IRC Goliath writes...

Seth's Con journal! (and just in time)

My Gathering experience

Wednesday (Day -1)

Before I left from Fresno, California I was really nervous about the flight:
a) I've never been out of the country before
b) I didn't have my passport
There really wasn't any excuse for me not to have my passport, I had plenty of time between The Gathering 2003 and 2004 to get one but I didn't think I needed one since I had a state issued form of identification and a certified copy of my birth certificate. Well, approximately two to three weeks prior to my scheduled time to fly out I wanted to double check and make sure I had all my shit together. So I called the Office of Vital Records to make sure I had everything in order and they explained to me that the look of the Certified Birth Certificates and the embossed stamp that is used on them had been changed since September 11th and as a result there was the possibility that an airline might reject my request to travel. So I made a mad scramble to try and get an updated copy of my birth certificate but was unable to procure one in time for my flight. I assumed as long as they let me on the plane at Fresno that I would be okay the rest of the flight and it didn't even dawn on me until I left LAX that there was the possibility they could reject me at JFK or Canadian Customs!
But despite all my worrying, things went relatively smooth. The people at the X-RAY machines always gave me a knowing grin as I proceeded to remove my keys, loose change, phones, pager, wallet, belt, etc. just to get through the friggin metal detector.

Thursday (Day 0)
So I landed in JFK on Thursday morning and that's when something really cool happened! They needed to bump one person from the 9am flight into Montreal to a later flight and offered a travel voucher for the person who would exchange seats. Since I knew my roommates weren't going to show up until 1pm I decided to be the volunteer. I could wait 3 hours in JFK and get a travel voucher or I could wait 3 hours at the hotel. So, several rounds of Mario Golf later I boarded the plane to Montreal.
Customs was... interesting. It was fairly easy in the sense that all I had to do was show them my Birth Certificate, ID, and answer a few questions. The line was LONG and I thought I was going to be there for HOURS but it moved faster than expected. The only thing that worried me was my luggage was already off the plane and off the carousel, sitting off to the side. Upon exiting customs I was greeted by not less than a thousand people. It took me a little while to remember that just because we're not allowed to greet people at the gate in America, the same does not apply for other countries. I quickly spotted an ATM machine so I could get some local money and was soon off to the hotel via Taxi.
The hotel was quiet... too quiet! Where the hell was everybody?! It took a while for everybody to trickle in (including my roommates) but eventually I began to see some framilar faces from cons past: Gorebash, Vashkoda, Wingless, CrzyDemona, Kathy, GregX, Hudson, Chris Rogers, etc. Wingless, Gaberus, A Fan, and I went in search of food after dropping my stuff off in the room and getting settled in. We chatted the night away with fellow fans before retiring to our respective rooms to get ready for the big day.

Friday (Day 1)
We woke up around 9 so we would be up in plenty of time to get breakfast and stop by the registration desk before the first events started. Good old McDonalds located down in an underground complex. Beneath Montreal is their subway system which expands into a gigantic underground labyrinth of malls and stores connecting to the aboveground buildings all over downtown Montreal! It's really impressive! I wish I had more time to explore it but, unfortunately, 90% of it was shut down on the weekends so I only had the little experience on Friday. After breakfast and getting my registration in order, I loitered around the lobby for a while say hi to old friends and getting caught up. I ran into some more friends that I hadn't seen the night before, including Greg Weisman, Lanny, and Siryn. These are some of my favorite times during The Gathering because there are so many wonderful and diverse people who attend and some of them I only get to see once a year. I also spent a little bit of time checking out the Art Show & Dealer's Room. Sans the items Disney brought from the Archives to display last year, the turn out for both artists and dealers was much more impressive and diverse this year.
Wingless and Gaberus went off to attend Flanker's Understanding Combat session while I went to attend Greg's Voice Acting Seminar. I love the voice acting seminar's as I'm a little bit of an attention whore and love the chance to perform in front of an audience, even though my voice isn't very unique sounding. And it's always great to learn new lessons and tips from people in the industry. The panel was supposed to feature both Greg and Keith David but Keith hadn't arrived yet as he was held over a day in Miami (I think) where they were filming Transporter 2. Despite the absence of Keith, the seminar was really great and Greg did a fantastic job parting advice and wisdom onto us. It was also during this seminar that I was introduced to a Canadian friend of Lanny's named Michael, who has done real voice acting in his life. Michael is quite the character and a real interesting guy... but more on him later.
After the voice acting panel it was time for me to try out for this year's radio play! For those of you who have never attended The Gathering before, Greg brings a script from episodes of Gargoyles or scripts from other projects he's worked on for us to reenact before an audience. But first we have to have auditions to try out for the various parts. This year's radio play we were able to figure out was going to be "The Journey" based on the initials of the roles that needed assigning.
After the auditions were over I had a little bit of time to chill out before the opening ceremonies so I accompanied Gorebash, Vashkoda, and Sean as they moved into a different hotel room with highspeed internet access available. We decided to check out this create your own pasta place that Vash knew about after ceremonies. Opening ceremonies proceeded as usual. The con staff welcomed everybody and presented themselves, the announcement for next year's convention, and Greg presented his usual slew of videos and stories (which we NEVER get tired of watching). There were a few major announcements:

1) Next year's convention will be held in the city of Las Vegas, Nevada!
2) Gorebash received the equivalent of the Lifetime achievement award for all of his efforts on Satation 8 and helping to keep the fandom alive
3) The official release date and stats for the Gargoyles DVD which was originally announced in 2002:
A 2 disc set comprised of the complete first season, uncut
MSRP (Manufacturer Suggested Retail Price) of $29.99
Commentary on the first five episodes by Greg, Frank Paur, and Keith David
The original pitch Greg used to sell the show to Disney
And a documentary on The Gathering of the Gargoyles 2004 as filmed in Montreal, Canada

That's right, there was film crew at the con who had been running around and getting footage of anything and everything they could (the voice acting panel and radio play auditions were no exception and I hope I end up on the DVD :D). Very, very exciting news... It was a GREAT time to be a Gargoyles fan. Greg closed with some inspirational words stressing just how much it's now up to the fans to get the word out on the DVD and The Gathering.
After ceremonies we went to the pasta place (whose name escapes me at the moment) but I think is worth mentioning because it was absolutely fantastic and I wish we had a place like it in Fresno. We all came back to the hotel for the Blue Mug-a-Guest which wasn't very blue this year due to A LOT of questions and excitement around the DVD. I tried to do my own part to help keep in on track with a few questions about Lexington's sexuality but it was still a great experience, as usual.

Saturday (Day 2)
I woke up late. There weren't many events I was planning on going to in the morning but I wasn't planning on staying up until 2:30am at the Blue Mug-a-Guest either. After buying a few items at the Dealer's room and bidding on the Art Show items, my roommates and I went down to the underground malls to try and find some food (perhaps more McDonalds). But they were closed! Everything was closed!! We probably spent close to 2 hours running around all of Montreal looking for some food! I was hoping to make it back in time for this year's auction. One of the things I'm famous for (even though I've only done it three, maybe four times) is paying outlandish amounts of money for some of the rarer pieces. This year I went to way to many conventions and took way too many trips so I was flat broke but I was still hoping to make a guest appearance just to freak people out and make them wonder what I was going to bid on (can't disappoint the fans). Unfortunately, it was not meant to be... I made it back to the hotel JUST in time for the Radio Play Rehearsals.
I've done quite a few of the Radio Plays and I must say this year's cast was brilliant. Everybody did a fantastic job! As I said, we did the Gargoyles episode "The Journey" and I was assigned the role of Owen Burnett... I swear I was type-cast!! But at least I had lines this year, unlike when I played the mute character Claw at last year's con.
Highlights included:
Zehra as Elisa Maza (I swear she SOUNDS like Salli sometimes)
Michael as Vinnie Grigori (he really has fantastic talent and he's cute too! :D)
The sexy Jen Anderson as Fleance
Liz and Stormy doing great jobs as baby Alexander Xanatos and Cagney the cat
Vashkoda and Gorebash played the roles of Maria Chavez and Matt Bluestone wonderfully
Lanny did a great Travis Marshall
But the people who stole the show with the last lines were Cindy and Chris Rogers as Margot Yale and Lennox Macduff.
Keith David finally arrived during the Banquet and I was the first person to shake his hand coming through the door. I believe he recognized me from past conventions as I've been to every convention he's been to and I thought I heard him say "It's good to see you again" as he shook my hand. Anyway, the banquet was a fantastic experience and many laughs were had by all... especially thanks to the party next door which featured some of the WORST off-key karaoke singing I have ever heard in my life!! To point that Keith said "Somebody shoot that horse" as somebody was hitting the high note on "I did it my way."
A couple of other highlights from the QA with Keither (for me anyway) was when he was telling us how seeing Harrison Ford's Motorcycle (they were in Hollywood Homicide together) would give him a boner and the out of context quote "I hope I can whip out Thailog when I need to." So THAT'S what he calls it (I know, I know. "My dick, my dick, my dick" ... or in this case Keith's).
After the banquet came the Masquerade and Cosplay. My personal favorites were:
John as the Renaissance Hunter (I'm a little biased because I played John Canmore in hunter garb in 97 and 98 but it was still a great costume!)
Lynati's Ophelia
Becca Morgan as Bronx.
Sapphire, Chameleon Girl and Ethan's reenactment of the second season Gargoyles theme with props
All of the staff members costumes (Siryn was SO adorable as Tom!!)
And last but not least, Loopy at Korul. It's about time a fursuiter showed up with a Gargoyles costume (complete with retractable wings that were controlled by his arms)!! He did a great skit as well as The Gargoyle who's scared of heights to the tune of rubbery ducky. Lanny pointed out to me later that we've seen costumes done better and more complex at other furry conventions but it was still awesome to see. Lanny and I spent most of the night chatting away and getting caught up as friends often do but we occasionally peeked our head back into the ballroom for some of the better highlights including listening to Cindy, Jen, and Keith sing (all three are fantastic in their own rights!), a hilarious edition of YMCA (or YMCsomething) and the filk "Blame Gargoyles" based off of South Park's "Blame Canada" (incidentally, I found myself whistling that tune all through the airport on Monday! Thanks A LOT guys… I'm lucky they didn't kill me, eh!). I said my goodbyes to Greg before heading upstairs to retire as he was leaving that morning to meet up with his family for his daughter Erin's birthday.

Sunday (Day 3)
Most of Sunday I spent gathering up a few last goodies in the Dealer's room before chatting the evening away with Jen, Lanny, Siryn, and Vash. Closing Ceremonies was sad, as usual because it means that things are unfortunately coming to an end (as is this diary). I was happy to see that many of the pieces that I voted on in the art show won awards and Cindy did an amazing job handling the whole ordeal :) I was able to get Keith David to sign my Delux Wingblast Goliath action figure and he made a note of it because he had never seen one before and thought it looked awesome (I have to see if I can pick one up for him to give to him in Vegas).
Afterwards Vash, Gore, Sean, and I ran around all of Montreal to try a find an EB Games for a Playstation 2 RF unit so Sean could play Final Fantasy XI in his hotel... Nothing is open on the weekends in downtown Montreal and I mean NOTHING. Hell, I'm shocked the hotel we were STAYING at was even open after the experience we had on Saturday and Sunday. I spent the rest of the evening in the con suite with the staff talking about the good, the bad, and the ugly for both this year's con and next and a little bit of brainstorming on how to help promote it and the DVDs. I also got a little bit of cuddle time with Jen and Alan grabbed my ass! WOO!!!

