Elf, My Weekend of Wonder
I attended the "Elf, Weekend of Wonder" convention in Orlando, Florida, August 26th-28th, 2005, sponsored by TheOneRing.net and Creation Entertainment. Following is my journal of the event. If you attended the event and you are visiting my site, please leave a comment. (Of course, if you didn't attend the event you can leave a comment too.)
Friday
My first day of ELF, Weekend of Wonder, is over. Friday was a pretty low-key day –no big celebrities. The makers of Ringers: Lord of the Fans presented some clips followed by Matt Appleton of WETA. Ringers comes out on Sony DVD in November. It's not just wacky fans, but a look at the cultural impact of the book since it was published to the present day. Somehow, they worked mariachi into it. Definitely need to see it.
I missed the first 15 minutes of Matt's presentation, but he related various anecdotes and factoids accompanied by a slide show. He described his experience playing an Elf at the Council of Elrond and what it was like to be in front of the camera instead of behind. For a change, other people kept adjusting his costume, so now he tries not to do that so much. He talked about the difficulties of the orc armor and prosthetics, and then he told a story about searching through boxes in the prop room until he opened a box with a Frodo puppet inside and got totally freaked out. So orcs don't faze him, but Frodo puppets are scary.
I missed the Tengwar presentation, briefly visiting the pool and pool bar, but came back for what was supposed to be a scholarly look at Tolkien's story development. It turned out to be an informal discussion of fandom by Gary Hunnewell. I joined the crowd again around 10:00 p.m. for the Emerald Rose performance (Celtic music that rocks!). I was planning on going alone, but at the last minute, Sarah, my 5-year-old, wanted to go, so we went together. She turned out to be a great date. I may not be the life of the party myself, but I am definitely raising one. She insisted on dancing to every song, and when the party was over, she still didn't want to go home, so we went for a night-cap in the bar before taking the golf cart home. Hey, it's Florida.
I met Joan, Elwing to the Prancing Pony cyber pub regulars, at preregistration. Here's the amazing thing: We bought tickets about a week apart, me from North Carolina, Joan from Canada, and we HAD SEATS RIGHT NEXT TO EACH OTHER LIKE WE PLANNED IT. It was great hanging around with Joan. She talked me into so many things – like buying the LOTR denim jacket (we can match even though we live in different countries!?), dressing up as hobbits for pictures Saturday (just happened to pack hobbit-wear in the suitcase), and so on. I also bought Sean Astin's book, this beautiful silver and enamel elven ring, and a couple of necklaces for Sarah. She promised to share them with me. I think Joan may have even shopped more than me. We tried unsuccessfully to get together for a drink Friday (I found the bar no problem, but not Joan), but we finally raised a real toast to the Prancing Pony, the cyber pub where we regularly meet, on Saturday night, complete with real desserts.
Flashing back to getting to Orlando, I had to stay at work signing checks until 5:30 Thursday. Then I rushed to pick up my son Joseph, two, from daycare, and my daughter, Sarah, five, from her first day (!) of kindergarten. I pulled in my driveway right behind Erica, the college student I convinced to come help me with the kids. We tossed in her luggage and headed for the Greensboro (NC) airport. About halfway there, I realized I left my phone charger at home, but Erica suggested we pick up a car charger adapter and share it. We got to the airport exit at 7:35 and decided to go two more exits to the Wal-Mart to get the adapter. This wasn't really a bad decision, because we did use the phone charger, but it put us at the airport at 8:00 for a 9:00 flight. I thought an hour would be plenty of time, but curbside check-in was closed, and it took us a nearly the full hour to get our 8 (!) pieces of luggage checked, the car parked, and through security. We barely made our flight, and then the plane was so small, I couldn't even get a drink (too small for alcohol), and I really needed one by then. In the rush I cut my hand between my thumb and index finger, and it was stinging.
We got to the hotel about 11:30, and to the room about midnight, the exact time the gift shop, pool bar, and room service all closed. Foiled again. I understand Elijah Wood had the same experience Saturday night, so now we have that in common.
The Wyndham Orlando Resort has an unusual setup. There is no main hotel building, just a lobby with restaurant/bar/snack bar and meeting and convention space. All the rooms are in large outbuildings, 16 of them, situated on a large landscaped campus. Each building is two stories and as a large as a motel. The units seem more like time-share condos than hotel rooms, but they are nice and roomy. I had to switch from a king-sized bed for me and the kiddies to two doubles so the babysitter would have a place to sleep. Oh well, they practically sleep on top of me anyway.
Saturday, Sean Astin and John Rhys-Davies are scheduled, so should be a busy day.
Saturday
Woo-hoo, what a day!
The cut on my hand appears infected.
Joan talked me into dressing up for the photos, so I went as hobbit wench and Sarah as Arwen in a lovely burgundy velvet number with train. Joan went as Frodo. I was surprised that complete strangers wanted to take our pictures, but we posed for several. Made me feel like a celebrity. Or a freak.
