggested a line of T-shirts based on his "Evil Makes Me Sad" T-Shirt (if you haven't seen this shirt, you MUST…it's really adorable!)…stuff like "Evil Makes Me Happy!" and "Evil Makes me Mad!"…then out of nowhere, there was "Evil Makes Me Want to Pee!" which gave most of us some really messed up mental images. We all enjoyed various dinner items, I had the pulled pork sandwich, because I was craving it…and we passed around a napkin cartoon a few times. MAui, Robert, Arno and I exchanged evil genius faces. It was a great dinner with some awesome friends, I just wished I could have shared similar dinners over the other nights, but I tend to forget to eat at Gatherings…
On the way back to the hotel, Robert spotted a Laser Quest arena and had to stop to check rates. He had this really great idea of getting a group of Gargoyles Fans together after closing ceremonies and basically take over the Laser Quest for three games. Hell, I'm all for it…I even played in that very arena waaaay back in April of 1997 with Melissa, Mae Li, Karine, Adrianna, Dark One, and others at the original Montreal Mini-Gathering. I wasn't going to miss this one for the world! We started to plot for that and get the word out that night during the costume ball.
At this point, I went up to my room to start working on part of the surprise I had in store for the Convention Staff…it was hard at first to put words to paper, but I think what I ultimately wrote was honest and heartfelt, but more on that later. Half of the ballroom I spent in the hotel room, struggling to deal with a slight panic attack…I tend to get very shy at times…I can get up and act like a total putz in front of a bunch of people when it needs to be done, like the Clan Olympics, but when I try to do such things for myself, I tend to not be able to…but this time around I was able to spend about half of the time actually wandering around and socializing a bit…especially with Flanker, Gorebash, Arno, and a few others that were in attendance.
Gorebash and I had a very nice conversation; we caught up with one another and told each other what we were up to. He's a guy whom I always considered a good friend, but never got much of a chance to hang out with. Come to think of it, a lot of people I consider friends I don't hang out with much…already working to correct that, bit by bit. One of the things I would love to do in the early fall is get a few Gathering folks together and do a wine tasting and brunch, and maybe even do a Spring Get-Together as well…bring back the Mini-Gatherings…there's no reason to not attempt them, really…and call me overly-nostalgic, I would love to see at least a few people more than just once a year.
During the early part of the ball I got a chance to listen to Keith David sing, and ran into his wife and his kids, but didn't realize it until he/they introduced me. Last time I saw Mr. David was in 1997, where he spoke with Karine and I…another very fond memory. He now has a beautiful family and is such an accomplished actor in many mediums. It was an honor and a pleasure to see him again after seven years. We spoke briefly about Gathering with a few others, and Flanker discovered his enjoyment of swordplay, which made his face light up…always a great thing.
After a rocky start of the evening it turned out to be quite a nice night after all. I managed to stay downstairs longer than I anticipated, it felt comfortable, and I was among people I cared about. I got to see some wondrous costumes; including Laurean as Tom and Kaylee as Princess Catherine, both were beautiful. Karine and Cindy did a perfect Pregnant Fox and Titania. There were some excellent gargoyle costumes also around, and someone even went as Echidna…I will always have a soft spot in my heart for snake women, and the people who have the talent and gumption to dress up as them. Karaoke was also fun, and some people in this fandom have truly beautiful voices. I remember one young lady on stage singing her heart out…and her mother hid behind Gorebash and me so she wouldn't be spotted…she wanted to hear her daughter sing, and that was really cool in my eyes, a mother supporting her daughter like that.
Eventually things started to wind down and we began to wander off to our separate ways. I tried finding Hudson's room to hang out and challenge Kaelyan to a round of Soul Calibur II, but failed to locate him. Next year, or next time he comes down to my place, his ass is mine. (Yes, that's a challenge…^_~) I stopped by the Arcadian Room and said my goodnights, and then wandered about the hotel for a little while longer, just taking in the beauty of it…visualizing all of us in our Station Eight Gargoyle Personas, lounging against rafters, relaxing and just hanging out in general. It was a real good visual to end the third night in Montreal. I found my room shortly after, and sleep soon found me…

