Month: July 2021

I almost forgot this

There was fursuiters, like there is at any anime con as you can see. My only problem was that we weren’t in the same location, at the same time.

Since I had time before I checked out some more panels. It was time for Lunch and the Dealers Area.

By now The Great Expotera, the restaurant that is connected to the convention center was finally opened. Thankfully they had there regular menu, including their anime con special Ramen.

They make an excellent ramen, I happened to have the curry one and it was delicious.

Now on to Dealers Area

By now their restaurants were also open

One can only assume the lack of the normal numbers of Dealers was due to the pandemic. Also there was a lot more space between Dealers than usual. This photo shows a good example of this.

…and yes I did spend a portion of my pay on stuff.

Overall despite what issues their was of being the 1st major con since pandemic restrictions were lifted. I had a great time, as for masks. About half there wore masks… including myself. Just wanted to play it safe.

Hopefully things will be better when fingers crossed MFF will happen. But everyone has to start somewhere.

I am a gamer and the amount of stuff I own is crazy. But here is something just for fun.

I brought my 3DS with me, more out of curiosity than anything. You see the 3DS can swap data with other 3DS’ and mine connected with 9. The thing with these data swaps you never quite know all you get until you start playing one of your old games.

Lastly…

I have no plans on at this moment to go to any other cons, except MFF when it happens. If I do others and especially MFF I will be doing more reports. With much more detail, so check out the Anime Midwest 2021 podcast when it gets posted.

Everything looked okay at first when I entered the Hyatt Regency O’Hare was able to find the panel which was called The Misadventures of Having a Podcast. Which I joined 20 minutes in progress. It was a good panel the story how it came to be is worth noting. It seems the 3 who hosted it originally submitted it back in 2018 and completely forgot about. Until Anime Midwest contacted them a few months ago, and the presentation was only done days earlier. They even joked that the con might have been desperate for panels. They also remarked that I could of easily done a panel as I have experienced so much blogging and podcasting.

If you been to the Hyatt Regency O’Hare before you are familiar with the O’Hare American Grill. It’s a mid-priced lobby level restaurant.

Which during any convention is always busy, but as you see in the photo it’s almost empty. Also there normally great selection was limited. I was there for their Breakfast menu and it was all pre wrapped and boxed. Such as a breakfast burrito, pancakes and bacon, and etc.

But of everything I did that day the very best was “Whose Line is it Anime?” obvious a version of the famous “Whose Line”. It was funny, I laughed my ass off, and no joke I felt all the stress in my body melting away the more I laughed.

I went to a few more panels and events that day, but “Whose Line” was the very best it also had the biggest crowd I seen down there

This is only part of it.

More tomorrow where I talk about both fursuiters, and the all important Dealers Area

Depending on how you look at it Illinois lifting a lot of those COVID restrictions could either be a good or bad thing… depending on how you look at it. Me I just knew I had to get out and have fun and actually shed a lot of that COVID STRESS we are all feeling. Also very frankly I didn’t know what to expect and what I found is frankly enough for an articles to cover more than a few days.. By then a video I pieced together will be up on YouTube of the unadulterated LINE CON I experienced and frankly I was happy waiting.

So taking both my vaccination card and my ID I happily went to Anime Midwest yesterday. What I found was this…

That is only part of it… wait to you see the full video.

I had been there 10 – 15 minutes or so after arriving at roughly 9:30 AM when a member of the staff came up and asked if we were Pre-Registered. Those who weren’t including myself was then brought to a 2nd line. Now here is one of many shocks I had that day. Most of those people waiting were Pre-Registered. There was only about 20 of us who actually needed to Register.

It wasn’t until 9:48 that we were allowed to head to where registration was to take place.

A few minutes later that gates opened.

Really my biggest complaint was nobody new what was going on.

After I got my badge and if you have been to the Stephens Convention Center before. You know there is a short cut exit through The Great Exopotera, is a mid price sit down restaurant connected to the convention center. It leads directly to the front door of the nearby Hyatt, where there was a panel I wanted to see and was missing second by second as time ticked by. I found the door was locked and no one knew it was closed. I only found out later that it was going to be open at 11:30 AM for the Lunch Crowd.

And you can look this up on any map I had to go all the way around through the Dealers area, the front door of the convention center, down a short road to the Hyatt. In my hurry I forgot about the corridor connecting both places.

But more on the Hyatt Regency O’Hare tomorrow…