No wonder a few hundred anime fans went to NekoCon to forget that the election ever had happened. The emotional baggage from all of the attack ads might have caused the weekend's odd trend, a flood of fans who made fans saying things such as "Will glomp for food." That led one new fan to ask "What is a glomp."

The only major disappointment the author saw during the weekend was from a fan who wandered into one of the actors' panels and asked if Brian Drummond had shown up. Drummond, who has had small roles like Vegeta in the first season of Dragon Ball Z, Captain Harlock in Galaxy Express 999, Brock in Pokemon and Allen Schezar in Vision of Escaflowne, wasn't able to attend for one reason or another. Oddly, a NekoCon flyer did list Drummond as Roger Smith in The Big O, which must have been a big surprise to David Lucas, the actor who played the part. 

When the convention started, up popped Monica Rial, the English-language voice of Hyatt in Excel Saga, among others. And not far away was Chris Patton, who was Yushiro in Gasaraki. Rial and Patton never were listed as guests on the convention web site, and their presence may have been a pleasant surprise to some.

The disappearance of Invader Zim from Nickelodeon meant more attention for the husband-and-wife Simons artistic team. For everything else Tavisha and Rikki have done, from Ranklechick to Reality Check, NekoCon fans were most interested in Zim's adverse fate. Fans got a strenuous weekend workout at Deb Rabbai's improv panel, getting an idea of what it's like to go on stage and make everything up as you go along.

For once, the author posted fewer pictures from a 2002 convention than in 2001. We're still trying to figure how that happened - it wasn't like there were fewer costumers or fans at NekoCon. Maybe the Friday afternoon nap was a reason. The author, armed with a new 50mm f/1.8 Canon lens, took hundreds of pictures during the costume contest, and posted more pictures from that NekoCon 2002 event than in 2001.

The contest probably will get a bunch of East Coast costumers talking. Sana and Miaka came up with another satiric masterpiece, this time aimed at some of the more prominent costumers. The author, a believer that the only bad publicity is no publicity, didn't see anything that would have been offensive or insulting to a good sport. One of the people featured in that skit said the big caricature of him that was paraded on stage looked better than the real thing.

Another costume group, featuring a costumer who was known for skimpy outfits, tried a new approach with seven-foot fluffy video game costumes, and those costumes were her most popular ever. Maybe the most comfortable, too - one of the outfits featured pillows as headrests. And in the middle of the post-contest celebration, one of the members of the winning team (which did a wicked parody of the melodramatic dance acts which have become popular in the last couple of years) realized he'd have to compete at future conventions in the master category, since he's been part of a group that won a major award.

The surprise costume at NekoCon had nothing to do with anime, but was popular to the point that several duos wearing this outfit were seen in the halls. The highlight of that costume's takeover came in the Saturday night contest, when Seras Victoria and Arucard from Hellsing faced this fearsome foe, only to find their vampiric ability was useless. They both bowed to the power of the unstoppable force...Harry Potter.

NekoCon was the first North American anime convention after AD Vision's announcement of their forthcoming cable TV anime network. No decision-making people from ADV were at the convention, but Toshi Yoshida from Viz wasn't sure if any of that company's shows would go on that network. Yoshida already was pleased with Viz' success with Inu-Yasha on the Cartoon Network, which he said was one of the highest-rated late-night shows.

Inu-Yasha was one of the costuming successes at the convention if you keep track of the number of cosplayers. The surprise was to have three Seras Victorias from Hellsing on hand at the same time.

One of the high points of the convention trip was the restaurant at the Holiday Inn Executive Center. On Friday, the author had considered a walk down the street to a Denny's for lunch, but he strolled to the hotel restaurant instead. Posted at the entrance were the magic words: "Seafood Buffet - $8.95." The author is a seafood fan, so he hit the buffet and was amazed with what he found, food that would have cost twice as much back home. Convention fans who left the hotel for fast food - and had piles of pizza delivered to their rooms - should have checked out the buffet.

The author wonders if NekoCon is going to have to move to a larger facility to make room for the crowds. The Holiday Inn is a neat place, but it got crowded on Saturday.

The World Series ended a couple of weeks before NekoCon, and the outcome of that championship raised some thoughts in the author's odd brain. The series ended at a ball park that is within sight of the Anaheim Hilton and convention center where Anime Expo will be held in 2003. The series was won by the Anaheim Angels, an American League team that was added in the early 1960's when baseball expansion was a radical new idea. The idea of holding more anime conventions was just as radical in 1998 when Animazement, Anime Central and NekoCon were added to what was then a sparse schedule. 

In 2002, there will have been around 40 conventions in North America, and the total could increase in 2003. An even busier schedule won't happen because there were several proposed 2003 conventions that never happened because of lack of money and organization. However, there probably won't be any sort of major "contraction" in the number of conventions unless things get really bizarre.

Virginia Beach is right next door to Norfolk, which is one of the biggest military towns anywhere. The locals are proud of saying they have the biggest naval base in the country, which hosts six aircraft carriers. You guessed it: one of the carriers is the USS Enterprise, although this ship is CVN-65 instead of NCC-1701.