Gandalf does a happy dance for a big green onesie

(Following on from yesterday's blip) (yes I know it's another long winded one- am literally typing and scurrying along the street but I'll try to cut it down later today!!)

Lacking the ability to navigate out of a wet paper bag, I initially had reservations about bunnyhopping my way across three trains to find the right building out at the Olympic Park complex. I needn't have worried, however - on scrambling off train #3 I spotted a veritable convoy of stalwart jedi knights manfully striding on despite the rain, superheroes shivering under umbrellas and Disneyesque princesses with their hoops bunched up to try and keep their ballgowns out of the mud. There is no way to sum up the variety of costumes that I saw over the weekend, except to say that I stopped the tally on Pikachu onsie costumes after #14; I didn't even blink at the Drogo-&-Daenerys/King Joffrey & Sansa Stark couples; the Star Wars/Star Trek/Dr Who/Lord of the Rings junkies were two-a-penny, and Jessica Rabbit sashayed past without me even bothering to turn my head to admire the sequins. Brownie points for the Ghostbusters quartet though.

As outlined previously, I committed to the weekend for the benefit of SWSNBN, thereby dooming myself to spending 95% of the weekend in queues for autographs and the like. It was ridiculous to spend nearly 2 hours queuing just to buy tokens, so that I could then go and queue some more to get something signed. But with all that time standing around, it was a good opportunity for people-and-costume watching and chatting with others in the queues. And seeing the lines were so long that I couldn't tell who the queues were actually for, it turned out I spent a great deal of time standing around chatting. Although I probably should have read up on who was attending, as there was much of the following:
Me: (having joined a queue and looked around cheerfully for someone to chat to) So.... Who's this queue for then?
Person dressed as Robb Stark/Captain America/Princess Jasmine/large slice of vomit-coloured pizza* : This is for Oliver Phelps.
Me: Who?
Person: (disbelieving look) You're kidding, right? James and Oliver Phelps? The Weasley twins? From Harry Potter?
Me: Ahh. (nodding sagely) Wouldn't be able to pick them out of a police lineup if my life depended on it. (and then I'd bid them thanks and farewell, and go and join another queue and ask David Bowie-a-la -Legend who he/she was queuing for. Repeat several times).

Absurdly, I got far more excited at spotting someone in the crowd dressed as Captain Martin Crieff (from the BBC radio play Cabin Pressure, complete with a whole lemon magically grafted onto their airline captain's hat,) than I did at fronting up to the likes of Carrie Fischer. Mind you, I only have her word for it that it was Carrie Fischer - it could have been anyone hunkered under that big shawl and sunglasses. But she was very gracious and rather than just a signature, once I'd explained why I was standing in front of her ("hi, I'm not a fan but I know someone who is a big fan - well, when I say fan, I mean not a big enough fan to actually come and meet you herself or anything.....") she wrote out far more than I would have even thought about asking for. So she got 3 gold stars in my book.

Have to say that most actors, novelists (Raymond E Feist was v popular) etc were very approachable; there was only one individual who was an utter prat but I won't tell you who that was.**

Although many of the younger fry (the Divine Aidan; Karl Urban; the Harry Potter boys; Bradley James from Merlin etc) were hugely popular, the hands-down favourite was Alan Tudyk (Death at a Funeral/Firefly/Dollhouse etc). Granted, the queues to speak to him or have a photograph with him were running hours behind schedule, but this was because he was having a good gossip with absolutely everybody who came to say hello, and making the effort to write something original and meaningful for each person. So his fans were very happy to wait because they knew that sooner or later it would be their turn. It was also educational in a way to sit in on his Q&A session - I would never have picked up relatively discreet costume details whilst roaming the main shrine to nerdiness, but in watching Tudyk do his thing in a separate area I couldn't help but notice that suddenly I was surrounded by hundreds of people wearing identical 'Wash' beanies. Plus two Scooby-Doos and one Duff Beer Guy.

Photo-wise, I could have used any one of a number of photos of people in various poses - transformers, vampires, fighter pilots, dwarves, you name it - but I think this quick snap more accurately showed the spirit of the day. It was one in which I got to see Fantasy Worlds Colliding, and you don't get to see that very often. Unless you're a nerd. Which I'm not.***
____
* I kid you not.
** Ok yes I will; his nickname rhymes with 'cough'.
***Well, not in comparison with everybody else there, anyway.