Con ramble: The Lucca Report

I'm going to say this now: this is a long, long ramble, and not all of it is about my main topic. If you're new here, this is probably TL;DR territory. If you're not new, you know this is just a standard weekend ramble. Well, no, this one goes a bit above and beyond the standard ramble, and may be offensive. I genuinely debated only putting this on the unfiltered blog, but I decided it's not that bad. But it is close. For instance, I talk about porn in several flavors and wanting to give a blowjob to Dirk Benedict.

I now know why I was in training all summer with the Kinect, and it was to prepare me for the endurance event that is Lucca. We've been to Lucca almost every year, and with each previous year it was my habit to drop partway through the day, making a bed of other people's jackets under a booth table to sleep. Even then, I'd spend the last two days of the con in the hotel, reading books and staying in bed because I was too worn out to walk. Last year, I used my Blackberry to write 6,000 words for the start of NaNoWriMo, even. I was laying on my back either way, so I figured why not do something useful besides play with myself? And besides, I was already chafed from playing with myself.

This may seem like a contradiction, but I'm a surprisingly low-energy masturbator because I lay on my stomach to intentionally asphyxiate myself in my pillow, resulting in a faster and easier climax. Not so easy on the heart, I suppose. But it's either that or rely on my imagination to tap into my libido, and half the time I kill my own mood because my internal editor jumps my fantasies. SO frustrating to be fapping to: He gently parted her thighs and… Wait is he laying behind her or under her? Because one of his arms shouldn't be able to do that if he's beside her. This is followed by, I'm masturbating, god damn it! I don't exactly need masterpiece fucking theater, all right? And yet, the next scene I write gets the editor's invasive input too. Like taking a penis in the urethra. Some nights, I go to bed frustrated because I've mentally teased myself.

I digress, there was no fatigued fapping on the bed at the Lucca hotel this year. (Pity. I did kind of miss it, especially with all the hentai manga I picked up this year.) Which is not to say I didn't have problems. I had a relapse at dinner on Sunday and had to stagger out of the restaurant early. Every night, I lay awake for hours, unable to sleep for the pain in my knees, hips, and back. So it sounds dreadful, I know. But, would I do it again? Oh, hell yes. I did it every day of the trip, and I suffered through every night because the days were just so. Much. Fun.

Granted, if I had to live like that for more than a week, I think I'd have to kill someone to deal with the stress and pain. Okay, maybe two people.

This has been one of my busiest, fullest trips to Lucca. Being that this was my first year owning an Xbox, it was also the first year that the game booths had anything to offer me. They don't usually have much PC games in the used shops, and what they had of PC games was less Game of the Year and more Lame of the Year. So I didn't need to pick through their selection with keen interest. But before this, there were still a few thousand other booths that did hold my interest. Now there's all those other booths, PLUS games. Which exposes yet another addiction in me…I'm a shopaholic.

Lucca is a constant reminder that I'm not just a singular nerd. I can be nerdy for games, sci-fi, fantasy, comics and manga, cartoons and anime, toys and games, faeries and mythology, for arts and crafts, puzzles, for magic tricks, for computer hardware and software, for Star Trek and Star Wars. So there's not any one booth or tent I want to hang out in. And, Lucca Comics and Games is spread out across half of Lucca's interior walls, so just to get from the games tent to the Japan Palace required a forty minute walk. In between those bigger camps is a dozen smaller tents, street vendors, and cosplay folks. The streets are jam-packed, and at any time traffic can just stop for photo ops.

So, this year, we arrived a day later than usual. Normally we arrive the day the con is being set up, but this year hubby had to attend a sales con before we could leave. I'm not really complaining, since watching people set up a con isn't so exciting. But I do like it, and I missed the chance to get around and check out people's stuff before the crowds converge. But this year, I had to spend a lot of time in crowds, moving with the flow of traffic from booth to booth to sort out what was where. It was more like being one of the attendants this year than an insider with a memorized map of where everything was. Not really a bad thing, just different. I think I liked having it different for a change of pace, having to discover everything like everyone else. Twice I walked through tents and thought I knew them, only to turn a corner a day later and go, "Wait, I didn't see this before." I also had to go around and catch up with some vendors who I've seen at multiple cons, and try to buy new stuff from them to help show my support.