Sunday, August 8th - The Hunt Is On, time to Get Zappy…

Had to wake up extra early this morning to get the final preparations for the Hunter's Moon Dash done and over with…needed to talk to the manager of the pool area and get her permission to hide the ball pit and MAui there, which she did, so that was cool. Went down to the gift shop and gave the clerk there one of the squishy soccer balls to put up "for sale"…and she did a truly wonderful job in displaying it rather inconspicuously. A few teams caught sight of it before the event, but didn't realize what was going on until later. Last night I sorted ball pit balls, taking out all but three yellow ones from the ball pit, and putting the rest in a container in a visible, but out of the way place. Also planted the shiny bags and the Sack Of DOOM tickets around, as well as giving more to the spirits. The last Clan Olympics event…finally!
Our teams filed into the terrace area with their decorated boxes, which overall I think was a great idea. There was a lot of spirit and excitement involved and it was going to culminate in the mad dash around the hotel looking for things like floor mats, plungers, diapers, and other assorted weird stuff. MAui and I did some last-minute plotting, and Flanker came strolling in with his "Billy For President" box, and my navy comforter! He must have overheard something, but he didn't get away with it…I took the blanket from him and told him to play nice. Gave him credit for trying though…and got to admit; seeing Billy plastered all over his container was quite funny. All of the boxes were wonderfully done, too…still like the 404 Error message drawn on the Arcadian Box also.
As the final team members made their way into the starting area, MAui ran off to take her position poolside on the 4th floor, which was right in view of the elevators. I briefed the Arcadians, Body Massagers, Mexinadians, and Challanged clans about the rules, and how everything was going to go down. I answered questions, and the tension and excitement mounted…and then the 45-minute countdown began and the Arcadians were off…the other three teams left within two and a half minutes of one another, intent on finding everything first.
Things were going well and good and rather mundane as teams collected the easier of the items, and then the Arcadians went on a tear on Bonus Items! I remember Arno and Dubble leading Karine to their box and getting her to stand in it for the full half-minute required for their big bonus. I wish I had taken a picture of that, because that moment was rather funny. Arno found my 2 by 4 in the Dealer's Room and sprinted it back to his box, and that was followed by a couple of squishy balls and a bunch of business cards. All the while, even the teams who weren't doing as well seemed to have a blast searching for all this stuff, and I think the gift shop lady took a shine to us when she began selling little souvenir birds and shot glasses. The 45 minutes was over way too soon, and it was time to tally up the scores…I think everyone knew that Arcadia International dominated the event and won the whole thing, but I didn't want to make the official announcement until the Closing Ceremonies. Besides, I still needed to find Cheap Plastic Medals somewhere in Montreal!
After cleaning up and thanking the hotel staff for their cooperation, I met up with Mike Cohen and Sarah the Great to go out for some lunch, and to search for the objects of my need. We headed over to the train station, and while Mike and Sarah ate their brunch I ran over to Staples and asked the clerks there if they had anything that resembled medals or even award ribbons. No luck; no medals, no ribbons…not even extra lanyards. I got stressed out a little, but then saw a bunch of metallic markers and decided to go even cheaper than plastic…this year, we would be giving out Cheap Cardboard Discs That Vaguely Resemble Medals! I bought my stuff, and some Instant Lotto and ran back to my two companions…chugging down some chocolate milk with them. Again, not choosing to eat all that much because really, I just don't tend to eat at conventions…too excited/nervous to eat anyway.
I managed to get back to the hotel just in time for another session of Phoenix Gate Anthology signings. Christine ushered me to a table and immediately had me sign books. I don't think I'll ever get used to the concept of people actually wanting my autograph, but the feeling of being able to do that for someone, and see them smile meant a lot to me. Perhaps it's a sign that I do decent to good work, or maybe it means I may be moderately famous someday. Who the heck knows? Still, to be able to express a thank you to both people who are very close friends to me, and to people whom I don't know as well, but consider me a peer and a comrade, that's just plain cool.
Keith David's Mug-A-Guest was in the same room as the Phoenix Gate Anthology Signing, which made me very happy because I thought I was going to miss all of the speakers this weekend. I knew I had some other stuff to do before the Closing Ceremonies, but I was going to at least spend half an hour in there! Listening to this man speak and give his reflections on show business, Gargoyles, and life in general was an absolute joy. That's one of the biggest things that stand out at this convention; the celebrities we have tend to not only be famous, but really down to earth…you feel comfortable around them, and I believe that notion is mutual. Greg Weisman, Keith David, Thom Adcox, Greg Guler…all of these men treat their fans with a great deal of respect, which makes it so much easier to give THEM respect and adoration. That is one of the biggest things that makes The Gathering such a special convention to me.
I really wanted to stay for the entire Keith David Mug-A-Guest, but I needed to get going and do what I needed to do. There were medals to be made and I didn't want to go into Closing Ceremonies empty-handed. (I really should have that backup plan ahead of time…) I ran into Sapphire and Chameleongirl during my little medal-creating project and we plotted to do some Gamecube action that night. We've been wanting to do that this weekend, and Liz wanted in on it, and anyone else was welcome to join too. So we set that up for right after Laser Quest, which I had already promised Rob and others that I would join in on. Even on the last official day of the Gathering so much was going on!
Kaylee, Ian and I snuck up to the Con Suite to carry out The Evil Plan: About two months before the convention I had decided to bring up a spread of Godiva Chocolate, Mint Tins, wines and other goodies, and put a thank you card in the center. It was going to be small at first, but it wound up being some 36 bars of chocolate, 20 tins of mints, three bottles of wine and a bottle of Godiva White Chocolate liquor. After putting forth so much effort and hard work, the staff really did deserve to be treated to something nice. Truth be told, a couple weeks before I almost chickened out on this, fearing it would be taken the wrong way…but sometimes, you need to throw caution to the wind and go with your inner nature. I was just very relieved that Kaylee managed to get the room key from Karine, for I believe she was the only one left in the dark by the time the surprise was to be revealed! We set up the spread in a nice presentation, and then left…it was now out of my hands.
Before long it was time to go to the Closing Ceremonies and everyone who was left was there. Karine takes the podium and begins to speak in French, which was a fitting way to kick things off. Not sure if that was planned or not, but it worked very well. I was going to toss out the three squishy soccer balls to the crowd for keepsakes, and CrzyDemona took one…which I didn't mind one bit…the Gathering Staff deserved a stress ball, after all. Cindy got up to speak and present the awards for the Art Show…and many of the people I voted for got ribbons, including Kythera, Karlyl, Stormy, Jade Griffin, and many others, all of whom deserved those rounds of applause and praise.
Chris Rogers began to talk about Gathering 2005, and MAui and I managed to get up and semi-interrupt him to declare the winners of the 2004 Clan Olympics. Arcadia International seemed surprised that they won by such an overwhelming margin, but they worked their butts off for that Cheap Cardboard Disc with Gold Writing on It. We did have another prize for them as well: MAui and I made Clan Olympics "We Kick Tail!" T-shirts for the four Gold Medal Winners, so Arno, Dubble, Robert, and Beedoo! (I think) got to take those home. We also announced that we would be doing another Clan Olympics in Las Vegas, which made a lot of people very happy. I know most of the participants this time around want to do it again. Overall, I think we did a decent job of putting it all together, and it was very gratifying to know that a lot of fun was had.
Keith David came in late in the closing ceremonies to sit in on them, which was welcomed without any hesitation, and he stuck around to sign autographs and artwork. It was at this point that I pre-registered for Gathering 2005 (for if I don't go, I'll probably never hear the end of it.) and was about ready to go back to my room for a bit when Kythera presented me with one of her limited edition prints, which really touched me: it was of Goliath kneeling on a pillar…and since Keith David was there, I asked her if she would have him sign it…and she agreed! This piece of artwork will be framed…done by a great artist and co-signed by a great actor. My thanks goes out to you, Kyt-Sis…in spades…and hearts, clubs, and diamonds too. That print will be on my walls for years to come, a fond memory of a great time.
We were talking and chatting and having a good time, happy that the convention was a success, and out of the blue CrzyDemona hugged me, thanking me for the spread in the Con Suite…this was followed by a hug from Karine, which was another one of those "Floor Me Moments." A lot of thoughts were running through my mind, but in the end I hugged back and accepted it for the thank you it was, and nothing more. Give credit where credit is due, and reward those who do a job well done. At the very least, I'm glad it wasn't taken the wrong way, and that it was accepted and genuinely appreciated.
After a rather lengthy meeting with the 2005 Gathering Staff and Attendees, it was time to go and get ready for Laser Quest, but not before running up to my room with Hudson to grab the last of the Godiva for Keith David. Felt rather bad that all he got was two measly bars, but I handed over the last double-box of Pocky I had, which went over great with his kids. He introduced me to his family, and sadly I can only remember the name of one of his younger daughters: Mae Li. I spoke to Beth Maza about this, and she still doesn't believe me. She'll just have to come to Vegas and hear it for herself. I also relayed the message to Mr. David that he was welcome to join us as Laser Quest, an idea which he seemed real keen on…so I gave him directions to the place on St. Catherine's and the first part of the group trekked on up.
I decided to wait up for Keith, because I had a little bit of doubt in my directions. A young lady stuck around with me, whose name I currently cannot remember (sorry!) stood by and chatted for a while, discussing fandom matters and how much both of us liked the convention. After about 45 minutes of waiting we both figured that Keith either went up to his room, went to spend time with his family, or went ahead to Laser Questing not knowing people were there to walk with him. No problem, the two of us managed to get up to the arena, and only one game had been played, so I found a guy who didn't want to play anymore, so I paid him eight bucks and took his place.
Hudson had begun dividing out teams for the next too games, placing all of his Quake Buddies and other good shots on his team and lumping the rest of us on "The Other Team". This was going to be an ass-handing, no doubt about it…but it was still fun. The first of the two games was just a simple points-based battle, and I spent most of my time doing the uber-slow Terminator (Governater?) walk around the maze, tagging people I could find…was proud that I hit Hudson and Chris a couple of times, and they returned the favor. I also probably hold the record for the most times barreling into a wall or obstacle in a span of fifteen minutes, got the bruises and scrapes to prove it.
The second game was called "Queen and King", where hitting the other team members didn't matter, and one woman and man on our team had a limited number of lives. Jade Griffin was our Queen and Flanker was our King, and we did our best to keep them safe. I wound up trying to follow Robert and Dubble as kind of this Secret Service like group, but managed to fall behind and then get lost. I'm hearing laser fire, and shouting KING!! KING!!! QUEEN!! However I was wandering around looking like a complete doofus. Still managed to tag a bunch of people though, but our team lost by a mere five points, not that this surprised me. In the end I was happy with finishing solidly in the middle of the pack of Laser Questers.
Having a Mario Party and Mario Kart date with Sapphire, Chameleongirl, and others, I decided to hightail it out on my own and make my way back to the hotel, and ran into Riverdale along the way, where we just talked…mainly about voice work, how we were linked to the fandom, and a bunch of other things. He eventually joined us in the GameCube partying that followed.
The video game goodness started in my hotel room when Sapphire brought over her controllers, games, and Karlyl, Chameleongirl, and others…Liz and her friend Matt(?) soon followed, and Ethan Gilchrist also joined in on the fun. We started out with Mario Party 5, just Sapphire and I, and then Chameleongirl and Ethan joined in on the second game. Just short contests, but Mario Party is a game where everyone can just pick up and play and have a good time. Chameleongirl never played Gamecube in her life, and she wound up winning, which was hilarious. Also remember teaming up with her in a pinball mini-game where we outscored the competition by about 36,000 to 3,000…so Chameleongirl, you may be my pinball partner any day!
After Mario Party, Shaun wanted to go to sleep, I don't blame him….so we attempted to move the game system into Sapphire's room, only to be foiled by a protected coaxial cable guard….damn those hotel safeties, trying to force us to pay for crappy, outdated video games! Not daunted, we moved into Lanny and Riverdale's room, and the Mario Karting commenced! I found out just how good Liz is at handling a little cartoon kart, and her friend was even better…I think I placed third in most of the races behind them, so practice is in order during the off-season. Karlyl and Riverdale took turns as well, and this elicited the next great quote: "I'm sucking the hind teat, noshing the nether nipple."
It sent three racers into the wall with laughter if memory serves me right.
As the party wound down we put in Bloody Roar: Primal Fury just to check out the "Jiggle Factor" on some of the female characters…which got a bunch of laughs. At this point, I'm beginning to wonder how Jenny the Bat can walk straight now. It was a great end to the whole thing…and it felt good to be able to share such moments with friends. I spend most of my working time talking about video games, and usually only play them in the privacy of my home, alone. Doing the whole party thing really kicked major butt…and I think I'll pack the 'Cube for Vegas. Sapphire, if you're up to this, let me know. ^_^
Being Sunday night, I decided to get a jump on packing up the car. I took all of the ball pit balls down to my Neon and packed them away, threw out all of the cardboard discs that I didn't need anymore, saving the one Kythera drew upon. The only things left of mine in the room was my suitcase and satchel…everything else was packed in ahead of time just to streamline everything for tomorrow. As I trekked half-asleep to and from my car I greeted other exhausted Garg fans and said my goodbyes to some, whom were either leaving tonight or tomorrow morning. Also stopped by the Arcadians' Room one last time to say my goodbyes there, for I think most/all of them were not going to go to LaRounde Monday Morning. It was a joy to be able to hang out with MAui, Robert, Arno, Beedoo!, Countess, Dubble, and the rest of them this year…felt like I grew closer to them this time around. I really liked the ArCanadians music disc I received from them…which has gone into my morning drive rotation.
Anyhoo, there was sleep to be had and I tottered up to get to bed…and realized I was only the second guy in the room. Flanker comes in a little while later, and then Mike joins the room last…this marks the last night of the first time in a long while that I slept in the same room with three other grown men. I remained awake just a little while longer, taking in what had gone on in the last three days, and could confidently say that I would never trade times like this for anything. The best part was that it wasn't over quite yet…

