It's another month and that means another BtVS con report from yours truly...but this one will be slightly different from most of my others. Why? Because I saw it entirely from a volunteer's view. And boy, do I have a whole new respect for con organizers now!

Wednesday, June 2nd:
Drove to the Philly airport to pick up Eurydice. I was sitting near baggage claim waiting for her plane to arrive when I saw this rather tall woman get off the elevator pushing a baby stroller. Her hair was pulled back and she was wearing a ball cap and I kept thinking how familiar she looked. That's when it hit me...it was Julie Caitlin Brown. Her husband, Craig, followed shortly after her with all of their carry-on luggage which looked like it included all of his camera equipment. My first con-guest sighting of the week. That was odd. The last thing I thought I'd be doing while waiting for Eury was running into Julie.

Shortly after my JCB sighting, Eury's plane arrived and we gathered her luggage and headed back to Château Brat. After getting SoccerRef motivated - all we had to do was say food - we went to dinner where we enjoyed nummy steak and good pickles. The reason I mention pickles is because apparently you can't get a good dill pickle in England and Eury was dying for one. So pickles she had. After dinner we went back to the house, hung out and talked until 3 Am about the show, fanfic and various other things.

Thursday, June 3rd:
Both Eury and I woke up at the ungodly (hehehe) hour of 8:30 so that we could do some running around before we went to the airport to pick up Irishrose. Trips to the liquor store, food store and gas station were all highly important things that had to be done! Once we finished with our shopping, we got lunch and went back to the house to finish packing. Around 1:30, after shoving as much of the food and liquor into my trunk as we could, we hopped into the car to drive to the Philly airport. Irish's plane was due in around 3:30 so Eury and I sat in a little bar and had appetizers while we waited. Yum. Earlier, we had decided to make a sign for Irish to let her know who we were, since hey, we'd never met face to face before, but we forgot to print one off in all our rushing around. Instead, Eury gave me her notebook and I drew a nice little sign in bubble letters. It was a work of art! It was a good thing we decided to hold up a sign because the way Irish described herself, there were like 8 people who came through who fit the same description. But all turned out well and we found her after her plane sat on the tarmac forever - they had problems with their loading tunnel.

Once we gathered all of Irish's luggage, we drove up to Split Rock Resort in Lake Harmony where Moonlight Rising 2004 was being held. By the time we got up there it was almost 6. First we checked in and then we ran down to the dealer room to register. We just made it. The ever lovely Teep took our information and got our badges and tickets for us. Once we were all signed in, we wandered around the dealer room and then the hotel before getting into the car to find our villa. The villas were separate from the main hotel and luckily enough, the grouping we stayed in was right across the street and to the left. Not a far walk at all. After attending last year's MR, I was a little hesitant about what type of accommodations we'd be staying in this year (especially after we had to pay a 25 cent toll to get back the road to the resort) so I was pleasantly surprised when we opened the door to find not only a gorgeous place, but a huge one as well. It was two bathrooms, two and a half baths with a full kitchen, living room/dining room with a fire place and a deck. Both the upstairs and downstairs had decks and the one bathroom downstairs had a jacuzzi and sauna. JACKPOT! It was amazing! The first thing we did, after squeeing at the loveliness of it all, was sort out the sleeping arrangements and unpack. Eury and Irish were already upstairs when I finished, so we sat around talking about what panels and Q&A's we were going to attend. That's when we realized we were all a bit hungry. Not knowing if the place had room service or not, I called the front desk and found out that they had a pizza shop right on the premises. It was located at another section of the resort called the Lodge. This resort was massive! It had an ice cream parlor, several coffee shops, several indoor pools, a movie theater...and the list goes on and on. Quite impressive and a place that I would stay if I were vacationing in the Poconos.