Got a photo with John Rhys-Davies first thing after a short wait. Joan and I collaborated and all three of us posed in each other's photo. We just switched and put Joan in front with hers and me in front with mine. JRD found Sarah to be quite charming, and goosed me and Joan (he gooses all the girls). After the photo ops, we went to the auditorium to hear JRD speak. He was wonderful of course, and he was followed by Sean Astin, who was also quite entertaining. After their hour-long talks, they started signing autographs, going row by row. As we were in row K, this took quite a while. I managed to finally make a break for the bathroom, and we sent Erica for a quick snack since we hadn't eaten since breakfast. We finally got to Sean Astin and he very quickly signed a copy of his book for me and a glossy photo for Erica. Then we got in the interminably long line for JRD, who takes a little longer to sign. We had no chance of getting his autograph before my scheduled photo op with Sean Astin, but he was still signing, so we waited until we got a number for our place in line and then left.
Since we also had late lunch tickets with JRD at 4:30, we got to go to the head of the line for the photo, without Joan this time. Sarah got to sit in Sean's lap (he's good with little girls) and then we worked our deal for the luncheon.
I only had one lunch ticket because it was originally a morning brunch, then a Friday late lunch, and then a Saturday late lunch. They would let Joseph in for free since he's two, but they wanted to charge me the full price of $65.00 for Sarah, five. Erin, who works for Creation Entertainment and is "the man", got Sarah in for free and I bought a ticket for Erica, so we all got to eat together. I had a brief moment of panic when I couldn't find my ticket in my little lanyard wallet, but I finally found it in my "important papers" envelope, one of my many completely absent-minded moments.
JRD came to the lunch and visited each table in turn. We were the last table, but Sarah again got special attention. She asked him to say something like Treebeard, and he came and knelt beside her and told her a private story about the field mice who tickle him. A Japanese lady at our table, Masayo, snapped a great picture and she's going to e-mail it to me when she gets back home. JRD thrilled Masayo by speaking in Japanese to her.
Speaking of pictures, it was not a good camera day for me. I finished up the remaining film in my camera and then I could not get it to rewind. Not that it really mattered at this point because Joseph also pulled out the trailing end on my new roll of film and exposed it all. I managed to get one blurry photo of Sean Astin on my camera phone, but it went dead before I could get any of JRD. Thankfully, Joan took lots of pictures, and she will e-mail them to me. Finally bought a disposable camera after the day's events but before the evening party. Yes, I actually crossed a busy street and went into Walgreen's dressed as a hobbit wench. The next day I figured out the problem was operator error. I went in the bathroom and shut the door to manually rewind the film, and discovered there was none.
Oops.
During the luncheon they had a silent auction for charity for some LOTR memorabilia. Most of the bids were pretty high, around a $100 or more, but there were several charcoal drawings of the movie characters that were a little more reasonable. I upped a bid on a set of three pictures – Boromir, Faramir on his desperate ride, and Aragorn and Arwen together – from $47 to $60 and got it! I'm going to get Boromir scanned and then uploaded to my blog www.boromirsblog.blogspot.com.
After the auction, it was back in line for JRD autographs. I think he had to catch a plane so he was a bit rushed by then. As soon as we got his autograph, Sarah went on stage for the costume contest. I didn't feel that my costume was elaborate enough so I didn't enter myself. There were only three children in the juvenile division, Sarah, a Legolas, and a Frodo, and they were all so cute they gave them all first prize, a $20 gift certificate. Sarah was ecstatic and people made lots of pictures of her. The winners in the adult category were a Gandalf (3rd), and Eowyn (2nd), and 1st prize went to four Japanese girls dressed as Merry and Pippin and Sam and Rosie. They were great! In fact all the costumes were great – mostly Elven princesses, but a few Frodos and other assorted characters.
We went back to our room after the contest to rest a bit and to change, and then it was back to the desert party. Did I mention they have a cash bar at these parties? After a bit of mingling and meeting up with Joan again and our row-mate Patrick, the TORn staffers organized an LOTR quote contest where people get up and act out their favorite quotes. Most efforts are silly and the winner was Frodo being chased by Ringwraiths and then jumping on the ferry. "Frodo" actually threw herself on the stage/ferry. A close second, for me anyway, was Cliff Broadway's (Quickbeam on TORn) interpretation of Celeborn as a robot.
We played several rounds of trivia, and I finally won one! Yay! Free t-shirt! Winning answer – a neeker-breeker is a kind of cricket. I knew reading the books again right before the convention would pay off!
The people here at the convention are so friendly – it's like we’re all family. From Lisa with the flaming red hair and Dan who animates 3-D Godzilla spoofs (an oxymoron?), to our row-mate Patrick who was never bothered by our constant traffic in and out, to Masayo from Japan, to Etienne and Marianne from South Africa, to various Elves and Hobbits, to the panel experts, to the TORn staffers, to the Creation Entertainment people, to Mark in the airport – everyone was great, but I want to make a special mention for Erin "the man" who was everywhere all the time and did everything in his power and beyond to accommodate our needs. Thank you Erin!
I should probably relate some of JRD's and Sean's presentations. If you want to know everything they said, then you should have been there. JRD talked a lot about his low expectations for the films and how he slowly realized he was part of something that was going to be truly incredible. During audience questions, he talked about acting as a profession and gave us a sample of how he would do an audition. (Acting!) He talked in general about the morality in LOTR and moral climate in Hollywood, and stated that the debate on morals is a good thing. It at least shows we're thinking about it. He added that there are only two countries in the world engaged in moral debate – Israel and the U.S. - and that we should be proud. Someone asked him if he would show us that tattoo that supposedly all the fellowship actors got. He replied that he did what any actor would do when asked to do something foolish, painful, and dangerous – he sent his stunt double!
JRD on Gimli's fighting prowess: "He doesn't know he's small."