Monday, August 9th - Back South…

Sooner or later it has to end, but it was going to end on a high note. Flanker, Mike, Shaun and I all woke up a little earlier than normal to get ready for checkout. I wandered around a bit to say my goodbyes to people who were not going to make the trip to LaRounde, trying to hit everyone I possibly could. I know I missed a fair number of people, especially Arno, MAui, and the rest of the Arcadian Crew. Eventually we got the car packed, I gave up my key to Shaun and he checked us all out. The Delta Center-Ville was probably one of the finest hotels I've have the opportunity to stay in, Gathering or not.
We all met in the lobby and soon gathered up in a pack to head toward the Metro station that would lead us all to Six Flags: LaRounde. The group in part consisted of Karine, Cindy, Liz, Talyesin, Kyffin, Sapphire, Chameleongirl, Shaun, Sarah, Laurean, Trishana, Patrick, Christine, Becca, Seri, and Top Man. I know there were more, but I can't remember the names, just plain bad at that sort of thing. We rode a few Metro cars and made it to the buses that would take us all to the amusement park. There were photos taken, laughter, happiness, and just a general feeling of less stress. The convention was officially over, but hanging out was still to be had.
LaRounde was the only major disappointment for me, sad to say. The park looked beautiful, but there just weren't any rides that I could fit into, which was strange because I could do a lot more when I went there a few years ago, and was heavier. I won't bash on LaRounde though, for it was one of the nicer parks I've had the chance to walk through. I took in the scenery and the watched the people, talked to a few of them. I played a few carnival games, and gave my plushies to some of the younger kids who were trying to win but couldn't. I have no need for stuffed plush roses anyway, and it was a nice thing to do. Also got a chance to play Outrun 2, which kicked major tail…but I didn't get on the Dance Dance Revolution Machine. I had told Sapphire that I would do DDR with her at some point…so I gotta get into better shape, and make sure I don't have a multitude of blisters on my feet because that will be something I'll need to make good on in Las Vegas, or in Florida, depending on how my vacationing plans go.
Overall, everyone kind of went their separate ways at Six Flags…I know a few of the convention staff members kicked out early, and I don't blame them one bit after all the work they've done. Others just got tired of the lines and decided to go home, and some of us stayed until about 5pm, Shaun, Sarah, and myself were a part of that number….we took pictures of the stragglers in our group in general and we parted ways. It was overall a decent trip, though I was a pretty miffed that I didn't actually get to ride anything. But hey, I got my exercise in spades and still managed to have a decent time. We rode back on the metro and were guided by one of the Montrealers, and during the ride I met a guy who knew where Penn Yan, New York was, which was neat…small world. We made it back to the hotel and at about 6:30pm we were on our way back to my place.
The trip back to New York State was filled with a lot of talk about various fandom ideals, political banter, mental issues and general silliness. Though we were all pretty tired so half of it was only semi-coherent. I had to get some gas before getting too far into the Quebec countryside, and it was the only time I had to gas up in Canada…score! We ate at Wendy's right inside the Ontario Province border and talked yet some more. The rest of the ride was just general rest, and me concentrating on driving until we hit the Duty Free store right before the United States…we had to stop. I grabbed a dozen Cadbury Flake bars, some Canada Flag stickers to torture my boss with, a shotglass, and a bottle of Godiva White Chocolate Liquor…figured this time I wouldn't be so tempted to give it away.
During our slow-moving line to customs we joked around and laughed quite a bit, and I forgot how to drive in the process, which was met with much embarrassment from me, but it got a good laugh out of Sarah and Shaun. Absent-Minded Professor genes are good for something. We talked to the U.S. Customs Officer and he asks us the standard questions and he actually recognized the show Gargoyles…I think we chatted up the convention and told him to go buy the DVD of the First Season, which is coming out on December 7th. He laughed and waved us through to United States Roadways. We hit another gas station, got more caffeinated beverages and motored down Route 81…hitting the Thruway a couple of hours later.
At this point we're pretty punchy: Shaun is snoozing in the back seat, and Sarah is keeping me awake by rambling about Yu-Gi-Oh!, which I counter with rambling about story ideas, both fan fiction based and original. It also helped that the road was mostly in a straight line. We finally get to the home stretch half past midnight and we begin to play "Spot the Mennonite", which we both lost because they were all probably sleeping. Pulling in at about 1am, we made good time overall…only we woke up the dogs, which started barking…oh well, they missed us after being gone for nearly five days. I set up the inflatable bed for Shaun, the downstairs hide-a-bed in the den was already made up for Sarah, and we were all ready for some well-needed sleep.
I spent a little time on the computer to read up on my e-mail that I missed, just to make sure I didn't miss anything major at work. Go into Station Eight and wind up bumping into Mai "Beth Maza" Li, who began to ask all about the convention. If there is one person I absolutely can't turn down speaking to, it's her. So we chatted a bit, Shaun put in his remarks and this kept going for at least an hour. Sleep depravation was finally get a hold of me, and I cut out. It was great to sleep in my own bed again…heck, it was going to be great to get more than four hours of sleep in general. When it comes to Gatherings, though, sleep depravation is very worth it, especially when it comes to seeing friends whom you usually only see once a year.

Tuesday, August 10th - It's Gotta End Sometime…

Waking up at 10am never felt so good, and I was still in short-sleep mode, so I felt really great. Shaun and Sarah were still sleeping so I took the time to sneak out and grab some eggs, ham, cheddar cheese, shredded potatoes and bacon…we already had bagels. I decided to prepare omelets, bacon, bagels, basically a classic Sunday Brunch style breakfast, only it was Tuesday…oh well, it was the Day Before Having to Go Back to Work Brunch. We all sat around our kitchen bar top, eating our eggs, bacon, hash browns, and drinking orange juice, just enjoying the last day together.
Sarah was the first to leave, we all grabbed her car and then I led her to the shortcut road I took to get to the Thruway in the first place…she honked, we honked…bye bye Sarah the Great. That left Shaun and me to go back to my house and prep up for his trip to the airport. We hung out in general for another hour before packing his remaining stuff in the car and heading toward Rochester International Airport. We popped in the South Park Soundtrack and half-smiled, half sang along, and Shaun eventually put in another Weird Al compilation, with Amish Paradise blaring as we passed Mennonites…the windows were closed though, unlike the customs crossing into Canada.
I stopped by Michael's Arts and Crafts to pick out a frame for the "Pillar" print that Kythera gave me, and picked out something in a black, dark purple and silver…that should be done in a couple of weeks, and it will hang in my room/apartment/house for the rest of my days. After that relatively short trip I got Shaun up to the airport. He and I hugged, I told him to have a safe trip, and he disappeared into the airport terminal. That was it; the last person I knew from Gathering was on his way home and I was a solitary Gargoyles Fan once more…at least until I got home to go online again. Another Gathering, my fifth, was now officially a very fond memory, and now there's just about 11 months until the next Gathering in 2005…in Las Vegas. I had been asked with MAui to do the Clan Olympics next year…which I will gladly take up the ball pit balls for. Who knows what else will happen…as long as I'm with a group of wonderful friends, in a great location, knowing does it really matter all that much?