After dinner, we sat around and talked about the fandom, what we were going to see, fanfic, the guests, you name it - we talked about it. I'm not sure, but I think it was around midnight or 1 Am that we decided we should get a good night's sleep since we wouldn't be sleeping much the rest of the weekend. Excellent idea except that the beds were rock hard and made sleeping almost damn near impossible. That's my only complaint about the accommodations.

Friday, June 4th:
Both Eury and Irish left early in the morning for a volunteer meeting and I slept in as best I could. Once realizing that I could no longer sleep, I got up and started getting ready for my picture with the Troika. Eury and I both had a photo ticket for the guys so we walked back to the Galleria to get in line. One of the nice things about how they did the photo ops was that they sat you down and you got to watch everyone in front of you get theirs done. It was really cool to watch the guys interact with the fans. Adam Busch recognized several faces from Common Rotation concerts and greeted everyone warmly with a hug or a smile. Same with Danny Strong and Tom Lenk. I am totally in love with Tom Lenk now. He's just too cute for words!!! When it was finally my turn, I got to stand next to Adam and Danny while Tom stood on Danny's other side. They were all very gracious and said hello to me when I was introduced by the volunteer. I so love the Troika.

I thanked them as I left and then waited outside the door for Eury to get her pics with Tom and Adam. A couple of the Split Rock employees were also standing outside the door watching what was going on and talking about the guys. It turns out that they were both huge Buffy fans and when they heard about the con coming to Split Rock, they volunteered to work the weekend so that they could see the guests. The one girl was so enamored with Tom Lenk that she was all giggly and bubbly about it - it was very cute and fangirly and made me laugh...in a good way.

Once Eury finished with her photo shoot, we went back to the dealer room where I proceeded to buy an amethyst necklace that was handmade by the woman behind the table. It's gorgeous!!! I couldn't help myself. I also bought a couple of Celtic toe rings as well. I also received a "gift with purchase" when I spent over $50. This gift? ASH and Nick Brendon's Q&A from Cleveland. WOOOHOOO!! Very nice. After I finished spending money, we walked over to registration to see how things were going. This was my first mistake. I got sucked in. Somehow I found myself behind the counter helping to make sure that the photo shoot labels for Iyari Limon, James Leary and Stephanie Romonov were in order. We were almost finished when Aria told us that Craig was looking for that stuff ASAP. So I grabbed the stuff in a panic and ran down the hall to the room where Craig was waiting with soulmate815, thefangirl and James Leary. There weren't many volunteers there with them so I offered to stay and help Soulmate with the check-in process. I'm glad I did because I got to see just how crazy things can get while you're doing something like this. I do have to say this though, I'm sorry if some of you felt as if things didn't run as smoothly as they could have, but believe me when I say, we absolutely tried our best to get you into the room, checked-in and seated so that everyone could enjoy their photo sessions as much as possible.

When the photo shoot was over, we went back to the dealer room where I signed up at the charity auction table to help thefangirl with the St. Jude's auction on Saturday. After that is when I returned to the registration desk and Teep asked me to stuff bags because she had been there all day and wanted to take a break to get Support Spike postcards out. That's when I ran into Alane from BAPS. It was good to see Alane again and we chatted for a bit before she and Teep went off with their postcards. As Irish and I were stuffing bags, Bitten (Lynn from More Than Spike board) asked me to take over for her at registration. So for the next hour or so I registered people and answered questions as best I could for someone who had just been pulled in. Again, I'm sorry if people were unhappy with the registration lines, but I know we tried to do what we could and if some of the volunteers came off as rude, I'm sure that most didn't mean it...there weren't enough volunteers to do the grunge work and those that were there we overworked and slept very little. I'm not saying it's an excuse, I'm just explaining where a lot of them were coming from.

