Convention Report

First of all thanks to all the guests for coming, to Sean for arranging this, to the staff and other stewards helping out, to anyone making my week-end the moct amazing week-end of my life.

Thursday -

Registration isn't much to say about, only that I got my badges, bought my photo tickets and then moved on to queue up for the Clare Kramer, Nicholaus Brown signing. I had no idea they were signing allready that thursday and was unsure about queueing up allready that day as I wanted to give her my drawing as well and you onlyu got one shot in each autograph session, but *luckily* they were an hour delayed, enough time for me to run back to the flats and get my drawings, hurry back in good time before signing started again.

I got my drawing out, asked the steward about giving it to Clare, but I wasn't allowed to due to the fact that it would hold up the queue for all the rest, instead the stewards would give the gifts to her after the signing, a bit disappointed I reminded myself that the important thing was her getting it, which they promised she would. I queued for a while, then I got so tempted to get a picture signed as well, so I hurried to get one and there I got to talk to this Irish girl who was really nice, complimented my drawing and things like that. We met up several times throughout the event to chat and such. Then finally my number was called and I could really queue.

I had only managed to put a little post-it on the drawing saying:

"Dear Clare,

love your work,
made you this drawing,
hope you like it

Guro"

I went in gave it to the stewards who again reassured me she would get it. Not having anything special for Nicholaus to sign, I decided to get the inside of the diary covers signed. He was really sweet complimented my name, when I said it was norwegian he said "Don't say, you're from norway..." LOL, really nice guy. Clare was awesome, asked me if I was excited about the week-end and such. She wrote "Be a God" with the autograph on my diary.

Later on when the queue had vanished I went to wait up for Sharon who was in the Clare session stewarding, then I saw Sean come out carrying my drawing. I went up to him and asked:

"Did she like it"
"Oh my God, she loved it, just wait here, she wants to say hi"

3 minutes later, enough time for me to drift into lala-land Clare came up from the side:

"Are you the artist?"

She told me she loved it and that she was gonna frame it and put it in her office. She gave me a hug, asked me if I was an artist, I told her it was mostly fanart at the moment. Nicholaus complimented my english and when I said it was from the influence of my brittish friends, they went "Yeah sure" and in the end I admitted it being from 6 hours daily of television watching... lol She thanked me again before going off to the green room... I was shaking like a leaf... just by excitement...

Friday -

First up was the Juliet Landau and Robert Patrick talk. I was up at the second row (only time this week-end all other times I was on row one... Stewarding had terriffic perks, but I can say I NEVER queue- jumped). I got some great pictures before queueing up for my photo with Nick... I was so sure I was gonna be sick with nervousness when I came into the room saw Nick there greeting people with a smile, shaking their hands, putting his arm around their shoulder for their photo... when it was my turn I just ran upo and gave him a hug, he was really sweet, held me close and said "there you go" :D I got a REALLY great picture of him, kinda like a SEMI-hug thing. I was all shaky by the time I left the rom.

Rolling on the James Leary talk, which I was at the first row of. He was extremely funny. Like "How was it like working Sarah?" (Upset voice) "Horrible... absolutely... nah just kidding, it was great..." and then his great obsaession. "If you could lick chocolate sauce of anybody who would it be?" "hmmmm..... Faith...... Faith...... did I mention Faith...?"

I then hurried along to the Juliet Landau, Robert Patrick, Tom Lenk and Sarah Hagan autograph session, this time I was more prepared and left half a page's letter for Juliet with the drawing, she was the first one I got the autograph from in that room. She was such a sweetie, wrote one of my best friend a sweet autograph with a smilie (gift to her, don't tell her... lol), wrote "Nice meeting you" on mine and "best wishes" in my yearbook. Her boyfriend was really nice, I had a little problems picking my photos up and he was really helpfull, really sweet of him. Robert Patrick I didn't get the autograph for as I didn't buy a picture of him to get signed... sure he's a huge scifi star, but for me it was the Buffy ones that counted the most. He was busy chatting about american idol with the rest of the gang.

Tom was really nice, said he'd really liked to come to norway, even asked for my home towns name, pretended to write it down. He's really funny, but has one of those natural frown thing going on (basicly it's just that when you relax it looks like you're frowning when ur really not... my dad and grandma has the same thing and people who don't know them thing they are sour or angry, but in reality they are nothing like that), he basicly wrote my name, a heart and then signed.