Monday (the final day)
I picked up some souvenirs and memorabilia for the people back home before packing up my bags and heading to the airport. The flight out was as smooth and uneventful as the flights in and now I can say that I've officially been to a foreign country. I always wish The Gatherings could go on longer than they do because I always have such an amazing time at them but this year I was a little glad to be back in America. Between nothing being open on weekends and not speaking French, Montreal ran me a little weary at times (and I appreciate even more how little Spanish speaking California actually is now, despite our complaints that they're taking over :D). But despite that I'm eagerly looking forward to returning to Canada to explore more of the country itself (and not just from the view of a hotel room) as what little I WAS exposed to took my breath away with it's gorgeous blending of country, history, and modernization. And I can't wait to do it all over again in Las Vegas for The Gathering of the Gargoyles 2005!!

Arno writes...

(Below you will find my Gathering diary, as it is. In its original version it is actually more or less integrated with a multiple page photo gallery, and part of a larger diary on my visit of Canada. This entire setup makes it very difficult to post the diary somewhere without the pictures or sub-pages. I have opted to copy and much of the relevant text into the submission form in order to post it here. Existing out of its original context, the result might be a bit confusing, so please bear with me.)

FRIDAY

Friday was the first proper day of the Gathering. It began with sleeping in late for most of us, considering the time we had gone to bed the night before. The exception was MAui. She had to get up early to work on the Clan Olympics with Abram Wintersmith. As a result most of the morning had already disappeared by the time we were up and about. By that time Robert, also our roomie, had shown up as well, swelling our ranks further.

One of our first acts of the day was to get registered at the registration desk. Again, a lot of familiar faces, and some new ones, but I have to say, I liked all the new faces I met.

We registered ourselves as a team for the Clan Olympics under the name "Arcadia International" ("We don't suck!"). Our members represented Canada, the United States of America, Great Brittain and The Netherlands. It was a team with too many members so we needed to rotate, but that turned out to work just fine as there was always some other team in need of a spare player. The Clan Olympics was a major event this year, and ended up dominating our weekend. Good thing it was a lot of fun.

At some point we decided to go to have breakfast/lunch. As we walked out ('we' being Robert, Dubble, Countess and myself) we walked right into a huge group of Gathering-attendants who all were just leaving for breakfast/lunch. The group was far too large to remember, but random names would be Hudson, Chris Rogers, Kaelyan, Cat, Mandolin, a bunch of people I know by face, not by name, and a bunch of people I don't remember at all. Awash in the sudden current, the self-appointed "Dweeby section of the group", we followed them around to a corner restaurant who gladly wanted to feed us, but only outside, where there was still room. The personel was quite friendly. It seems that for some reason, wherever Gargoyles fans go, everyone seems to like them. What is it about us? ;)

After all this the Gathering started proper, starting with the opening ceremonies, and then through the MGT3K event to the second Clan Olympics event. The second event? Indeed. The first had already been sprung at us during the opening ceremonies. A very daring move indeed.

Unfortunately Countess and Beedoo! missed most of this. Countess had to pick up Beedoo! from the airport as the opening ceremonies started and returned very late due to a delay. But with Beedoo! there at least our room was now completely present.

I recall that at one point, we went too bed. Way too late, again.

--- The registration desk, manned and womaned by BrooklynX, Rob and Siryn, was a very active place at the start of the Gathering, so much so that people gathered there for the largest part of the day. Aside from regular registration there was the seperate registration for the Clan Olympics beside it. No one could register without at least hearing of the event.
(Actually, I think the man's name was Rob. I know what his online handle is, more or less, but I can't even begin to spell it. ;) )

--- At the registration desk we also met the camera team sent there by Disney to film the Gathering. I was very pleasantly actually surprised to find that they were very open, very enthusiastic people. In my cynicism I had assumed they would just show up, shoot some film, collect their wages and leave. Instead, they really seemed to be there to want to get into the thing.

The camera team asked us to register again, so they'd have footage of registration. So we handed in our badges, then, in front of the camera, walked up to the desk, told our name and got handed a random badge and envelope. It was nothing like proper registration, unfortunately ("Arno! Hey Arno! What's you're last name!?"), and I wish they'd been there to film that instead. But we dutifully did our bit. A great actor I shall never be though.

They certainly filmed a lot of stuff. As I was talking to the camera people, signing away either my soul or my right not to want to appear on the DVD (yeah, right!) on some piece of legal paper, and suddenly I realised that I'd lost my program! But when I turned it around I found it again, under this enormous camera, being filmed for the DVD. I am so proud. Sadly, though, I lost it for real later that day.

--- As always the Gathering officially kicked off withthe opening ceremonies. In random order: we watched the movies, we listened to the stories. We listened to what the staff had in store for us, there was a fun tape with recorded messages from about a dozen(?) people involved with Gargoyles on it (as with Ed Asner's letter at the Gathering in LA, 2001, I can't help but notice what a kind man he seems to be), Gorebash received a well-deserved fandom award and at some point the opening ceremonies even got hijacked by the Clan Olympics.

After the chaos caused by this died down the opening ceremonies continued as usual. Further notable parts included the release date and further information on the Gargoyles DVD and Chris Roger's plans for the future of the Gathering which were, to say the least, fascinating.

--- During the opening ceremonies the whole thing got hijacked by the Clan Olympics. MAui and Abram Wintersmith stepped to the front of the room, stoically dropping cue cards declaring the opening ceremonies to be taken over. Truthfully, It was a hillarious thing to happen, and I must say, a brave thing to do for both them as well as the Gathering staff, who no doubt had to OK this rather unconventional idea.

So there we were, participating in the first event already, Jess and Dubble grabbing balls from a box and Robert stuffing them down my shirt for all he was worth, all this in front of the entire assembly of fans as well as the camera crew.

Sadly, I have no pictures of the actual event itself. I was too busy getting balls stuffed down my shirt.

--- Beedoo! arrived hours later than she was supposed to, but fortunately just in time to do the traditional "hanging out in our room" thing with us again.

SATURDAY

The second day of the Gathering was the only full day of Gathering planned. As such, it was filled with activities, most of which I did not have a chance to attend.

As stated earlier, the Clan Olympics dominated our weekend, and it continued doing so. One thing it did was force us to get up relatively early (once again, even earlier for MAui), allowing us to have much more day at our disposal as we would have had otherwise. The whole day consisted of walking around, looking at things, meeting up with people, voting on the artshow, voting on the art show again only properly this time, all that fitted around the two impressive Clan Olympics events: Trivia Torture and Really Hard Pictionary.

I did not manage to visit many (or any) panels that day, though I did go see the radio show. We also, as traditional, did not go to the banquet, since some of our group have finances that will not allow such an expenditure. On the other hand, most people seem to have missed the Karaoke singing following the masquerade, and that's certainly their loss.

--- Three years ago I met young Becca Morgan at the Gathering in LA, 2001. She threw a cat at me, numerous times. This seems to have left quite an impression on her as this year, when she finally showed up again, she had insisted on bringing a cat to throw at me. As the old toy was lost a new one had to be bought for the sole purpose of being thrown at me. Believe me, the money wasn't wasted.

--- The first Clan Olympics event of the day was Trivia Torture, possible the most professionally executed one of all. MAui had worked hard (and stayed up late) designing and printing professional cards for this game, while the way this conventionroom was set up could not be more perfect for this game.

The rules were complicated when explained but simple while playing: each team assigned a team member to sit on a chair below. This team member would not play, they would be the 'hostage'. Above each hostage three circular cards with entertaining text were stuck to the wall. These acted as a form of 'points'. If the 'points' of a team reached zero, ie, all the cards were removed, the hostage would be tortured either with spraypainted hair, or various disgusting combinations of food to eat. We put Robert down there (who bravely volunteered). Surplus Arcadia International member Dubble played for another team and promptly got sat down there as well, making sure we'd lose even if we won. ;)

The game centered around questions asked (from professionally designed cards, of course) by either Abram or MAui. The question would be either Gargoyles trivia or 'regular' trivia question. A member of the first team to hold up a piece of paper with a legible and correct answer would then get to step down and remove a 'point' from one of the teams.

Intermixed with all this were bonus cards which could do either good or harm, and the Spirits, members of teams which were previously eliminated from the game and who could interfere with the game at their apparent discretion.

Arcadia International eventually won the event through Spirit intervention at the expense of the Green Dragons. There's no saying for sure whether we would not have won otherwise, but I will say this though: the Green Dragons were good. Very good!

--- The second Clan Olympics event of the day was "Really Hard Pictionary", which lived up quite well to its rather presumptious name. Really Hard Pictionary was, well, really hard. Try drawing "It's the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine". Try drawing "Advanced Dungeons and Dragons". Believe me, it's even harder than it might seem.

By popular demand the game was continued even after all the scores were awarded, just for fun. I'll note that Robert and Flanker turned out to be very good at making people guess the right phrase. Absolute highlight was Flanker drawing a schetchy big fat gargoyle to indicate the word "Broadway". The Gathering was probably the only place in the world where this would work.

--- After the Really Hard Pictionary event of the Clan Olympics each team was given a box and provided with a source of markers of all sorts of colours. The box was to be used in the next and final event, the Scavenger Hunt, and we were to decorate it as we saw fit.

The decorating was taken care of by the two most artistic team members available, Countess and Beedoo!. Countess did some terrific lettering, while Beedoo! drew some cute pictures of the characters of our team. To them goes nearly all the credit for a fine box indeed. Myself, I went to the radio play as it was being decorated, and thus my only contribution was the addition of the Dutch flag among the three other flags of our respective countries.

--- As the box was being decorated and I was about to make my way to the radio play, this person here walked into the hotel. I don't know his proper name, I don't even know his face, I just know that he went by the name of 'Korul' and that this was the most amazing costume I had ever seen. Needless to say, he was there for the masquerade later that day.

--- I went to the radio play expecting to find Keith David there playing the role of Goliath. Unfortunately, he still had not arrived. The radio play was still pretty fun though, because the reworked 'original' script of 'The Journey' worked well and because there was some pretty good voice acting there. Clearly after all those years people have become quite good at this sort of thing.

The people who stood out the most, though, I thought, were Chris Rogers as MacBeth and Eden as Margot Yale. They were amazing, bickering with each other. "Madam, they burned witches like you in the middle ages!" "You, sir, live in a fantasy world!" If anything of the radio play ends up on the DVD that had better be in it.

--- As not all of us could afford the banquet, we ventured out to find some food of our own. This entailed my first trek through downtown Montreal. As it turned out, almost all I would see of Montreal on the days of the Gathering I would see that day. Everything we needed was conveniently placed in one single street.

--- We finally found food in a Hard Rock Cafe, situated in the middle of a Brazilian street party of all things. With all the bustle it took them rather a while to serve us, but we had fun entertaining ourselves.

--- This year's masquerade was the most spectacular I have seen. Granted, all other years, for one reason or another, I missed the grand entrances, but even then, the quality of costumes was very high, as was the quantity. It was a very nice touch that nearly the entire staff was in costume as well. I was quite impressed.

Overall winner was, of course, the man known as Korul. The detail on his gargoyle costume was amazing, particularly the moving wings and mouth. It was very impressive and a very well-deserved win.

--- After the masquerade came the Karaoke night. Sadly, due to some apparent technical difficulties taking up a bit of time, many people had already wandered off. Which is their loss.

SUNDAY

Sunday was the wrap-up of the Gathering, but a very busy day nontheless. To begin with there was the final Clan Olympics event: the Scavenger Hunt, a fitting finale which had us exhausted and yet hyped up before 11 AM.

After this came the closing ceremonies, which I have to admit seemed a little of an anti-climax. Greg Weisman had already left, as had the camera team. And really, what else was there to say that "we're done"? Nevertheless, the Gathering staff put together an excelent con altogether, and they deserve to be praised for it.

