Fanime Day 2

Saturday...the weekend proper had arrived, and now Fanime was really in full swing.

I woke up early, needing to get to the Rumiko Takahashi gathering which was starting at 10:30AM.  Skipped out on Russell's Mahjong panel, sorry Russell!  I needed more sleep...

Parking was a success this time!  Only paid $5 for the whole day, woo-hoo.  Hopefully I'll be able to win at that tomorrow as well, though maybe I won't if I arrive too late and parking fills up...

I saw a Vanellope on the way to the con!  But I actually didn't see any Wreck-It Ralph people anywhere throughout the rest of the con...kind of sad.

Anyways, my first stop was the Rumiko Takahashi gathering; it was pretty cool to see a Ryoga, Ranma, Akane, and even Genma and...Pantyhose Taro??

Impressive.  The gathering was pretty small, but still rather fun.  I'm glad that another Kikyo showed up; I think I would have felt a bit bad if I were the only one who did, even though I guess part of the reason I decided to be there anyways was in case they didn't have one.  The Inuyashas seemed like pretty cool people, hehe.  Also, that Ranma was totally prepared...he had on the alternate movie outfit underneath his normal one:

After that was all done, I was heading into the con, but they were calling all cosplayers who happened to be around out to the main plaza in front of the convention center so that they could take huge cosplay photos, and...I saw Merida!

When I saw her costume and wig I actually thought for a second that it was the same Merida that I had met the year before, and was a bit embarrassed after tapping her on the shoulder excitedly to find out that she wasn't.  Ah, well, still cool anyways.  But I think I'll never have the same excitement that I did when I met that Merida last year; she was so friendly!  The ones I met today felt so much more...distant...

After briefly meeting up with Azura (I think?) and also Wendy and co. in the gaming room I headed out to grab lunch for myself, settling on Hydration over McDonald's, half because I felt like rice and meat was going to feel like a more proper meal, and half because...it just felt like something that I should do while I'm at Fanime.

Oh wait, actually, I forgot; before that I stopped by both the LoL/Dota and Final Fantasy gatherings, just to see if there was anyone interesting there.  At the LoL gathering I only saw one Sona--the one from before, so whatever.  And the only person interesting at the FF gathering was...a girl who was dressed as Ultros from FF6, haha, woo~  It was kind of sad when they called FF1-3 and no one came up.  I guess that's sensible though; the only ones who would really be there from that are probably generic black and white mages anyways.  But it was also sad that no one else from FFIV or FFVI was there.  Actually, come to think of it, I really haven't seen that many FFIV or FFVI cosplayers at Fanime ever, bah.  I guess sprites don't translate into cosplays as efficiently.  I was half-hoping I'd be able to see Bleu as Rydia or Terra ^^;  Haha, that reminds me of last year during the cosplay masquerade show when they did a Final Fantasy Hunger Games skit, and I was cheering for Terra (who ended up winning!  YES!)...

I ran into a Guqin Sona later!  I probably missed her in the gathering since she didn't have the guqin or anything...

I finally found Belicia and Erica!  (And also got to say hi to Amy after she performed at Fanimaid live...even got to wave hi to Reece, who was visiting as well)  Walked around artist's alley with them some more and...found some more Journey prints and buttons...orz.  I resisted the temptation to buy them (*pats self on shoulder*).

After that I ran off to the Touhou gathering.  I didn't bring my Lily White cosplay this year because...I really don't feel like doing that cosplay anymore, and I'm beginning to care less about the Touhou gathering in general.  It's not really that much fun when not a single person out of Russell, CCY, Derek, Belicia, Kat, Erica, etc. are there.  But I still felt a duty to spread the Lily White love, so I brought my green Lily White sign again (which I had been trolling people with earlier in Artist's Alley and the gaming room), and made sure it got included in the appropriate shots.  Apparently there was also a Lily BLACK this time, what???  I was kind of disappointed that I didn't end up bringing my cosplay after all; we could have had a Lily White + Lily Black shot, how rare would that be???  But...meh, it's fine.  I actually don't really regret it.  I actually don't really care much about that green sign anymore either; I actually ended up stashing it behind a table in the Dealer's Hall; it might still be there at the moment, ha ha ha.  I was thinking of trying to pass it off to someone in the Touhou Gathering, but I'm not even sure they would have taken it...(here, have this random green poster, it's yours now, deal with it, kthxbai?)

