The New Mid-Ohio-Con debuted this year, and I'll write much about it. The prêcis version: Awesome. I had my best sales at a show evah. Tons of good at the show.
Here's a quick hit, and one of my favorite parts. It also illustrates why I love the Con World: It's that unique parallel universe where stuff like this works and is appreciated.
So, good friend and great writer Paul D. Storrie and I were having a war of words. Lyrics, actually. The truly-excellent Dr. Horrible (written by Buffy scribe Joss Whedon, and starring Neil Patrick Harris, Nathan Fillion and Felicia Day) musical features songs that are darn-near instant earworms. You can't get them out of your head.
Paul and I would go up to each other, sing a phrase like "Everyone's a hero in their own way…" and know that the other person would have it burning in their skull for the next couple of hours. On Sunday, Paul went nuclear by calling me and singing the Bad Horse song.
Not one to be outdone, I set upon a plan. I went to Paul's booth and said "It's time for my revenge." And I sang (if you can call it that) "I hear it's better the second time/I hear you get to do the weird stuff" and, on cue, my friends Mariann and Sarah popped their heads through the curtain behind him and sang the chorus "We'd do the weird stuff."
Paul even got caught up in the moment, singing the chorus before he knew there would be a chorus, and inadvertently putting him in the role of Creepy Fan from the show. Thom Zahler for the win!
To do this, Mariann and Sarah had to walk through Darryl Banks' booth. I went up to explain the situation, which I swear went like this: "Darryl, I'm Thom Zahler. We've met before and I work with the show…" Daryl had an inquisitive look on his face, not knowing where this was going. "Oh, hell, I need to play a joke on Paul Storrie."
Darryl smiled and said "Do whatever you need to."
Man, I love conventions. Especially this one.
More updates as I find the time.