In between the Scavenger Hunt and the CLosing Ceremonies I happened to stumble upon a Mug-A-Guest with Keith David. Now, I'm not really one to go listen to celebreties. I'm quite sure they are interesting, just no more so than my friends who I only see once a year if that. I decided to stay and listen, though. I found there that Keith David, whom I knew next to nothing from, was a very intelligent, very thoughtful and very kind man. I was very impressed and I hope the camera team got some of it all.

Also, nearly everyone at the Closing Ceremonies will remember Robert and Jess peddling a sign-up sheet for an impromptu game of laser-tag. To those that did not sign up, or show up: you missed out. Really. Definately.

--- Once again Clan Olympics had us get up at the crack of dawn (also known as about 8:15 AM) in order to take part in the one Clan Olympics event us Arcadians actually consistently do well: the Scavenger Hunt.

The Scavenger hunt involved finding items from a list and putting them in the box we prepared the day before. Some items were simple, others were difficult, and a few turned out to be impossible: A can of Lysol, a bird, any bird, three different flavors of lip gloss, diapers, any vehicle floormat, one standard #2 pencil, a non-hotel blanket, a MALE con-goer with a 2004 Gathering shirt not from our team (who was to strip off the shirt and toss it in the box), a hardcover book, a set of balls from the first Clan Olympics event, a shotglass, three rolls of packed toilet paper, a disposable camera with no photos left on it, a plunger and a note from any hotel staff member saying "I did this for the Clan Olympics".

And then there was a list of bonus items, held by MAui who had hidden herself somewhere in the hotel. These items were for extra points: some wooden thing called the "Official 2x4 of the 1998 Hock-Fest", some bonus bags, three squishy soccer balls, as many different business cards as we could find and a special guest or Gathering staff member to stand in our box for 15 seconds.

It was a very exciting and very exhausting game which had Gathering attendants running chaotically through the hotel. We got a cleaning staff member to give us toilet paper and write us a note, I stripped in my Gathering Shirt in exchange for a vehicle floor mat and a disposable camera for another team, and then I generally ran around with no list, no team member and half an idea of what to look for. The box filled marvelously nontheless. I am only disappointed not to have been there to see Kanthara stand in our box.

Fun fact: the Gathering Hotel had only one plunger in the entire building. And they'd lost it.

--- During the closing ceremonies the winners of the Clan Olympics were announced. Considering the scores and our results at the Scavenger hunt, it was not really a surprise anymore, but Arcadia International won! Mind, with some help from the spirits, but even then, I know my teammates certainly played quite well.

So, we came forward and accepted our prizes and the honour. Our prizes consisted of a circular piece of cardboard saying we won and four Clan Olympics T-shirts to split between the five of us. Look at us showing our Arcadian pride.

After closing ceremonies I got another shirt from Chris Rogers for pre-registering. Very kind of him. Withg the Gathering T-shirt, the Evil Makes Me Sad T-shirt and the Clan Olympics prize, it was my fourth new shirt that weekend. I'd started seriously regretting bringing shirts at all.

--- The other major event of the day: Lasertag!

Saturday evening we passed a lasertag place on our way back to the hotel. Now, Robert had, at earlier Gatherings, already expressed a desire for us to play Lasertag. So, he went inside for a moment, asked for information and came out with the knowledge that a group of exactly 30 people would get a good discount.

So, he set about organising a group of exactly 30 people. He and Jess went round the lines for Keith David and pre-registering after the closing ceremonies and collected names of people who wanted to come. It took some doing, but they actually managed to fill their list. Even Keith David signed up.

Of course, around the time people were to gather in the lobby things went all pearshaped. Some didn't show up, others wanted to join after all. Some would arrive late. Keith David was still eating with his wife. In the end we left in two groups, one of twenty-one and another group of straglers that would hopefully make thirty.

Robert became nervous.

The walk to the Lasertag place was sort of an event itself. Keeping a group that size together on the sidewalks of Montreal was no small matter, especially considering that we were late and needed to keep up a good pace. Being Robert's roomies more or less automatically assigned us the task of keeping the group together a bit. Now we know what sheep dogs feel like! It was an entertaining walk, though.

It took some time for the rest of us to arrive, but when they did we were with 33, though sadly without Keith David. It turned out they could fit 32 in their maze, so Jess kindly voluntered to sit the whole game out. She really missed out for the rest of us. She's too kind (but don't tell her that ;) ).

The game itself was brilliant, and I'm sure the massive amount of people we brought helped a lot. It was pandemonium and I think everyone had great fun. There were three rounds, one with everyone against everyone, one with two teams, and one with two teams protecting two members, a king and a queen. It turned out Robert was the Lasertag champion among us. No wonder he wanted to play.

I hope we'll do this again some time.

Vashkoda writes...

Gathering Report Part I--the abridged, somewhat more relevant version

Thursday:

Gore navigated through the back alleys of the Bronx to pick up me and my friend Sean. It's in fact thanks to Gore's car (and his offer of floor space) that I was even going to the con, as I was otherwise still suffering from jetlag, work-guilt, indecisiveness, and a general nervousness of being filmed. But when your transportation, lodging and company is taken care of, how can you say no, especially when you really wanted to go in the first place?

So we take off on the I-87 with the general awareness that it's going to be a long drive, and that the direction will be North. Somewhere along the way, we realize that we are no longer on the I-87, nor heading exactly North. I guess that's what happens when you get distracted by long discussions about Greg Weisman's ideas for the show. So after passing the twentieth or so cornfield, Gore proceeds to make a daring U-turn right in front of the toll booth. We throw repeated glances over our shoulders as we listen to what Gore dubbed "running from the cops music". It turns out no one was following us, and we saved ourselves from paying the toll for our detour. The detour did cost us time, however, and we only made it to the border at 10 (though this did mean a shorter line at customs). I made use of my French-skills in translating a few signs, and we managed to find the hotel. There were some fans waiting in the lobby when we arrived, but all we could think about was sleep. Luckily we were shepherded upstairs by Seth/IRC Goliath and Dave/Wingless, who told us registration had been pushed back a few hours the next day. That suited us just fine. Through the elevator glass, we gaped at the view of the pool on the gym floor. Then we reached our room and crashed.

Friday:

Not knowing where else to go, we decide to eat at the hotel. We fill up on omelets and buffet food to give us the energy to explore the city (by foot. Gore had his car, but due to a miraculous feat of squeezing it into a tiny parking space, he was very reluctant to take the car out again). We dash over to registration real quick to get our packets and, most importantly, the schedule of events. I begin a hunt for a laptop for a certain video project I was hoping to complete (I was almost positive either Gore or Seth would have brought one, but no luck). Seth does mention that Chris Rogers, with help from Lynati, managed to hook up a VCR to the hotel tv's (which were somehow modded to stop guests from doing that sort of thing). That gave us hope for Sean's PS2. So we go to the Staples-like store next door, but don't manage to find the remote that would let us switch the video input (this of course, assumed that we would manage to hook up the PS2 to the tv). As we're looking at the map in the con booklet, we set what may be a Multimedia City towards the top of the map. After fifteen minutes of walking what we thought was north, we see the word "ouest" on the *left* side of the map, which meant we had actually been going south the whole time. D'oh! On the walk back, Gore starts asking me to translate signs, and gets a real kick out of the "Je me souviens" on the Quebec license plates. I then teach him the opposite phrase, "J'oublies", and he amuses himself saying it throughout the con. For his impertinence, a Quebecan pigeon makes his shoulder its new roost. We only have time to explore 'North' a short distance, but we do manage to spot a "International Pasta" restaurant that I insist we go to for dinner. Sadly, the Asian-style building we'd been hoping was also a restaurant, turned out to be a Holiday Inn.

So we make it back in time for Greg's voice-acting panel. Normally I wouldn't have gone to this one, as I've heard it in the past. I was actually planning on going to the tour of Karine/Kanthara's animation studio, but that was unfortunately dropped out of the new schedule. Still, the fact that Keith David would be there made this one a bit more special. Only…it turned out Keith was delayed filming a scene for "Transporter 2". We were still treated to a unique twist when the DVD video crew turned up in the middle of the panel. [I will omit my detailed notes here and save them for my site, which if you're curious, can be found here: http://crossroads.dragonmists.org/fantasy/avalon/gathering/g2k4.html]. Afterwards, the room cleared for Radio Play auditions. Sean was as reticent as ever, which only made me less eager to try out. Gore had no problem putting himself near the front of the line. I stood back and hesitated, and then had my single personal encounter with the DVD crew, when they asked if I was auditioning. Then when I saw the crew going inside to film the tryouts (yikes!), and saw that Siryn (who I'd be embarrassed to act in front of) was going to help judge, I made a quick escape. My reasoning to everyone afterwards was that it'd be better to try out the following day, when Greg might be more desperate and forgiving.

As a consolation prize to having no PS2, Sean urges us to upgrade to a room with internet access. We go up to our new room on the 22nd floor and chat with Seth, as Sean tries to get his old laptop to boot for over an hour. I decide to give up on my project (guess it'll have to wait for 2005). Just as it activates, it's time to head to Opening Ceremonies. We manage to snag the front row right in front of Greg. I embolden myself to go up there and have a quick word with him (I really wish at some con, I'll have a chance to have an actual conversation with the guy). Then the con staff begin to speak one by one, until Maui and Abram hijack the mic to announce that the Clan Olympics' first event is starting right then and there. Greg looks bewildered and slightly annoyed (or perhaps worried about the chaos and how it would look on film), and I wonder if he had been warned of this ahead of time. I was relieved that enough people showed interest to fill ten teams. The goal was apparently to do a plastic-ball relay to fill a teammate's shirt (which had holes in it, though whether this was to allow balls to go in or to make it harder to keep them in, I wasn't sure). The team in front of us had so many balls, they had filled the sleeves and had to use their teeth to keep them up. Yet despite this, they were the losing team, which leads me to think that the goal was not the number of balls, but rather the kind of balls, as some apparently had points written on them (I really hope the rules were explained at the beginning to these people, or I consider this event to be horribly unfair). Balls kept falling to the floor, and Gore amused himself juggling them (until he was outstaged by Siryn).

Opening ceremonies then resumed with more con staff announcements. Gore ends up winning the Fandom Guest of Honor award, which was well deserved after all the hard work he put into making (and still upgrading) Station 8. The G2005 staff (Chris, Lanny, Aaron and Mara) show off their mascot and announce plans to tentatively hold the con July 21-Auguest 1 at the Las Vegas Plaza Hotel. They also want to organize a celebrity charity poker game to try to draw more guests, along with plans for a Grand Canyon trip and acquiring show tickets. Then Greg takes the mic and asks the con virgins to raise their hands (I'd say a good thirty people did-I wonder how many of them are Canadians who weren't able to make it before?). There were five people who had been to all 8 conventions. We then watched the spinoff pitches for Dark Ages, New Olympians and Bad Guys, as well as the original series pitch, and a video with interviews I don't think I've seen before (my memory is fuzzy, but Greg did mention he'd just received a new tape from Buena Vista). We also listened to the Team Atlantis crossover-episode audio tape. And as a surprise bonus, we got to listen to members of old Gargoyles cast and crew wish us well at the con. Included in the tape were Frank Paur, Keith David, Bob Kline, David Schwartz, Troy Miters, Vic Cook, Ed Asner, and Cripsin Freeman. Carol Wagner had collected the voices, but didn't have time to get any more before the con. And then of course, Greg announced the big news - that the DVD will be out on Dec 7th for $29.99, and that there would be an audio commentary for the "Awakening" 5-parter. He reminded us that he's done all he can, and that it's up to us now to get the word out and get as many people to buy it as we can if we hope to have a season 2 DVD, or even a continuation of the series. He also asked us to go to the DVD film crew and tell them how Gargoyles changed our lives (relationships, fan-writing/art, reading Shakespeare, getting tattoos, etc).