See everyone in 2005!

And You Thought It Was Over…

When I came into the Gargoyles Fandom in October of 1996, I had the
long-standing belief to give credit where it is due. This is no different.

I would like to thank the 2004 Gathering staff for a job extremely well done. Karine, Rob, Brenda, Patrick, Jen, Ian, Shaun, Liz, Laurean, Cindy, Carol…all of you pulled together one of the most elegant and classy Gatherings yet, and for that you have my gratitude, respect, appreciation, and an overabundance of chocolate. Liz, thank you especially for working with MAui and me on the Clan Olympics, we couldn't have done it without you. Brenda and Ian, thank you so much for co-conspiring with me on "Evil Plan #1", I'm happy it worked out as well as it did.

To my two travel buddies, Shaun and Sarah…thank you for putting up with my crazy rambling and blatant addiction to Instant Lottery. I've always enjoyed road trips, but road trips with friends are that much sweeter. Sarah, it was a joy to meet up with you again, and to share this wild ride with you. Shaun, it has been a pleasure to be able to have you as a companion and friend on this road trip. Thank you both for making the ride up to and back from Montreal a joyous one for me. You are both welcome in my home anytime, and next time, I'll get steaks, I promise.

To Shaun, Mike, and Flanker…rooming with the three of you has been a trip and a half, and I wouldn't trade that for anything in the world. It was a great deal of fun, though Flanker, I'll still have the occasional nightmare about that military cot. I hope I didn't keep any of you up with my snoring, if I did….well, revenge is sweeter in Vegas.

For the Arcadia Clan; thank you for unofficially adopting me this weekend, and having me along on your trip to the Hard Rock Café, and to Laser Quest. Robert, Arno, Beedoo!, Dubble, MAui, Countess, everyone in that wild and crazy bunch, you made me feel more than just welcomed, you made me feel normal…as normal as a Gargoyles Fan could be, anyway. A special thanks to you, Countess, for being a walking companion that night to get some Tim Hortons, that meant a lot to me.

To Sapphire, who helped co-conspire a Sunday Night GameCube Fest, and to Chameleongirl, whom I will play pinball with any day.

Everyone who approached me to sign their Phoenix Gate Anthology, thank you for

Ellen writes...

GATHERING JOURNAL, PART TWO

SATURDAY

Those responsibilities asserted themselves a few short hours later, when I got in touch with Spacebabie and Christine, my 10AM panelmates. Christine had family obligations, but Spacebabie was able to join me for breakfast downstairs at 9. We discussed topics we expected to cover during the panel, and a great deal more.

Our panel seemed to keep moving all right, considering that the majority of us in that room had stayed up way past our bedtimes the night before with the Boss and everyone else in the con suite. It was a huge help, of course, to have a con panel veteran such as Christine there. Most importantly, though, the people in attendance seemed to enjoy it. We were up against some stiff competition with the radio play auditions, and I for one am grateful to each person in attendance for helping to make our panel a success.

From there I wandered into the dealer/art room and did my level best to fill in the art ballot as thoroughly as possible. (Who am I kidding? Half the time, I was only guessing while I voted. All of the work was awesome.) I then headed to the live auction. I stayed for almost all of the proceedings, enjoying the fabulous floor show that the auctioneers -- Marc and Rob, were they? -- were putting on. They were witty, smart, and persuasive -- I was all the more willing to bid as a result of their efforts.

Also, during the live auction, I had an opportunity to introduce myself to Karine. And I'm setting this off in its own paragraph for a reason. Folks, I have been pregnant myself. I have been *six months* pregnant myself (as was she at this point). You can ask my husband how much fun I was to be around during that time -- preferably in my absence, if you desire an honest answer. Hauling a small sack of cement around on your front ain't all that comfortable, and it can be very, VERY tiring. Nevertheless, through it all, Karine was unfailingly hardworking, cheerful, attentive, and indefatigable. I found it almost frightening. Whatever kudos, whatever glamour, whatever reward this woman receives from her work on Gathering 2004, no matter how great, will still fall far short. She is superhuman, and we mere mortals are all the richer for it.

From the auction I wandered back out to the mezzanine, where I encountered Kathy and Carol Wagner. They encouraged me to go downstairs and talk to the Disney film crew. I was glad I went when I did, because I was able to listen in on Dylan and Stormy's eloquent testimony to the greatness of this series we all know and love. They did the series proud, and I'm looking forward to seeing how much of their can't-miss presentation ends up on the DVD.

On the other hand, this also meant that my own little ramblings had to follow in the wake of their verbal luster. Oh well. My interview was essentially a pleasant chat with David, which is what it should have been. Whether or not I gave him and his crew anything they could use is another matter. If and when I go to the cutting room floor, I'll go happily, knowing that I did my best and, above all, made yet another friendly acquaintance amid the populace of these Gatherings.

I decided that this year I mustn't miss the radio play, and I was glad I went. The players, all cast-of-thousands of them, were individually and collectively brilliant. They put their hearts into every line, and the synergy between them and narrator/director Greg was almost palpable.

Following the radio play, I decided that a little bit of quiet time was in order. Unlike last year, I didn't actually fall asleep (fortunately). I rested comfortably instead, contentedly watching the Yankees-Blue Jays game and the periodic updates of Greg Maddux's ultimately successful bid for his 300th win (life is good). I kept an eye on the clock, and rousted myself when it was time to dress for dinner.

I arrived at the banquet slightly late, but found a place at a table with Kelly, Leo, Alex, and James Anatidae, with whom I was particularly pleased to converse, considering that I hadn't been able to spend time with him otherwise. The food was very good, too.

And then Keith David arrived. How could I do anything but give this gentleman a standing ovation?

(Memo to self: If 30-year high school reunion next year features a karaoke system, make sure no guests of honor are trying to speak in the ballroom next door.)

I said above (and on previous occasions) that I could sit and listen to Greg Weisman talk for hours. Same with Keith David. The gentleman loves to tell stories, and tells them with every inch of his body and every shade of expression in his face. And what a joy it is to watch and listen.

I stayed for the masquerade and cosplay, and was very impressed. Some serious work and talent went into those costumes, and it showed. Loupy/Korul and Becca both were too cute for words. And Flanker, you were drop-dead elegant. I might have to write your Hunter into one of my stories.

I was dismayed to know that I'd miss Allaine singing karaoke if I headed up to the bar for a little quiet time with a few of my other pals, but I was again craving uninterrupted conversation. So off I went with Dylan, Leo, Kelly, Alex, Mercedes, Andrew...

And, well, whaddya know? In walks Mr. David. He sits on our side of the bar and begins chatting amiably with the bartender. I pointed him out to my companions, and Dylan knew exactly what to do. He got up immediately, his hand fishing in his pocket for his wallet, and paid for the maestro's drink. Since Dylan had missed out on the banquet and the subsequent Q&A session, I decided that he deserved a little one-on-one time with Mr. David, and abandoned my urging that he persuade him to join the rest of us. After a while, though, I decided to horn in on the conversation anyway, if only for a minute or two. I went up to them, introduced myself to Mr. David, and chatted for a bit. Our talk touched upon the funeral profession at one point, giving me the opportunity to entertain Mr. David with a brief and thoroughly silly anecdote involving the friend with whom my husband and I would be having dinner several nights later. I'm proud to say that I made the maestro throw his head back and let out a laugh that would have filled the interior of Notre Dame de Paris.

Not long after that, the bar closed, Mr. David retired for the night, and the rest of us meandered back downstairs to check out the proceedings, such as they were at that point.