Sarah Hagan was naturally shy, really soft, kinda unsure of herself kind of voice, really sweet, wrote "Best wishes, [heart] always".

And the Clare & Nicholaus talk was great as well, I asked a few questions such as if she remembered the opening cheer from "Bring it on" (VERY little, Nicholaus offered to do it, but chickened out... lol) Rolling on the Clare phototshoot she smiled and told me "nice questions", I got a REALLY nice picture together with her as well... (And believe it or not, but the day after when I got to pick it up I saw that there was somethign else than the autograph on it as well. It said: "Thanks for the artwork", that was really amazing, she recognized me. 200 people had been in that thursday, 200 more that friday and ton of people got their photograph with her and yet she remembered ME.

On my way to get the photo tickets I saw Emma for the first time as she passed me. I looked like a complete idiot halfway grinning, halfway shocked, saying "hi". Shaking I went to Juliets autograph session room (well outside it) to see if I managed to get as lucky as I got the day before. And there Emma walks past me again. I must say she looked absolutely stunning and so tiny! She had her back towards me so I felt it would be wrong to go up to her, but then she entered the autograph session, knowing that she would have to come out one of the doors in front of me, I hurried to grab my drawing, praying that she wouldn't be in too much of a hurry that I didn't get to give it to her.

She came out and I croaked "Excuse me, Emma? I was wondering if I could give you this..." And she accepting it went "oh wow... thank you... you made this yourself?". One would almost think I had a seisure the way I went all red and shaky... I was like that practicly all week-end though.. lol. Emma was such a sweetheart, said I had done a good job before having to go to the Green room. Only a minute later Juliet came out and I managed to get some words with her as well. She too was really happy about it, thanked me and asked me if I was gonna be there later on, I said I was there all week-end and she said "Great, we'll hang out..."

That night was my first duty as a steward to guard a door... lol, make sure only the proper people went in. It was allright, I was closer to the opening ceremony than what I had expected, though not as close as I'd like to be. First Sean introduced Clare and then Clare introduced everyone else. Everyone went in one and one except Nick and Emma who came in together in the end. Emma said she hoped to meet with everyone of us and if she didn't she would get pissed and Nick warned us about getting her pissed... lol

Partywize it was allright, but I'm not really a big partyer, I loved more all the other aspects of the con. I danced by that door until my two hours were up, then I danced a bit with the gang befor getting tired and with the Nick and Emma photoshoot being at 9, I wanted to get a decent night of sleep before it so that I wouldn't be all puffy eyes around them.

Saturday -

First up, well almost first up was my photo shoot with Nick and Emma, but I managed to see a bit of Nicholaus' talk before going in and queueing for Nick and Emma, who both looked amazing btw. And the pictured turned out great :D

I got back to Nicholaus' talk again. Asked him questions about like what he dressed up as on Halloween. It was very interessting, listening to someone from behind the scenes of Buffy...

Jewel and Summer had an ok talk, only haven seen Summer, and that for like a few minutes in AngeL I felt no connection, but it was pretty cool to hear them talk about firefly, made me want to watch it. The fun thing however was Nathan actually lining up and asking them a question "who's you're favourite firefly character" lol And Summer and Jewel went all "hmmm.... which is our favourite firefly character" LOL

Then Nathan and Elizabeth was having the next talk. A girl asked Elizabeth for tips on how to take better care of her pet rat so that he didn't bite her. lol... I got to ask Elizabeth what she felt about portaying a character that most of the time was a rat, how she felt about the rat being male and if any fan directly has accociated her with the rat. Her answer was that she felt very much like the poster child for rats, but she didn't mind cause actualyl rats are very nice creatures, that she loved playing with the rat that played her character when she wasn't there, even picking up some droppings here and there... lol and that many fans send her stuffed animal rats and such in the mail. Nathan had several funny stories, like how he as a prank shifted places in a scene, without it beng noticeable on camera... well at least if you didn't start wondering why on earth he was somewhere else in the "room" as well... and that he also had made a hobby of showing Jewel the finger, and even better... making up new ways of doing it, such as like a magician, pulling it out from underneath a cloth.... lmao....

Rolling on to Nick and Emmas talk, where I got many, many photos of of course... lol A really sweet yet funny thing was when they were asked to say something nice about each other and Nick said a sweet thing, don't remember exactly what, but Emma went "oh wow, and I haven't even blown him yet..." LOL. And also how she could just say about something "I don't f*cking care..." Everyone started cheering, applauding... I love it that someone can be so straightforward, I absolutely loved it...