JRD on Gimli's manners: "He can hold his liquor, but not his wind."
JRD on Gimli's taste in women: His song about "swimming with little hairy women" was his "perversion bubbling to the top."
Sean was very personable and entertaining. He related how JRD introduced himself as being from the Isle of Man, "'otherwise known as 10,000 alcoholics clinging to a rock.'" He talked about his daughters and the difficulties of being separated from his children for work. He told a story about his daughter seeing one of his publicity photos from when he was 17 and he was all buffed out. She asked what those bumps were on his belly (muscles), and then said "'but my daddy has a soft furry belly.'"
Sean by the numbers:
The TV show he's been signed for next year: 24
How many episodes he's seen of fellow hobbit Dom's TV show Lost: 1
How many months he's been caffeine-free: 6 (He drinks decaf chai at Barnes and Noble now)
Approximately how many times a year he sees Elijah Wood: 7
What's tattooed on his ankle: #9 in Elvish
He explained that he watches TV shows by waiting for the entire season to come out on DVD and then watching it all at once because he doesn't like to be held in suspense. As soon as Lost comes out on DVD he will watch it. He talked about his book some, and said that he published it quickly in order to capitalize on the interest in the movie, in other words, for the money. He admitted that some people remember things differently from him, but that's going to happen (some of you may remember what I am relating differently). He said that it felt good to get all those emotions out and behind him. Someone thanked him for his efforts to promote literacy and asked him what he was currently reading. He replied that he had the most pompous answer for that question because he read the first three chapters of The Brothers Karamazov on the plane ride over. This impressed Joan most of all because she already thought he was pompous, and if you can admit you're pompous, well, that brings your pomposity down a notch. Lastly he asked us to tell Elijah "hi" for him the next day (which we did).
Sunday
Woke up early yet again. Packed. Got breakfast. Hottest day yet. The cut on my hand looks better. Checked out. Got a golf cart ride and stored the luggage at the bell stand. Ate lunch. Fatigue is setting in.
Joined the line for the Elijah Wood photos just before 2:00 and the line was huge. Daytrippers, fangirls, whatever you want to call them, were out in force. EW is definitely the money-man. By this time though, I recognize and greet all the people who've been there all weekend. WE ARE THE HARDCORE. YES!
A photographer from the Orlando Sentinel took about 20 pictures of Sarah in costume, and we made it in the Monday print edition. Too bad they weren't taking pictures Saturday when we were both in costume. Or maybe that's a good thing.
Everyone gets a picture with Elijah though, no matter how long the line. I was wearing street clothes this time, but Sarah elected for her burgundy Arwen dress again. I planned to put both kids in the picture since Joseph hadn't been in the ones the day before, but Sarah started insisting on holding her lavender stuffed poodle dog, and I wouldn't let her. By the time we got to EW she was crying, and I finally got my first glimpse of him in person. He will hate me for saying this, but he really does seem hobbit-like in person. I knew he wasn't tall, but he's skinny too. Well then, not exactly hobbit-like - he doesn't eat enough food for a hobbit! He was wearing ripped jeans, black boots, and a yellow t-shirt. Even his feet are small. His dark hair was a little spiky with long sideburns setting off perfect pale skin (see pic below). He was smiling and upbeat, seemingly unfazed by the long line of people. I told him that Sean held Sarah in his lap, but when he picked her up she just cried more. Not wanting to hold up the line I stepped away, tried to calm her down, even tried the purple dog. She said she was just tired of getting her picture taken, "tired" being the operative word, so I handed Joseph off and posed by myself. It's not the first time girls have broken down in tears in front of him I'm sure.
Quite some time later, EW came on stage for his presentation. He started off by taking pictures of the audience as we took pictures of him. Then he called Dominic Monaghan on speaker phone and chatted, followed by a call to Billy Boyd. We sang "Happy Birthday" to Billy Boyd. After that he pretty much had nothing prepared and just took questions from the audience. The audience delivered Sean's message, and he said "what, we're communicating through fans now?" He was also asked the tattoo question, twice, and both times he showed us his #9 located on his lower abdomen. EW pulling his pants down. Cool.
Nordicay was right. I am a pervy hobbit-lover.
He talked a little about his movie Hooligans, which is creating some controversy in England. Someone asked him to describe his past week, and he did, in detail, from a movie premier in the U.K., to where he slept each night, to Comic Con in Canada, to arriving at the hotel in Orlando Saturday at midnight. He said he loved airport delays, which would unfortunately proved prescient. He talked about the "tog" game that Dom and Billy tried to teach him, but every time he thought he had it, they came up with a new rule. Six months later they finally told him they made the game up. He compared his film experience with LOTR like going off to college because it was the first time he'd ever been away from home and living on his own. He talked about the practical jokes the actors played on each other. One night they came to him and suggested trashing Viggo's trailer. He was like "ok", and then explained that they made a poo and put it on his steps, then backtracked and said not a real poo, but some stuff from the WETA studios. He said the f-word about 3 times, and then apologized each time, saying he knew there were kids in the audience, and he was trying to cut down. He talked extensively about his taste in music and said he wanted to start a record label.
The questions and answers went on for about an hour and a half, which was about half an hour too long. Joseph fell asleep as he did every day, and Sarah was so tired she just about fell asleep in her chair. I'm afraid she was a little bored by the presentations and has had enough of actors for a while.