It was then that I found the opportunity to thank the Boss for dropping that link on Station 8 to his brother's outstanding baseball blog site, Dodger Thoughts. Then, with tongue planted firmly in cheek, I proceeded to bawl him out in the same breath for giving the name of such a nice guy (viz., his brother) to such a shit-heel (viz., Jon Canmore/John Castaway) in his Gargoyles universe. Hey, it had to be said. ;) I also mentioned how impressed I was that his father was in attendance at the last Cubs World Series (and not as a Tigers fan, either). Let it be said, however, that I chose to avoid *real* controversy, and refrained from bringing up the recent Paul Lo Duca trade.

By the way, Jennifer Anderson has a *beautiful* singing voice.

As things wound down in the ballroom, Kathy, Alex Garg, and Dylan agreed to accompany me to my room for a nightcap. Our conversation ran until 4, at which point I announced that I was on the verge of physical collapse, a sentiment readily seconded by my comrades. We said our good nights and got a few hours of shut-eye.

(To be concluded.)

Alex Garg writes...

Monday, August 9 - The Long Road Home:
I woke up, collected my things and went down to the desk with Denis to check out and make sure Denis was set to spend another day in the room. There were a few communications blocks at first, but Denis used his French to get them cleared up - gotta love those bilinguals. Too bad I spent most of my time in high school on Italian and dead languages (get a Gathering in Italy and I'll be golden).

We all gathered together for breakfast and ended up sitting next to Gorebash and a couple of his friends, though we pretty much kept the conversation within our own groups. Leo split afterwards to catch up with the group heading to Six Flags, and Denis... I don't remember what Denis decided to do, but he went off on his own.

Kelly and I gathered our things, went down to my car and headed off around 10 - getting out of the city was much, much easier than getting in.

With no stops along the way (well, no pick-ups anyway), it was smooth sailing. We hit traffic around Toronto, but fortunately we were staying outside of the city so there was no risk of getting misdirected again. A storm threatened to make things particularly hazardous but it held off long enough for us to get to the QEW and to Hamilton.

Got Kelly back to her place in one piece and didn't stick around for long - cat allergy aside, I was in a mindset to just get to Niagara Falls and relax. Got out of Hamilton without incident and headed on back to the States.

Of course, it wouldn't be a road trip if there was no incident. I ended up following the wrong signs and got lost on the Canadian side of Niagara Falls - nice town, just not where I wanted to be. Eventually I got my bearings and continued on to the correct bridge.

I slowed down on the bridge to take a look at the Falls, which was as close as I would get this trip, and continued on home. I had an interesting conversation with the border guard that, well... I was tired. This is pretty much verbatim:

Guard: Okay, I gotta ask - what do your plates mean?
Me: "Let there be night." It's Latin, motto of a club I belonged to in high school.
Guard: Ah. Okay, citizenship? ~What I heard: Citizenship papers?~
Me: Birth certificate and driver's license.
Guard: No, what country are you from? ~What I heard: What country are you coming from?~
Me: ...Canada...
Guard: ...What's a Canadian doing with Virginia tags?
Me: What? I'm not ~~sudden realization of what he had actually said~~ ...oh! I'm American. Sorry. Yeah, American.
Guard: Carry on.

I got to the hotel about the same time as a crunch of Italian tourists and guests who didn't seem to understand the concept of checking into a hotel, so I opted for a quick dinner while the crowd dispersed. Nothing, and I mean nothing tastes as good as a steak after a long day on the road.

Made it into my room and ordered "Master and Commander" for some post-travel entertainment. As soon as it ended I went to sleep.

Day's mileage: 430
Total mileage: 1,360

Tuesday, August 10 - The Long Road Home Continued:
I woke up around 8:30 and carried myself to the Duty Free Shop to exchange the Canadian currency into ol' Greenbacks as I doubted I'd have another chance after Niagara Falls (another difference between the U.S. and Canada - while you can exchange currency almost anywhere up there, you can only do it at the border and international airports down here). I walked there because the only exit by car was back into Canada, and while I very much enjoyed my time up there I just wanted to go home.

I decided against going to the Falls for three reasons: rain was coming, the crowds were gathering and I just wanted to go. So I left at 10 and began the final leg of the road trip.

It started with my getting turned around in Buffalo. I lost track of the various signs and ended up on I-90 Eastbound. Okay, so, not wanting to go to Albany I turned around, donated $.30 to the state of New York via their toll booths and tried getting home again.

Not much to report for the first part of the trip - just followed the breadcrumbs from the way up. However, if you'll recall the storm that slowed Leo and me down on Wednesday, it would seem lightning can strike twice in the same place. Just before State College and my turn off to I-99, a storm fired up and dropped visibility to zero. It was pretty dramatic - driving rain, lightning all about and cliffs on either side of the windy road, all at speed (nobody felt like slowing down). I made it out of the storm in one piece and well beyond my exit.

By the time I figured out that I had missed my exit I was halfway to I-81, so I decided to carry on. As I mentioned back on Wednesday, Pennsylvania is entirely too big. Oh boy, well, I made I-81 and carried along on to I-70. I had planned on going to I-66 to avoid the traffic, but I was approaching the nine hour mark and didn't want to add another 40 minutes to what was going to end up being a 10 1/2-hour trek, so I braved I-70.

Only when necessary, friends; only take that road when absolutely necessary.

So that path aside I made it home in one piece - although very, very tired. I stayed up just long enough to grab dinner, my only meal that day, and then hit the bed hard.

Day's mileage: 580
Total mileage: 1,940

That's it - all I've got. Thanks for reading through it.

Alex Garg writes...

Sunday, August 8 - The Weekend, Pt. 3:
To say that I "woke up" at 6 would be wrong - I merely emerged from a comatose state with limited activity. My shower was only slightly rejuvenating, and the two cups of coffee I had downstairs just barely gave my body animation. Simply put, today started off on only adrenaline and caffeine - truly a Gathering experience.

Well, Gathering and high school.

Anyway, as true consciousness and animation slowly returned to me I made my way to Allaine's round robin panel and an equally exhausted group assembled - Ellen, Allaine, Princess Alexandria, Denis and Spacebabie. We waited a while as Allaine tried to wrestle some more people away from the Gargoyles Biology panel but he was unsuccessful and we got underway.

I had missed Spacebabie's panel on Friday so I wasn't really sure what to expect, but what I didn't expect, though, was that doing an oral round robin would be harder than a typed one; although given my state of body and mind, doing anything that morning requiring more than a passing thought or gesture was challenging. Despite that, the round robin came together and we got a decent story going - then we had to stop.

The dealers' room/art show was the next stop. I put in bids on artwork (I lost all of them) and saw that the PGA signing tables had been set up. Christine was there and let me know that we were finally underway for the book signing, so I joined her. People trickled in at first, not really sure what was going on (some people weren't even aware of the PGA), and after a while more of the authors began to assemble. It was about half an hour before the crowd really gathered and we were signing multiple books at a time.

Being asked for a signature is really a weird experience, especially given my attitudes towards my work, but as long as people think that getting my signature was worth it - fair enough.

I had intended to go to Kathy's workshop, but about the time I was going to step out when the crowds were dying off Keith walked in, so I stuck around. It went well, good Q&A, and in the course of it we signed a PGA copy for him - now that made me nervous. I don't know why, but it just didn't sit well with me.

After Keith's mug-a-guest had ended it was time for Closing Ceremonies - so sad. People had already left, Greg wasn't there, people were still running around; it didn't have the same energy as Opening Ceremonies and was kind of depressing overall, really for the reason that it was the end of the con. I skipped on pre-registering for Vegas - I have no clue if I'll be able to make it, but if it turns out that I definitely won't, I'll put in a supporting membership for sure - and just got in line for Keith. It didn't occur to me until I was in line that I should have brought my Radio Play script from last year for him to sign, so lacking anything Keith/Goliath-related I just had him sign my copy of the PGA - a little quid pro quo signing.

From there I went with Ellen, Allaine, Princess Alexandria, Kelly and Leo to lunch in a deserted food court - good, not great. We chatted about what we all had to look forward to when we went home. On the way back to the hotel Ellen offered to take us up to Mount Royal to look out over Montreal at night. Allaine was going to laser tag so he couldn't make it, and Alexandria opted out. Kelly was undecided up to the last minute when I ambushed her at the hotel restaurant and encouraged her to come.

It was a haul going through Montreal, but it was all so worth it.

