Dragon Ashes

Megacon is this weekend.  Since I work close to the Orange County Convention Center I get to see a few cosplay attired fans walking along I-Drive as I drive in and out.  However, I have never been able to 1. Get my painfully shy* self to commit to going, 2. Found someone else interested in going who would go with me and/or help convince me to go or 3. Had the available loot to get in.  Megacon isn’t a terribly expensive convention as they go, but when you worry about gas for to and from work every week, it is an expense that doesn’t fit in the budget.  But, oh, how I would love to go someday.

What does one do at a convention of this sort?  I don’t really know other than what I’ve read about online.  I know that there are always vendors – both independent artists** and big name publishers and the like – who set up booths to capture the attention of the fans.  I know they have ‘panels’ where a group of people, generally people in the business related to the con (in this case: comic books, anime, scifi/fantasy, manga) get together to give a talk or have a discussion for an audience.  Often these will be actors or artists or publishers or writers and they’ll discuss any number of things that could be related to the subject.  They also have parties of differing sorts and it is also a place to see and be seen for your love of the subject – wearing costumes as characters in the comics or shows or whatever is featured.  Some people find this to be the best part, I confess I think it would be a lot of fun to be a spectator watching people who have spent a lot of time and effort to costume themselves as a character they are fond of.  If you are interested in finding out more about what the cosplayers look like, check out Jen’s http://www.epbot.com/ blog as she attends nearly every year and loves capturing the cosplayers on film and posting those photos on her blog.

But, it ain’t in the cards this year.  Someday!  On the other hand, I’ve had fun watching the birds this morning.  We’re still gloomy and cloudy but the wind has got the birds all aflutter   Some of them play in it (the vultures seem to relish it), others get annoyed (mockingbirds, is there anything that DOESN’T annoy them??) and others (like the ducks I’ve seen bobbing up and down on the lake this morning) ignore it as unimportant.

In other news, we’ve finally identified the ugly goose-like birds that hang out around our lake.  They are Muscovy Ducks.  It took us a while because identification images never showed the true ugliness of the ones that we see here.  And now there is an argument going on between Mr. Dragon and FIL regarding the origins and territory of the Muscovy Duck.  I’m content to just know what they are and that they eat a lot of mosquito larvae!  Have a picture:

Photo from Wikipedia.  Ours are way uglier.  Their black and white coloring is much more mottled and the red knobby skin around their eyes more irregular, looking almost like they are diseased.

*When I say painfully shy I mean it.  How many friends do you have?  I have two.  One I see on a semi-regular basis and one I’ve only met online.  Oh sure, I have acquaintences but a friend is a little different.  If I don’t count my mom or Mr. Dragon, that is all there is.  I’m just not good with social interaction.  People think I’m surly because I don’t have conversations.  I don’t do small talk and the stuff I actually enjoy discussing is a little geeky and of no interest to most people I meet.  Add in that I rarely go places where I could meet new friends and you have a person who is more comfortable online than face to face.  This isn’t really a sad thing, except when there comes a time (which is rather rare) that I DO actually want to go somewhere.  Us shy people don’t like going places alone, we need wingmen.

**I think the artist tables would be the biggest draw for me.  I love art in all shapes and sizes and it would be fun to meet the artist too.