After Opening Ceremonies, we rushed to the con suite where they were showing the music videos. Apparently there was no system in place to project them, so we had to watch them on Liz's laptop. By the time we got there, they were already playing the and last one, so we forced them to play them all over again. My favorite was one to the music of Linkin' Park, mostly because the images were sometimes appropriate to the song, and because it didn't seem to drag on too long. Then I reminded my roommates about the pasta place we saw earlier (I'm a pasta-freak), and we invited Seth, Dave/Wingless, and Dan/Titanic/Gaburos to come with us. It was better than I could have imagined. It was only a small fast-food-like chain, but this place put professional Italian restaurants with pasta-combo deals to shame. You could pick from a dozen kinds of fresh pasta and 30-or-so sauces, and they would put the ingredients together and sauté them right in front of you. After skipping lunch, I needed a hearty meal, so I went with the linguini and stroganoff, though I salivated over everyone else's dishes as well (not literally, thankfully).

We were exhausted when we got back to the room, and I tried to decide whether it would be worth torturing myself trying to stay awake for the Blue-Mug-A-Guest. After assurances from Seth and Gore that they would take good notes, I finally allowed sleep to overtake me. So ends Day 2.

Jeffrey Allan Boman writes...

I posted this first in the Comment Room, but realized I should post them here:

Gathering of Gargoyles
August 6th - 8th
Delta Hotel, Montreal

First I have to point out: in terms of my attendance experience, this was a small convention. All conventions seem small after WorldCon, but at approximately 180 attendees, this one was a little larger than Primedia in 1999.

The big difference is: I had fun at this one.

I think it helped that this had a much more specific focus: PriMedia was for fans of all television media; this convention was solely for fans of Gargoyles, the most rich and fascinating animated show to come from Disney. As a result, we all had something in common.

It also helped that the convention was kept to 6 rooms spread over 3 small floors; PriMedia was all over a few long, empty floors of a hotel, helping it to feel like a ghost town.

Day One

I started the convention with a chuckle: when I filled out my registration form, I put my BBS alias (Thoth) in the nickname section.

When I got my registration badge, I learned it was the ONLY name listed! I don't think many there would recognize me from the name alone, but it still made for a funny thing.

I was amazed at how young most of the fans were: folks in their late teens or early 20s. The show really touched fans all over the age spectrum.

The 1st panel Friday I attended was called Perspective at 1 PM. I thought it might actually be about the show. At first I wondered if I was in the wrong room, as I was the only person there. Turned out the con chair who was hosting it was just running a little behind.

The panel was actually about drawing in perspective, something I learned in school. I stayed in case the panel speaker (the con chair Karine) needed some help. That was a bit of arrogance on my part: she's actually a working animator; I'm not.

This was the only drawing panel I attended during the con... since I can no longer draw that would just seem pointless.

We began learning just how quickly the hotel staff worked to please us: first, the a/c made the hotel feel chilly. That was fixed up quickly. Also: the speakers were blasting 'muzak' in all the rooms, making it hard to hear panelists. That too was fixed immediately.

I visited the con suite next. They didn't have snacks out yet, but the room was quite nice, and I got to enjoy some of the classic shows on tape. I'd forgotten about some of the episodes, like the one that introduced the Golem of Prague!

3 PM: RPG panel

The speakers were longtime gamers, owned a store in Seattle, and the wife was a published author. They relayed some fun "war stories" of their past games. This is something I never grow tired of.

Bringing the panel back to the reason for the con I asked what game they thought best to play Gargoyles. They mentioned how Steve Jackson has the write-ups (they were massive GURPS gamers), but can't publish them. Disney won't let anyone make money off their IP (even if they don't try) so I suspect legal reasons.

5 PM: Opening Ceremonies

This was attended by the most people I'd seen to date at the convention. Not surprising, since it was attended by one of the guests Greg Weisman (series creator and producer). ?

The Ceremonies were 'interrupted' by the first event of the Clan Olympics, a Gargoyles-themed version of the Color Wars we'd held in summer camp. The difference was again that these were fun. I got to hold one end of a dividing line rope for the first event.

Greg played an audio tape of some actors from the show expressing their apologies that they couldn't attend. The audience got very lively when Ed Asner spoke!

The Con Chair for next year had a speech. The con holds an Olympics-style city choice every year; Las Vegas won for next year. That's not a con I can afford along with Westercon. Two trips in less than a month would be too much.

Because of the Clan Olympics I had to leave before the end for Transport, so I missed some of Greg's speech. At least I was there for the most important part: the first 5 episodes (season one they call it) will be released on DVD on December 7th. Mark your calendar and get many folks to buy it, so that we can send the message to Disney that the series can be profitable. DVD sales are the reason Family Guy will be coming back next season. Maybe this could do the same thing for Gargoyles!

Day 2

I grabbed some eats at a hotel snack shop. The hotel restaurant was too pricey, and breakfast was a buffet. Without someone else to carry my plate, I wouldn't be able to carry it.

10 AM Thrill of the Chase

This was my "Writer Panel" of the weekend. :) The panelists mostly were awake. One of them showed the effects of too much partying Friday night, not enough sleep.

The topic was, as the name implies, chase scenes. They spoke of the challenges to write a good one, of how a chase may have nothing to do with action, and how even Gargoyles had a show-long chase (Eliza Maza and Goliath). It was a very interesting panel.

Next was a convention lunch break. I spent it in the dealer's room. I haven't outgrown my D-R Liaison roots... the room had many more dealers, as often happens at smaller cons; dealers will save money by only being there for the longest day.

I had a neat surprise there: Emru & Tamu Townsend were both there for fps! I hung with them for most of the rest of the convention to talk shop, to share memories of my University days with Emru, etc (I just realized: he makes another APA link too!). They had past issues of the print magazine for sale and display. I was actually in more of them than I remembered: counting my online review, I actually have 5 to my credit, not 3 (two were in one issue that I own but haven't seen in many years). Counting my mini report for this con, I'll be up to 6 pieces so far.

12:30 PM Mug-a-guest : Greg Weisman

Several of us asked about a lot of things. I asked about Greg's dealings with voice actress Brigit Bako (I explain in the sidebar) and the seeming non-finish of the Avalon storyline (actually it was the World Tour. I had the wrong name). Others asked about different story points, Greg's opinion on current Disney 'toons (opinions cut to avoid hurting Greg if they come out wrong). It was an interesting panel.

Emru went aside with Greg to interview him for the magazine, and I spent the time chatting with Tamu. Afterward I had lunch w/Em. We went a short enough walk into downtown, but it was enough to leave me wiped out. We took a small cab ride back to the convention; I wanted to pay for it, but Emru did - it was his chance to expense something to the magazine. :) We came back to:

3:30'ish PM Radio play

This was Greg's final episode of the show, read by attendees. There were differences from how the show originally aired; not a surprise, since Greg wasn't the series editor by then. Unfortunately Keith David was delayed due to a film shoot, otherwise he intended to be there to read the Goliath part. Rob St-Martin, the convention Vice Chair, read it instead. It was a fun piece. Emru made a joke about the Auditorium we sat in; it was as if we were back in school!

Rob St-Martin added to the NaNoWriMo reunion of the weekend: he, Karine and the smaller Mark all ran things, while the taller Mark (I don't know his last name. Mike might) was there, and Chris Taras (who ran our NaNo-group) ran the Auction. It was very successful from what I hear.

I couldn't afford the Banquet too, and I missed both it and the Masquerade - but I still reserved my evening Transport after those events. I ended up eating supper at hotel restaurant. I tried the con suite after, but it was closed for those events as well. Fortunately I only had a 30-minute wait for Transportation after though. That's far better than a 2-hour wait!

I almost forgot: I saw our friend Kriquor at the Radio play. I saw his name on the pre-reg list, and guessed he'd be there as David Xanathos, but this was my first chance to see him. He's another friend now living in Toronto, sadly. :(

I did see one of the folks in hall costume (or for the Masquerade) outside of the Radio Play too. I wish I'd had my camera ready, because it was breathtaking.

DAY 3

I spent most of the day in the Dealer's Room with Emru & Tamu. The only panel I wanted to attend the most for the day would be there anyway.

10 AM'ish Mug-a guest w/ Keith David

There were a lot of people seated to wait for him... I told him how he was one degree of separation from Brigit for me. He said he may say hi to her for me, but I won't hold him to it. Unless he recalls my name, I don't expect him to remember me.

His speech turned into a long diatribe on how soldiers can't easily adjust to regular life after war, but once he began talking about his career, it was gold.

One thing that stood out: he listed Gargoyles as an animated series, not a cartoon. As he said, cartoons are now things aimed at kids (in North America, granted), whereas the series was far more sophisticated. This was very apt to many of us.

Before he arrived I passed through the art show, as it would be taken down soon after. There were some very talented artists shown... of course the primary subjects were characters from the show.

After Keith's speech, Emru had a prize drawing. He'd got folks on an fps mailing list for a chance at a prize. I won one of them: a CD of music inspired by anime. I didn't win the grand prize (a season 3 DVD set for Family Guy), but I may get it anyway... Em will try to get me all 3 seasons to do a series overview.

2 PM Closing Ceremonies

This started with another speech from the 2005 Con Chair (Vegas: I can dream...) then a long string of awards for folks in the art show. Then we got the winners of the Clan Olympics. They spotlighted the lady who had the first pre-registration to this convention. She came from Australia - wow!

I unfortunately had to miss Keith David's final words as I had to get my Transport home.

Conclusions

I had fun at this convention. It had a smaller set of panels, only two guests - but the fact that it was on a focused theme, that I knew quite a few folks there, that everyone was friendly... it was definitely worth the time and effort.

I'm counting the days now until the DVD comes out, and I'm hoping to get to the 2006 Gathering - the 10th anniversary!

Ethan Gilchrist writes...

Just cutting and pasting my entry from my livejournal about the con. To sum up though, I miss everyone and cannot wait for next year!!!!

Wednesday:
Spent most of the day trying to get to level 20 on CIty of Heroes. lol

Thursday:
Last minute packing before I left. Shower and shave and out the door! I was supposed to hit Newark Airport by noon to meet up with my ride. For once the notoriously late one was on time!!! Got there at 11:52am, called Chris and found out they were late. LOL 3 hours later they showed and we began a looooooooong drive up to Montreal. The drive was actually uneventful for the most part. That is until we got to the border. Turns out the Canadian Border guards were "on strike". They're not actually on strike but they were being uberly slow. Ah well. Made it to the hotel and proceeded to pass out.

Friday:
Woke up and 19 of us decided to mob a restaraunt for food. That was uber fun!! Made it back just in time for the voice acting seminar and the auditions. I was uber nervous but I still had the guts to try. Didn't care if I made it or not, I just wanted to make up for missing it last year. While I was in line Sapph showed up and let me know what room I was supposed to be in. After the audition she ran up to me franticly and said "Ethan! I need you!" No NOT like that! (Not that I wouldn't mind heh). She needed me to do the naration for the skit she was planning for the masquerade which I'll get to in a bit. We went to her room and practiced. After that were opening ceremonies which was a real treat for me since last year I missed them. Con quote for me was said here "Sign my grandma!". LOL!!!

I skipped the next couple events but for the life of me I can't remember what I did! lol Round 11pm was the blue-mug which was fun though oddly tame this year. Went out for dinner at some place called Le Marche which was sort of like a permanent street fair/cafeteria sort of place. Stayed up all night until about 8am before staggering back to the room and going into a coma.

Saturday:
Yet again woke up just when I needed to. Just in time to stumble to the registration desk and find out that I got a part!!! *happy dance* It was only a bit part but I got to be a villian which was MUCH fun. Like acting evil is a stretch for me. lol I only missed one cue which was when the coldness of the auditorium got to me really bad and for a second I just couldn't talk. I don't know if anyone caught that but we just kept going. Thing about that was that I didn't worry that it would just stall. I knew everyone else would just keep going. *shrugs* Anyway, after that me and a couple people went to an Irish pub down the street for a guiness. Walked in, sat down at the bar and told the (uber cute) bartender "Hi, yes we're tourists, no we don't know what's going on, and yes we will refrain from pretending we do." She got a big kick outta that. Made it back for the banquet. The food was great! The manager even surprised everyone by making special gargoyles menus!!! Missed the Q&A because I had to get ready for the masquerade but I don't mind that...