All weekend I had been worried that EW's presentation would go long and we would miss our autographs and our flight because our plane was scheduled to leave at 6:45. When I booked the flight, I had no idea that EW would be speaking so late. I figured the show would wind down about 4:00 Sunday afternoon. We explained our dilemma to Erin on the first day, and he said he thought he could work with us. Meanwhile I checked on a later flight with the airline and found out if necessary, we could catch a flight at 9:45, and if we waited until three hours before the scheduled take-off, we could reticket for only $25 a ticket. This seemed like a good back-up plan, but it would put us home at 1:30 in the morning. Since we had both work and class the next day, we wanted to do everything possible to make the earlier flight. We packed and stored our luggage with the bellman at the hotel, and I asked them to have our luggage loaded in a van taxi by 5:45. It seemed like a plan.
Towards the end of EW's talk, Erin told us to come up for our autographs. EW kept going though. At one point he stopped and was ready to leave, but they told him he could take two more questions. Erica and I nervously looked at our watches. I snapped a couple of photos from close to side stage, and then my camera batteries went dead. This was not a good camera weekend.
Erin got us in first for autographs, which was very cool. Elijah had just gotten backstage and hadn't even sat down yet, and looked at us kind of quizzically when we were the first to walk in. The rest of the encounter seemed to go in slow motion, so try to read it s l o w l y.
I walked in first and in response to EW's look, I said "We're special." He asked us if we had an early flight, and I said "yes." He's probably thinking "who would be crazy enough to fly down here with two children?" I handed him my FOTR Visual Companion and a glossy photo and said I couldn't decide which I wanted him to sign. He was nice enough to sign them both. Then I started babbling about how I had a plan for autographs, but then I got Sean Astin to sign his own book and that messed up the plan. Like he cares. About halfway through my babbling I realized that I was babbling and that I had a sleeping baby strapped to my belly in a smiley face sling and how that's probably not something Elijah sees every day. Sarah wouldn't look at Elijah, but at least she wasn't crying. Why can't I think of anything clever to say? I should say something about New Orleans. I used to live there, and he said he had friends there and the hurricane is coming. Then he signed a photo for Erica. They are not supposed to take the time to personalize the photos, but Erica asked him to write "to Erica." He looked at her, and she just said "with a 'c'", and he did it. Then she said "I like your shoes." Smooth.
Of course now I can think of million things to say. "Where do you go when you're in New Orleans?" "Where do your friends live?" "Here's the addy for my blog."
As soon as Erica complimented Elijah on his shoes, time speeded up. We raced out of there to the lobby where I had instructed the bell captain to have our luggage loaded in a van taxi by 5:45. It was at least 5:55 by now, but when we got there our luggage was not loaded. This may have been the crucial flaw. Perhaps the bellman couldn't load it without seeing our claim tickets, but I thought I had it all worked out. The taxi driver made a valiant effort to get us there, but neither the sky cap nor the ticket agent would accept our luggage or let us on the plane because it was less than 30 minutes before the scheduled take-off. We had no choice but to wait until 6:45 and book the next flight at 9:45. Then this flight was delayed until 11:35. So we were the first to get autographs and probably the last to leave Orlando that night. Well, maybe Elijah will remember us since we were first. And like Pippin who thanked Denethor for Boromir's brave but futile defense, I could not be more thankful for Erin's assistance in getting us our autographs. If only airlines could be as helpful.
We finally got on the airplane. Sarah was over her hyperactivity by now and quietly colored her My Little Pony magic coloring book. Joseph sat next to me and smiled and jibber-jabbered and reminded me that he is the best boyfriend I will ever have. After a while Sarah told me that she just wanted to go home. Then she asked my why she had to dress up like a princess every day. I guess that crown gets heavy after a while. She composed and sang a song which I'm going to reproduce here – remember, she's only five. A few more lyrics and I think this thing will really rock.
"Take the world away. (repeat)
You can't hold the world up.
Only God can cause it's so big.
It's just a ball in outer space
And we can't leave.
Bring the world back. (repeat)"
We landed about 12:30. I got the car out of the parking lot at 1:00 a.m. We loaded the luggage and the kids, and they were asleep by 1:15. Erica and I went over the events of the weekend and then she dozed a little. I did ok until about the last 20 minutes, when the lines on the road started to converge and the lights on the cars in front of me turned into red zigzags. Finally rolled into town about 2:30 a.m. Unloaded the necessities and plopped the kids in bed. Plopped myself in by 3:00 a.m. and fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.
So was it worth it?
Here's the tab:
$551.24 cash (I made it home with $49.76 out of $600)
$245.52 various charged items, most from the vendor room
$242.40/tkt for 4 airline tickets
$100 to reticket when we failed the 30 minute rule
$514.64 hotel bill for 3 nights
$349/tkt for two Wizard Level tickets
$65/tkt for two for the Charity Lunch with JRD
$60 photo op with JRD
$60 photo op with Sean
$70 photo op with EW
Grand total: $3398.00
Shit. I am a freak.
But, yes it was worth it. We had a great time and met a lot great people. We got to meet our idols, Treebeard for Sarah, and Elijah Wood for me. Erica and I have already agreed we want to do it again. Next time I would like to spend less time in line and more time in some of the discussion groups, but I'm not sure what I would give up to do it. I would buy my tickets sooner to get closer to the front. I would have a better autograph plan, like getting them all to sign the same picture. I would slip the celebrities my website address (still kicking myself for not doing it when I had the chance). Maybe get matching costumes made for the whole family – it's fun and it gets you noticed. And I would definitely schedule a later flight.