Ellen pointed out the various places she remembered from her days in Montreal on our way up, but the fun began when we got to the park. We opted for a back route to the observatory that turned into a nature hike, but there were plenty of other disoriented groups to keep us company as we went up the narrow trails.

Eventually we arrived at our destination and we were not disappointed. Montreal is stunning. Honestly, the staff should have had a trip to this place - it was just so beautiful. We hung around for about an hour or so enjoying the view, but eventually we had to go back so Ellen could catch up with her husband.

We didn't take the scenic route back - nightfall made that an impossible feat - but we did cut through the university (so, okay, a different kind of scenic) as Ellen extended her tour. We stopped off for a drink at an Irish pub for a quick round before we finished the trip, and the stop gave Ellen the perfect timing to walk into the hotel to greet her husband at the check-in desk.

Realizing that it was unlikely we'd see each other in the morning we said our goodbyes in the lobby and then retired to our rooms. I gave my parents a call to let them know when I'd be leaving the next day and then went to sleep - actual sleep this time.

And that was the weekend.

Next, "The Long Road Home"

Alex Garg writes...

Late Saturday, August 7 - The Weekend, Pt. 2:
Gee, I wonder how many Disney cartoons he could have been talking about, given the activities in the hotel. I suppose they could have just gone on some drunken tangent about Duck Tales, but was pretty sure the guy was talking about Gargoyles and those of us attending the Gathering.

I am a magnificent eavesdropper. I know it's rude, I know I shouldn't do it, but it's just one of those things I do very well; and when the conversation relates (in some way) to me, well, I grant exceptions in my morals to listening in on people talking about me behind my back.

Their conversation started off pretty typically - what nerds, why bother, yadda-yadda; stuff I'm used to hearing being the Gargoyles geek that I am and things I pretty much ignore. I was about to tune out when as the conversation turned to what was going on downstairs, the costumes, karaoke and the like, but then they started talking about crashing the party.

*ahem*

I don't go to many conventions and see my online friends all that often, so when I do attend such events I appreciate them *not* being crashed. They passed around the straw to see who was going to go down and scout it out, come back and bring the others for a good ol' party crashing. They came to a guy who, apparently, had some connection with the group (I would find out what later) and spiced up the bet. The bet was that he couldn't come back to the bar in 10 minutes with a girl from downstairs and the pot was set at $17.

As the group was finalizing their plans, Keith David entered the bar and Ellen and Dylan began talking about inviting him over. All right, so, people were about to go downstairs to crash the party and an opportunity to share drinks with Keith David had just entered the scene.

Stop party crashers, drink with Keith, stop party crashers, drink with Keith...

Ellen and Dylan decided not to invite Keith over - Dylan instead opted to buy Keith a drink - and so my course was clear. When the crashing scouts left the bar, I followed.

Of course, I made no attempt to be stealth-like in my pursuit - the objective was an interception, not make sure they involve a fellow Con-goer in their sick little bet - and they, guy and a girl, spotted me. I was quick to let them know that I had overheard their conversation and wasn't going to give them a free ticket down.

They denied wanting to *crash* the Gathering but the guy did fess up to his boss' bet. Okay, let's back that up - this guy's boss bets him that he can't get a girl back to the bar in 10 minutes. Are you feeling a little repulsed by his boss, too? The guy turns on the charm and appeals to me man-to-man, thinking that I'm going to sympathize and approve of the bet to lure a girl back to the bar. He even tries to slip a bribe by me.

In what some might consider counter to a federal employee's stereotyped first instinct, I refused.

So he tries the backup plan - feign interest in the Gathering. All right, semi-weak spot, semi-opening to get him to leave: if you ask me about the fandom and the Gathering, I'll tell you all you want to know. My thought process was to use that to *maybe* get him to forget about the bet or bothering us and just part ways peacefully. It worked to some extent, however I talked it up a bit too much and they insisted on seeing everything that was going on. Plus in the course of conversation it was discovered that they were from the D.C. area as well, so we ended up talking a bit about all that was going on at home which, although it eased any tension that was between us, took away a bit of my edge.

In any event, we headed down to the ballroom - the two of them looking for their target, me looking for security - and then they revealed who their target was. "Kelly." Earlier I had seen the Kelly I've been hanging around with go to the bar in proximity of the guy, but she had gone to bed a while earlier; so I told him that Kelly was my roommate, asleep, and "probably not" going to go back with him to the bar.

He looks into the room - "No, there she is."

Ah, see, it didn't help that there were three Kelly's at the Gathering and that his "Kelly" I know as Sapphire. So... instead of diverting him, I led him right to his objective.

*heavy sigh of defeat*

Sapphire came over, greeted the guy and invited him in - you have to invite a vampire into your house before they can attempt to suck your blood - and I left; I don't need to be defending people I don't know and who are very capable of handling themselves.

She sums up the event in her journal as follows:
"I had to lay down for a while because I was feeling ill. I went to the bar to get something to settle my stomach. A guy, Nate, came over and started hitting on me, and wouldn't let me go back down to the convention. Once I left, he even came down to the convention to see what it was about (which is fine because I told him he could). Luckily he left shortly, I think we were too weird for him."

As I said, I went back to the bar feeling pretty rotten about the event - namely my handling of it, particularly in hindsight - and saw Dylan and Keith sharing a drink. Ellen shared an anecdote with Keith that had him laughing (it's actually very funny, but you'll have to have Ellen tell it because I can't). The guy, of course, came back to the bar without Sapphire and was chided by his coworkers - no big loss.

We stuck around the bar until it closed then went down to see if the ball was still going. There were a few people left but it was clearly winding down for the night (/morning - it was 1 a.m. at this point). Continuing my wallflower state I hung around while Ellen and Greg talked about baseball and his brother's website. Had I known that Greg was leaving early I would have spoken more - not that I had much to say, I just like the guy - but, alas, I missed my chance.

The party ended and we brought Kathy into the group - now just down to me, Kathy, Dylan and Ellen - as we headed up to Ellen's room to just hang out. The coffee I had sucked down plus my mind rolling over and over the earlier episode and how it could have gone even worse were keeping me up, so I gladly stuck around.

Again I didn't talk much - seriously, I love to listen more than chat. The three of them, among my inspirations for writing, talked back and forth about books they liked, writing techniques they used, etc., so for me, just kicking back and listening in on all this was great. Dylan left around 3 and Ellen booted Kathy and me out about a quarter to 4.

I was still very much awake at that point - again, more from continually going over and over the night's events more than the coffee - and just wandered around the hotel. At that point, it registered that the Gathering would be ending soon and, well, that just saddened me. Eventually my body cried out and my brain allowed it to return to the room to lie down.

So at 4:15 a.m. I plopped down on the floor and my eyes shut - brain very much stayed on. No sleep.

Next, "The Weekend, Pt. 3"

Alex Garg writes...

Saturday, August 7 - The Weekend, Pt. 1:
Woke up 7-ish and grabbed some breakfast before heading off to Ellen, Christine and Spacebabie's panel regarding chase scenes in fiction and what makes a good one. They all seemed rather tired, but despite that the panel turned out well - good participation from the audience (although they all seemed tired, too - for once I was ahead of the sleep curve).

I stopped by the mezzanine to take a look at the cast list for Radio Play around noon and was very happy to see that I had made the cut - along with about 30 other people. Largest cast ever.

Grabbed lunch with Kelly and we pretty much just hung out in the restaurant. From there it was on to Radio Play rehearsals where we learned that we'd be doing the uncut version of "The Journey." I was Art, and I had fun with it.

I filled out the audition sheet as "Alex Garg" - Greg inserted "Alex 'Carter' Garg" on his own. Greg remembered my name... I'm so happy.

Radio Play was well-attended, thanks to the staff closing everything else so people would sort of be forced to attend. A good strategy as last year's Radio Play's audience was sparse. Of course, the DVD crew was also there, so maybe they'll get a shot of my head or something. Overall, the show went very well and everybody seemed to have a great time with it. We had a bit of a break before the Banquet and I used that time to, once again, retreat to the room - briefly.

The Banquet was definitely something else. At the table were me, Kelly, Leo, Denis, Ellen and James Anatidae. It was a fantastic meal. At some point near the end Keith David finally showed up, having escaped filming yet another movie, and was bombarded with questions before he could really get a chance eat. I was tempted to ask, "Would you like to eat before we continue?" but decided not to be a jerk - the group doing karaoke in the next room had that covered.