Lunches at the con this year were happily less stressing on tummy because the regular con food was joined by Barilla pasta cups, both regular penne and whole wheat fusilli. These were light and satisfying, giving me plenty of energy to keep going as well as something to soak up a bit of my beer or mojito. I drank through most of the trip after lunch, but I drank real, real slow. So I barely reached a mild buzz, and once I got there I shifted back to bottled water. Then I'd drink with dinner until I hit the buzz point and moved back to water. (Well, but I was hitting my one-hitter about once every two hours all day, so it's not like I wasn't a bit sedated. Hell, half the days, I felt so good I was singing and dancing WHILE walking. Yes, people stared. No, I didn't care.)

Day one, I didn't buy much because I was afraid of getting something expensive, only to find something cool and cheap that I couldn't afford. So I wandered around with hubby in search of the anime tent. I had wrongly assumed it would be in the Japan Palace. But they had more cosplay and toys, with only a few manga vendors here and there. So I had to go back to the games tent, drop off hubby, grab a map, and hike a mile back the way I'd just been. There, I walked around the stalls for a few miles too. Not surprisingly, when I finally did sit down, it caught up with me. My knees and ankles swelled from too much activity, and I had to have help getting back to the car. I had many painkillers and a lot of pot to get the swelling down. Not surprisingly, I arrived at dinner with the munchies. After dinner, I had a fatigue attack and passed out fully clothed after falling face first into my pillow.

This meant I woke up at 5 AM with acid in my chest. Bleh. But I took out my copy of The Drowning City and alternated between it and Chaos Tryst until it was time to take a shower and get ready for breakfast. The Drowning City is still awesome, by the way. I finished part one at long last, and all the cast is assembled, and I really love everything here. The writing style, the objective narration, the balance between description of scenery and actions without being purple; it's all very well done.

I wish I could say the same for Chaos Tryst, but it's a book where I love the world and the idea the writer is getting at, but I think the characters are awful. Supposedly, they're both creatures of chaos, which explains why they're so random. But their "conflict" is so stiff and dreadful, and even the back story that they somehow have known each other forever WITHOUT actually knowing each other is not enough to make me want to root for them to get together. In my writerly opinion, this is a couple meant for a one night stand. After which point, the woman should come to her senses, realize she just wanted to make a booty call, and scram. The man-boy-bear is a waste of her time, and he's a stereotypical male show-off anyway. So while the writer is telling me, "Ooh, this is so sexy," I'm going, "No, it's kinda lame, actually. This dude is worth a pity fuck, at best." Nevertheless, the world building is interesting and I'm kind of stuck for the full ride even if I think both of the main characters are unrealistic and slightly grating.

Day two, I realized the goofiness of me bringing manga to read at the con. I'd never taken those books out of my bag, and anyway, I wanted to find new comics. So I set out to the manga tent and got a few books here and there to sample them, the first four issues of Nana and something else, but it slips my memory what just now. In fairness, I bought a LOT of new manga this year. I also found a vendor selling comics in English, and I picked up Stephen King's N. I still couldn't commit to any bigger purchases, but I found the complete Jojo's Bizarre Adventures set and got that.

Dinner on day two was a "Japanese" place called Oishii that apparently didn't understand what Oishii meant. My salad had a dressing that was mostly salt, and had some sesame seeds sprinkled across the top. There was almost nothing at all about it that was Japanese, except possibly the crab on top. But I suspect the crab was likely not from the harbors of any of Japan's islands either. They used local rice for the meal, so it had the wrong texture, the wrong flavor, and it was cooked Italian style rather than a proper Japanese style. The only thing I could eat was my grilled fish, and let's face it, it's almost impossible to fuck that up. BUT, I did note that one of the guys commented that they'd cut the tuna wrong, too. So even on sushi, raw fish, they were screwing some of it up too. Just, not a good experience.