Friday
My first day of ELF, Weekend of Wonder, is over. Friday was a pretty low-key day –no big celebrities. The makers of Ringers: Lord of the Fans presented some clips followed by Matt Appleton of WETA. Ringers comes out on Sony DVD in November. It's not just wacky fans, but a look at the cultural impact of the book since it was published to the present day. Somehow, they worked mariachi into it. Definitely need to see it.
I missed the first 15 minutes of Matt's presentation, but he related various anecdotes and factoids accompanied by a slide show. He described his experience playing an Elf at the Council of Elrond and what it was like to be in front of the camera instead of behind. For a change, other people kept adjusting his costume, so now he tries not to do that so much. He talked about the difficulties of the orc armor and prosthetics, and then he told a story about searching through boxes in the prop room until he opened a box with a Frodo puppet inside and got totally freaked out. So orcs don't faze him, but Frodo puppets are scary.
I missed the Tengwar presentation, briefly visiting the pool and pool bar, but came back for what was supposed to be a scholarly look at Tolkien's story development. It turned out to be an informal discussion of fandom by Gary Hunnewell. I joined the crowd again around 10:00 p.m. for the Emerald Rose performance (Celtic music that rocks!). I was planning on going alone, but at the last minute, Sarah, my 5-year-old, wanted to go, so we went together. She turned out to be a great date. I may not be the life of the party myself, but I am definitely raising one. She insisted on dancing to every song, and when the party was over, she still didn't want to go home, so we went for a night-cap in the bar before taking the golf cart home. Hey, it's Florida.
I met Joan, Elwing to the Prancing Pony cyber pub regulars, at preregistration. Here's the amazing thing: We bought tickets about a week apart, me from North Carolina, Joan from Canada, and we HAD SEATS RIGHT NEXT TO EACH OTHER LIKE WE PLANNED IT. It was great hanging around with Joan. She talked me into so many things – like buying the LOTR denim jacket (we can match even though we live in different countries!?), dressing up as hobbits for pictures Saturday (just happened to pack hobbit-wear in the suitcase), and so on. I also bought Sean Astin's book, this beautiful silver and enamel elven ring, and a couple of necklaces for Sarah. She promised to share them with me. I think Joan may have even shopped more than me. We tried unsuccessfully to get together for a drink Friday (I found the bar no problem, but not Joan), but we finally raised a real toast to the Prancing Pony, the cyber pub where we regularly meet, on Saturday night, complete with real desserts.
Flashing back to getting to Orlando, I had to stay at work signing checks until 5:30 Thursday. Then I rushed to pick up my son Joseph, two, from daycare, and my daughter, Sarah, five, from her first day (!) of kindergarten. I pulled in my driveway right behind Erica, the college student I convinced to come help me with the kids. We tossed in her luggage and headed for the Greensboro (NC) airport. About halfway there, I realized I left my phone charger at home, but Erica suggested we pick up a car charger adapter and share it. We got to the airport exit at 7:35 and decided to go two more exits to the Wal-Mart to get the adapter. This wasn't really a bad decision, because we did use the phone charger, but it put us at the airport at 8:00 for a 9:00 flight. I thought an hour would be plenty of time, but curbside check-in was closed, and it took us a nearly the full hour to get our 8 (!) pieces of luggage checked, the car parked, and through security. We barely made our flight, and then the plane was so small, I couldn't even get a drink (too small for alcohol), and I really needed one by then. In the rush I cut my hand between my thumb and index finger, and it was stinging.
We got to the hotel about 11:30, and to the room about midnight, the exact time the gift shop, pool bar, and room service all closed. Foiled again. I understand Elijah Wood had the same experience Saturday night, so now we have that in common.
The Wyndham Orlando Resort has an unusual setup. There is no main hotel building, just a lobby with restaurant/bar/snack bar and meeting and convention space. All the rooms are in large outbuildings, 16 of them, situated on a large landscaped campus. Each building is two stories and as a large as a motel. The units seem more like time-share condos than hotel rooms, but they are nice and roomy. I had to switch from a king-sized bed for me and the kiddies to two doubles so the babysitter would have a place to sleep. Oh well, they practically sleep on top of me anyway.
Saturday, Sean Astin and John Rhys-Davies are scheduled, so should be a busy day.
Saturday
Woo-hoo, what a day!
The cut on my hand appears infected.
Joan talked me into dressing up for the photos, so I went as hobbit wench and Sarah as Arwen in a lovely burgundy velvet number with train. Joan went as Frodo. I was surprised that complete strangers wanted to take our pictures, but we posed for several. Made me feel like a celebrity. Or a freak.
Got a photo with John Rhys-Davies first thing after a short wait. Joan and I collaborated and all three of us posed in each other's photo. We just switched and put Joan in front with hers and me in front with mine. JRD found Sarah to be quite charming, and goosed me and Joan (he gooses all the girls). After the photo ops, we went to the auditorium to hear JRD speak. He was wonderful of course, and he was followed by Sean Astin, who was also quite entertaining. After their hour-long talks, they started signing autographs, going row by row. As we were in row K, this took quite a while. I managed to finally make a break for the bathroom, and we sent Erica for a quick snack since we hadn't eaten since breakfast. We finally got to Sean Astin and he very quickly signed a copy of his book for me and a glossy photo for Erica. Then we got in the interminably long line for JRD, who takes a little longer to sign. We had no chance of getting his autograph before my scheduled photo op with Sean Astin, but he was still signing, so we waited until we got a number for our place in line and then left.