As a result of working registration, I missed Iyari's Q&A, but I did manage to catch some of Leary's though after I got my volunteer picture and badge done. This is where things really start to get blurry for me. I remember following Eury upstairs to attend a general fanfic panel - she was hosting along with a few others. I figured it would be interesting to hear what other writers had to say since I wasn't going to be attending Writer Con. When we arrived, Eury was the only one from the panel who showed for the longest time. At one point she said that if no one else showed up, she was pulling me up front to talk. Eventually though, LornesLadyLove arrived and that made two...that's when they heard that Spikealicious was sick and might not make it. So up I went to the front of the room to talk fanfic. At first I was a bit nervous because I don't see myself or my fic as something worth hearing about, but after a few questions I settled in and really enjoyed myself. The thing is, before I went upstairs to the panel, I had to go to the ladies room but couldn't find one on the third floor around the meeting room. I figured I'd be fine and be able to wait the hour the panel would take. Mistake. I had to dash out a few minutes before the panel ended and I felt really badly about it. So for those of you who attended the fanfic panel, I'm sorry I left so abruptly, but nature was calling me in a very big way.

After I finally found a bathroom (on the second floor), I went down to the ballroom to see the opening ceremonies. I thought it was going to be something neat to watch because I knew that some of the guests would be in attendance. Pfffft. When I found my seat (after searching and searching because the rows snaked instead of going in numeric order), I was dismayed that the concert equipment was in the way of the wall where they were going to show the video. Not only was it difficult to see the video, but the ballroom was not the greatest for acoustics. The sound reverberated off the walls and made it hard to understand what was being said.

The video they showed was the Q&A's from last year's MR which was all nice, well and good, but for crying out loud, it would have been nice to have been addressed by the con organizer instead of just hearing her stumble over herself and then say something like, "uh, let's have fun." How articulate. The whole thing only lasted a few minutes and as soon as it was over, I bolted out of there because I had to go pick up ty2lobo at Scranton airport.

When I got to the Scranton airport, ty2lobo was already waiting outside for me to pick her up. Of course there were hugs and lots of excitement despite the fact that we had just seen each other in January...but that felt like a lifetime ago! So on the drive back to Split Rock, we caught up on things and talked about what was going on, who was at the con, what stuff we were going to do and how much we were looking forward to seeing the guests. That's when I let her know that Andy Hallett was not going to be there due to his health. She was supposed to have a pic with him, but instead turned it in to have one done with the Troika on Saturday.

We arrived at the villa just as Eury and Irish were about to make their way to the cocktail party (which I thought was way too expensive for what they received). Introductions were made, but first I had to get off the phone with rockgoddes who wasn't there at the con, but was with us in spirit. Once everyone knew who everyone was, the girls left for their party and Jennette and I settled into the villa to unpack and hang out until the improv which was scheduled at 9.

As we meandered through the hotel towards the place where the improv was to be held, we ran into Aria who told us that the improv was being moved elsewhere due to acoustic and set up problems, so we backtracked to the new room. Once we walked in and I let those who were there practicing know that the event had been moved to the room, we realized that there was no way we were going to be able to fit everyone in there...especially since Leary announced that he would be heading it up. We immediately went into planning and panic mode...tables were moved up against the walls and the chairs were set up in the middle in rows. However, by far, there weren't enough chairs so I went to hunt down Aria to let her know that 1. the room was way too small, 2. there weren't enough chairs and 3. it was way too hot in the room. When I found her and told her what was going on, she told me that it was the only room available, no more chairs were going to be brought in and that the air conditioning was not going to be turned up. Great. Goody for me that I was the one that was going to have to make the announcement to a room full of cranky people. Yeah, needless to say, didn't go over too well.

The improv itself was funny. Leary was a hoot as always and added great comic relief to an otherwise bad situation. However, we left after Leary did because it was just too damn stuffy in the room and Eury wasn't feeling well. It was nice to get into the hall where it was less crowded and fresh air was available. We then attended James Leary's Stunt C*cks which probably would have been much funnier if we could have actually understood what was being said, plus there was the whole no one seemed to know how to work a DVD player thing going on too. After a while the four of us decided to head back to the villa where sat around talking until after midnight or so.

