Taimak, you broke my heart.

The Fatman contacted me a couple weeks back with an interesting proposal. He and Dora had made plans to visit the MotorCity ComicCon. Neither of them had even been to a comic convention before and as geeks they were interested to partake. Did I want to join?

Mayhaps.

Think of it chums. Comics, nerds and booth babes. An explosive mix.

-Does this guy even know his customer base? He dedicated a third of his display to Twilight. A third. I didn't see that many thirteen year old girls running around the floor. Just a lot of sweaty mens.-

I'm really not into comic books. I've enjoyed them, especially graphic novels. But I've not purchased one for years. Nor am I really that into toys, or anime, or paying high prices for t-shirts. I prefer gaming and fiction to the other forms of geekiness. Sadly, my two preferred forms of sport were largely ignored.


Enter Spectatormode.

-Wow, she's come far in life. All she needs is a porn movie of her very own. Wait. She already has one of those. Career complete.

There was a fairly extensive list of celebs and quasi-celebs. Some genuinely fit into the expected mold quite well. Carrie Fisher, the uber-sex-symbol from Star Wars was slated to be there. Sans metal bikini. Hell yeah I want to meet her. The likely non-existant girl that fills my fuzzy dreams is usually at least at one point clad in said garb. I first saw Return of the Jedi when I was about 5 years old. Even then Slavekini clad Fisher was hot.

Sadly, Carrie Fisher was only going to be at the convention on Saturday and Sunday. Damnation! Curses! Skullduggery! Oh well, we still have Taimak.

As were several actors from some of our favorite sci-fi shows. Battlestar Gallactia, Star Trek Voyager. The Dukes of Hazard. Really? The Dukes of Hazard? Who spilled the Billy Beer in our Mountain Dew? I mean come on. Catherine Bach is a little beyond the age of being delightful to see in a pair of low-riding Daisy Dukes. She's still a pretty mature woman, but she's no longer a sex-kitten.

-It was a great panel, funny and informative. But what the hell is that pink shit that he's drinking.-


The rest of the list seemed to be a haphazard mix of everything from aging wrestlers from the 1980s, to Playboy Playmates. Beautiful booth goddesses descending from their crystalline pedestals to tease a bunch of nerds who would be a mere table's width away. So close and so very far. Really it was like a zoo of duality. The geeks and nerds got to come in and view the beautiful and famous, who in turn got to see a parade of the Dork Elite.

Imagine it, all the inherent dorkiness of the internet concentrated into one large, hanger-like convention hall. Was I interested? Maybe. What's going on? Wait, Taimak is going to be there to meet his fans? Glee!

Fuck Yeah! I want to meet me some Bruce Leroy! We should cosplay and go dressed as Sho'Nuff and his entourage. The Fatman thought that an awesome idea, in theory, but a little cumbersome in practice. We're lazy people.

The day started out with Evil and myself meeting the Fatman and Dutch in K-zoo for a little pre-carpooling breakfast action at the International House of Pancakes. Lewis Black's premiere health club. A place where they have several different and rather random varieties of syrrup at your beck and call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. A place where they have the Bacon Lover's Omlette. Six strips of bacon and chedder cheese all wrapped in a blanket of eggs. A delightful experience for those who don't wish to make it all the way back to their car before their heart explodes.

-Dutch and the Fatman from the lesser known Backstreet Boys collection. They have style and dancability. The chicks, they go mad for the goodness. -




-Dutch, using his Blackberry to look up the Boysenberry. Ironic!-

You will never hear me utter the phrase 'Hey, let's goto the IHOP.' In any of it's possible variations.

Tis a two and a half hour drive through rustic farm-land between K-zoo and Novi, driving along traffic infested highway. Dutch was trying for a new local land speed record, along with about half the rest of the people on the road that day.


- The unstoppable FIB Canuk! -

The first thing I really noticed about the convention is that the vast bulk of the patrons is made up by sad creepy bastards just like me. This was expected. I know my own people. But still surprising. Nerds of all shapes and color had convened for this sacred yearly rite. Though mostly they were round and pale and were the carriers of the Y chromosome.