Since we also had late lunch tickets with JRD at 4:30, we got to go to the head of the line for the photo, without Joan this time. Sarah got to sit in Sean's lap (he's good with little girls) and then we worked our deal for the luncheon.
I only had one lunch ticket because it was originally a morning brunch, then a Friday late lunch, and then a Saturday late lunch. They would let Joseph in for free since he's two, but they wanted to charge me the full price of $65.00 for Sarah, five. Erin, who works for Creation Entertainment and is "the man", got Sarah in for free and I bought a ticket for Erica, so we all got to eat together. I had a brief moment of panic when I couldn't find my ticket in my little lanyard wallet, but I finally found it in my "important papers" envelope, one of my many completely absent-minded moments.
JRD came to the lunch and visited each table in turn. We were the last table, but Sarah again got special attention. She asked him to say something like Treebeard, and he came and knelt beside her and told her a private story about the field mice who tickle him. A Japanese lady at our table, Masayo, snapped a great picture and she's going to e-mail it to me when she gets back home. JRD thrilled Masayo by speaking in Japanese to her.
Speaking of pictures, it was not a good camera day for me. I finished up the remaining film in my camera and then I could not get it to rewind. Not that it really mattered at this point because Joseph also pulled out the trailing end on my new roll of film and exposed it all. I managed to get one blurry photo of Sean Astin on my camera phone, but it went dead before I could get any of JRD. Thankfully, Joan took lots of pictures, and she will e-mail them to me. Finally bought a disposable camera after the day's events but before the evening party. Yes, I actually crossed a busy street and went into Walgreen's dressed as a hobbit wench. The next day I figured out the problem was operator error. I went in the bathroom and shut the door to manually rewind the film, and discovered there was none.
Oops.
During the luncheon they had a silent auction for charity for some LOTR memorabilia. Most of the bids were pretty high, around a $100 or more, but there were several charcoal drawings of the movie characters that were a little more reasonable. I upped a bid on a set of three pictures – Boromir, Faramir on his desperate ride, and Aragorn and Arwen together – from $47 to $60 and got it! I'm going to get Boromir scanned and then uploaded to my blog www.boromirsblog.blogspot.com.
After the auction, it was back in line for JRD autographs. I think he had to catch a plane so he was a bit rushed by then. As soon as we got his autograph, Sarah went on stage for the costume contest. I didn't feel that my costume was elaborate enough so I didn't enter myself. There were only three children in the juvenile division, Sarah, a Legolas, and a Frodo, and they were all so cute they gave them all first prize, a $20 gift certificate. Sarah was ecstatic and people made lots of pictures of her. The winners in the adult category were a Gandalf (3rd), and Eowyn (2nd), and 1st prize went to four Japanese girls dressed as Merry and Pippin and Sam and Rosie. They were great! In fact all the costumes were great – mostly Elven princesses, but a few Frodos and other assorted characters.
We went back to our room after the contest to rest a bit and to change, and then it was back to the desert party. Did I mention they have a cash bar at these parties? After a bit of mingling and meeting up with Joan again and our row-mate Patrick, the TORn staffers organized an LOTR quote contest where people get up and act out their favorite quotes. Most efforts are silly and the winner was Frodo being chased by Ringwraiths and then jumping on the ferry. "Frodo" actually threw herself on the stage/ferry. A close second, for me anyway, was Cliff Broadway's (Quickbeam on TORn) interpretation of Celeborn as a robot.
We played several rounds of trivia, and I finally won one! Yay! Free t-shirt! Winning answer – a neeker-breeker is a kind of cricket. I knew reading the books again right before the convention would pay off!
The people here at the convention are so friendly – it's like we’re all family. From Lisa with the flaming red hair and Dan who animates 3-D Godzilla spoofs (an oxymoron?), to our row-mate Patrick who was never bothered by our constant traffic in and out, to Masayo from Japan, to Etienne and Marianne from South Africa, to various Elves and Hobbits, to the panel experts, to the TORn staffers, to the Creation Entertainment people, to Mark in the airport – everyone was great, but I want to make a special mention for Erin "the man" who was everywhere all the time and did everything in his power and beyond to accommodate our needs. Thank you Erin!
I should probably relate some of JRD's and Sean's presentations. If you want to know everything they said, then you should have been there. JRD talked a lot about his low expectations for the films and how he slowly realized he was part of something that was going to be truly incredible. During audience questions, he talked about acting as a profession and gave us a sample of how he would do an audition. (Acting!) He talked in general about the morality in LOTR and moral climate in Hollywood, and stated that the debate on morals is a good thing. It at least shows we're thinking about it. He added that there are only two countries in the world engaged in moral debate – Israel and the U.S. - and that we should be proud. Someone asked him if he would show us that tattoo that supposedly all the fellowship actors got. He replied that he did what any actor would do when asked to do something foolish, painful, and dangerous – he sent his stunt double!
JRD on Gimli's fighting prowess: "He doesn't know he's small."
JRD on Gimli's manners: "He can hold his liquor, but not his wind."
JRD on Gimli's taste in women: His song about "swimming with little hairy women" was his "perversion bubbling to the top."