I planned on asking about what language they talked in Selfless... supposedly it was Swedish, but I thougt it was pretend swedish, cause swedish is actually very simmilar to norwegian, but when I came home later on and rewatched selfless I started understanding some of the words, not all as there were either mumbling or going in a 100 miles an hour pace, but I at least understood a bit... I asked them if anyone pulled any pranks on them, wondering if Nick would pull out the pants story, which he did (where basicly it was Sarah and Aly pulling his pants off, only his boxers went down as well...) and Aly also had been the one to pull a prank on Emma, where she had made everyone believe that her 29th birthday was actually her 30th birthday... lol

Then my number for Elizabeth's photoshoot was called and I went to queue up... She was very nice, I asked her if I could get a hug and "of course I could..." It ended up very nice as well... I'm not unhappy with any picture at all... no matter how I could see a double chin and zits... lol

Then I went to Tom and Sarah's photoshoot. Picture turned out good as well and they both signed it :D

After break it was time for Juliet and Clare's talk. I went on asking some questions to both of them there, including if they had any pranks done to them as well. Clare smiled and waved at me :D Neither felt their stories were pranks, but Clares was about her in a scene was kissing this guy and they kept kissing and kissing and when they thought they had been doing this for long, the looked around and apparently the director had given everypone time off and let them sit there and kiss...

Juliet's story was the scene in What's my line where Dru and Angel are tied up together... She didn't really know David back then and they were strapped together, so it was like doing a few shots, talk, doing some shots... and during breaks they would be left alone tied up together... really amused I just added the comment "just admitt it, you both loved it" and they started laughing...

After that I went on to queue up for the autograph session with Nick, Emma, Elizabeth and James. In the queue I was told by the stewards that Nick and Emma would only personalize our personal object and the rest would be plain autographs, but when I got there, first Emma personalized the yearbook, then one photo for a friend and then a photo for me. Nick also personalized a photo for a friend and for me, but he didn't personalize the yearbook though... but still they did more than I was told they were gonna do. Elizabeth signed the official Amy yearbook picture and James signed my Buffy diary... I loved his commment "got kittens?" really original!

I didn't get to give neither Nick or Elizabeth their drawings personally, nor did I get a chance to speak to them about it, but I didn manage to mention to Elizabeth that the stewards would give her a drawing from me, both I gave away with half a page letters to them. I managed to get a word with Sean the day after who reassured me that they liked the drawings.

I missed out on Robert Patricks talk, but that didn't bother me. I came in in the middle of Tom and Sarahs talk. I lined up and asked a question I had been dying to ask Tom. "Who he thought Andrew fancied the most, Warren or Spike?" LOL The room burst into laughter... He first tried to get away with Andrew admiring them, but later on he answered Spike. Then in the middle of the talk Emma sneaks in, hush us all, though everone get their camera, she still managed to surprise Tom by hugging him from behin. Then she madeh im do his actor exercizes in front of us all, which were really hillarious, I got some pictures of that, good or not, I'm not sure, I will know in a couple of days... lol Then later on in their talk Nathan queues up to ask Tom and Sarah who their favourite firefly character is... I sat really closeby and got some really good pictures :D

At the party I had door duty at the back so I missed the fancy dress competition, didn't really have any costume either... but next time I will have a costume, even know what I will dress up like, but *not* telling... lol. After my duty we went partying on the dance floor, they had these huge beach balls they were throwing around, really fun. Then it was after midnight and I was 20!Funny thing that it was also one of the Irish guys birthday (he turned 19) and the two of us wandered the dance floor together for a few mins. It was fun, we went home around 2... I think...

Sunday -

I first queued up and oredered the fusion tapes, I was the very first to order one. Spent a little time in the dealers room, well I spent time there more than once, and used a ton of money. I saw some of Nathans talk, not all. I missed out on the beginning, but apparently he was giving oput polaroid pictures from the sets to people asking questions. Unfortunatly I had no questions as I have only seen him in one episode so far...

I saw pretty much all of Sarah's talk, then during Toms talk my number for Juliet Landau was called. Apparently she recognized me, cause she pulled me into a hug. I told her it was my birthday and she wished me happy birthday, twice...

And as Toms talk went to an end and there wouldn't be anything happening until 2 I returned to the dealers room, went shopping, bought the end of days tapes and the bad girls wild boys one, sure I was never present, but I couldn't help being curious about it and watching it on tapes is better than not weatching it, as I never had a chance in coming.