Shortly before the masquerade I realized something. We were pantomiming the opening to the show. This meant I was reading the lines from it. Kieth David's lines!!! With him sitting in front of me and judging us!! ACK!! lol I was quite a bit nervous but I franticly ranted about that for a while to get it outta my system and just went for it. I had an absolute blast! Sapph and Julie were amazing!! The worst part was that it was soooooooooo hard not to bust out laughing myself! :D

Afterwards there was kareoke and after being charged up from the masquerade I took the mike (which I forgot to turn on lol) and belted out "Another Irish Drinking Song" by Da Vinci's Notebook. I think people liked it. Wasn't bad since by that point my voice started dying. Ended up staying awake until 6am after a marathon conversation which, for me, is one of the highlights of the entire con.

Sunday:
Yet again woke up just in time. I was the model for the life drawing that day. It was fun except the room was INSANELY cold!!!! Went to the mug-a-guest with Kieth David afterwards and then wandered around trying not to be all depressed that people would be leaving soon. Heh Closing ceremonies were bittersweet but on the other hand it just get's me closer to next year's con and VEGAS!!!!

More stuff went on after closing ceremonies were over but I'm going to cut this here since I'm getting tired of typing. lol Still a lot of detail I left out of this as well but I'll add more later. Anyway, that's all for now!! *bampf*
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Kaioto writes...

Well, I'm not sure if this is very relevent, but it is a post anyway. ;-)

My Gathering Experience - Montreal 2004

Honestly, I think I spent less time focused on Gargoyles this year than any other. I blame driving competely. This was the first Gathering I'd ever brought my car to, and it was a mixed blessing.

On the positive side, I could afford to take myself and my wife to this event due to the fact that I could drive to and from Montreal in only 6 or 7 hours. It wasn't that far from Boston. I also managed to help out a friend in a tight spot.

On the down side, the drive was taxing, traffic problems conspired to make us miss registration and Opening Ceremonies, and I spent more time than I bargained for outside of Montreal proper.

I have to say that the city reminds me of home. The construction still causes assinine traffic. The drivers are atrocious. The only big differences were that everyone I ran into from a bilingual Francophone / Anglophone and it is illegal to make a right turn at an unposted red light.

On the up side, we got Kael's bag back for him. Seems that when he flew down to Virginia to hook up with Chris Rogers car to drive up, his airline lost his luggage with his clothes. They got yelled at and agreed to FedEx it ASAP to the hotel in Montreal. Of course, they didn't bother to make sure it would clear customs in time to actually get there. So it was to sit at the airport in a FedEx depot for the entire weekend until after Kael left. That was uncool, so we drove up there, got lost in the airport, surrounding highways, and auxiliary roads. Eventually we were directed to the depot, then redirected to the terminal where we had to repeat the litany of disaster to a friendly customs agent who eventually took pity and stamped the release forms. We took them back to FedEx, filled our more forms, and Kael finally had his stuff back.

You know, I wonder how Elisa coped with not having a change of clothing during that whole Avalon Tour. It must've been annoying, especially with all the adventuring. It'll ruin your clothes pretty quickly.

That was sort of the tone for the whole Gathering. Run around. Drive around. Get lost a lot. I was so tired I spent most of the time lounging here or there, just listening to interesting people talk and drifting. Hudson always has interesting stories to tell. The writers panels seemed to be going well, but I just don't have any time or ambition for writing at the moment. The dealers room was very cool. I got a chance to go through the art show and pick up some pins, T-Shirts, and pre-register for Vegas.

The Banquet was very nicely done. I enjoyed everything but the loud noises coming from the next room over. Keith David was as charming as ever. Managed to get some good coordination going with Siryn and Chris about web-marketing the Gargoyles DVD and Gathering 2005 online. I managed to take a peek at a lot of the awesome costumes from the contest and harass Greg a bit about a comic project we've been plotting for a while now.

Chris managed to convince me to take Lexy along and go to the Montreal casino that night. It was very late, but I really didn't want to call it a day since I had to drive back Sunday anyway and wouldn't have time to do anything else this Gathering.

I never have any luck at crowded casinos on a weekend night, so I should've known better. I dropped some money at a cold Blackjack table. Lexy was caught by the slot-machine that wouldn't die. It just kept playing down to one quarter and then hitting back up to 40. It yo-yo'd like that 3 times staight! Chris had more luck on the higher blackjack tables and a little time playing craps. He treated Lexy, myself, and Kael to dinner / midnight snack over at the buffet. I had chocolate and raspberry death-cake and a lemon pasty of some sort. The sugar was enough to get me back to the hotel in one piece.

The drive back home wasn't too bad, except for having to double-back for something vitally important right at the U.S. border. That added 3 extra hours of driving time, but people were so honest and helpful that I could still count it as a somewhat positive experience.

Perhaps I'll have better luck with my travel and my tables in Vegas next year.

Hope to see you there!

- Marty "Kaioto" Lund

Mara Cordova writes...

Basically, this is a cop-out post because I'm still in the middle of writing my Gathering diary and have hit the wall, narration-wise. (Also, it's more or less the same for a majority of the time pre-and-post con as Aaron, Spaciebabie, Revel, Emambu, Lynati, GregX and Alex Bishansky since we all caravaned to and from Canada.) I do plan on finishing it, sometime, but for now I just want to post that I had a wonderful time, it's always great to see everyone again, meet long time online friends who finally get to make their first Gathering and actually have some really nice conversation with people I sorta knew by name but not really on a person-to-person level.

I will will *will* (I say to you three times) try to get my diary done, but I wanted to post something now at least.

So I had a great time and I'm looking forward to seeing everyone (and more people who haven't been before or haven't made a Gathering in a few years... *crosses fingers*)again in Vegas. Which, somehow I'm on staff for... again. But that's another kettle of fish. Ja ne!

Wingless writes...

Well, I've been wanting to do this for years, but not being a person very good with words(which is why I got into radio, after all), I've never gotten around to actually writing a gathering journal. This was the 4th gathering I've attended, having been to 1998, 2001, 2003 and this year. I've never been big on traveling, mainly because I'm legally blind and deathly afraid of getting myself lost or something. I can see enough to read(nose to page-or in this case, nose to screen). I can also use a camera reasonably well, and what might surprise you is that I can see things in the photos I took better than I could actually being there. Stating that, I apologize in advance if I don't get all the names right or miss metioning someone. Also excuse any bad grammer or spelling. As I stated, writing ain't my thing.

Wednesday August 4th.
I had been pretty busy trying to get all the details done before the trip. I had done minimal packing up to that point, and needed to get my butt in gear. I had also been working on a little surprise for Greg Weisman, and thankfully got it completed on time(more on that in Saturdays entry). I had also made a CDR of mp3s for the trip. I had bought some new clothes, done lots of washing and managed to get most things packed before the evening. This would be the easiest Gathering trip I've had, being Ottawa is only a 2 hour drive from Montreal, and I was traveling with my friend Gabarus(Dan) and Flanker(John) was driving up to Ottawa to pick us both up. Flanker was going to stay with Gab overnight and we'd head off to Montreal early Thursday morning.
I had gone into Station 8 chat and talked to Whitbourne(Dylan) who asked me to bring my Ultimate Goliath action figure, along with an 12 inch tall Elisa figure his fiancee Stormy(Mary)asked me to bring for her custom action figure display, so I made a point to pack those before I forgot. The Goliath figure actually came in handy later. Talking to IRC Goliath (Seth) that evening, It was looking like we might pick him up at the airport on our way - but the best laid plans..and all that. So, I chatted to Gabarus briefly online(since he has no phone) to make sure Flanker got there ok and make our plans. I wanted to leave by 10, they wanted to leave by Noon, so we compromised and planned for 11am. IRC Goliath was flying to L.A. first, and he got online at the airport for a bit and made some plans to try and pick him up. It was after 1 am before I finally hit the pillows - and actually managed to sleep, which I was never able to do before the previous 3 gatherings I attended.

Thursday, August 5th

I got up reasonably early to get myself showered and pack my shaver and a few last things. Had a bit of breakfast and a coffee(I prefer tea, but coffee is faster to make). Then I headed to the computer to see if my sleepy head travel companions were awake. No sign of them-but IRC Goliath was online again. He was in New York - and his flight had been delayed to Montreal, so he wouldn't be leaving there till after 11. That seemed to be a good thing, except we hadn't left yet. Without being able to co-ordinate things, we wouldn't be able to pick him up, which I felt kinda bad about. When 10 am came and went, I started to get a little nervous. Then 11 am, I started to get concerned. It was 11:15 when I got a call for Gab, they were at a gas station about 5 minutes away and they'd be to get me shortly. A half hour went by and the two lost souls pulled in the driveway. They came in for a few minutes to help me with my luggage. I had a large suitcase and a carry on bag - and a few other things in a plastic bag. Feeling like I was bringing the house with me, I felt a little better when I heard Flanker was bringing a cot and sleeping bag, and Gab packed his full sized computer tower with him, plus his other luggage. The plan was to hook the computer to the TV in our hotel room and we could watch DVD's - again, the best laid plans....
So on went the tunes and off we went. Flanker had already made the trip to Montreal, but not from Ottawa, so we kinda had to limp our way out of the city. I'm no good at directions and Gab is reasonably new to Ottawa. After a few wrong turns, we found the right highway and were on our way. It was a relatively uneventful trip, although we overshot Montreal a little bit, but that gave us a chance to stop. Flanker checked the map, Gab went in search of smokes and I found a Monsieur Felix and Mr. Norton cookie place - a gourmet cookie place only in Montreal that I've heard about for years. So I grabbed a dozen mix of chocolate chunk cookies and some water, found my way back to the car (with Flanker's help) and, after we all had a cookie break, we were off again.

We arrived at the hotel after 2:30 and took the scenic route around the parking garage before we found a spot, close to the elevator of course, and we made our way to the lobby. It wasn't long before I heard a familiar voice - IRC Goliath was hiding off in one of the seating areas close to the windows. Gab & I had our roomie, Flanker went off in search of his roomies as well. We checked in, got our keys and headed up to our room.

The room was certainly nice enough. Being a large person, I always check out the bed frame, which was less than sturdy. Gab suggested we remove it for the duration of our stay, so we disassembled the bed. They brought up our bags and Gab immediately went for his computer tower-to see if he could hook it up to the TV. Although it had A/V jacks, they were not accessible(we even had hotel techs check it out and there was nothing they could do). We also planned to have a few cold drinks in the room, but there was no fridge. We called down and they actually sent one up. We were all set-except for the tv. After we talked for a bit and looked at some of the DVD goodies IRC Goliath and Gab brought that we planned to watch, we headed beck downstairs in search of other early arrivals.

We found a few people, including A Fan. By this time we were all getting pretty hungry, and A Fan was looking for someone to venture out for food with, so we were instructed that there were places to eat down below the hotel(which strangely you have to walk through the hotel restaurant to get to(go figure). A lot of places were closed, but we finally settled on a strange little pub/eatery done up in a super hero motif - almost like you were walking onto the set of the old batman 60's TV series. So we all ordered and started to eat(although they got my order wrong...oh well). Gab wasn't feeling very well. He had been fighting a bout of strep throat for the last few weeks and was still feeling the fever from it-so he had his food packed up and we headed back to the hotel and headed back to our room for a bit.

