Sorry I haven't been able to update until now, but life hasn't spontaneously decided to start going easy on me.

Luckily for you, my procrastination is going to result in another huge update. Once again, both Comic-Con and Otakon occurred only a few weeks apart, leaving me in a total state of insanity. Then ShoujoCon was hot on their tail, providing a very nice end to my yearly convention tour.

Raising the National Average Temperature
July 4th isn't only Independence Day, it's "Raising the National Average Temperature Day". Think about it, how do we, as Americans celebrate this day? We light fires, and blow things up all day. Not to be unpatriotic, I contributed to the heat energy production by firing up my gas grill for the first time since last year. (Yes, I have my own gas grill... I really like steak.) However, in order to do this, I needed to get a new propane tank. Easier said than done.

Apparently, the folks at Blue Rhino (the propane tank swapping company) believe that all tanks should have the same adapter. Well, my grill is very non-comformist in its beliefs, so it didn't want to cooperate. So in addition to purchasing a new tank, I also had to purchase a $15 adapter just to make it fit my grill. (This is the first time I've had this problem, mostly due to the fact that I had to leave my previous tank behind, since it wasn't "purged" before the movers came...)

So there I was, with a full tank of combustible liquid, ready to fulfill my civic duty by contributing to greenhouse gases and the overall lack of air quality. All that stood between me and the flaming glory of my grill was installing the adapter. The shiny new brass adapter... with shiny new razor sharp virgin threading. You may see where I'm going with this.

I severely lacerated my right thumb while screwing the adapter onto the tank, but managed to get the propane turned on before going inside to run some water over my cuts. Marcia brought me some neosporin and a few band-aids, and I figured "Ah well, it could have been worse." While the grill was heating up, I decided to slice the veggies for our dip. You know, it's not very easy to use a Ginsu knife dexterously when you can't use your right thumb.

I made it to the convention center Saturday morning, and picked up my badge without problem. However, they didn't have any exhibitor guides left, so I didn't have a quick way to figure out where my publisher was on the massive convention floor. Luckily, I did spot the 3 Little Kittens at the Broadsord Comics booth. (I had a wig to deliver to Holly the next day...)

That's Holly in the middle. Meow! >^;^<

After she got a break from having her picture taken, she asked one of the onlookers if they had a guide she could look at to find my publisher. The fanboys just about fell over each other trying to be the first to get the book into The Catress's claws. I giggled to myself at the unspoken power of a corset.

After I found my booth, I took a seat at the quietest end and tried to start on my overdue issue 108 pages. No sooner did I get my pencils out and the paper flattened down, than Rod asked if I wanted to go sit up next to Fred Perry instead. I was contented in my spot, but I guess someone else needed to squeeze in on that side of the booth. So I sat down next to Fred, and tried to get back to work.

Fat chance!

I wasn't taking commissions, since I didn't have any of my pens, but I did like 30 sketches while I was there. I even got to sign one of my wig customer's "falsies"! (He was dressed as Rally Vincent from Gun Smith Cats.)

Fred was pretty cool to sit with, he's great with the fans, generous with the sketches, and very patient with the people asking annoying questions. (There were a couple of times where I just wanted to crawl over the table and throttle some of these less tactful conventioneers...)

On Saturday there was an AP panel, which should have been the "Fred Perry and Ben Dunn Panel", since most of the rest of us just twiddled our thumbs while Fred fielded most of the questions. There was even the inevitable: "Ben, are you planning to return to Ninja High School?"

To which I added: "Besides, they'd have to pry me off with a crowbar."

I didn't get a chance to actually look around the convention at all, so I can't really say much about it. The AP booth was much bigger and nicer than previous years though, if that's any help.

When leaving the con on Sunday, I decided to take a bike cab back to my friend's apartment. The driver of the cab told me that he is a member of a band called Gasoline Chicken. He says they'll be big any day now, so keep an eye out for these petroleum poultry.

Driving back to Fresno from San Diego was pretty typical, except for the surreal experience of driving through a wildfire at night. The length of Interstate 5 south of Bakersfield is referred to as "The Grapevine" by California locals. Everyone who has made the trek to L.A. knows what it is. The highway twists and climbs through the foothills surrounding the San Fernando valley, and at night is like an eerie black rollercoaster. Now imagine coming around a curve to see the mountainside engulfed in flames. What makes it even stranger is how quiet it is; no firetrucks, no crackling noises, just the sound of the road and the glowing wall of orange extending up at an angle for thousands of feet. (And me without my camera...)

