In 2008 two friends and I attended San Diego ComicCon, as we had several years prior. We knew to pre-register, we knew to arrive early, we knew to bring water–still, three hours after arriving, we were standing in line (a line that extended all the way to the end of the Marina) waiting to pick up our badges. It is my firm belief that the length of the line was limited only by the fact that we ran out of land to stand upon.
The convention itself was busy as well, and again fraught with lines for everything from attending seminars to using the restroom. We missed seminars due to volume, the exhibitor floor was constantly crowded, and, frankly, in just two years Comic Con had become something I wasn’t sure I wanted to attend again. While this may not sound like a big deal, it’s one of the few times a year I’m able to carve out a chunk of time to spend with friends, one of which visits from across the country.
We all talked about it. Comic Con was loud, it was crowded, we got to do almost nothing we went to do, and best of all we had to wake up early every morning to drive two hours to San Diego. But we still wanted to hang out.
And so I described my perftect con. First, low(er) attendance, specifically a dozen or so close friends and family. No lines, no registration (unless I wanted to be funny), and we’d mail your registration to you anyway. What would we do? Watch movies, play boardgames and videogames, chit chat, eat, whatever we felt like. Events? Maybe one or two things scheduled a day, but besides that whatever hit our fancy. And the coupe de grace, it would be at my house, and start at 11am each day so I could sleep in. It was a joke, but my friends and I just added and added to it, and suddenly it was something I really wanted to do, and an excuse for our friend to visit from out-of-state. We didn’t even have to come up with a name, it rolled out of my mouth before I realized it: HomeCon.
And so this November we are attempting to pull this together, four days of fun, time with friends, and no B.S.
The convention itself was busy as well, and again fraught with lines for everything from attending seminars to using the restroom. We missed seminars due to volume, the exhibitor floor was constantly crowded, and, frankly, in just two years Comic Con had become something I wasn’t sure I wanted to attend again. While this may not sound like a big deal, it’s one of the few times a year I’m able to carve out a chunk of time to spend with friends, one of which visits from across the country.
We all talked about it. Comic Con was loud, it was crowded, we got to do almost nothing we went to do, and best of all we had to wake up early every morning to drive two hours to San Diego. But we still wanted to hang out.
And so I described my perftect con. First, low(er) attendance, specifically a dozen or so close friends and family. No lines, no registration (unless I wanted to be funny), and we’d mail your registration to you anyway. What would we do? Watch movies, play boardgames and videogames, chit chat, eat, whatever we felt like. Events? Maybe one or two things scheduled a day, but besides that whatever hit our fancy. And the coupe de grace, it would be at my house, and start at 11am each day so I could sleep in. It was a joke, but my friends and I just added and added to it, and suddenly it was something I really wanted to do, and an excuse for our friend to visit from out-of-state. We didn’t even have to come up with a name, it rolled out of my mouth before I realized it: HomeCon.
And so this November we are attempting to pull this together, four days of fun, time with friends, and no B.S.