IRC Goliath and myself headed back downstairs to see if we could find more arrivals - and maybe spot Greg, who had supposedly arrived. Discovering Greg and the Con staff had slipped out for dinner, we hung around checked out who had arrived. Chris Rogers was around, as was the Mysterious Lord Sloth(a fellow Canadian I wanted to finally meet). Abe Wintersmith also had made it and he sat down and chatted with IRC Goliath & myself for a bit. Maui, Arno and her crew from Toronto also rolled in (Maui is from Ottawa originally and I hadn't seen her in some time - this would be the first Garg Con I've been to with her attending. Little did I know the major part She and Abe would play in making it such a fun Con). We ran into Hudson and his group - and took some pictures. Gorebash, Vash & Hyperdawg arrived we chatted in the lobby for a bit-and took a few more pictures. We saw them up to their room. Not surprising the first thing Gore & Hpye did was unpack their electronics - You would almost think that it was sustenance and they required it, but hey, I'm much the same way, so I shouldn't talk. We talked for a little bit, then headed back to our room to check on Gab-who was dozing off with the TV on. Back down to the lobby we went to hang around for a little while longer-still hoping we'd catch Greg & the staff come back from dinner. It was creeping on 1 AM by the time IRC Goliath & I finally gave up and headed back up to our room for some much needed shut eye.
I must admit here that I said hello and got hugs from quite a few people - but my poor memory combined with my lousy eyesight prevents me from mentioning everyone - and I feel a bit bad about that. I appreciated everyone that came up and said hello to me.

Friday, August 6th:

I have this over conscious habit of not wanting to hold everyone up by me being slow, so despite setting the alarm, I got up an hour early so I could shower and clear out of the washroom so Gab & IRC Goliath could have free reign-and that would give me some lounge time to relax a bit before the long day ahead. Goliath was the first of us to head down to register, while Gab & I....gabbed. a bit longer and waited for him to return so we could see his schedule and get an idea what our day would be like. By the time we got moving it was almost lunchtime. Gab & I registered, and I ran in to Whitbourne & Stormy. I was thrilled they would both be able to make it. The Can Clan couple as I call them. They've been to visit me at my place in Ottawa many times over the years. Since they moved from Kingston to Halifax I don't see them as often.
After that, Gab, Goliath & I headed to McDonalds to grab a quick bite. Gab & I had plans to catch Flanker's weapons panel and Goliath wanted to check out the voice actor's panel. I was feeling I was missing something, since I wanted to hear Keith speak again. We only got a brief taste of him at Gathering 2001, and the thought of having him for the whole gathering was great. Not that I'd likely have the nerve to go up and talk to him, mind you. I'm shy as all get out.

I wasn't entirely sure what to expect for the understanding combat panel. Being visually impaired, using a gun is kinda out of my league, but I went just the same. I had promised Flanker - and was a little concerned about a low turnout. I need not have worried, the room was about 3/4 full and there were a lot of technical questions. Flanker put on a very good demonstration. He knew his stuff - despite an attempted upstaging by Hudson and a few other knowledgeable attendees. I've known Hudson was very knowledgeable about weapons for some time-so that wasn't a surprise. I can see him and Flanker working on a similar panel in Vegas next year. On the subject of Flanker-the man has some of the most amazing red eye! You'd swear he was a gargoyle the way his eyes glow in some of the pictures I took.

After the panel, Gab & I went in to the art room to check things out. There was a lot of amazing art and merchandise there. Gab picked 2 T shirts, and he found someone selling a Goliath Mug. My very first piece of Garg merchandise was the Lexington mug-and though I had found Broadway and Brooklyn, Goliath had eluded me. Whitbourne came over just at that moment and bought the mug for me. *blushes* He's amazing-and no amount of protesting from me was going to stop him. The artwork as always is simply breathtaking. We have so much talent in this fandom. That's another thing that Gargoyles has inspired - it's caused many people to explore their talents in writing and drawing - and we have one amazingly large pool of talent in both fields. I spied a few pieces of Kythera's work that I wanted(I think I would have bought out her binder of images-along with everyone else's if my wallet would have let me...*sigh* oh well.

It was time for the radio play auditions. Every year someone tries to get me to audition and every year I chicken out. Would I like to do it? sure! I've been involved in radio on a volunteer basis for close to 20 years, so it would seem natural. Trouble is, doing a radio show in a room by yourself with a microphone is a lot different than speaking in front of close to 200 people. Radio is a breeze compared to that. For that reason, and the fact that the script would have to be large print for me to even considering becoming involved-and with the hectic pace the con takes, it would be too much of a hassle getting one made up. So I just stayed on the sidelines and convinced Gabarus to take part(he's also has some radio experience-and a good voice). I knew IRC Goliath was going to audition-as were Whit & Stormy-Although Stormy wouldn't get to audition until Saturday morning. While all this was going on, I headed back up to our room for a bit to relax, check out some of the pics I took before opening ceremonies.
Gab made it back up to the room to unwind before opening Ceremonies as well. We talked for a bit, and after auditioning for the radio play, we realized he was also tied in with the Clan Olympics. He was just a little miffed, thinking he was committed to 2 things at once-and was certain that it was me who had hooked him into the Olympics in the first place. I was feeling bad-largely cause I wanted to see him in the radio play. Strange thing, I couldn't for the life of me remember ever having talked to him about the Olympics before. We finally figured out that it was indeed Flanker who had "recruited" Gab to team Canadian Body Massage. Ha! It wasn't me!

The Opening Ceremonies began. I was up at the front near the video screen(as always) with Gab on my right and Stormy & Whit on my left. It was fun watching and hearing Stormy's reaction to everything-as a Con Virgin and all, but I'm quite sure Whit filled her in on some of it. Still, you really need to be there. We had the intro for the Con staff and a taste of what Gathering 2005 was about. Then, before Greg got his chance to talk-the event was hijacked by Abe and Maui and the Clan Olympics! We were introduced to all the teams.

Team Canadian Body Massage:
- Flanker
- Whitbourne
- Stormy
- Gabarus
The 2005 Con Staff
- Chris Rogers
- Lanny Fields
- Erin Wheeler
- Mara Cordova

The Mexinadians
- Top Man
- Reusch
- David
- Nezumi

Arcadia International
- Robert Luca
- Arno
- Dubble
- Countess

The Dark Knights (Said "Ka-Nig-Its")
- Shade
- Enyo
- Adam
- White

The Green Dragons
- Kya White Sapphire
- Chameleongirl
- Karlyl
- Kyffin

The Defective Gargoyles
- Gix
- Airalana
- Syrth
- Wolffer

Clan Challanged: Part Duex
- Sarah the Great
- Chyna Rose
- Mike Cohen
- Amena

Then-the first event, which involved one member wearing a hole filled shirt while the rest of the team did a relay of sorts to bring plastic colored balls and stuff them in the shirt. Whitbourne was up there as the victim..er, person wearing the shirt-proudly waving his Acadian flag. It was a fun event(although I forget now where we placed in that). Gab apparently got bowled over-landing flat on his back during the event. He has back problems to begin with, and as long as I've known him(which is like 8 years now) he's forever having accidents that result in him landing on his back. Poor guy.

Greg finally got his chance to shine. We saw the original pitch of Gargoyles to disney(with a very young looking Greg on the video) for those who might not know, this video features a synopsis of the show idea, with several still drawings of the Characters. Being that Gargoyles was conceived as a comedy, several of the character designs on these cards reflect that original concept-namely the trio and especially Bronx. Then, the original test reel with some borrowed music from several other movies. The infamous "It's Better Than Barney" story -and the pitches for the unmade spin offs, "The New Olympians", "Dark Ages", and the lica reel of "Bad Guys" - which in itself is worth going to the Gathering to see! Then, something we fans have been waiting for...the announcement for the DVD release -along with an actual date-December 7th!. I Can't wait myself.

Once opening Ceremonies came to a close, Gab & I hooked up with Goliath, Gorebash, Vash and Hyperdawg and we ventured out for food. This was really my first look at Montreal on foot. I now that sounds strange, not only being Canadian, but also only 2 hours away from the city. I just never had a chance to go before. I was amazed how clean it is - and only someone like me could appreciate the extra bright crosswalk lights and the countdown timers so you know how long you have to cross. What also too me by surprise is how little business activity there was. Many store fronts were empty, and those that were occupied were closed. It took us a while to find a restaurant. We finally found a nice pasta place - which not only gave you a choice of pastas, but also your choice of about 20 different sauces-which they made fresh right there in front of you! We all made our choices, and sat down and talked about the gathering events thus far. It felt a lot like a bunch of old friends getting together. I know most of us chat online to one another, but it always amazes me how much the world has opened up as a result of the internet. The whole gargoyles fandom and the convention are a good example of that. It's a pretty wonderful thing. Myself having been quite a sheltered person most of my life - getting out like this is an amazing experience. Just a little frightening at times being in an unfamiliar place and not being able to find your way around without some help. I'm pretty used to knowing my domain and being able to navigate without looking. I must admit I do feel a little bad having to "lean" on people and have them watch out for me. So I'll say a big thanks to Gab, Goliath, Gore, Whit, Flanker and in past years, Dark Horse and Pogo. All of them stuck their necks out for me to make sure I had a good time. I'll tell ya guys, it's greatly appreciated.

Dinner was over. Gab Still wasn't feeling his best and he brought most of his dinner back to the hotel(that fridge we had sent up to the room got pretty full towards the end of the Con. We all headed back to the hotel and hung out for a bit. Then back up to our room Gab & I went. We watched TV for a bit. Goliath joined us a bit later - he needed the experience of seeing some of the Simpsons and South Park in French! Goliath then headed down to meet some other people before the Blue Mug A guest with Greg. I stayed with Gab for a bit longer-then headed to the Con suite to get us some seats for the Mug A Greg event. At that point there was still hope Keith David would make it for that, but we'd have to wait a bit longer.

I grabbed the last few seats for myself and Gab(who was going to come down later). Someone gave up a seat for me-which was appreciated. The room was soon packed-with little walking room, let alone breathing room. It's one event I think most of the 18+ con goers look forward to the most. I really think at times we talk about the Gargoyles as if they were real. I think that's a lot of the appeal of the show - the characters ARE so lifelike in how they were written and portrayed that it's easy for the fans to get lost in that. I know myself I would like them to be real. I think the human race could stand some competition at this stage of the game. We could stand to have some a "Living conscience" that would help to keep us in check.
It was a tame blue mug A guest compared to previous years. The absence of Thom Adcox and the excitement over the DVD likely helped to keep things at least PG for most of the event. I actually got the nerve to ask a question...ah, the coward that I am. Basically how Gargoyles would handle the subject of the "Birds & The Bees" - since the parental structure of the clan is different from that of humans. The hatchlings have many fathers and mothers(biological connections don't matter so much as the older clan members raises the younger).
It was 2am by the time Greg called it a night. It had been a busy day so we ventured back to the room and crawled into bed. The con was going by too fast already.

Saturday, August 7th:

Again I got up before the alarm, showered and got myself together before my sleepyhead room mates woke up and did the same. By the time we got ourselves together, it was almost time for the first events for the day, so skipping brekkie, Gab and I headed to the Clan Olympics trivia torture. Keep in mind that I wasn't officially on any team, but I knew Stormy was auditioning for the radio play, and that left Team Canadian body massage short a few members - so I offered to stand in. Thankfully, I wasn't selected to be the victim up at the front of the room having to be tortured. I even got one of the answers right! *faint*. It was a hoot, and I was busy running my camera to capture the "tortures" on film...Chocolate and blue cheese dressing? What were they thinking?!!