I spent most of the afternoon walking the aisles and taking in the ambience, which was mostly a dull roar of conversation on all sides and a moving mass of geeks.

-I'm pretty sure that the lady at the far right is cosplaying as a preggers!-

Really ninety-percent of the population was male. There is nothing like watching two forty year old men, balding with grey hair, running around and giggling like 10 year olds. Good on ya gents, keep it real. I didn't get a picture. This is completely awesome for the female or gay male crowd who happens to enjoy experiencing an exhibit of sweaty pudgy manflesh. It was kind of like being surrounded by a blubbery maelstrom. I still feel dirty from the experience. Hot water does little to cleanse those memories I tell you.


-Naked Killer! Hell yes! This one has got to be a story driven by strong characters and a well developed plot!-

I think this is why they import the Playboy models and such, to restore some of the balance. And because lonely geeks really enjoy looking at pretty, scantily clad, women. Even if it's from a distance. Man, the creepiest part was the dude who was taking pictures from 50 feet away using a telephoto lens. As Evil said, just go up and talk to them, that's why they're here. Then again, the gorgeous women have sort of an aura of unapproachability, especially for my people. They were there to buy comics and geek out, not tragically fail at hitting on a woman way out of their league.

There were even some pretty girls wandering around the floor who were neither hired booth babes or goddesses. I think. It's a temptation to say 'they were female, they were there and thus they were gorgeous'. But I wasn't that far withdrawn from reality, yet. There were some real beauties, both as attendees and as workers in the various shop booths. One particularly pretty redhead stands out in memory. She made eye contact. I wonder how a conversation would have gone down, specially with my inability to make small talk.

-I don't know who she was, but I took this picture because what she's doing with her foot freaked me out a bit. Not because she's female and is in possession of a fine posterior. That was just a fringe benefit. It would seem that that sort of joint flexibility is common in females. Who knew?-

I was disappointed by the lack of cosplayers in the crowd. Geeks getting dressed up as their favorite characters. I was expecting them to be a dime a dozen. Really they were perhaps only a dozen total. Sure, there was the mighty lord Vader and his Storm Trooper minions. Girls dressed as Princess Leiah (no Slavekini's,sadly). One cute chick dressed as Poison Ivy, a costume which involved a corset and some green panties. She looked good. I was definitely a fan. Hurrah for pretty girls in skimpy costumes!

-Dude is much skinner than his movie made him out to be. -

So I went to the convention for one reason. To meet Taimak and get my copy of the Last Dragon signed by his own bad self. He wasn't there. I must have passed his booth a dozen times. If the goddesses took notice, no doubt they marked me as some sort of weirdo sex offender who was stalking the area like a horny chipmunk. Still no Taimak. Worse for him I guess, he was to be seated next to the beautiful Chanel Ryan. Had I thought of it at the time, I would have asked her what was up with her neighbor, and then gotten her to sign my copy of the Last Dragon. Or perhaps I did think of it and didn't have the cajones to go do so.

So with a heavy heart, we left the convention to go home. Well, first our last meal together. We hit a small greasy spoon across the street from the convention. The place was nearly abandoned and the waitress took a sadistic, and hilarious, pleasure in fucking with yours truly. The food was edible, if not memorable. The Fatman got the Hamburger's Lover Omelet, which lead to painful events later on. Not much of a capstone for the day, if somewhat appropriate.

-That was just on the floor of the diner. I needed a picture of it to make the day complete. -

Strange sights beheld:
A grown woman sitting on the floor flipping through Playboy magazines.
"The hunchbacked Lesbian"
Cosplayers.
Two 40 year old men running around like 10 year old boys away from their mother.
Voyager's Ensign Kim (Garret Wang) with long hair.
Storm Troopers playing DDR.
Attractive females who actually seemed comfortable.
Random WW2 veteran.
Cosplayers taking pictures of cosplayers.
The crazy goth-sith chick who was probably just cosplaying as herself.
Dora The Explorer, on the same table as the Zombies board game.

Lessons Learned:
Rule 34, it never fails. Stupid hamburger lovers.
I am not nearly as geeky as I once thought. Such arrogance I had in my youth.