by Michael S. Kaplan, published on 2011/03/07 07:01 -05:00, original URI: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/michkap/archive/2011/03/07/10137516.aspx
So this last weekend was Emerald City ComiCon 2011.
I love going each year for at least a day or two.
Not that I collect comics anymore (I don;t), or that I haven't sold the ones I had long ago (I have), but to just be able to do some massive people watching.
Of course I'm pretty conspicuous, what with the iBot and all. But people enjoy that too. ComiCon is probably the places with the largest percentage of people who heard of the iBot before, even fi they had never seen it. So I basically got to talk about it a bunch with people.
And I remembered how much fun it can be to do that when there isn't a reason not to. :-)
Early on I decided on my strategy to counter anyone who led with how cool the iBot was while we were at ComiCon, and Angela Melick of Wasted Talent helped me immortalize it for all:
If you aren't familar with Wasted Talent, it is a site no geek should miss; funny engineers are so rare, and she is also much funnier with her own jokes than with mine!
Several artists there sketched the iBot, though I don't think anyone came up with a storyline yet, so I am not expecting the graphic novel to be released any time soon!
There was a fascinating conversation about zombies, too. It went like this, a bit:
Other threads branched off in the conversation referencing vampires with souls from the Buffyverse and elsewhere, as well as the consensus that James Brown is nota vampire. Anyway, it was great fun and might have mad a great panel discussion (even better than the fictional "Can Star Wars fit into the Star Trek universe or vice versa?" that everyone had an opinion about too.
And I ran into Pam there, which is awesome any time it happens:
Pam has a 3-day pass but as far as I know was only there Saturday. Still fun to talk about stuff that was there, like the opportunity of a photo-op with William Shatner for only $70 (my comment was I'd let him do a photo-op with me for just $20 if he wanted) and lots of genuinely interesting stuff going on....
I also witnessed some funny moments, like when a costumed tyke dressed as Spiderman blew off a costumed tyke dressed as Batman. I had one of the many artists take a stab at rendering it (click on the picture for a bigger image):
Or dragging along the Rat City Roller Girls for a ride:
Or meeting the more convincing of the Supergirls I talked to while I was there:
Even better was the later scene that happened while we were talking and someone came up to (it seems) talk to both of us, though he was somehow distracted and unable to make eye contact with either of us:
Kids were the most fun of all the people, it was like a comic book brought to life but for real (more than one person who watched it raising up on two wheels pointed out the Iron Man 2 similarities).
Anyway, it was a great time, it truly was. I can't wait for Emerald City ComiCon 2012!
John Cowan on 7 Mar 2011 8:03 AM:
Wuddaya mean, so rare? Around here, Engineering is where you go to find Teh Funny. I know lots who are accomplished raconteurs, including, well, me. Granted, a lot of the humor is pretty left-brained.
Come to think of it, this may be an age thing. The younger ones do seem to be a little bit humor-challenged.
Michael S. Kaplan on 7 Mar 2011 8:16 AM:
Well, rare to be consistently funny, at least.
ErikF on 7 Mar 2011 11:17 AM:
I like that last cartoon sketch, but I'm trying to decide whether you're supposed to be a super-hero or a super-villain there. (Actually, I really want one of those chairs. There seems to be nothing that they can't do!)
Michael S. Kaplan on 7 Mar 2011 5:36 PM:
Hero. Definitely hero....
It has given me many opportunities I would not have had!
Gary Lawson/ America's Huey091 Foundation on 8 Mar 2011 5:39 AM:
We provided 23 ibots to wounded veterans/ J&J stopped manuf. We are trying to revive with an adjunct of our nonprofit. We need all ibot users to help us get the message out that ibots make a difference in their lives.http://huey091foundation.org/