Speaking of the Dealer's Hall, this year marks the first time where I bought absolutely =nothing= from the dealer's hall!  Woo~  The only thing that I really wanted was a Tiny Snow Fairy Sugar poster, but...really, even if I seriously wanted it that badly, I have no room on my wall whatsoever to put it on.  So...I guess I'm sort of done with all that.  Or maybe it's just because my fandom(/merchandising?) tastes are different now...I'm going for Journey things and Brave nowadays instead of being all up on Pita-Ten and Nanoha and everything.  So I guess I just buy from Artist's Alley nowadays?  That's kind of...fine, actually, I almost feel like the stuff coming out of there is just, a lot "nicer" sometimes, haha.

I went to the Kyoukai no Kanata gatherine with Belicia and Erica, where...we had like 12 Mirais.  It was actually sort of frightening.

I also ran into a Journeyer!

Dammit, thinking back on it, I probably should have said hi...if I see them again I definitely will try and talk to them and ask them if they're on the forums or anything.  For now, I'll just...blame it on the fact that, it's a Journeyer--why would I think to talk to them using words?  I should just chirp at them and run around in circles around them, then faceplant on the floor.  LOL man...if I ever make a journey cape, I will definitely definitely have to do that if I ever meet another journeyer, ahahahaha...

We went off to the Disney gathering (where I also met up with Isabelle briefly), which was not nearly as epic for me as it was last year (Merida and Wreck It Ralph!!!), but ended up having some epic moments, usually involving Cinderella's sisters:

Who in this shot are pointing at the other pair of sisters who were photobombing them from behind the glass wall.  Too perfect...

Mary Poppins was also awesome, especially the cheeky remarks she made in rebuttal to the Cinderella sisters.  At one point the Cinderella sisters were arguing over who had the better dresses, trying to woo over Gaston, and Mary Poppins over on the side was just like "Well, we all know there's only one person here who's really dressed properly here, now don't we?"  She also made witty remarks about Gaston...something like "No one's been like Gaston...but that doesn't mean to be like Gaston is a good thing."  And when the Cinderella sisters whipped out their recorder and flute and played horrendously, Mary Poppins just did a very deliberate *slow clap*.  Haha, so perfect.

After saying goodbye to Belicia and Erica (who went home for the day), I went over to the gaming room again, where I found that Kitaru had set up Ti!  So I hopped on that and played for...quite some time, actually, haha.  Ran into Jasper too, and ended up grabbing dinner with him and his friend (cheesesteaks).  I was quite exhausted after all that, but I decided to head back to the con one more time just to see if anyone was around, or if any random strangers seemed amenable to meeting or anything.  I ended up playing some more TGM3, and ended up getting Shirase S5 (and hitting the Torikan) despite feeling quite brain-dead.  So that's my first ever "EXCELLENT/but...let's go better next time".  I also had my first ever promotional exam, which was pretty exciting, although the exam was for S5, which is...not that exciting (for reference, my current best single performance in TexMaster is an M7, which is a full 11 grades higher than that).  It's probably because my Master performances on that account so far have been...pretty crappy (haven't even cleared the game yet).

Anyways, I was definitely much tired, so aching at that point, I checked up on CCY and Russell and said hi to Russell and Wendy but basically just left to go drive home at that point.  At the last chance possible, during the elevator ride up to my parking spot, I struck up a short conversation with a friendly-looking man and woman there, asking them how their con was going and if they had gone in previous years and if they had any plans for tomorrow.  It was a short and trivial conversation, but it actually left me feeling quite good.  I've really come a long way since years past.

Tomorrow I don't have all that much to do, besides maybe stop by the *other* Disney gathering, play some TAP doubles mode if that's set up, and go see the cosplay masquerade.  Oh, there's also a Nidhogg tournament going on at 7PM, but I'm really not sure how long masquerade will take, and I wouldn't be too disappointed if I didn't get to join in the Nidhogg fun; it seems like it's pretty popular and so it will probably take forever to actually get the tournament going.  Plus, what happens if I get the cave stage?  Really the sole reason I want to enter the tournament is so I can show off my fancy movement, hahaha.  Well, whatever.

It's been good so far~  Let's get a good rest and take a good attitude to tomorrow, too!