anime expo? again?

. . .i swear someone on staff at ax is on crack. . .

anime expo has rolled around once again and it's time to crawl out from under our respective rocks, grab our trusty towels and make that long trip out to anaheim. . . er, long beach.

they might have the problems they had at disney last year, might not. their official excuse for moving is that the facilities are bigger even than disney's. and of course, behind that there are thousands of screaming otaku who swore last year never again to visit disneyland.

so what are we looking forward to? kikuko inoue's doing her jellybeans cd rounds, in case you don't have them yet. animate still has haruna cels from tenchi in love 2for sale, really cheap. (yeah, i know. . . shameless plug. at least it's not a coke ad).

speaking of coke, i swear someone at ax has gotta be snorting that. whose idea was it to show the iron giant, batman: the mask of the phantasm, and pokemon 2000? all right, the last i can grudgingly understand. it's still technically anime. batman doesn't make sense to me. it would make a bit more sense to have the batman beyond: return of the joker movie. batman beyond at least _looks_ a bit more animeish. and as if that isn't insulting enough, iron giant? the only correlation i can find is that it's animated. that's it.

and, adding to the list of reasons to support animagic, ax is threatening to confiscate cameras and revoke admissions for the use of camera flashes at certain key moments/places. extremely odd. ax lives up to its draconian reputation again.

so how do i see ax coming out this year? i don't know. i'll be spending the better part of my time as a dealer with animate u.s. make sure to stop by! i'd like to see what kind of freaks, geeks, and weirdoes read my eclectic and occasional "articles". so. . . as i'll be press in the dealer's room, seeing it first hand, expect from me a report on the dealers' room and what it's like to work at a con.

but as i am often reminding people, a lot of why i go to ax is for the nightlife, sad as that may be. i'll cover the masquerade as well, so you all can see what kind of cameraman i am, and get a glimpse of all the costumes as well. i'll cover the dance as only i can (that is, seizuring about the floor trying to look like i'm dancing.) what else will i be doing at ax? i'll probably continue interviewing cosplayers for that long-range article i've been working on, to get intothe psyche of cosplayers and why they do it. yeah, it's always puzzled me.

maybe we'll throw another room party, too. this year it might even not be entirely ddr. maybe we'll have guitar freaks too. . . or maybe we'll actually have some music playing, and if i'm absolutely tanked and or insane i'll try to mix. . . but no promises.

so what can i say. . . hope to see you there.

—aldo