Saturday, June 5th:
Eury and I woke up rather early so that we could get over to the Galleria to do the charity auction. However, when we got there, we found out that it had been moved to 10:30 instead. Not a problem, but it would have been nice to know that ahead of time so that we could sleep in. When we found thefangirl, she explained that she had gotten about 1 hour of sleep and that we all should have been contacted about the change in schedule. It really wasn't a problem because Eury and I found other things to do...like look for season 5 promo pics of Alexis Denisof. A room full of vendors and dealers and I found ONE AtS season 5 pic. Just one. Of course I bought it. *g* Oh, and I think that's when we bought our Action!Spikes too. It was such a good deal on the blue shirt and green shirt figures that we just couldn't pass them up.

After our purchases we headed to the ballroom to be runners for the auction. Now what's a runner? They're the people who run around the room taking down the information of those who won the items. At first it was slow on my side and then all of a sudden it really picked up. I was quite impressed with the emcee, Paul, and Leary for getting the bids to go higher. In fact, towards the end, there was a pic of Clem and Spike, signed by both Leary and Marsters that went for quite a pretty penny...but that was only AFTER Paul decided to throw in Leary's bum, kisses from Leary, and face lickings by Leary as an incentive to bid. And bid they did! Though Leary's bum didn't bring in quite the same amount as ASH's did last year, it was still a lot of fun to watch. Two women both thought they had won and Leary was gracious enough to take on both. So for a total of $800, each woman got to grope Leary's bum for 10 seconds, as well as get kisses and licks. It was all in good fun and it was all for the children!

Once the auction was over, Eury and I helped drinkthepoison sort out the things that the guys hadn't had a chance to put up for bid so that it could be put out for the silent auction instead. We missed Stephanie's Q&A as a result, but since I saw her in March and I'll be seeing her again at Toronto Trek in July, I wasn't all that upset about it. After Stephanie was the Buffy panel which included Iryai Limon, James Leary, Tom Lenk, Adam Busch and Danny Strong. At the beginning I was sitting next to pluckygirl, but then moved to the floor when her friend came back from volunteering. It was a great vantage point to see everything, plus the sound was much better up front...I could understand everything they were saying. It was fun to watch them interact with each other and they played well off one another. Leary, however, was the funniest of them all (not surprising since he's such a ham) with Tom Lenk and Danny Strong coming in a close second. And Tom definitely wasn't as shy as he was last year at Chicago. Maybe he's getting used to doing these appearances. YAY!

After the Q&A's were autographs for the first 400 tickets. Eury and I chatted while we waited for our turn to see Danny, Tom, Adam, Iyari, Stephanie and Leary. I had bought a picture of the Troika in the dealer room for them to sign and as I went to each one they were very sweet and thanked me for coming. Even at their autograph tables they kept up the comedy shtick which was very entertaining and helped to pass the time. Once I got through the guests, stopping at Leary's to get him to sign my Clem pic and saying hi, I started to pass Julie's table. She had a table next to Leary's where she was signing autographs and selling her CDs. She had given a concert on Friday night, but I didn't attend since I was picking up Jennette at the airport and such. So I stopped to check things out and to say hi to soulmate815 who was PA'ing her. That's when I asked about the new CD Julie was selling. It's called "Love First" and it's a self-help seminar. She told me that she was going to be giving the seminar in the morning and if I was interested I should stop by. I was intrigued so I asked if she needed any help since Soulmate would be getting her JM picture during the time of the seminar. Julie asked if I would be getting a JM pic as well and I was like..."pffft, nah. Didn't order one of those." Don't get me wrong, I love JM, but I have several pics with him and they were free so I wasn't about to spend the $50 for a professional one. So that's how I became Julie's PA for Sunday morning, but more on that later.