We got a break after the Banquet/Q&A to retreat to the room, and on our way down to the Cosplay we encountered Keith who, as it turns out, would be staying on our floor - not that we interacted much with him, but it was still cool to know that Keith David was right down the hall.

Let's talk about Cosplay for a second. I don't know if it was Montreal, the DVD crew or just a huge collective effort this year, but the costumes were above and beyond. Seriously, some great work. My camera wasn't working, though, so I don't have any pictures.

I didn't stick around for the Ball - never have, I don't dance - and instead went with Ellen, Dylan, Stormy and a couple of others to the bar (they had drinks, I had coffee). Leo and Kelly showed up later and joined in. I didn't really say much, as always more content to listen. This kept my ears sharp for them to pick up from behind me "It's a [cut] Disney cartoon!"

Next, "The Weekend, Pt. 2"

Alex Garg writes...

Friday, August 6 - It Begins:
Nobody bothered to inform my internal clock that I was on vacation and didn't need to be up *nearly* as early as I was. However, it gave me time to freshen up before we all went down to breakfast with Kathy and Ellen, the whole group being me, Kelly, Leo, Denis and Rob. After that we kind of scattered - registration was moved to noon so I just hung out in the mezzanine and talked to folks as they came by.

After a while registration opened and we got our packets - con badge, schedule (which was really something else), PGA and shirt (I ordered an XL, I was presented with a small (made the exchange for a large later)). I flipped through the PGA and was very, very impressed. The stories are truly top-notch, and I'm still surprised that I'm in it. The back of the book says, "This anthology contains ten stories and eleven pieces of art, brought to life by eighteen of the fandom's top authors and artists," and to be in that list (given all of my literary accomplishments) is something else. Still amazed.

At some point Ellen asked if we all wanted to go on a walking tour of downtown Montreal - Ellen's old stomping grounds - and we agreed, we being me, Kelly, Leo, Denis and Kathy. It took a while for us to assemble - whenever one of us showed up, another had to run back to get something - but we eventually made it out of the hotel.

Montreal is a beautiful city, a great mix of modern architecture with an old world atmosphere. We stopped by the Notre Dame Basilica and Chinatown (all very nice) and then started looking for a place to eat. What we hadn't done, however, was check our watches, and when we did we realized that we were all going to be late for panels we wanted to attend (and I had missed Spacebabie's Round Robin). So we had to cut short our plans to eat out and headed back to the hotel. We passed Ellen's alma mater on the way and she and Kathy eventually ducked into a cafeteria. As became a theme with me this Gathering, I wasn't hungry and, with the others being similarly without appetite, we made our way back to the hotel to attend Flanker's panel. From there I was off to Radio Play auditions.

Last year I had the role of Thailog, so I wasn't too nervous going in - right up until the DVD crew showed up. For a second it looked like they were going to film my audition, but they did not. I read as Lex, got nods of approval from Greg and Jen and left it in their hands. As I stepped out of the audition, the DVD camera was *right there.* There was only one thing I could do - look like a deer in headlights, give them a quick nod with a smile and dart away. I hope that doesn't make the cut - nobody needs to see a sleep-deprived, tired, startled Carter.

I had been very excited about the DVD crew being there, but I pretty much made it my business to avoid them. Not that I'm camera shy or anything - not by any means - I just didn't really have anything to say and I wasn't doing anything particularly interesting. So, you know, there was no point in getting in their way.

Anyway, I went back to the room and hung out with Kelly for a while until Opening Ceremonies. LOTS of first-timers at this one, close to half of the attendees. We saw the videos, Greg played a tape of many Gargoyles-involved people and we heard the pitch for the 2005 Gathering - we're goin' to Vegas!

Opening Ceremonies also included the first Clan Olympics event - many, many teams involved - that was hilarious and chaotic. After that event we went back to the room to hang out for a brief time before the Blue Mug-A-Guest. It was at this event last year that I "earned" the title "Creepy" - *poke at Greg* - so of course I was going to participate in this one. The event was going to be held in the con suite and about 60 people packed in, even though there was really only comfortable room for about half that.

It wasn't very "blue," if you will - they scheduled it before the regular Mug-A-Guest, so the many took the opportunity to ask the regular questions; that plus all the exciting DVD news was on people's minds. I would have stayed around longer but I was suddenly overcome with sleep and ducked out about 12:30 a.m.

So ended the first official day of the Gathering.

Next, "The Weekend, Pt. 1"

Alex Garg writes...

Thursday, August 5 - The Longest Freakin' Day:
On the road again...

Leo and I left Niagara Falls about 8:30 and had no problems getting across the border - I know, we were spoiled. Once we were across the border we sent Kelly a heads-up to let her know that we were on the way. After making that call, Kathy called to ask if I would pick up her roommate at the airport after she arrived - to which I agreed.

Hamilton should have given us a warning of traffic to come. I'm used to one-way streets, that wasn't an issue, but not an entire city of one-way streets. I managed it, however (though I almost went the wrong way down one of those pesky one-way streets), and found parking.

We found Kelly, I dropped off Squidgy's toys, Leo scared Squidgy off by taking many, many, many pictures of her, Kelly and I exchanged CDs (which I wasn't originally aware that we were doing, but it worked) and we were off once again.

Toronto is a very impressive city - skyscrapers, CN Tower, etc., much like NYC; and the traffic's about the same. This didn't help us when the GPS decided that we should see Toronto more closely and turn off the highway an exit too soon. We were never *lost* in Toronto, despite what Kelly and Leo might describe in their journals, we stayed on the same street the entire time - we just had trouble finding a suitable exit.

Anyway, because the GPS was kind enough to take us off the highway then peter out (going back to that problem of not managing to download the detail maps), Leo was left to navigate. He got us onto a parkway which led us back to the highway and we fled Toronto hastily.

A short time after noon Lord Sloth (Rob) called and wondered if we could still swing by and pick him up, and I had no problems doing so - well, I had no problems agreeing to do so anyway... sort of.

Cell phone coverage was less than sharp along that stretch of highway which led to some amusing conversation.

Rob: "I'm wearing a white shirt." + cell phone static = "What's your insurance?"
Me: "...State Farm...?"

Less amusing was the fact that when he said we should take the third exit into Kingston we just took the third in a series of seven exits and ended up far, far off course. However, like in Toronto we got through it and picked up Rob without further incident - unless you count the fun we had at the A&W store when trying to pick up food.

Let's not go there.

It was more smooth sailing from Kingston to Montreal, but it was in Montreal that things got very, very interesting and frightening. Like with any metropolis, traffic piled up when we were about 20 minutes out. Then it piled up some more. Then some more.

I've had this route planned for months down to the mile and minute - unfortunately, I must have thought that Rush Hour didn't exist in Canada because that's when I planned the minute I'd arrive in Montreal. On top of that, the drivers in that part of the country are, to put it nicely, insane. So, we were approaching a metropolis in Rush Hour conditions with the worst drivers Canada has to offer.

To this respect, Montreal is Canada's Washington, D.C. - I was home.

On top of the traffic, Rob let us know that he needed to be at the hostel by 6 (it was around 4:45 when we learned this) otherwise they were going to drop his reservation. The crunch was on.

As at home as I was with the traffic patterns, it took a second to dawn on me that I had crossed over to the other side - the tourist. I can't stress how often I grind my teeth at a Georgian who swerves from lane to lane playing dodge-car with Marylanders, or how often I need to charge around a New Yorker who is obeying the posted speed limit in spite of the flow of traffic. Now, I could imagine the Quebecers who took a glance at my Virginia tags and felt their hearts sink at the knowledge that this tourist was going to throw a wrench into their traffic.

And how I did.

All right, let's talk a little bit about that sketch tunnel that welcomes you into Montreal. Because, you know, it's sketch - at least if you're trying to get to University St. The signs... kind of don't exist for that until you get *out* of the tunnel, if you get out at the right exit. I did not get out at the right exit. So, confused, I got back *into* the tunnel and popped out even farther from where I needed to be. From there, things got weird.

I fumbled through Montreal until we got to a major road at which time I pointed towards downtown and hoped to cross University. Let's talk about this road that I turned on.

