Rose City Recap

A little chaos from my con experience

Portland’s Rose City Comic Con happened over the weekend, so I’m still recovering and processing the event as I write this. As usual, I failed to take very many pictures of the event. I tend to get lost in the moment and forget the camera. Therefore I never take pictures and sometimes don’t reply to texts for hours or sometimes even days. While I didn’t leave with many pictures from the convention, I did leave with some great things, and a few stories. This week’s newsletter will be a highlight reel from my con weekend. But first, allow me a moment of pride with this picture.

That’s right, Neptune reached #1 in new graphic novel releases on Amazon. Thank you to everyone who has read the book and a virtual hug to everyone who left a five star review. I’m incredibly proud of this book and everyone involved. I really think we were all working to the best of our abilities and the book really shows it. If you haven’t read it yet, I believe you can read it for free with a prime membership, so give it a look and leave a five star review so we can hold onto that top spot for a little while. You can find the Amazon page here. For those of you who want a print copy of the book, it will be published by Dark Horse in March. 

Meanwhile, Back at the Convention…

Comic conventions are always a strange melting pot of people. For some people it’s an excuse to dress up and be someone else. For others it is a place to go meet someone famous. Some people are actually there for comics and art. For myself it is a place to connect with other people in the industry and talk shop, or talk shit, as appropriate. With this wide range of people, you really have to keep your eyes on the ground to not see something strange, or wonderful, or even cringeworthy. Someone out there could dedicate an entire newsletter to the strange happenings you’ll see at conventions, I’ll only share a couple examples from the weekend, but know that stories like these all too common at a con.

Nice Beard

It is commonplace for people to ask to take a picture with a stranger at a convention. I’m not talking about a celebrity, but an actual stranger. If you try to navigate the convention isles for more than twenty minutes you will undoubtedly find yourself in a traffic jam as some fan is trying to get a picture taken with someone dressed as a character they recognize. This is an entire subculture and there are many people who come to the convention dressed up just hoping that a stranger will want to take a picture with them. While this isn’t for everyone, it is a fairly normal thing in fandoms. Of course there are times when it gets a little creepy, there are plenty of awkward dudes with little social awareness who want pictures with any cosplay they find sexy regardless of the fandom or if they even know the character. However, I think this weekend revealed the most awkward photo op I’ve ever seen. 

As stated above, there are multiple ecosystems inhabiting the same convention space. While they do cross over from time to time, this very brief incident was one of the most perplexing crossovers I’ve witnessed. The man walking in front of me was a typical comics fan. Stalky, in a ball cap, a long beard that rested on his belly, and a backpack full of comics he was hoping to get signed over the weekend. He had just been ahead of me in the artist alley getting books signed, so I knew he more than looked the part, he lived up to it. Walking in the other direction was a young, awkward, teenage cosplayer. I couldn’t tell you who he was dressed as, but he was in a basic, hastily assembled costume of some sort. 

The cosplayer stopped and said, “Oh my god, I love your beard!” The comic man’s eyes shifted from side to side hoping there was someone else with a beard that this awkward teen was talking to, but quickly realized it was only him and muttered a small, ‘thanks.’ The costume-clad teen then rushed forward and set his backpack on the ground stopping the progress of the comic man who looked frightened and confused. The young man dug through his bag for his cell phone to complete the reverse photo op while the comic man stood still, looking around for someone to rescue him. I knew there was nothing I could do to save him from the awkward situation. That young man was going to get him to politely pose for a picture because he aspired to one day possess this comic man’s ability to grow a beard. I did the only thing I could, I pointed out the situation to my friend, and kept walking as we laughed at the absurdity of what we were witnessing. 

The Foot

Sometimes you have to witness an awkward moment alone because pointing it out while it happens would only create a larger, more awkward situation that would make you more than just an observer. This happened while I was sitting just outside the convention hall with my friend Konner, but the moment was so fleeting that they didn’t even know it happened right in front of us. There are few places to sit and rest, and even fewer where you can charge your phone. This meant that we had no control over the type of people we were surrounded by while Konner plugged in and waited for enough battery life to survive the rest of the convention day. 

We were surrounded by a group of young cosplayers who lacked social awareness. I was trying my best to talk to my friend without hearing any of the cringeworthy conversations around me, but my eyes wandered to the young girl sitting on the floor in front of me. While I could drown out their conversation, I couldn’t ignore it when I watched her slide her bare foot out of her shoe, lift it to her nose then casually slip it back on. I froze trying to comprehend what I just saw. We made eye contact for the briefest moment, but there was no embarrassment in her face. She clearly didn’t find her behavior to be strange. The moment had passed so there was no pointing it out to my companion, and it would only become more awkward had I mentioned it in front of her and the other cosplayers who found this act to be normal. 

The Taco Incident

This happened away from the convention at an after hours hang out. The young man in question was very kind and was probably nervous about hanging out with comics pros as he started his own comics journey. Please don’t judge him too harshly when I tell you what happened next. 

We found ourselves at a bar with limited food options. After scouring the limited menu for something that sounded appetizing, I settled on the tacos. The young man in question saw my tacos and decided to order his own. They weren’t great, but the place was so poorly lit that you couldn’t tell from looking at them. Perhaps the poor lighting contributed to the incident as well. We talked about comics and those with experience shared what they knew while those looking for experience asked questions that were answered by everyone with or without knowledge. Amidst this conversation, his tacos arrived. 

There were three tacos with two tortillas each. This is a pretty standard set up for those who are familiar with tacos. However, the young man managed to grab only one side of the tortilla first causing some of the filling to spill. Not a big deal. Then he grabbed the first taco and one tortilla from the second taco causing it to spill some of its continents. Again, it’s a dark bar and we’re all distracted with conversation, the tacos are still mostly intact. The conversation went on and nobody else was looking at the tacos while the young man spent the next five minutes adjusting the tortillas. I thought this would be the end and he would have the problem handled after this shifting and scooping to reassemble the tacos. I was wrong. 

I don’t know how you hold your tacos, but I doubt you would describe it the way you would a claw machine, which is the only way I know how to tell you that he finally picked up the first taco. I was dumbfounded by the strange approach. I didn’t draw attention to it and continued the conversation about the industry, how things work or sometimes appear to work, what we love and hate in comics. After the first taco was gone with only minor spilling, he went for the second. Instead of the same claw-like approach, this time he attempted to fold all the ends up and pinch it together at the top like a little bag of taco meat. I was dumbfounded and maybe even a little offended at this technique, which proved flawed as he spilled much of the contents back into the tray with taco number 3. 

I had never seen someone struggle to understand a taco before. It was now 2-0 to the taco and only one chance left for any kind of redemption. To make matters worse, the filling from the first two tacos was now piled so high on the third that there was no chance of it closing without risking disaster. I can give you advice on comics and I can give you advice on eating tacos, but both in one night would be more than what is deemed professional without money exchanging hands, so I shifted around the room to where I couldn’t witness the trial of the third taco. I would like to think that after I walked away it all clicked and the enigma that is Mexican food suddenly became clear in his mind. Whatever the outcome, my threshold for chaos had been reached by taco number two and the foot incident from earlier that day.

If you or a loved one have a convention experience that you would like to share, please do so in the comments below.

A rare selfie to end on.

I don’t take pictures on myself very often, but I did get a quick selfie this week as Ileft the convention center. Some of you probably don’t know what I look like at all, so here’s a rare glimpse at my mug. Thanks once again for subscribing to my newsletter. If you are reading this and you aren’t subscribed yet, please do so below. My weekly update is completely free to read so click the botton and check in nextweek for more nonsense and a few more gems from my convention weekend.