Sean was very personable and entertaining. He related how JRD introduced himself as being from the Isle of Man, "'otherwise known as 10,000 alcoholics clinging to a rock.'" He talked about his daughters and the difficulties of being separated from his children for work. He told a story about his daughter seeing one of his publicity photos from when he was 17 and he was all buffed out. She asked what those bumps were on his belly (muscles), and then said "'but my daddy has a soft furry belly.'"
Sean by the numbers:
The TV show he's been signed for next year: 24
How many episodes he's seen of fellow hobbit Dom's TV show Lost: 1
How many months he's been caffeine-free: 6 (He drinks decaf chai at Barnes and Noble now)
Approximately how many times a year he sees Elijah Wood: 7
What's tattooed on his ankle: #9 in Elvish
He explained that he watches TV shows by waiting for the entire season to come out on DVD and then watching it all at once because he doesn't like to be held in suspense. As soon as Lost comes out on DVD he will watch it. He talked about his book some, and said that he published it quickly in order to capitalize on the interest in the movie, in other words, for the money. He admitted that some people remember things differently from him, but that's going to happen (some of you may remember what I am relating differently). He said that it felt good to get all those emotions out and behind him. Someone thanked him for his efforts to promote literacy and asked him what he was currently reading. He replied that he had the most pompous answer for that question because he read the first three chapters of The Brothers Karamazov on the plane ride over. This impressed Joan most of all because she already thought he was pompous, and if you can admit you're pompous, well, that brings your pomposity down a notch. Lastly he asked us to tell Elijah "hi" for him the next day (which we did).
Sunday
Woke up early yet again. Packed. Got breakfast. Hottest day yet. The cut on my hand looks better. Checked out. Got a golf cart ride and stored the luggage at the bell stand. Ate lunch. Fatigue is setting in.
Joined the line for the Elijah Wood photos just before 2:00 and the line was huge. Daytrippers, fangirls, whatever you want to call them, were out in force. EW is definitely the money-man. By this time though, I recognize and greet all the people who've been there all weekend. WE ARE THE HARDCORE. YES!
A photographer from the Orlando Sentinel took about 20 pictures of Sarah in costume, and we made it in the Monday print edition. Too bad they weren't taking pictures Saturday when we were both in costume. Or maybe that's a good thing.
Everyone gets a picture with Elijah though, no matter how long the line. I was wearing street clothes this time, but Sarah elected for her burgundy Arwen dress again. I planned to put both kids in the picture since Joseph hadn't been in the ones the day before, but Sarah started insisting on holding her lavender stuffed poodle dog, and I wouldn't let her. By the time we got to EW she was crying, and I finally got my first glimpse of him in person. He will hate me for saying this, but he really does seem hobbit-like in person. I knew he wasn't tall, but he's skinny too. Well then, not exactly hobbit-like - he doesn't eat enough food for a hobbit! He was wearing ripped jeans, black boots, and a yellow t-shirt. Even his feet are small. His dark hair was a little spiky with long sideburns setting off perfect pale skin (see pic below). He was smiling and upbeat, seemingly unfazed by the long line of people. I told him that Sean held Sarah in his lap, but when he picked her up she just cried more. Not wanting to hold up the line I stepped away, tried to calm her down, even tried the purple dog. She said she was just tired of getting her picture taken, "tired" being the operative word, so I handed Joseph off and posed by myself. It's not the first time girls have broken down in tears in front of him I'm sure.
Quite some time later, EW came on stage for his presentation. He started off by taking pictures of the audience as we took pictures of him. Then he called Dominic Monaghan on speaker phone and chatted, followed by a call to Billy Boyd. We sang "Happy Birthday" to Billy Boyd. After that he pretty much had nothing prepared and just took questions from the audience. The audience delivered Sean's message, and he said "what, we're communicating through fans now?" He was also asked the tattoo question, twice, and both times he showed us his #9 located on his lower abdomen. EW pulling his pants down. Cool.
Nordicay was right. I am a pervy hobbit-lover.
He talked a little about his movie Hooligans, which is creating some controversy in England. Someone asked him to describe his past week, and he did, in detail, from a movie premier in the U.K., to where he slept each night, to Comic Con in Canada, to arriving at the hotel in Orlando Saturday at midnight. He said he loved airport delays, which would unfortunately proved prescient. He talked about the "tog" game that Dom and Billy tried to teach him, but every time he thought he had it, they came up with a new rule. Six months later they finally told him they made the game up. He compared his film experience with LOTR like going off to college because it was the first time he'd ever been away from home and living on his own. He talked about the practical jokes the actors played on each other. One night they came to him and suggested trashing Viggo's trailer. He was like "ok", and then explained that they made a poo and put it on his steps, then backtracked and said not a real poo, but some stuff from the WETA studios. He said the f-word about 3 times, and then apologized each time, saying he knew there were kids in the audience, and he was trying to cut down. He talked extensively about his taste in music and said he wanted to start a record label.
The questions and answers went on for about an hour and a half, which was about half an hour too long. Joseph fell asleep as he did every day, and Sarah was so tired she just about fell asleep in her chair. I'm afraid she was a little bored by the presentations and has had enough of actors for a while.
