The Vampire Ball. Is that a dance or a raffle?
So. This weekend had been long looked forward to. Christy and I were going to take some much needed R+R time, catch up with friends, have a belated party with wedding cake and champagne, dance the nights away and generally let our hair down.
It became evident on Wednesday that this wasn't happening courtesy of a white van man, a Fenland road, and the resulting very nasty car crash which led to Christy being cut from the wreckage and carted off to hospital on a back board. Of course there was overwhelming relief that she wasn't as badly injured as she might have been but the anger at the idiot who caused the crash was not helped by the fact that not only had he left my poor sister with massive bruising and a broken sternum but he had completely wrecked a long awaited treat! Obviously Christy was going nowhere and not only that but we couldn't even reschedule for Hallowhedon because she won't be recovered that quickly.
So on Friday morning I sadly set out alone via Christy's place ( and when I saw the mess that bastard had made of my beloved sister I was all for tracking him down and visiting Anyanka style vengeance but reluctantly decided to leave that to the police).
Thankfully Susie sat nav and Amorata got me to Heathrow on time and in one piece and I checked in, met Gish and we headed off to meet friends for drinks and a catch up before wandering off to the venue to register, meet and catch up with more friends , say hello to lots of lovely people who we know from boards and FB and LJ and other events and wait for the opening ceremony.
As usual I won't be namechecking here in case I miss someone but oh how lovely to see you all!
The opening ceremony had been scheduled for 7:30, rescheduled for 8:30 and finally happened somewhere around 9:00. We were on Starfury time.. so laid back it's horizontal... once we got the hang of it we just went with the flow:)
Opening ceremonies amuse me! All the attendees file into the hall and take a seat. The organiser comes out and introduces the event, then the guest stars stroll onto the stage , say hello, get cheered, and stroll off again... and that's it!
Talking of guest stars this event had True Blood and Lost Girl stars.. I quite like True Blood, don't know Lost Girl at all but was really there for James Marsters and Juliet Landau... Spike and Dru! Everyone else was a bonus.
Ceremony over we left the convention hotel went across to another hotel where the rest of our group were staying and had a nice chatty evening meal then Gish and I strolled back to the hotel where we were staying ( there are a LOT of hotels in Heathrow) freshened up, walked back to the convention hotel and joined the party. I will confess that our bottles of water might just have contained a rather large slug of vanilla vodka and this fact might help to explain why we danced in a frankly inadvisable fashion till twenty to two and finally got back to our hotel and to bed somewhere around 3AM.
We don't do autographs or photographs so were able to take a late start and leisurely breakfast on Saturday before wombling back to the event. We phoned Christy who was, bless her, totally out of it on painkillers which is a good thing! Had coffee, chatted to people, went to a couple of guest talks, had more coffee, chatted some more, went for lunch ,chatted some more then listened to Godric and Lorena (Mariana Klaveno and Allan Hyde) discussing True Blood and waited for the James and Juliet Q and A. Those two are great at con stuff and I'm sure someone will post a full accounr but I'm mean and confess that my loudest cheer was when someone did the thing which irks me most.. goes up to the audience mike and tells a long and rambling story during which I wonder
A) if there's a question anywhere in our future and
B) Why doesn't every event have a steward equipped with a shepherd's crook to hoick the "questioner" off the floor and away from the mike?
Anyway this one went
"Ramble ramble ramble me me me me me ramble ramble me me me then I did this and this and this and this and ramble ramble ramble.... continue ad nauseum whilst the audience slides down their seats squirming and muttering and Deb begins to think about packing her own shepherd's crook at future events ... ramble ramble ramble and FINALLY just as I've lost the will to live - a question which is usually something like " Do you agree?"
James
"Yes"
Next question
Anyway a highly entertaining talk and fun was had!
I think there were autographs next but we commandeered a group of comfy chairs and chatted some more until it was time to walk over to another hotel and pile into someone's hotel room for Doctor Who ( Sob, sniff, pass me another slice of apple and blackberry pie and a large G+T).
After which Gish and I went back to our hotel and changed for the Vampire Ball itself. Gish into clean jeans and top and me into a black ballgown and fascinator. I felt a bit of a prat wandering along Bath Road dressed up like a dog's dinner but once we got to the venue I felt rather under dressed! The costume contest was just finishing and some of the get ups were astonishingly good! Every day is a learning experience and this weekend I learned a lot about corsets. God I wish I had the nerve and the figure and the talent to create and rock some of those outfits!
Somewhere around 1:45 as we were dancing in an unsuitable manner to a dubious song Gish and I paused to wonder if our behaviour was appropriate for two fiftyish women... and we decided that it was!
I caused great amusement to a hotel employee by going to visit Amorata in the car park and hugging her bonnet and telling her that she was safe and I'd be taking her home on Sunday! The car park guard seemed rather startled to see a half cut mad woman in a ballgown hugging a car but it seemed like perfectly rational behaviour to me!
However next day the realisation that we were indeed fiftyish dawned on our bodies if not our minds and it was , as a result, an idle and drifty day through which we drifted slowly!
I rang Christy and came back cheering and immensely cheered cos my beloved sister was FURIOUS mad as hell, spitting fire and sounding like my sister as opposed to the pale and battered little ghost I had seen on Friday and spoken to on Saturday. YAY!
This made me feel 100% better about life, the universe and everything !
We had breakfast, packed up, put the luggage in Amorata and headed back to the con... where I was presented with a pie dish! It had contained Blackberry and Apple pie but had now been lovingly washed. It became the source of much hilarity as the guardianship of the sacred pie dish passed from person to person throughout the day " I'm just going to get a coffee.. GUARD THE SACRED PIE DISH WITH YOUR LIFE!"
The con was so laid back it was horizontal and we were a few degrees more laid back than that, in fact we spent the day lolling around in various hotels chatting to people and then pottered back to the venue for the final James and Juliet Q and A... which was a lovely end to our weekend.
The scheduling put another autograph session between the last Q and A and the closing ceremony and last night party but Gish and I slipped away after the Q and A. Sorry that we didn't stay to say goodbye to everyone but it was so lovely to see you all, I love it when the fandom comes out to play!
And so I'm home. The cats are trying to pin me to the sofa and stop me leaving again but I have a day off so this afternoon I am off to see Christy and to take her the many many good wishes which so many people passed on for her at the event. I'm so touched that so many of you care so much and so will she be. Bless you all! The many , many hugs that I received on her behalf cannot be passed on for a good 6 weeks or so but I've kept count and will pass them on as soon as she's fit enough to deal with them!
And the hen weekend will be reconvened! For I have decreed that this will be so!