Let’s get this out in the open – sales sucked. Every single person who came by with idiot questions like, “why don’t you have more things for sale?” and “why isn’t the booth bigger?” – the answer is “Because Yuri fans are cheap.” If you’ve ever wondered why there’s more Yaoi than Yuri (setting aside the fourteen million cultural, business and social reasons,) the answer is, “Yaoi fangirls buy WAY more Yaoi than Yuri fans buy Yuri.” And btw – don’t come up to the booth asking stupid-ass questions like why isn’t it bigger, when you won’t even cough up a freaking buck for a post card. Cheap. Cheap. Cheap.
BUT, I do want to thank everyone who did come by and supported us, bought a book or a postcard, had a nice chat. It’s always great to see folks every year. So thank you folks! You are the ones who make it possible to do things like publish Yuri Monogatari 5, and run events like the “Yurisai” event! On behalf of everyone at Yuricon and ALC Publishing – thank you!
Now that that is out of the way, I had an *awesome* time at Otakon this year. I spent more time with friends than I’ve managed in a long time. I already mentioned that we had a Yuricon staff dinner, which was cool. The next night some of staff/friends got together and went out with Tran and Isabel from Drama Queen, a Yaoi publishing company. We had the best time. Great food and great company. The DQ folks are just great. We’re hoping to do a show together this winter. It ought to be a hoot. :-)
Sunday we finally had our Yuri Panel. We were originally scheduled for Saturday at 10:30, which would have been great, but hey, we at least got a panel. (They had a lot of panel issues this year.) Considering our time slot, 1-2PM, which is basically the last panel of the whole con, we had a nice crowd. More importantly, the three girls I met two weeks ago at AnimeNEXT came, and they dressed as the Marimite girls again for us. Leanne and her sisters were as awesome this time as they were last time, but now all my friends know what I mean when I said how adorable they were. I did get better pictures this time, but no, you still can’t see them – you’re all too creepy. LOL
I really need to thank their father, though, because he was so cool about it all and just laughed when I said that if *I* was being to creepy, he should just tell me to back off. He also didn’t beat me to a pulp when I inadvertently said something a tad crude in front of his little angels. The youngest of the trio, who was a perfect little Shimako, was so bored during the panel. I expected her to fall asleep any second. It was breathtakingly cute. Yumi was bored too, but she was very polite about it. Leanne – please thank your sisters for being so nice to us. They deserve an ice cream or something for being such good sports.
Ohohoh – I forgot to tell this story. Leanne has the *win* story of the con that she told me. She was walking down the hall dressed as Sei when Noto Mamiko, the seiyuu who plays Shimako in Marimite, saw her and gave her a hug saying, “Onee-sama!”
She wins.
I started the panel with “Who here is on /u/ on 4chan?” Two guys w/yuri paddles raised their hands, but when I said, “Get out – you can’t have it both ways” they just looked puzzled, which made me laugh, so I let them stay. Because it was Sunday, I had no voice, so I had planned to give each of the panelists a few minutes to talk about a series of interest to them – with clips and/or screencaps where we had time to get them. Serge talked about El Cazador de la Bruja, Katie discussed Red Garden, Bruce wowed everyone with a great sell on Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou, which made me want to run out and read it all over again and Sean covered Maria-sama ga Miteru. I finished with Nanoha StrikerS. The audience didn’t seem to know anything newish, so hopefully they’ll all look for those and for Media Blaster’s Simoun and Strawberry Panic releases. Although it was late in the con, I thought it went very well. If you enjoyed the Yuri Panel, let ’em know – and tell them to not bury it next year!! LOL
After the Dealer’s Room closed, I wrapped up some stuff and we met Sean and his friends for dinner, at which we got to enjoy Sean’s drunken ramblings. :-)
I went to a party afterward, but ran out of social skills early and left to go back to the room. When I got back to the hotel, I went over to Tran’s room and chatted with her and Isabel, forgetting to check in with my roommates, who tracked me down a few hours later and gave me a tongue lashing for making them worry. I felt so loved. :-)
So, in a nutshell, that was Otakon. Mostly it was time spent with friends, getting to kick back and actually relax a bit.
The next con up on the schedule is – Yuricon’s 2007 “Yurisai” Event! We’ll see you there!!