Okay, imagine your standard four-lane road. On the far right you have your bus/taxi lane, on your far left you have your turning lane - all normal; the middle two lanes are, instead, one big-ass lane that two cars share. To repeat - that two cars share.

Never have I heard of such a thing, much less driven such a thing. I would have been more than happy to turn off of it, but Leo had discovered that the road took us almost directly to Rob's hostel (it was about 5:30 at this point). Traffic was heavy, time was running out, and I was completely in the dark as to what was going on. Eventually I got sick of it all and just sank into D.C. commuter mode.

I must have angered many a Quebecer, much less scared Leo, Kelly and Rob - but I give props to my mad driving skills (Kathy, if you're reading this, stop laughing).

With about 10 minutes to spare we dropped Rob off a block from his hostel, and he reported later that he got his reservation with four minutes remaining. With that mission accomplished, we made it to the hotel (after having to briefly leave Montreal) and got ourselves squared away.

I had planned to arrive with enough time to relax myself, but the traffic ordeal had made it so that I had to leave the hotel to pick up Denis and Kathy pretty much as soon as I stepped into the room.

Off I went.

Getting to Dorval was simplistic - just had to take a highway and follow the signs. Again, the Maryland-like driving qualities of Quebecers, the setting Sun in my eyes and a really sketchy roundabout kept me on my toes. I saw that Denis' flight was two hours delayed and was going to come in about the same time that Mandi, Kathy's roommate, would be coming in, so fortunately I would only have one more trip after this one. I picked up Kathy without much of a wait and it was back to Montreal.

Determined not to make the same traffic mistakes I had made on my first ride in, I made new ones. This included screwing up the tunnel again *and* running a red light - first time for everything. Overall, though, getting Kathy to the hotel was much, much easier than getting my roommates there.

Had a little downtime in the room then it was off to get Denis and Mandi. At least, we left the room to do so. Kathy and I decided that since customs was adding an hour to people's wait times we would just hang around the lobby. Oh, boy, talked to a lot of people (Michael, Lenny, Mara, A Fan... lots more), saw Greg show up (tired) and then we were off.

Mandi showed up... Denis didn't. After an hour, Denis still hadn't shown up. After an hour and a half and learning that British Airways was undergoing a complete meltdown at Dorval... Denis didn't show up.

We waited until midnight for Denis and then figured that he'd be intelligent enough to realize that we weren't going to wait around all night and just take a shuttle. This he did - just two hours earlier, minutes before we showed up at Dorval.

*grumble*

Got to the room at 1 a.m., unrolled the airmat that my fellow office intern loaned me and called it a day - a long, long day.

Day's mileage: 480
Total mileage: 930

Alex Garg writes...

Tuesday, August 3 - Prologue:
Typical day at work. Got up around 7:30 a.m., out of the house around 9, in by 10 (love that summer recess intern work schedule: 10 a.m. - 3 p.m.). I left a note for my parents to dig up my passport so I'd be all good to cross the border - for years I've insisted on keeping it, but they've always said that it would be better for them if they kept everybody's stuff together. At about 11 I get a call from my dad - Dad never calls my office unless it's something big.

Mom was sick and couldn't remember where my passport is (she was under the impression that I had it. See note above, understand the minor headache that washed over me at that moment). So, I said that I'd just go with my birth certificate.

Apparently, that's with my passport.

*sigh*

Fortunately, I was born in D.C., so I cut out from work early to head down to D.C. Vital Records to pick up a new certificate. I don't know if it's because I work for the bureaucracy that has made me immune to fear of bureaucracy (the DMV doesn't scare me, either) or that I was too dedicated to getting this checked off my list that I wasn't thinking about what a trip of this nature entailed, but I set off to do it anyway.

There's nothing like walking in a suit in 90 degrees + humidity for a mile-and-some to get you in the mood for filing paperwork. And, of course, there's nothing like sitting around for 80 minutes while the people who came in after you get their certificates first to keep that energy going, not to mention the words of encouragement coming from the man who had been waiting five hours for his certificate.

So, after that long wait I got what I sought and was on my way. I did all my packing that night, made Kelly her mix CDs, double and triple checked with the hotels that all my reservations were in order and took a good, long sleep in preparation for tomorrow.

Here's what I didn't do: get drinks for the ride, get Kelly's cat, Squidgy, any toys and download the maps I needed to my GPS - I had the route in there for about a week, just not the maps along the way. I could do those in the morning.

Wednesday, August 4 - Onward:
Dad woke me up on his way out at around 7:30 a.m. and we had our goodbyes. I went through my morning routine and was out the door at about 8:30 to take care of the last-minute details of my trip and I left the computer to download those GPS maps. While out I picked up the drinks, an Arnold Schwarzenegger "The Governator" chew toy and scratching post for Squidgy, a 128 MB memory disc for my digital camera and a new pair of headphones for Kelly as a belated birthday present (Squidgy had destroyed hers a few days earlier).

I returned home about 9:45 to check on my maps, only to see warnings that my device didn't have enough room to hold them all and the map of Montreal was corrupted. So after sacrificing the maps of D.C., Maryland, Pennsylvania and greater Ontario in order to keep maps of the key cities *and* reinstalling Montreal… I was out of time. Leo was due into Dulles at 11:10 and, the airport being 40 minutes away, I needed to go.

At 10:06 I posted in my LJ "See you all in Montreal!!!" and was off shortly thereafter - quickly grabbing a road atlas on my way out.

No problems at Dulles, other than getting together with Leo, but through much of the morning we didn't have any incident. We stopped in Altoona, Pa., for a bit of lunch about 1:30 p.m. but for the most part had a straight shot - although through some very windy, skecthy back roads.

One of the great things about today was that my older sister was on her way *back* from Canada and pretty much along the same route. She gave me a ring at some point in the afternoon that she had just gotten through a major storm in Pa. and wanted to know where we were.

We were just entering the storm at that point.

It was, well, massive, and we had to pull over a few miles east of Du Bois to wait it out, but from there (I promise this time) - straight shot.

Pennsylvania is entirely too big, BTW.

We got into our hotel in Niagara Falls, N.Y., around 7:30 p.m. without much trouble and ordered a pizza for dinner (culture clash - how big is a sheet of pizza?) We called Kelly to let her know that we were just across the border and to confirm the time we'd be picking her up (and asked her the question above - she didn't know).

That night we had to contend with a very, very loud tour group that had taken up the hall. So, though I ended up sleeping soundly, it took a few hours to get there.

Day's mileage: 450

Next, "The Longest Freakin' Day"

Spacebabie writes...

Thursday, Aug 5

Woke up and showered. Greg bought Donut Holes. I ate a few along with some coffee. Greg, Alex, Revel and I tried to wake up the others. We paused to admire Greg's action figures and Revel pointed out one of his Peter Parker figures appeared to be constipated. After a few laughs we managed to get the others up. I decided to show off and picked up Aaron from behind. He went LIMP and had to sit back down. Now I know how Lynati feels. (Ask her or Aaron about a certain Akon story)

We managed to get everyone fed and dressed and head out to the hardware store to pick up more supplies for Lynati's costume and then fill the cars with gas and the coolers with ice and sodas

We passed by the Catskills (More mountains and another Washington Irving Setting.)

The lines at the borders were long, but we managed to make it through. We pulled over to a rest stop to get better directions. It seemed the second we drove over the border the temperature dropped. Coat time! I tried to wait along with the others but because of my sandals. (Comfortable for traveling) I had to jump back into Hyena to warm up my feet. After we received directions we continued toward Montreal.

The star wars jokes picked up when we drove through this tight trench made up of cement dividers. As we drove up on the bridge into Montreal Greg noticed a big glowing red search light and made an LOTR joke. Our first exit was blocked off but we managed to find another one and drove towards the hotel.

Nearly everyone got out to find the real place to park and try to get our keys. Several people in the fandom were there to greet us including Sapphire, who looks totally differed sans glasses. We got out our suitcases and I watched the stuff while Revel and Emambu park the cars in the basement parking lot.

After dropping off our luggage we went down to socialize. I met with Ckayote from the S8 comment room: Another Floridian and a fellow Golden Knight. I tried to stay awake but I could actually hear the lullaby music form the Sims game in my head. I had to crawl into bed before I passed out on the lobby floor.

Next up Friday.