Dinner woke me up at 4:30 with a very sour stomach, so I once again opened books to pass the time. Then I showered, staggered downstairs and had a light breakfast of yogurt and cereal with my coffee. This was a good plan, because the extra energy helped while I was walking from tenet to tent. This was the day where I committed to buying stuff, since I'd seen everything and knew what I wanted. So I picked up a bunch of complete series, Lain, Soul Taker, and something from master-cheescake fanservice-maker Ujin, Sakura Mail. I also got Aika and Boys Be… I picked up a few yaoi and yuri comics, for research. (Ahem) Ooh, also, I got some used X-box video games with a ninja theme, Mini-Ninjas and Naruto: Rise of a Ninja. I'm not even a fan of the series, but the game just looks fun to me. It was a huge haul, and getting it all back to the room just about drained me. I was hauling most of it in my backpack so it was close to twenty pound when I got done packing it. (X_x)

Which is why dinner at Varrone was such a pain, even though the food was molto buono. Varrone is a steakhouse, but I can speak from experience, they also have a FANTASTIC vegetarian menu, which I had the second year we went to Lucca because my stomach was being even worse than it was on this trip. But this year, I said "You know what? Fuck you tummy. I'm having the steak!" And tummy was like, "Fine, go ahead. See what happens at five in the morning, biyatch."

I was already worn out, but Varrone is loud, very brightly lit, and smoky. The problem with the loudness is, I strain to hear someone speaking a foreign language, and my brain is taxed just trying to translate under normal circumstance. But now every third word is lost because the couple behind me is shouting to be heard over everyone else…so everyone else yells louder to compete. By the time my third course arrived, a fantastic steak with herbs, the loud noises led to a relapses, and suddenly it was like someone was playing with my volume knob, making the crowd noise rise and fall in waves. The lighs became painfully bright and had to cover my eyes to make the stinging stop. So I had hubby help me to our friend's car, and then I faded in and out of consciousness until it was time to go back to the room. Then I collapsed in bed and let hubby undress me before I passed out. I woke up around six, and I was like "Wha's up now, tummy? I thought you said you was gonna hit me? But no, instead it's my spine." And tummy was like, "Um, I told spine to do that."

And finally, it was Monday, our last day at the con. So we had to pack our bags and put them in a truck with one group before the con. Then we went and spent the final day wandering around. I used this day to go to the gaming booths and push my way through the boys to get a hold of the controllers. This is a lot harder than it sounds, but I was able to get a feel for several games. Don't know if I was tempted to play more by any of them, except for this one weird import, Catherine. It had the look of some kind of horror based Japanese dating sim, but each "night" the actual game play sections were a puzzle-based maze, a tower that the player has to ascend by pulling and moving blocks. The bottom of the level is falling away while you play, so you have to work quickly to get to the top. Very weird game, and something I could see playing to goof off with. There's a whole other role-play aspect to the game I didn't get to try in the demo either, but the trailer made it look like something from the director of Paprika and Perfect Blue. (Both of which are incredible anime movies that left me feeling less skillful as a writer.)

I finished my last few hours combing through manga before I settled on buying the first two issues of High School of the Dead. In the final walkthrough, I also found an amazing goth art jigsaw puzzle with 1,000 piece for only 16 euros. I had a blast putting together that 500 piece goth vampire puzzle last year, so 1,000 pieces with a goth chick in snow, at least 460 of which are all grey or white from snow blinding should prove…challenging. Then we unpacked our bags from one car, moved them to another friend's car, and then we made our way back home. So just to make the trip complete, I got car sick and had to lay down and close my eyes. Whee. Oh, and the ride in the car led to this exchange about Red Bull…

Me: Oh, I don't know. I like the taste of Red Bull, but—

Fabrizio: Well of course you do. You are an American, and all Americans have bad taste.

And I got all huffy and shit. Not because I was told I had bad taste, but because I could be lumped in with the rest of you assholes so easily. Kidding! Come back!

On the trip we also discussed green energy, advanced in solar panel science and glass industry advancements, the bad politics behind the green movement, and why more average Joes need to be sold on the concept on individual investment into the energy grid to create local solutions tailored to the people instead of being forced on them by someone else. We talked about how society needs to move away from consumerism, and back to the idea that every person has a responsibility to invest in their world to get something positive back when those investments are returned a few years down the road. But we also talked about how the lack of entrepreneurship in most countries has led to people being less likely to invest in themselves, in their local economies, or in the energy plans of their cities. Instead they hope to find people to invest in them as an employee rather than making the much larger risk of starting a business and hiring others themselves.