Lunchtime proved a bit of a challenge. Goliath, Gab & I hooked up again and went in search of a place to eat. Heading down to the tunnels under the hotel where the stores had been so busy the day before - here, at noon on a Saturday EVERYTHING was closed! I'd never heard of that before -so we followed the tunnels for a while and landed back up on the street. It was a good hour before we found somewhere to grab a bite. On our walk back - we stumbled on a building with multi colored windows. Something like that is great for me. A landmark even my eyes can pick up on-plus I love colors. So we grabbed a few pictures (I see by other peoples photo collections from the con that I wasn't the only one that noticed that building...I still don't know what was in it though.)

We didn't quite make it back in time for the Auction - something I don't like to miss, since I have a vast collection of Garg merchandise. I did notice that someone had brought one of the Gathering 99 double CD soundtracks that I had made(I ended up making over 90 copies of that-and gave em all away or they were auctioned off at the con). I still wonder if Greg ever got his copy(as usual, I never had the courage to go up to him and give it to him myself-but I'd be tricked into it this year...more on that later).

It was time for another round of Clan Olympics-but it was also time for the Radio play auditions, which took Gab, Stormy & Whitbourne away from Team Canadian Body Massage again - so in steps Wingless to stand in on the "Really Hard Pictionary". I think team captain Flanker began to appreciate having Mr.fill-in handy-and surprisingly I got one of the answers there too-woo for me! We wrapped up early and continued to play before the radio play opened up. I was surprised it was held In the Auditorium. The room was set up like a lecture hall, with raised tables with these silly pull out chairs-much to small for us large economy sized Con goers-so I planted myself on the stairs in the middle. I figured that would be a great spot to take pictures from. My Camera overall didn't like the lighting in that room, so it fought with me to take pictures. Once the radio play started and Greg introduced they would be doing an unedited script of "the Journey"-with some scenes that didn't make it to the actual show. He introduced the very large cast and things got underway. We have some very talented voices in the fandom. I was glad that everyone I knew that auditioned got at least some part in it. Then the Camera crew set up and started taping the radio play...right in front of me. That was a bit of a disappointment - but I know it was more important for them to get good shots of the event. Better them in front of me than me in front of them. It was an amazing radio play - always one of the highlights of the convention.

We all went our separate ways for a bit. Gab got invited up to Hudson's room, and IRC Goliath was also socializing. Gab & I had not gotten banquet passes, so we were trying to hook up with anyone that was going out to dinner. It seemed no one was or the plans fell through. I headed back up to the room to relax a bit and wait for Gab & Goliath to return. Goliath headed to the Banquet, and when Gab got back, we made arrangements(after trying to navigate a French phone book for a good half hour) to order some food in. Gab was feeling better thankfully and had a better appetite. We got done early, and I headed down to where the Masquerade was to start. It was then I found out that Keith David had finally arrived, so I peeked in to this bizarre room-lit in Orange mood lighting - very bizarre. I sat down at the back and listened to the last 20 minutes of Keith's Q&A. I don't think I was supposed to be there-not having paid for the banquet, but I'm glad I got to hear some of it just the same (notwithstanding the noise from the group caterwauling with the bad disco music next door to us.

Then the Masquerade and cosplay began. Some of the most amazing costumes I've ever seen for sure. Every year people seem to go further and further out to create the ultimate Gargoyles related costumes, and they do indeed improve every year. All of them were amazing. From the Gargoyles intro...with visual aids, to Korul and "the Gargoyle who's afraid of heights"-what an amazing costume! Flanker & Stormy were great in their Renaissance Hunter and Quarryman outfits. The Titania and Ophelia costumes were amazing as well. Jade Griffin in her Bellelisa dress-wow! My pic of her has to be the best one I took at the convention. Of course Becca Morgan was adorable as Bronx-ah to be young and able to walk on all fours again without killing your back. Got a great picture of Gab scratching her ear. It's a riot.

Things seemed to be winding down somewhat. I hung around taking pictures of the costumes madly while they got set up for the Karaoke. Then came the moment. I mentioned earlier the CD I made for Greg. To explain this better. A few years ago, someone found out Greg liked M&M's-so of course, the fans(which is short for fanatics, of course) don't miss little details like that, so last year everyone started hiding M&Ms in Greg's stuff-or put some in front of him when he wasn't looking. Well, to continue that fanatic vision. Last year, while on the subway to Coney Island in New York, those of us sitting near Greg picked up on him whistling or humming the Theme to the TV show-the Banana Splits (the "Tra la la song-one banana, two banana"). For the benefit of those who don't know what the Banana Splits was. It was a late 1960s kids show made by Hanna-Barbera.. It was a show hosted by these live action animals-basically people in amusement park type suits. Fleagle the Dog(the group leader), Bingo-a gorilla with lotsa teeth, Drooper, a rather clumsy Lion and Snorky, a shaggy gray elephant that doesn't talk-he honks! Basically these 4 animals live in a clubhouse which we got invited to each week. They'd show cartoons and a special adventure serial called "Danger Island" and also tell jokes, do prat falls & such. It was very colorful ans psychedelic. Well, the four animals were also musicians, and in the last segment of each show-there would be a little music video, with them romping around ala the Beatles or Monkees(this was still over 10 years before MTV folks). Anyway, marketing the way it is, there was a Banana Splits album released-with some pretty cool songs on it, along with a number of box top mail in EP singles you could get. Well, the DJ and 60s music collector that I am, took advantage of this little inside to Greg's mind set and made him a one of a kind CD soundtrack of these rare records. I had planned a little speech when I gave it to him-the whole 9 yards. Then the coward in me began to set in...I started to think-Greg isn't going to remember that happening on the subway. He's gonna bloody well think I'm out of my mind! So, though I had brought the CD down with me, I had, by that time, given up on the idea of giving it to him. Then Gabarus steps in. The take charge, fearless, in your face kinda person he is, went over to Greg and told him I had something for him, the Gab proceeded to drag me over to Greg(without me having a clue what he was up to-in order for me to give him the CD). I was in shock, and likely would have turned around and run given have the chance -but I stuttered through part of what I had planned to say and gave him the disc. I was very surprised and pleased that he seemed to like it. I imagine he didn't know they had actually put out records of the songs from the show. Just the same, I'm happy I got a chance to give it to him. Especially since learning later on that he had to leave the convention that night. I wouldn't have gotten another chance. Gorebash actually made me tell the story of the CD on video. God, I hope that never sees the light of day. I was still in shock from having actually given it to Greg! *faints*

Karaokee: I hadn't planned at all to stick around for that, but I'm awfully glad I did. Like I said earlier, we have some good voices in the fandom, and not just for the radio play. Catching Titania's "all that jazz" was pretty amazing, as was the parody of "Blame Canada"(very appropriate one to filk at a Montreal convention folks) - "Blame Gargoyles-we should form a full assault-it's Weisman's fault!" Then Keith David got into the act. What a voice! With his little ones in tow - he got up to sing-and beautifully too.

Not long after that - we headed back up to the room. Gab and I are a thirsty pair, and we were forever hunting for drink machines or somewhere to get something wet. I finally located a machine on our floor-and Gab had found one on the pool level too, so we loaded up and headed back to the room. Gab had made arrangements earlier in the day to borrow one of the projectors used for the opening ceremonies. Turns out that he ( Yggdrasil) was our next door neighbor in the hotel. Small fandom. So, Gab proceed to borrow this machine, hot-wire his computer to it(without the proper cables yet) and we were watching a few movies and futurama on the wall of our room till the wee hours of the morning. Yggdrasil needed his projector back early the next morning for his presentation(although I wasn't sure what it was about at the time).
Still feeling a bit damp & icky from the days events, I grabbed a quick shower and hopped into bed.

Sunday, August 8th:
Late to bed, late to rise. The convention winding down and I didn't want it to end-at least not yet. We were up too late to get anything to eat so we made a coffee in the room(Gab had Tea), and we all headed down to see what was going on. We all wanted to attend both Keith David Mug-A-Guests. It was only then I realized that Whitbourne and Yggdrasil had their biology panel at the same time. I waited around for the Mug a guest to start in the art room. When it proved to be delayed, I snuck over to the Biology panel. Much like the Blue Mug-A-Guest, here are all these people discussing cloning and the potential biological makeup of fictitious beings with Wings and tails. It was wonderful. Ah, the possibilities!

After the panel, Gab & I returned to the dealer room to find that the Keith Mug-A-Guest had yet to take place, and would be delayed longer-so we hadn't missed anything.

I only got to meet Keith briefly at the autograph signing in LA in 2001. He was on a tight schedule and didn't really have time to socialize. Wow! Did he make up for it this year. All eyes turned on him and applause sounded as he walked into the room. He went around to every table showing interest in what everyone was doing, The artwork, the Phoenix gate anthology, the T shirts - and everyone waiting to hear him talk. He warmly greeted all of us and shook our hands. That floored me. Maybe it's just me, but I don't see many people with that much charisma and class in the world today - taking time to talk to everyone that was there...even lil' ol' me!

His talk was amazing. One of the revelations that impressed me was when someone asked him "what haven't you done that you would like to do" and he said, "the Nat "King" Cole Story" - after his previous night singing-it just clicked! He'd be so perfect for that. People were interested in stories of the voice recording sessions for Gargoyles, the movies he'd been in and the people he's worked with.
After the Q&A, he stayed around to talked to people. Gab had talked to him briefly the previous evening about how to get into voice acting, and he had promised to talk to him the following day. He remembered Gab-who then dragged me over-Mr. Nervous knees that I am. Gab had told him about my involvement with music and radio. He said he was going to be in Ottawa with his family at one point and would consider dropping by my place to see my collection! I almost dropped dead on the spot.

The schedule was running a bit behind, so closing ceremonies had to begin. We all gathered in another room and ran through the awards ceremony. I was busy snapping pictures left & right the best I could, so the actual awards were a blur to me. I know Stormy and Kythera won several-as did many other artistic fingers. The presentation for Gathering 2005 by Chris Rogers. It sounds impressive. Vegas though? Large people and airlines don't usually like each other very much. At the moment I can't see myself going. That's not to say that I won't work on it. I certainly want to, If over I can get over the fear of traveling alone. I'm awful, I know.

Then the autograph signing with Keith. I had already gotten his autograph in 2001, and hadn't really brought anything to get signed. Stormy had returned my Ultimate Goliath figure during lunch break-since She & Whitbourne had to leave before 5pm. I got the idea of having him sign one of the Wings-which thankfully were detachable. I also brought the Goliath mug Whit had bought me. Gabarus was just ahead of me and we arranged to take each other's pictures with Keith. He was still charming and very open. When it was my turn, I went behind the table with im, and he put his arm around me and talked with me for a minute(keep in mind that I'm in utter shock at that moment). Thanks to Gab, I have a picture to prove it happened. Keith signed both the wing and the mug-and had never heard of the "Ultimate Goliath" figure before. Admittedly, it's not one of the better likenesses of Goliath, but hey, I had it there and Keith signed it.

Stormy came over and I congratulated her on her awards. She showed me close up her "gargoyles in drag" figures. Yes folks, she's a very unusual person-but I love her-and her fiencee Whitborune. They were off for their plane back to Halifax, so we exchanged our goodbye hugs and they were off. I snapped more pictures of people before they headed off as well.

Now, there was talk of a laser tag event being put together. I've never played, and being it's a very sight oriented activity-and was willing to go. Gabarus wasn't up to going and I wasn't about to leave him behind. I also figured IRC Goliath would be going for sure, and was very surprised that he didn't. I don't know for certain, but I think he might have stayed behind because I couldn't participate. Either way I was happy he didn't(and if that was the case, I luvs ya Seth).

