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January 2007 - Author's Notes We were a little later than usual posting these notes because of something that went spectacularly right, which changed what would have been a major annoyance into a big success. Thanks to the Northwest Airlines gate attendant at L.A.International Airport, instead of having to spend another day on the road, we got back home earlier than expected. (Well, the real reason we posted the notes late was because we went to the Oaken Barrel for all-you-can-eat rib night, but...) The trouble started in Hawaii, of all places, where the airplane we originally would have ridden from Los Angeles was stuck because of a maintenance problem. That would have delayed our flight by six hours and might have forced us to spend the night in some strange town waiting for a connecting flight home. But it just so happened that there was an earlier flight to Minneapolis-St. Paul, our original connecting point, that was boarding at the same time we were looking at the Northwest web site, trying to decide what to do next. It wasn't until after the earlier flight had boarded that we went to the counter and asked the best way to handle the big delay we were facing. To our astonished surprise, the gate attendant dove into her computer terminal and said she could rebook us onto the Minnesota flight that we thought had closed - and she reworked our itinerary so we would get back home four hours earlier than we had originally planned. We were the last person on the 757, barely managing to find room for our big camera and computer backpack in an overhead bin. But when the earlier flight left, we were onboard, rather than being stuck in California for another six hours and with no idea when we'd get home. Thanks to the gate attendant for bailing us out of a tough situation and helping us get home. The reason we were able to check the Northwest web site inside the airport was another one of the things that went right, something we've been hoping to have for some time. It was a fast wireless Internet connection, but not WiFi. It was an EV-DO connection through Sprint, something that's been available for only a year or so and affordable in the last few months. EV-DO isn't as fast as the most robust WiFi or LAN links, but it's plenty fast enough for use in the field. We put our Sprint EV-DO link to the test when we were riding in the back seat of a Prime Time Shuttle headed north on the 405 to Van Nuys; the Pantech card we used maintained a solid, unbroken connection in highway traffic. The only reason we had to break off the connection was that the van's ride, overspringed and underdamped, was so jarring that we were lifted off the seat several times - and we were belted in. After we got to Van Nuys, we got out of the van and looked underneath to see if the shock absorbers were connected; we're not sure if they were bolted into place. That EV-DO link we mentioned was invaluable when this writer checked into his LaQuinta Inn room in Austin, Texas. Our first task was to check the room's wired Internet access. It didn't work, so we had to use the Sprint link, which worked perfectly. Then we got out of the room and looked for Ushiko's Block Party. It was as hard to find as the net access. The idea, put forward by some of the same people who ran the Ushicon convention, was to have fans run parties out of hotel rooms instead of having the event organizers stage the events. It's like a flea market; the idea works if enough people show up. From what we saw in Austin, there wasn't much interest in the idea. We didn't find as many as a half-dozen room parties scattered among the hotel's five floors. The block party might have gotten little support because it came one week before Ikkicon, an Austin convention that was announced to replace the presumed and announced demise of Ushicon. We'd always wondered what would happen if a city had two conventions on consecutive weekends, and we got part of the answer with our first trip to Texas. We're hoping to get the second part of the answer with a return to Austin for the inaugural Ikkicon. So why travel so far for so little action? There was one special event planned that brought together creative people from the Princess Tutu universe. It was worth the time and expense to head to Austin for that single event, because it was so rare. We can think of only a handful of times in nine years of convention coverage that there have been encounters between Japanese and American artists or actors, and only a couple of those times have seen actors from the same series. What happened in Austin was exceptionally rare and exceptionally pleasant, because everyone in the room loved Tutu and wanted to celebrate its special romantic universe. The event was so special that some people not announced as guests at the event still made the long drive from Houston to be there. The main factors lacking at the Austin block party were fans and costumers. To find those, we headed to Van Nuys on Sunday for Anime Los Angeles. We found the costumers, but we also found some odd attitudes from the convention staff. We managed to get kicked out of the event because we took pictures of a security type who had told someone they couldn't carry a hand made bow and arrow - after they'd had the item for several hours. The security types were really angry - talking about release forms and violations of privacy and federal law - when we thought they'd be secure enough about their actions not to fear a guy with a camera. Turned out there was a lot of unhappiness with the security people ordering costumers and people with cameras, telling them not to stand in one open area. We'll never figure out the joy that some get in shouting orders; must be a way of making up for a bad week on the job. More important to us was some equipment trouble, as it looks as if we wore out the same Canon Digital Rebel camera for the third time. Look closely at some of the Van Nuys costuming pictures and you'll spot some exposure irregularities across the frames. We noticed the trouble, examined the camera, took off the lens and fired off a few dozen frames. It took a while before the problem revealed itself, a broken shutter blade. We switched to our backup camera, but now we have to decide if it's worth the money to have the first-string camera repaired. The oddest moment of the weekend came when the flight home crossed the outer airport boundary. Hovering just north of the runway were two TV station helicopters, which usually isn't a good thing to have at an airport. But while rolling toward the terminal, the pilot pointed out an Airbus A330 being loaded at the international arrivals terminal - for the Indianapolis Colts, wh were ready to head to Florida for the following weekend's Super Bowl against the Chicago Bears. Yes, the Super Bowl is so big that loading a team's equipment on an airplane is big news. January 2007 Main Page