sam_gamgee | (no subject)

The bad parts about today:
1. I'm not used to driving my dad's truck (which is bigger than mine), so there were a few white-knuckle moments with merging and such.
2. At some point this evening, I lost $42. Thankfully, I didn't need any more cash on me after whenever that happened, but still...
3. I could only be at FarPoint for one day. :-(

The good parts about today:
EVERYTHING ELSE!!!

Even with not being used to driving my dad's truck, both the drive down and the drive home were easy enough.

Getting registered was quick and painless and I was only a little late to the Browncoats panel. I also went to a "panel" to remember

njpax - who'd been in fandom for a long time and had died back in September. It felt good to be able to reminisce with other people who knew her.

I did wander around in the dealers' room a bunch and hung out there for a bit, part of the time was with

aprilvalentine, since she had a dealer table. And I finally got around to ordering a mug from her - which will have the Cascade PD Mission Statement on it. (Yes, I realize I'm a dork.) I also chatted with the Shore Leave ladies for a while, as well as a guy who collects props and costumes and such and had brought some things from Serenity, including costumes for River, Mal, Wash, and Kaylee.

I saw the tail end of Phil Weyland's talk and he seems pretty cool. I had to laugh because when I went in, he was finishing up a story and says, "And I'm going to go back and finish a story I started earlier. We're going to need a GPS for this..." and I couldn't help but think of Dan Shea at CreationCon in November.

Alan has been signing pay-for autographs earlier in the afternoon, and I ended up breaking down and buying a photo of Wash that I really liked and paid to have him sign it. He was very sweet chatted with everyone who came over. (I was surprised that there wasn't a long line.) It was cute watching him try to figure out how to spell my name (my badge was on my bag). And

nakedwesley will be very proud of me - I did talk to him and I didn't babble or anything. I asked him if he planned to do any more theatre and he said he hoped to and that he really loves doing it.

During his Q&A, he brought some stuff and signed it for people who got up to ask questions. I decided I was going to ask about Spamalot, but someone beat me to it. And he said he hadn't realized when he was preparing for the audition that it was going to be for Lancelot, so he prepared the other half of the dialogue and he saw the show the day before he auditioned and was like, "*Wait* - I'm auditioning for *that* role?" He also brought the blooper reel from Serenity that had some slightly dirtier language and it was fun watching them with other fans and seeing him laugh at some of the stuff.

When I went through the regular autograph line to have him sign my notebook, I mentioned Prelude to a Kiss to him and he said that he really enjoyed doing that one too and that he hadn't known much about it prior to doing the show and he said some nice things about John Mahoney.

All in all, it was a really nice day and Alan is such a sweetheart.

I will have pictures up soon, but my body's demanding that I feed it now.