Now that we had our autographs, there was only a short period of time before the concerts started, so the four of us high tailed it back to the villa to change and freshen up. Did I mention it rained? Yeah and it was chilly too. I have to apologize to Jennette for giving her a hard time about being from California and thinking everything below 50 degrees was cold because let me tell you, it was damn chilly and damp up in them there hills of Pennsylvania. Also, before the concerts, Eury and I were signed up to help cash out the silent auction. When we reached the auction table, we found out that they had ended the auction early and that we weren't really needed so we went back to the villa and that's when we found out that President Reagan had died. We watched some of the reports for a while. At 7:30 we made our way to back to the Galleria to see Common Rotation and Ghost of the Robot. As many of you know, I'm a huge CoRo fan so getting to see them again was a real treat. The only thing that I had a problem with was a comment that Adam made right before they started singing - it was about Reagan being dead. Personally, I thought it was in poor taste, but many in the audience who were unaware of the news thought it was a joke. Despite that, the guys totally ROCKED!! Yeah, there were problems with the equipment, but the guys played through it and were absolutely spectacular. This group could do a concert totally unplugged and still be impressive. Being one of the people that was standing up by the stage, I didn't have as many problems as those elsewhere in the audience because the sound wasn't reverberating off the walls making it impossible to understand anything they sang. Oh, and I also know all the words to the songs, so I'm sure that helped too.

When CoRo finished their set, I figured an announcement would be made that we had to return to our seats. In fact, I expected it. However, no such announcement came until 10 minutes before GotR was to go on. In the meantime, people were pushing and shoving and I felt like I was in a mosh pit. People...say it with me now...there was no band on the stage so there should have been NO reason for the shoving. Finally, Leary came out and said that we all needed to return to our seats before GotR would come out. Fine. Most people complied, but quite a few didn't and then when Aria came out and asked to see those that she had talked to earlier, tempers really started to flare. Instead of explaining that the first three rows up by the stage were for security purposes, she just said that the first three rows were hers and everyone else had to sit in their seats. This pissed off a lot of people and I can't say that I blame them one bit. We were all told that seating for the concerts would be by badge number and in the end, those who paid less had better views than those who had paid more. If a security team had just been posted in front, along with a cordoned off area, I think a lot of those problems could have been avoided. But I suppose hind sight is 20/20 and all that.

Anyway, GotR finally came out and people once again rushed the stage. Soulmate and I stood in front of our seats in the front row and had a hard time seeing anything through all the teeny-boppers and those screaming and waving at JM. At one point I turned to Soulmate and asked if it was just me or was I getting too old for this sort of thing. It also didn't help that the band was throwing glow sticks and necklaces into the audience, making people push and shove just to get a precious item touched by one of the guys. And then to top things off, the band and JM, by their own admission, was drunk and sounded awful - acoustics aside. I was disappointed to say the least, especially after seeing them in Berlin and London last month and how incredible they were there. That being said, I'm not going to speculate as to why this happened or why JM acted as he did. The man is in obvious pain about something and this is his way of acting out. Once I got tired of the shrieking in my ear, I found Eury and then the two of us found Jennette. We quickly decided after about the third or fourth song that the guys just weren't on and really weren't worth seeing. The three of us went back to the villa to get ready for a our gathering. I can't remember who all showed up after the gigs, but we had a great time with lots of food, booze and fun that lasted into the wee hours of the morning.

Sunday, June 6th:
What a crazy day. ty2lobo and I went to bed at 4:30 AM after vacuuming silly string up from the floor. It all came up as I knew it would and when it was sprayed it was all in good fun - and very funny. I think I got a total of 3 hours of sleep because I had to be back at the Galleria at 9:30 for a volunteers meeting. Spiceywings from Marsters Mobsters board was in charge of the volunteers and she's a lovely lady. She gave us our assignments and after about half an hour or so we went about getting ready for the day. Eurydice and I walked around selling raffle and 50/50 tickets while waiting for our other assignments to start so we missed Stephanie Romonov's Q&A.

