I think one of the marks of having a good time is that at the end of it all, you’re left hungry for more. By that measure, this year’s Youmacon was a lot of fun. I knew that being in a new space, the ginormous Renaissance Center in Detroit (GM’s HQ BTW), would make things different than last year in some ways. Fortunately, the hiccups that resulted from the change of venue did not cause more than some mild frustrations for me at least.
The Thursday drive out was uneventful and at the end of it, I only overshot the Ren Center by a mile or two. I pulled over and used Google Maps on my iPhone to plot my final approach. But once I was pointed in the right direction, it was pretty hard to miss such an enormous building. And I achieved my secondary goal of not accidentally driving into Canada!
Normally, I don’t cosplay on the Thursday of a con, but with 4 costumes and only 3 main convention days, I decided it would be good to have a warmup cosplay. So after I checked in and got a bite to eat in the food court, I got into my Princess Princess Toru cosplay. This gothic lolita styled nurse’s uniform is one of my favorites and is always well received. There were a couple of people who recognized Toru and told me that Princess Princess was one of their favorite animes. Yay! (^_^) I had really wanted to see the Anime Style panel, but the panelist never made it, so I bounced out to the Dr. Who panel and then the always hilarious How to Con panel. Finally spent a little time at the Cosplay PJ party before calling it a night. I may well add Thursday cosplay to my con SOP from now on. Not only was it fun, it forced me to get my other costumes ready for the next day.
On Friday, I was very happy to have pre-registered. The registration line was enormous and pretty much stayed that way the whole freakin day. Sadly line management issues would be the bane of the con for me. I missed the concert and was late to other activities because of it. Part of the problem was the tiered membership system. Platinum members paid extra to guarantee early admission to events and other perks. To support that, lines were delayed to allow Platinum members to go first, which usually meant a search through the line by staff for Platinum members. It also meant that rooms were cleared after each event. The result of this was a long line up for almost every event. A better solution would be what I saw at Wizard World Chicago Comic Con. Rope off preferred seating for the Platinum members. This allows people to enter the rooms earlier and then after a prescribed time, let any unfilled premium seats be filled by anyone there. This would have cut down on the long lines and the delays in starting events. The Ren Center is a new space for the con, so I’m sure next year will be better.
Friday’s cosplay was Sakura from Tsubasa. This is also one of my favorites, now more so with much more comfortable boots. Thursday’s cosplay had given me a lot of confidence so I thought I looked pretty good which must have been the case with some others too. I was drafted into the It’s A Trap! game as one of the traps! I had actually planned to watch and showed up early while preparations were being made. One of the staff saw me and suggested I should be in the game. They were short of cosplayers, so I agreed to do it. After all, being part of the show is one of the reasons I cosplay at cons to begin with. I had fun with the other cosplayers, and gave some, *ahem*, interesting answers to the questions I was asked by the player.
I had hoped to go to the concerts, but the line simply was not going anywhere. So I decided to bail on the line and head back to the room to freshen up. This led to the epic battle of the elevators. I tried a number of strategies to get a space sooner, all honorable of course, to no avail. So 30 or 40 minutes later, mostly through luck, I got back to my room where I changed out of the boots, which I didn’t want to dance in, and fixed my makeup. That done, I made it to the Yuri and Yaoi/Bara panels and then the VAT dance. Interestingly enough, I met a Jesus cosplayer at the Yaoi panel (Chicken or Beef) who asked me for a picture. No inconsistency there, as Jesus probably would hang out with people at anime cons no less than He did sinners and tax collectors in the scriptures. I’d see the Jesus cosplayer a few more times around the con, and got his picture later. He seemed to be a pretty cool guy.
Whoa! Look at the wall of text! Here’s some Sailor Uranus until I finish this up next time!