All weekend I had been worried that EW's presentation would go long and we would miss our autographs and our flight because our plane was scheduled to leave at 6:45. When I booked the flight, I had no idea that EW would be speaking so late. I figured the show would wind down about 4:00 Sunday afternoon. We explained our dilemma to Erin on the first day, and he said he thought he could work with us. Meanwhile I checked on a later flight with the airline and found out if necessary, we could catch a flight at 9:45, and if we waited until three hours before the scheduled take-off, we could reticket for only $25 a ticket. This seemed like a good back-up plan, but it would put us home at 1:30 in the morning. Since we had both work and class the next day, we wanted to do everything possible to make the earlier flight. We packed and stored our luggage with the bellman at the hotel, and I asked them to have our luggage loaded in a van taxi by 5:45. It seemed like a plan.
Towards the end of EW's talk, Erin told us to come up for our autographs. EW kept going though. At one point he stopped and was ready to leave, but they told him he could take two more questions. Erica and I nervously looked at our watches. I snapped a couple of photos from close to side stage, and then my camera batteries went dead. This was not a good camera weekend.
Erin got us in first for autographs, which was very cool. Elijah had just gotten backstage and hadn't even sat down yet, and looked at us kind of quizzically when we were the first to walk in. The rest of the encounter seemed to go in slow motion, so try to read it s l o w l y.
I walked in first and in response to EW's look, I said "We're special." He asked us if we had an early flight, and I said "yes." He's probably thinking "who would be crazy enough to fly down here with two children?" I handed him my FOTR Visual Companion and a glossy photo and said I couldn't decide which I wanted him to sign. He was nice enough to sign them both. Then I started babbling about how I had a plan for autographs, but then I got Sean Astin to sign his own book and that messed up the plan. Like he cares. About halfway through my babbling I realized that I was babbling and that I had a sleeping baby strapped to my belly in a smiley face sling and how that's probably not something Elijah sees every day. Sarah wouldn't look at Elijah, but at least she wasn't crying. Why can't I think of anything clever to say? I should say something about New Orleans. I used to live there, and he said he had friends there and the hurricane is coming. Then he signed a photo for Erica. They are not supposed to take the time to personalize the photos, but Erica asked him to write "to Erica." He looked at her, and she just said "with a 'c'", and he did it. Then she said "I like your shoes." Smooth.
Of course now I can think of million things to say. "Where do you go when you're in New Orleans?" "Where do your friends live?" "Here's the addy for my blog."
As soon as Erica complimented Elijah on his shoes, time speeded up. We raced out of there to the lobby where I had instructed the bell captain to have our luggage loaded in a van taxi by 5:45. It was at least 5:55 by now, but when we got there our luggage was not loaded. This may have been the crucial flaw. Perhaps the bellman couldn't load it without seeing our claim tickets, but I thought I had it all worked out. The taxi driver made a valiant effort to get us there, but neither the sky cap nor the ticket agent would accept our luggage or let us on the plane because it was less than 30 minutes before the scheduled take-off. We had no choice but to wait until 6:45 and book the next flight at 9:45. Then this flight was delayed until 11:35. So we were the first to get autographs and probably the last to leave Orlando that night. Well, maybe Elijah will remember us since we were first. And like Pippin who thanked Denethor for Boromir's brave but futile defense, I could not be more thankful for Erin's assistance in getting us our autographs. If only airlines could be as helpful.
We finally got on the airplane. Sarah was over her hyperactivity by now and quietly colored her My Little Pony magic coloring book. Joseph sat next to me and smiled and jibber-jabbered and reminded me that he is the best boyfriend I will ever have. After a while Sarah told me that she just wanted to go home. Then she asked my why she had to dress up like a princess every day. I guess that crown gets heavy after a while. She composed and sang a song which I'm going to reproduce here – remember, she's only five. A few more lyrics and I think this thing will really rock.
"Take the world away. (repeat)
You can't hold the world up.
Only God can cause it's so big.
It's just a ball in outer space
And we can't leave.
Bring the world back. (repeat)"
We landed about 12:30. I got the car out of the parking lot at 1:00 a.m. We loaded the luggage and the kids, and they were asleep by 1:15. Erica and I went over the events of the weekend and then she dozed a little. I did ok until about the last 20 minutes, when the lines on the road started to converge and the lights on the cars in front of me turned into red zigzags. Finally rolled into town about 2:30 a.m. Unloaded the necessities and plopped the kids in bed. Plopped myself in by 3:00 a.m. and fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.
So was it worth it?
Here's the tab:
$551.24 cash (I made it home with $49.76 out of $600)
$245.52 various charged items, most from the vendor room
$242.40/tkt for 4 airline tickets
$100 to reticket when we failed the 30 minute rule
$514.64 hotel bill for 3 nights
$349/tkt for two Wizard Level tickets
$65/tkt for two for the Charity Lunch with JRD
$60 photo op with JRD
$60 photo op with Sean
$70 photo op with EW
Grand total: $3398.00
Shit. I am a freak.
But, yes it was worth it. We had a great time and met a lot great people. We got to meet our idols, Treebeard for Sarah, and Elijah Wood for me. Erica and I have already agreed we want to do it again. Next time I would like to spend less time in line and more time in some of the discussion groups, but I'm not sure what I would give up to do it. I would buy my tickets sooner to get closer to the front. I would have a better autograph plan, like getting them all to sign the same picture. I would slip the celebrities my website address (still kicking myself for not doing it when I had the chance). Maybe get matching costumes made for the whole family – it's fun and it gets you noticed. And I would definitely schedule a later flight.
posted by Mary Joan | 1:31 PM
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