Around 11'ish, I think Irish, Eury, and ty2lobo went off to get their JM photos done while I helped JCB with her seminar. I was very impressed with the seminar and with Julie herself. The message of "love yourself first so that you can love others" was wonderful and inspiring and makes a hell of a lot of sense. The thing that impressed me the most about her was her intuitiveness as she talked to several people who came up afterwards to buy her CD. I was amazed at how accurate she was with her assessments. No matter what people say about her, she's an incredible person and I'm so glad I got to work with her. Once the line ended for autographs, she then began explaining how she wanted the autograph lines to go. My first thought was, why are you telling me this? I'm just a peon. However, I quickly got over my "don't tell me" attitude and fell into line to help set things up. It was cool to see her in work mode and the one thing you can't really fault her for is the fact that she knows what she wants and how she wants it done.

After everything was set up to her liking, I went to find the girls, who by this point, were all on highs after getting their pics with JM. Apparently he was in a really good mood and vamping it up with each person in turn. I'm sure it was a lot of fun to watch. Shortly thereafter, an announcement was made that the Trio's Q&A was going to run a bit late because of the photo sessions running over. This gave me a bit of time to grab something to eat since I hadn't eaten anything yet. Mmmm...glorious food. Little did I know that it would be the last thing I'd have until much later in the day when Jennette took pity on me and got me french fries.

We did attend the Trio Q&A, but we sat in the back of the room and couldn't really make out anything that was being said. It all sort of got lost in the cavernous room, but the people up front laughed at appropriate times so I guess they were their charming and delightful selves. Once they were done, it was time for the man himself, James Marsters. At this point I made my way to my seat so that I could actually hear what was being said. I have to thank the wonderful dzinkabird (aka DeepBlue) for her generosity...she knows why. :) Anyway, JM came out on stage and was his usual hyper self. He began answering questions from both sides of the audience which was a lot better than just having him face one side as he always seems to do. Eventually Spiceywings came up to the microphone to let him know that she had a bag of 800 lollipops for something that I can't remember so she handed it to him. Little did she know that Mr. Marsters would soon be throwing those lollies into the audience or taking requests for sucked on pops as well. I was not impressed with those antics at all. Call me a prude, but a lollipop sucked on my James Marsters is not something that is overly important for me to have or see. Gah. The man needs to learn not to indulge the little fan girlies' fantasies. And he wonders why he gets stalked.

If you're looking for a transcript of JM's Q&A, this isn't the place because I didn't stay for the whole thing. But you can find a wonderfully done transcript over at BAPS, done by Laurie and Alane. It's no secret that I'm a Republican, nor that JM and I don't see eye to eye on political views, but I've only ever had one problem with him before this...during his audience in London. However, that being said, it didn't make me want to get up out of my seat and leave his Q&A...unlike the remarks he made about President Bush. I'm big on politics, but I'm bigger on respect for your fellow person. It's his right to speak his opinion, it's part of the first amendment of our Constitution and I will fight to the death for his right to express himself, but sometimes there are lines that should not be crossed and in my opinion, JM crossed them. I'm sure many of you already know what was said, but for those who don't, I'll repeat it here and then I will not speak of it again - it still makes me angry.

James Marsters when asked his feelings on President Bush: "George Bush should have his hands cut off and be left to bleed in the middle of the Iraqi desert, only to be rescued by the Iraqi people."

That's too violent an image for me and no matter what your thoughts are on the current President...I'll be the first to admit I heavily dislike Clinton and bitched about him a lot while he was in office, but never once did I wish bodily harm on him. Not once. I respect the Office of the President far too much to spout such things. I realize this is a personal thing and that's why I chose to leave the Q&A. From what I understand, I didn't miss a whole lot more since it was almost at an end anyway.

