Terminus, Entry Six. Summaries: Tuesday and Wednesday.

[valis2]

*deep breath*

These are going to be loooong, as y'all know already.

Big shout out to my roomies gmonkey42 and loudmeggaphone for dealing with my spazzy demented self. They are awesome rockin' roomies and they know the secret power of Sparkly Unicorn Points.

Tuesday

So I was totally crazed while trying to get out the door. Ended up taking a slightly different route to Chicago than I usually do, and it worked out well. I was supposed to pick up Gmonkey & Meggaphone at the airport, and then Gmonkey called and said her flight came in early. So I ended up picking her up at the hotel and then zooming off to the airport again, where I sat in the cell phone lot next to a taxi whose driver was napping. Then I picked them up and drove us all back to the hotel and we spammed each other with tales of Cats We Have Known (or, in their cases, Cats We Have Been Knowing Right Now).

Because we had limited time, we ended up going nearly straight to Wicked (well, I was there already, lol) and checked out the theater. It was lovely, a baroque and stylish old theater, and one of the ushers was Filch. Seriously. He even yelled at people.

We were on the balcony level, and there are those two special boxes (you know, the Waldorf and Stadtler boxes), and a guy and girl ended up getting into one of the boxes and kissing for our entertainment. And then he smacked her ass, which must have also been for our entertainment (and hers, I suppose).

The kid behind us was angry at being stuck in the middle of the row because he stood up and said, "I'm not standing up again!!" Yes, with two exclamation points. Ask Gmonkey. She was there.

Wicked was...interesting. Skip this next bit if you don't care about my opinion of Wicked. I won't be sad, I promise.

The first time I saw the Wicked poster, I didn't really think about it. But then, after hearing WickedSQUEEE from everyone (including my usually not-so-squeeful mother), I took a closer look. I don't know if you've seen it or not, but here's a link. Anyway, the Wicked Witch is facing the camera, her hat pulled down so that you can't see her eyes, and she is grinning a wicked grin. The Good Witch is leaning in and whispering in her ear.

I've heard all of the stories about Wicked, and I know a plot point or two, so I thought about it and decided that the Wicked Witch was pretty damned wicked and the Good Witch was cluelessly informing her about things which the WW would later use to her advantage. I expected a truly wicked witch, y'know? I like powerful women stories.

Imagine my surprise when it turns out to be an Odd Couple story, where most of the action takes place at Hogwarts school, and Elphaba (WW) is just an impassionate, socially stilted loser and Glinda is the Legally Blonde witch. Hmm. Not what I expected. That's not to say that I wasn't happy with the musical. The love interest guy had a nice voice, and because I couldn't quite see his facial features (and because he was in motion most of the time) I just pretended he looked like Fox Mulder and that was just dandy.

Glinda really made the musical for me. Her character was hilarious, and the performance was tons of fun.

Back to the con!

So we went back to the hotel after Wicked was over, and we stopped at the pub for a bite to eat, only the extremely loud folk music drove us back to our room to order pizza, which was delivered by the surliest pizza man ever. We had asked for (and paid for) a side of sauce and a can of pop, and napkins and plates, but SPM was not interested in providing us with such frivolities and we received the pizza and the can of pop and not one thing more.

The hotel promised that they would deliver our fridge but it did not arrive.

Wednesday

I have "Sirens!!" written in my book, which is what woke me up, I believe. Ten minutes of sustained sirening. Yes, I think that's it. Also, the front desk called to say that we would have a fridge in five minutes, but it was a terrible lie. At that point I gave up trying to sleep.

I left Gmonkey and Meggaphone to their well-deserved rest and wandered down to Starbucks, where I played spot-the-fen, which is not nearly as interesting when played alone as it is with julian_black. Though I did win this time.

I met up with alabastard and alabastardragon, who were waiting for their room to be prepared. My manners were abysmal--I forgot to introduce myself and I had no squid with me so it is entirely conceivable that they had no idea who I was.

I overheard someone on a cell phone trying to change one of the names registered for her hotel room because she had found out her roommate's real name. Only at a con. lol.

I was labeled a Hufflepuff by a random fan. *raises eyebrow*

Gmonkey, Meggaphone and I went to lunch at the pub, and laughed about their display of blackthorn canes. Irish pimp canes, y'all.

vampireanneke and sheryll crashed in our room for an hour or two while waiting for their own to be ready.

Gmonkey and I worked on our Snape's Mary Sues presentation, and I freaked out a little about it.

I saw marginaliana and unsymbolic briefly.

Gmonkey, Meggaphone and I went to the Eleven City Diner, which was marvelous with a capital mar. I totally enjoyed it. The food, the atmosphere, the delightful company--just wonderful! And they even had Faygo in glass bottles on the menu. Win.

And now I shall tell you about Wizarding Wrock. Gather close, my children.

I've never seen any of Wrock before, and I was interested in it as a phenomenon, more than in the Wrock itself. So I decided to go, because I've skipped it at the last few cons. I purchased my ticket for Wrock Chicago before I found about ravenna_c_tan's Erotic HP Reading Night. I then thought to myself, self, do you really want to go to Wrock? Because you know you want to hear these readings and you'll have a great time there.

And I said, listen up, fool, I am going on a great sociological trek into the unknown, and I will gather insights unto myself, enough for at least a dozen blog entries. And also, I will verily voyage to said bookstore if the Wrock does not fill me with white light.

Okay. So I decided to watch two of the headliner acts, the Whomping Willows and Remus and the Lupins. I have seen the WW's--er, the lead Willow--at a drunkeaters party before, so I wasn't totally unprepared. I remember thinking it was repetitive.

Well, I am still scratching my head. It was still repetitive, and worse yet, hard to understand. The distortion was terrible, and I was at a loss about what anyone was saying.

The phenomenon was mildly interested. I'm noticing a schism in the fan ages--we have the older slasher guard, who gravitates toward the con behind the con, and then there is the young Wrock crowd. Keep in mind that this is just an observation, not condemnation, and I'm aware that I'm waay oversimplifying.

So the Wrock crowd was quite boisterous. They were jumping up and down continuously, and I was sitting in a chair at the edge of the room, and my chair was bouncing up and down, but not due to any motion of my own. The entire floor was bouncing. Apparently a chandelier on the floor below fell down.

There were long tables set up on the other side of the room where the bands were selling merch--CD's and shirts, that sort of thing.

I find that the Wrockers are very passionate; they love their bands, and the music, and they like to play it on their phones and talk about it and such. There was a Wrock track at the con, with presentations every day about Wrock, and that fascinated me as well. It also makes me want to make a Welectronica band called Valismort. You think I'm kidding, don't you?

So I got bored with the concert shortly after Remus and his very favorite Lupins came onstage, and went back to the lobby. After much calling and consultation, I found out that the bookstore was quite a hike, and just decided to call it a night after being very very sad that I had missed out on a cool get-together.

Whew! That's just the first two days...