Convention Roundup from a Previous Show…
Jet lag’s a funny thing, sometimes it hits you sometimes it doesn’t. Veronica was up and showered before I was but I soon followed suit and then stumbled my way down to the hotel breakfast, which was a Starbucks Bistro— which means they had a grill and hot food. I ordered my breakfast and sat down with a coffee- at the next table over was a large all American looking man and a little person— it was Buck Rogers himself, Gil Gerard and his robot pal Twiki, Felix Silla. Felix also played Emperor Penguin in Tim Burton’s BATMAN RETURNS as well as dozens of other well known characters.
When I was a kid I watched BUCK ROGERS, I think it was on Saturday nights- and even though it wasn’t as good as Star Wars in the days before DVDs you took what you could get. One of the episodes featured original Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon Buster Crabbe in a guest role. I dug the show.
Veronica joined me, we finished up and headed over to the show. In the lobby we ran into Gil Gerard again, I hadn’t interrupted him while he was having breakfast, and I said hello to him and told him he looked great. While Veronica took the ten flights of stairs Gil and I rode up in the world’s slowest elevator and he told me about a new Buck Rogers show he was producing, sounds like it’d be good.
I rejoined Veronica and we set up at the show next to Ben Templesmith, an artist whose work I like very much, while down the row from us was Rick Hoberg who was the last Batman Artist for me. I stopped reading Batman Comics in 1986 when he left the title.
The show opened and we chatted it up with a few fans and signed a few books. This was a medium sized “old school” show— old school meaning it was mostly all comic books. Also set up at the show was our good friend Jay Yee of Harley Yee Comics— we said hello and made plans to have dinner together.
The show provided us with a handler who brought us water, coffee, snacks, lunch and pretty much anything else we needed. The chairs at this show were amazingly comfortable. Most convention halls have cheap folding chairs which do a number on your back, these were great.
The first day wrapped up at six. Veronica had a headache and opted to leave about 4:45 to go back to the hotel, I handled things at our booth and closed up and met her in the lobby before we headed down the block to TheKoi for dinner.
TheKoi is a modern Japanese restaurant with classic styling including a huge Drum in the entrance. Our waitress was exceptional— a good waitress knows exactly how to joke with you and when to move along. Jay and his two helpers Doug and Nell arrived and we ordered drinks and appetizers. My first drink was a Tokyo Whiskey and my second was a Gin Based concoction— I don’t normally mix drinks but I wanted to try both. I ordered Monkey Ball as an appetizer which was out of this world. A fresh mushroom stuffed with crab and cream cheese and then Panko coated and fried. For a meal Veronica ordered a huge plate of sushi and I got Chicken Teriyaki.
Service was excellent, the company was too, Doug told us some hilarious stories and was planning to head out to an all night party in Seattle after dinner.
Continued Next Week.