I made it home without incident, and the next day it was business as usual.

First off, Otakon is in Baltimore, and I am not. This wasn't the case in previous years, so new issues were tossed into the mix like "how am I going to get me and my booth stuff all the way across the country without having to sell a kidney?"

Hence why I decided to set up the "Help Katie Get to Otakon Fund", which actually got enough donations that I could afford to get a plane ticket! (Thanks so much to everyone who donated! Keep an eye out for your goodies after Otakon!) The rest of the stuff for the booth was sent to my friend's house for the hefty price of $165, so it still wasn't cheap.

Pepper, the Summer Pinup Girl
In spite of my hectic wig schedule, I promised myself that I'd finish up my Seasonal Pinup Girl cosplay series with the grande finalé: Pepper, the Summer Pinup Girl. Her design was inspired by the original Brazilian Beauty, Carmen Miranda.

Besides being all about fiesta and fun, she's also a reminder of a more "innocent" time in our country's history, specifically the flavor of pre-WWII movies, where everything was about big production numbers, dancing, and music. Nowadays, when people think of big budget movies, they think of big explosions, or big stars, not merely of extravagant lifestyles on film... I got a little off topic there. Anyways, go take a look in the cosplay section at Pepper, and the rest of the pinup girls.

The Reasonably Friendly Skies
I used to like flying more than I do now.

But ever since 9/11, flying has become an annoyance, and a hassle. I'm not worried that I'm going to be on a hijacked flight, or that the plane I'm on is going to be shot down , it's just the ridiculous "security" measures that we now have to go through in addition to all the things people complained about before. I'm not just talking about sending your possessions through the ubër x-ray machine, and having to take off various pieces of your clothing and being prodded by a metal detector, I'm talking also about things like the amount of time they're asking people to invest pre-flight. Passengers are asked to arrive 2 hours before the flight,

In addition to this, because of the fact that it's become less convenient to fly, the airlines are losing money and trying to cut costs. ("Smaller bags of peanuts means more leg room for you!") The result is that the few things left that were enjoyable about flying are being removed in place of cheaper or more politically correct alternatives. For instance, before 9/11 it would be pretty common for me to get two full meals on my cross-country flights, now I'm lucky if I get a bag of pretzels. Pretzels?! Where's the peanuts? Apparently, when the airline execs found out people could be allergic to peanuts, they switched to pretzels. I hope they don't hear about wheat allergies, or we'll end up with dried zucchini slices. And get this, some flights even charge you for meals, which, more often than not, include a bunch of stuff you'd never eat on the ground. (Like the cucumber, tomato, onion, garlic, and vinegar salad that came with my stale ham, provolone, tomato and olive paste garnished sandwich.)

Then there's the coffee. It tastes like it was brewed in an ashtray, and while they will give you three measly packets of sugar, they don't carry instant creamer anymore because of the whole anthrax scare.

Of course, as soon as I woke up, I realized I had forgotten some pretty vital stuff the night before, so I had to quickly try to squeeze that in between everything else. I made it out the door at 10am, and since my flight was in at 2:03, I was confident I'd be able to get the wig dropped off at Mail Boxes ETC and still make it to the airport just fine

Heh... yeah. So, I get to MBE, and place my pre-addresses package on the scale, and tell the clerk that I'd like to send it out Express Mail. I should have known by the puzzled look on her face that the day was going to take a header. She leaned over the box, staring at it, as if scrutinizing the label was going to tell her what to do next. She continued to stare at it for what seemed like an eternity, before finally asking a coworker for help. Appearantly, she had never seen an Express Mail package before, and had no idea how to send it. So I had the personal joy of getting to sit there and watch the more senior employee train the new one about how to use the computer. I didn't get out of Fresno until 11am.

Out of Fresno? Why didn't I just get the flight out of Fresno's airport? The same reason Jodon didn't: because it cost $200 additional to fly out of Fresno instead of Sacramento. Mind you, Sacramento is 172 miles from my house, but as I've already established, I have no trouble with long drives. However, just because I don't mind, doesn't help the fact that I can only go so fast.