As it turns out, our entire dinner crew from Friday night didn't end up going, so Gore, Vash Hyperdawg, Gab, IRC Goliath and myself headed back to the pasta place for another round. On the way they had some streets closed off since they were shooting a movie. They wouldn't allow cameras, but, after our meal, we came across a horse drawn bus type wagon(without the horse) so we couldn't resist getting a picture of the crew in front of it.
Once back at the hotel...everything was a blur. There were quite a few goodbyes and hugs from people departing. We headed back to the room for a bit, Goliath went up to the con suite to see what was going on, and ultimately got swallowed in the activities up there. Gab contemplated a swim but decided against it, so we just lounged for a bit. Once Goliath returned, we all called it a night.

Monday, August 9th

We had arranged for a late check out(1pm) so we could catch up on some sleep, pack and grab a bite before we had to check out. Things don't always work out the way we plan them. We got showered, packed, and by the time we got down to get something to eat, it was 12:30! We had to grab a really quick bite-thankfully the tunnel mall under the hotel was open. We ran back to our rooms, ate, grabbed our luggage and headed down to check out. There were still "gatherers" lingering about. We dropped our luggage, and there was a cab waiting. Goliath had to catch his flight in a few hours. After a long hug, we saw him off.

I went to sit down with our luggage while Gab went out for a smoke. Keith David was still there, making the rounds in the lobby. He came over and, shook my hand and said goodbye, again saying that he'd try to come by when he was in Ottawa. He never did make it, but the offer alone-Wow!
We found a few more lurkers at the hotel - Hudson, Kythera and bunch of next year's Con staff talking about 2005 in Vegas. Gab and I were awaiting Flanker-who had ventured to old Montreal for a cyber café to check his email. Keith David came by again-this time with his Kids to say goodbye, and there Gabarus snapped my last Gathering photo. An amazing Gathering it was.

Flanker returned, we loaded up his car and headed off back to Ottawa. An uneventful trip home I must point out, considering my previous 3 disaster trips return trips from the gathering. At least I wasn't going to get stuck on a runway in a fierce thunder and wind storm, or miss my flight an be stuck at LAX for 9 hours-hoping for a seat on an overbooked flight, or get stranded in the small town or Kenville, New Jersey when our car broke down(all true stories folks). We dropped Gabarus off first, and then myself...Glad to be home, and yet wishing I was still in Montreal with everyone.

How about this-we start our own commune - The Gathering of the Gargoyles commune where we'll all live, work and have fun together all year around(or at least for the summer months).

My only regrets? I didn't get to see more of Montreal-and show some of my American friends that Canada does have life to it. That I didn't get to socialize a bit more with everyone. There's so many people I chat with online and would like a better chance to get to know them better-as well as hang out more with those I do know. That I didn't get one of Arno's "Evil makes me Sad" shirts. We need to mass market those Maui.

Lets hope I make it to Vegas next year.

and here's a link to my gathering photos. As I write this(August 29th) I still have at least another 100 to post - so keep looking back in.
http://www.thecanclan.com/gathering04

Thanks everyone for making it such a great time.

Dave "Wingless" Sampson

TopMan writes...

Top Man's Super-fantastical Super-long Con-virgirnal (Vir-journal

Disclaimer: Many of the people mentionned in this were also ConVirgins and n00bs, so chances are you've never heard of them/me and barely remember them/me from the convention, if at all. Hopefully, this will help you get more acquainted with us ^^

Someday the Nth of Whenever

I was browsing the web, and *somehow* came across the Gathering Of The Gargoyles 2004 website. I looked at it and thought "Jeez, what weird kinds of people would go to this?" Then I read the page, and thought "Jeez, I would go to this!!"

A couple of days after Someday the Nth of Whenever:

I talked to Reusch about it, thinking she'd laugh in my face. Instead, she said "awesome!" Everything was set ^^

Friday, August 6th:

Well, the day started off with Reusch and I getting a lift over to the hotel from my dad. The convention wasn't due to start for a little while, which we planned on purpose so we could wake ourselves up with a Tim Hortons french vanilla. We ended up eating brunch there, and it was very nice, except at the very end, when we were sitting outside with our coffees, much to my disgust and Carolynn's delight I was pooped on by a bird -_-. Not the proudest moment in my life. Luckily it was just my hand, so I washed it off easily, and we decided to head over to the hotel and scope out the inside.

In doing so we found out that Registration table was already open, so, feeling VERY antisocial, we sort of tiptoed up to the counter and waited until someone approached us, then we half-whispered our names and sat down at an empty table feeling foolish and admiring the packages. Suddenly, I get Abe from the table going "Heeeey, Topman!" and Sarah The Great is asking us if we want to join the Clan Olympics. I had already been considering it, as it sounded fun, and Abe was there to encourage me, and Reusch was all up for it, so I was close to saying yes. The only problem was we had only two people. So I asked her to put a question mark down next to our names. About 5 minutes later I figured "Ah, what the hell" and signed us up. She said there were two others needing a team and asked if we didn't mind pairing up with them, which of course we didn't. This was the make-or-break moment where half the convention could end up being spent with complete and utter weirdos.

And fortunately for us, we did! Nezumi and David were great fun from the get-go, and we hung out together the entire convention, but more on that later, because Abe ruined our good mood by making us think up a name. After five minutes of weird conversation, we decided on "The Mexanadians" (despite the fact that Nez was from Texas, not Mexico, and Texanadians would have been just as easy, for some reason we stuck with that.) We were so proud of our bizarre name, that we were grinning right up until the moment Abe said "Okay, so now we need your team motto." And we all went: "MOTTO!? *GROAN*" So, we decided that a hearty groaning sound would be a good motto for us. Unfortunately, for the moment we were going to have to leave our new teammates, as Con Virgin 101 (which Reusch and I felt we definitely needed to attend) was starting, while Nez and David decided to attend something else, which escapes me at the moment.

Con Virgin 101 was a blast. We arrived 15 minutes late due to our meeting with Nez and David, and apparently we weren't the first to interrupt Sapphire's panel, but since there were so few of us she just ended up starting over from the beginning. She talked about how everyone's insane (which is true), and then showed off her impressive art and french skills with a hilarious little scribbling. ("Bonjour, je m'appelle Velociraptor" XD) Of course, there can't really be ALL that much to talk about for introducing new people to cons, so after about 15 minutes, she realized that we had a whole spare hour. So all hell broke loose (that is to say as much hell as can break loose with about 7 people) and we started drawing on the board and chatting. We met ChameleonGirl there too, who is a great and funny gal, and there was a couple which I believe were French Canadian, and unfortunately I never caught their names, but they were nice and friendly. I felt a bit bad about having made little comments throughout Sapphire's presentation, because she seemed a bit miffed by all the interruptions, but I hope she realized I did it because I had warmed up to her and the room, and wanted to join into the discussions, maybe not in the most appropriate of ways. If you're reading this, I hope I didn't offend you in any way =S

Next up was the voice acting seminar, where Reusch and I got to see Greg Weisman in person for the first time. We learned here that Keith David wasn't going to make it, which was a little disappointing because I had been hoping to hear him spout a number of Goliath lines during this panel, but I soon got over it. Greg was a great speaker, and had a lot of information to give out, and I thought it was a very interesting panel considering, as a child actor, albeit not a very famous one, I had done (small amounts of) voice acting in the past and wanted to see what he had to say. At the end he was having people read the skits and coaching them, and Reusch SOMEHOW managed to convince me to join in for the last skit, provided she did too. I ended up getting Brooklyn, and Reusch, this time to MY delight, got Hudson (which was funny, as we are both avidly averse to Hudson's character). It was fun, although I'm almost positive I read WAY too fast, and then felt confused because Greg didn't mention anything to me (it either wasn't as bad as I thought, he didn't notice, or I was a hopeless case). Sidenote, whoever did the first Demona reading (I believe it was CrzyDemona?) and the Griff reader (Michael?) were AMAZING!!!

Unfortunately, we found out the Radio Play Auditions weren't available for viewing, so it was either the Costuming Seminar or the RPG panel. Reusch didn't want to touch the Costuming Seminar (we had just spent two solid weeks working on my Thailog costume, which was a beast to make) so we went to the RPG panel. Unfortunately, we had only dabbled in RPGs (read: RPG, as in one) so we didn't understand the panel at all, and decided we should probably leave before we went nuts in the room trying to pretend that we knew what we were talking about.

We went up to the con room and watched a couple of episodes, I seem to remember Kingdom and Hound Of Ulster. At some point we ended up finding Nez and Dave and decided that during this extended break we should find some food somewhere so that we wouldn't start stomach-rumbling during the opening ceremonies. We went to the McDonalds that was found, by whom I don't know, by going through the hotel restaurant into a bank/business building, then down the escalator into an underground mall. The service there was TERRIBLE. First off, the girl at the counter AND the guy in the back CONSTANTLY disregarded the beeping of the fry machine, so they burnt the fries TWICE. Reusch's salad took at LEAST 15 minutes to make, and they ended up giving her the wrong kind of chicken, despite the counter-girl asking twice. They neglected to give her a fork or salad dressing. She later found out that the chicken wasn't cut properly, so she returned to the counter, asked for a knife, was given a fork. David, meanwhile, was waiting for a double big mac, and they ended up accidentally making a single big mac, and then didn't notice until he was waiting for the food for five minutes. So he got to wait even longer. They gave us a complimentary hamburger, which I ate, but it wasn't all that good, and definitely didn't make up for the awful service.

We all headed back to the Opening Ceremonies, which were a blast. The staff presented themselves, and then during Liz's speech, Abe and MAui surprised us all by "taking over". They announced the teams, and then shocked us by saying that the first event would be NOW. Good thing we'd eaten =) Reusch and I had to grab the balls from the bin, and then pass them over the line to Nez, who stuffed them into David's hole-filled shirt. While Reusch grabbed balls from the bin, I took the strategy of picking up any and all balls that were dropped by others onto the floor. It must have worked moderately well, because we were in third place by the end. After all the excitement died down (I felt bad for Liz... the beginning of her speech was cut short, and then we were all still catching our breath for the end) Greg presented the DVD info (w00t for December 7th) told his amusing stories (I was shocked when EVERYONE around me shouted out "It's Better Than Barney", but I'll be prepared to join in next time ^_~), played a tape with a bunch of people who worked on Gargoyles (Keith David was hilarious, and Ed Asner was funny too, but he also said some very deep, nostalgic stuff about his being on the show and wanting to come to a Gathering that kind of made me sad, the way only nostalgia can), and then played all of his videos, which for some must be a bit boring now, but for me was quite interesting, as this was the first time I was seeing them. He then played an audio tape of The Last, the not-so-long lost Atlantis episode, which far too many of us took far too dirtily, but for good reasons!

After Opening Ceremonies came Mystery Gargoyles Theatre, which Reusch and I didn't quite understand at first, but then we figured out it was just people making jokes about the show as it's playing, which is what we do anyways. We also met some new friends there, Annie and Catherine, who, while we didn't see them much aside from the banquet, were really cool people and great fun to talk to. Jade Griffin also came off as being really cool, but I never really had a conversation with her until Sunday, which is a bit of a shame.

After an hour or so of heckling, the Clan Olympics people were kicked out of the room so we couldn't see what was being set up. It ended up being some kooky toss-the-ball game, with some very inventive twists, such as the Spirits and the flip-over rule, and the tic-tac-toe. I suck at tossing balls, and although two of my three shots came EXTREMELY close (one actually bounced off the middle of the chair that the target was sitting on, but never actually hit the target) but none succeeded, which made me feel a bit useless. We almost got a tic-tac-toe, which would have scored us some bonus points, but we didn't end up doing so. If only I had gone last instead of second, I MIGHT have been able to at least accomplish that... nonetheless, Reusch, David and Nez had enough skill to pull us into 2nd place! Congrats to them.

Saturday, Sunday and Monday hopefully coming before Tuesday ^^

bummed writes...

My Gathering Journal -
I couldn't go! I wept at least once an hour. Could someone schedule a Gathering in early June someplace nice? I probably can't go to the 2005 one either. (bawls eyes out) :(