After JM, I had to go help Common Rotation set up for autographs. For those who wonder why things sometimes run late...this is why: as a volunteer you have no control whatsoever over where the guests go. This was the case for me and vampgaia we were trying to track down CoRo to assist them and couldn't find them anywhere. They weren't where they were supposed to be and after much running around, we found them downstairs at the autograph table. Apparently they were with Adam in his room. Doh!

Once I recovered from my many trips up and down the steps, I was assigned to the exit to check badges and to make sure the autograph lines moved smoothly. And that's where I stayed...for.the.rest.of.the.day. Talk about being dead on my feet. Lack of sleep. Lack of food. I went completely on adrenaline alone. I call it the con diet and I really don't recommend it to anyone as a way to lose weight and stay healthy. Although on a positive note, while standing at the exit, I did get to meet several wonderful people who helped me with my door nazi status. Aimee and April, thanks so much for keeping me sane. NONE SHALL PASS and WE ARE THE WORST SECURITY GUARDS EVER! We also got to meet and hang out with Stephanie Romonov's security guard - he was reassigned to our door once Stephanie was done with autographs. He also kept us sane by cracking jokes and helping us check badges. Eventually both April and I pulled chairs over so that we could sit down since our feet were sore and we were about to fall down from exhaustion.

Around 7 PM...after JM had taken a dinner break...SoccerRef appeared at the doorway. He came up to take home all the extra food, booze and other items left over from our gathering the night before so that I could fit four of us in the car the following day. At that point, we still hadn't gotten our autographs yet because volunteers went at the end so I made SoccerRef sit down in my chair and wait for us to get our sigs from JM. Of course, before I went up, I introduced him to everyone who was within listening distance...he's a great hubby, how could I not? So off Eury, Irish and I went to meet the man. We only waited in line for about 15 minutes and it was nice to actually get a bit of time with him.

Me: Hi, these M&M's are for you, but I see by the basket overflowing with candy that you already have enough sugar.
JM: Oh! Thank you! You can never have enough M&M's!
Me: So true.
JM: Thanks for helping and coming out.
Me: You're welcome. Thanks for being here.

End of my JM story. He signed my action!Spike, handed it back to me and then shook my hand. He looked absolutely exhausted and I didn't linger or take up any more time than that.

I then sent SoccerRef back to the villa with ty2lobo and Eury so that they could start gathering things while I waited for Irish to get her signature. I also made SoccerRef bring an authentic Philly cheese steak for ty2lobo to try since she said that cheese steaks in California were pretty crappy. You'd think we fed her creme brulee or something by the way she was going on about the sandwich. It was really cute. I guess because I live here, a Philly cheese steak is just something I take for granted. Now I know what I have to take to her anytime I fly to LA.

After giving SoccerRef a whirlwind tour of the villa and packing his car trunk to the brim, the gals and I, sans ty2lobo who said she was going to use the sauna, headed over to the volunteer party. By this point I had been sucking down as much caffeine as I could get my hands on and I was still exhausted. I didn't even suffer from the jitters or anything that comes with too much of the stuff. That's how I knew I was beyond hope.

When we arrived at the party, all of the guests were there and we got to hang with them for a while before they headed up to the VIP dance. I was supposed to attend the dance, but I gave my ticket to Mary Elizabeth whom I'm hoping had a great time in my place. Once the party was over, we hung around the lobby for a while talking to everyone before heading back to the villa to get some much needed and deserved rest.

All in all I had a great time, even if I was beyond exhausted from volunteering. It was good to be able to experience a con from the other side of the fence, so to speak, because now my respect for organizers of events such as these has sky rocketed. Yes, there were bumps and problems, but I believe that a con experience is what *you* make of it. If you're convinced you're going to have a bad time, you do. If you have a good time, despite the little things, then you're there for the right reasons. So I give Moonlight Rising 2004 two thumbs up!

One more thing before I wrap up, quick shoutouts to everyone I met over the weekend and to those I got to see again. I hope to see you all again very soon. *HUGS*

So there you have it...one more down and two more to go before I retire from the Buffy Con world.

Brat