Airline regulations now require that you check in for your flight 45 minutes ahead of time. Well, I showed up at the airport about 1 hour ahead of time, then came the gargantuan task of trying to find parking.

Sacramento Metro Airport has a major lack of parking. They're building a parking garage, but in the meantime, all they have is this remote satellite parking way out in the middle of nowhere, with shuttles that take you to the terminal... every 45 minutes. -_-'

I figured this map would help illustrate the situation a little better.

So yeah, I missed my last opportunity to check-in by 3 minutes.

The ticketing agent rescheduled me on a later flight... a much later flight. Instead of arriving in Baltimore at 11:30pm, I'd be arriving at 6:30am the following day. I'd never taken a "redeye" flight before, so this was a first for me.

My friend Vivek used to call me "MacGuyver" when I'd used my unconventional methods to solve problems, so I'm sure he wouldn't have been surprised when I used the cap from my Sobe bottle to cut the hemp string the fellas had. Perhaps my unequaled klutziness has just given me an improved sense of what types of things can cause cuts. Heck, just look at what I did on July 4th!

The flights themselves were uneventful. I got window seats the whole way, stayed up during the redeye to watch "Down With Love" (Ewen MacGreygor has some dang skinny legs!), and watched the sunrise from above the cloudline.

When the flight attendant opened the door, I was greated by one of the reasons I never liked Maryland. Even at 6am it was like walking into a sauna. Yuck.

Ok, I made it to Otakon, and was pleasantly surprised by the absence of the maaaaassive registration line we faced last year. This time we were only in line about 15 minutes, then we were off to artist alley.

Jodon had arrived several hours earlier, and had set up the table for me. Of course, several folks had already stopped by to see if I had their wigs. (I said Friday afternoon, guys. I don't even get up before then.) I also had a stack of comics waiting for me to sign, and a couple of people were going to "come back later" to barrage me with questions. (I guess it's a good thing I didn't sleep in too late, or they would've been tearing Jodon apart.) As it was, he was already very tired since we had been at Kinko's the previous night til the wee hours. (As is the tradition.)

Alas, this pretty much ended up being the theme for this year: "I wish I had time." I didn't do anything at the convention besides sit at my table. I had to leave early on Friday to finish the last four wigs people needed on Saturday, and I was up until 6am working on them. I was completely exhausted on Saturday, and couldn't leave the table because either I was talking to fans, doing commissions, signing, or doing portfolio reviews. I didn't get to see the anime music videos, or the cosplay, or the Otakon Idol contest, or do karaoke. I worked, and worked, and worked some more.

Oh, and I think my klutziness is somehow attaching itself to inanimate objects now. I had one of my five "Lokki in Limbo" poster prints up in the art show, and some guy went to touch it and it fell and shattered the frame. He offered to pay for it if the buyer didn't want it, but the original bidder was ok with it.

I'll have to get some better pictures later... probably in the produce section of the local supermarket. ^_^

Also, I had to take a picture of this sign as we left artist alley for the weekend...

If you don't see the humor in this sign, you should read it until you do.

Wig, wigs, and um... more wigs.
I'm not even sure how many wig orders I had to do since my last update, but I'm pretty sure it was over 35. This serious overbooking led me to re-evaluate how I determine how many orders is "too many".

Before, I had been going on the method that I could only handle a certain amount of orders per month, not really based on how difficult they were, but more on just the quantities. Yeah, I don't know what I was thinking either. I never thought my designs would get this popular, so I guess I wasn't anticipating being deluged with literally hundreds of requests per week. Ó_Ò'

Anyway, when I started to assign all the wigs different levels of difficulty, I realized that I'm already booked through next year! I feel bad that I can't take on more orders, but I want to make sure that the ones I can do are done well. Also, since I had to do so many orders last minute, I ended up having to pay for a lot of express shipping that the normal shipping charge didn't cover. I figure I lost about $300 in July from having to ship wigs out Next Day Air. I don't feel right asking people to pay for the extra shipping since it's not their fault I'm so busy, but thanks to those who offered anyway. ;_;

... it'll make more sense when you read the report. ^_^

As always, drop me a line and let me know what you think of all this oddity.