I went on to the firefly autograph session and both Summer glay and Jewel staite wrote happy birthday on my diary. well actually Jewel wrote Happy, happy bday :D, Nathan put a simple "dirty" on his.... lol

Hurrying back I managed to get to the Emma photo session before break and got both a hug and a happy birthday from her as well. And during her talk just after I asked told her about there being Beverly hills reruns at home at the moment directly in the Susan Keats period and I asked her about her working again with Jason Priestly (what a coincidence that thing yesterday then... lol) on who had iniciated it. Apparently she had been asked if she wanted the role and she accepted cause she really wanted to work with Jason again... Also she was so frank, so natural, she used the f-word a lot... lol, her favourite expression was "f*ck fox"... Before she left she actually did the Anya-dance to the Buffy-theme, which everyone, including me... LOVED!!!

Then Nick had his talk, there was a really cute thing with a little girl asking if she could have a dance again with him, cause she danced with him the night before (I was on duty, ergo didn't see it) He was so funny going back stage yelling "Anyone here? Do we have some music? Anything?" He turned his head back and said "It's on it's way" Then he jumped off stage, danced with the girl and went back up, such a sweet thing to do... Then someone asked him if he ever checked out fanfics and his answer was "you mean like me and Spike having sex?" Apparently he did... lol

I too went up and asked a few questions, like his reaction when I read the zeppo, the episode that was all about Xander, if he had any movies coming up and in the end I even dared to ask him if I could have a hug since it was my birthday. Which I got, I went over to the stage, he jumped off, gave me a great big hug and wished me happy birthday, cameras were flashing, blushed and happy I went back to my seat.

Then I had my photo taken with James Leary who also gave me a birthday hug. The actual picture was in hug position as well :D

Getting to the closing ceremony early I managed together with Isie and Amy to get seats in front at the right, at the table to the right Nick, Juliet and her boyfriend sat at first. A little girl came up to them and they talked to her for a while, then Nick had to go. Juliet stayed behind a little while before she too went to enter with the other guests. They entered to "we will rock you" and the guests started a baning on the table rythm which we all followed. The closing ceremony was everyone having an introduction then a thank you speach. James Leary was funny as he started conduction out applause and cheering, a little louder, a little less loud, then up in a roar, turn the noise off... etc... etc... hillarious!!!

Juliet waved at me, same did Elizabeth and I waved back :D

Jewel Staite had a nice speech, but the best thing was when she just said "and an other thing" and showed Nathan the finger... LMAO! And Nick pretended to be scared and hid under the table... hillarious. Then they held the raffle, where you could win a date with Emma and Tom... noone we knew won, that lucky, lucky girl. I managed to ask her afterwards how it was like and her answer was "Amazing!" Emma was so cool how she just went "We're gonna get WASTED!" Then when the ceremony was over, both Nick and Emma went around and gave random fans hugs. I got one from Emma, then I spotted Clare further towards the stage. She gave me a hug and I thanked her for the comment of my picture, then she again thanked me for the picture, we talked for a couple of minutes. I told her it was my birthday and she wished me happy birthday asked me which birthday it was and I told her 20 and she said it was a good age, then she had to go in the end and I got a good-bye hug from her, then I talked to Juliet for about a minute or so and got a good-bye hug from her as well.

I wanted to get a hold of Nick and Elizabeth, but they had allready gone, but at least Sean had assured me that they liked the drawings. Then I had to report for my last duty, I was originally prepared to miss the stewards party, but a staff memeber said she wasn't going anyway andf that she could cover for me, even though I didn't mind doing my duty, but I went and all stewards got a diploma with some autographs, mine had Clares, Juliets, James, Sarahs, Jewels, Summers and Nathans.

I got to say goodbye to most of the people. It was really weird with it being over. I mean... I was sad that that was the end of it, but at the same time I had so many great memories, plus the fact that I got to talk to both Clare and Juliet before they left, that sort of wrapped it up for me and I was left nothing, but contemptment, you know. Cause it was over, but it had been a lot more than I had vere hoped for. It had just been the most AMAZING week-end of my life... unforgettable and I had like 300-400 pictures to show for it. So it was a good feeling in me when I left Blackpool.

~ Guro

Credits: "Thank you Dave and Malcomn who took many of these photographs at Starfury Conventions events"