FedCon 18 - text update

Hello everyone,

First of all: happy birthdays Joyce & Steph!!!!

Last night we came back from a delightful weekend in Bonn. Unfortunately I have had no time to upload any pictures to my photobucket account (yet) to share with you. Seeing we came home quite late, I only had the chance to upload the pictures to my pc. I have to check them if they aren't too blurry and some I'll need to rotate in order for them so the viewer will not have to rotate his/her screen all the time.

So I will try to post some text info about this wonderful weekend now, seeing we're in the car on our way to Joyce's birthday present from my parents: a visit to Emmen Zoo. That means I do have some time to write. And I had one picture on my cellphone, the lovely picture of Joyce and I with the diva of FedCon 18: Nichelle Nicols! She really stole the show and what a powerful woman she still is at the age of 76 (she'll turn 77 this December). As I had the honor to tell her before we went home: as soon as she enters the stage, she OWNS it! And she got glistering eyes when I told her that, thanking her for her delightful presence. And all Joyce could add: she fell on her knees and bowed for Nichelle, which got her teary eyed (again). What a delight... But let's not rush to the end of the weekend just yet! I don't know how far I will get during this post, but I'll just start and see how far I'll get.

I did post some pictures and a small video I made on Friday.

We thought it would be like a 1,5 till 2 km walk (a mile or a bit longer) from our hotel to the Maritim hotel where FedCon was being held. So we walked and walked and realized that it was more like 4,5 till 5 km... Luckily, the weather was lovely! We had printed the schedule and that showed that the autographs were being done on Saturday and Sunday. So we did not bring the stuff to be signed along. When we finally arrived there were long queues. Or in German: Slange. But when we checked our numbers (1071 and 1072) we found out that we had the queue that was the shortest one. So that was a nice surprise. They checked our tickets and ID's and we got all we needed to enter the con. The woman who helped us out had to check something for us at the info counter so we did not have to stand in the line to get in but could follow her in. When all was arranged we checked out the place. And found out that we could get some stuff signed already!

So we asked about the U-bahn at the info desk of the hotel. They have us a small map and all the info we needed. We rushed to the station but Joyce had trouble getting the tickets in time. So then we had to wait for about 18 minutes. We decided to walk to the next station and try to get the tickets there. We asked a man for some help and we got the tickets in time for the next train. That surely went a whole lot faster. When we got at the hotel we grabbed our stuff and ran back to the U-bahn to get back in time for the autographs and photosessions.

First we went to get some autographs from the people that were on the first floor. More info about that in my next blog, when I have the pictures to add with it. But Max Grodénchik (Rom, DS9) was sooooo funny, using a flowery fan to blow-dry his signatures. But that also took a lot of time so in the end, they moved him to the back of the signing line... After that we had to hunny because...

We wanted to do two photoshoots that day, so we needed to queue for that: Mark Alaimo (Gul Dukat) and then with Jeffrey Combs (Vorta Weyoun and Investigator Brunt). We met some nice people in the queue who we've been hanging out more than once during the whole event. The nice thing about queues is that you have the chance to meet new people and chat along. I am told that when I do something, I'll plunge right in. I have no problem walking up to people (guests or stars) to ask a question or tell them something. Why should I? We're all there for the same reasons: we all love Sci-Fi! The photosessions were really fun, even though the photographer was grumpy and wanted to be like Speedy Gonzales!


During the openingceremony they showed us a 28 minute preview of the new Star Trek movie! So awesome! They told us we were not allowed to make any video of pictures of it and the security even had nightvision goggles (it wasn't a joke of the ceremonial leader, we DID see them with the goggles) to be sure the rules were obeyed. After that, the stars of the weekend were introduced. Seeing no one said that filming was prohibited I HAD to make the small video I posted. Seeing it's only 45 seconds and not too good quality, I hope they won't mind. The stars came on stage with a great applaud. But then came miss Nicols: which resulted in a HUGE standing ovation of more than 2000 people (all the other stars included!) which went on for about 10 minutes. Nichelle got teary eyed and wouldn't believe that it was all just for her! When she finally got a quiet audience, we all hang to her words. She gracefully included each and every other guest that joined her on stage. WONDERFUL & DELIGHTFUL all the way! Nichelle Nicols: THANK YOU! After being overwhelmed by this opening ceremonial, we were frakking (if you don't know the term "frak" yet: watch "Battlestar Galactica" and you'll know it.

We're almost at the Emmen Zoo, so I will send off this blog post, with one of our two Nichelle Nicols pictures. I'll be back everyone!