So this led me to a whole rambling tangent where people need to be given some kind of pep talk selling the concept of making money from their excess energy. Because all people can see is how much it costs at first to plug into the grid and start sending them energy instead of receiving it. And it is HELLA expensive. To get our place rigged for solar and get onto the grid, it's a minimum 6,000 euro investment. When you convert that into US dollars and factor in inflation, that's a cost so prohibitive that a lot of US people cannot imagine EVER making the change. So, I reasoned, if the government really wanted people to embrace green energy, they would offer financial incentives and tax breaks to individuals, allowing people to recoup most of their investment as a show of gratitude to the homeowners for investing in their local grid.

This talk in the car was something of a eureka moment for other reasons, because we talked about Beppe Grillo, and how he got elected to office, and how in Fabrizio's opinion, his complaining all the time is what helped the Italian left parties lose to the right again. I don't know if it was all Beppe's fault, because honestly, watching the left government in inaction was sad. They made every mistake possible, and then some. They made Obama look good. Yeah. So, saying that Beppe was the cause was, I think, a bit much. What mattered and led to the eureka moment was Fabrizio's impression tha Beppe was only complaining. Whether he was right or not had nothing to do with his views. He simply didn't like the tone that Beppe was taking.

Holy shit. A man got hit with the tone argument by another man. Eureka, we have full equality in our cynicism. BUT, this conclusion also led me to think that sometimes, who I am as a punk taints the projects I start because there's too much other stuff in between my relevant points related to said project. People don't want to have to wade though a river of my whinier bullshit just to get to those points that are interesting to them. And, part of me being a crazy thick-headed punk makes me naturally inclined to say "Piss off, I don't bloody care."

With this new thingie I'm pushing, I really don't want this to be about me, but about an idea that I hope one day might become an institution much like punk has moved from being an idea to being this huge amoeba alternative music culture that's always evolving to take on new aspects. So I was thinking how it's not just important to have a good idea, but to have a good "face" on that good idea, so people find it easier to look upon and approach. And, so that's what led me to the idea that as soon as I got home, I needed to register a new wordpress blogs for the Immature Adults market.

Something that was different for this con from previous years is that every year, hubby would tell people I was a writer, and then when they asked if I had any print books, I could get that defeated look and explain that I'm only a self-published writer, and I don't sell many print books. BUT, this year, I had a book, and as I had copies to give away, I did. One copy went to a publisher friend of mine, who took it as an attempt at a submission. Since I just got back the rights, I wasn't about to correct him. So, in theory, the book might have a new home with another small press if he's not opposed to sci-fi that's a bit…quirky. Also, these guys are so small, they don't mind if I do my own ebook edition. So it's not like I slipped a book in with Mondadori, or anything spectacular. Still, there was not one copy I gave out that the other person didn't ask for an autograph. So it was very cool to finally have something to show folks and go "See? I have a book in paper!" Also, it felt kind of good to be a minor celebrity for five minutes at a time. And I got to see one real celebrity that I knew and had a childhood crush on too.

Oh, right, Dirk Benedict. Yes, Dirk was at the con, less that a hundred yards from the booth that hubby was painting at. I kept going over to the booth where he was doing signings and photos, and I wanted to tell him, "I grew up watching you on Battlestar Galactica and A-Team." I wanted to say a lot to him, or maybe even give him a copy of my book. But every time I walked around, I always seemed to come by when he was looking flustered or tired. So I thought how I'd feel being so tired and having yet another person walk up to say how much they love me. Then I'd wander away from the booth feeling guilty for wanting to bother him, and then feeling guilty because I couldn't work up the nerve to say "My gosh, I think I still have a crush on you after all these years."

BUT…at one point, Dirk looked at me. I completely lost it and ran off, and I'm sure he must have thought I was a crazy stalker. And that's really rather sad isn't it? That one of the highlights of my trip is my childhood crush looked at me. I can't even add that we shared one special moment, because I looked away too fast.

I used to joke that if I ever became a celebrity I'd screw it up because while my fans were squeeing over me, I'd be squeeing that I had fans. But Dirk makes me realize that if I had a lot of fans, after a while, even saying thank you must be very draining. I mean, I know he was making money for every photo and autograph, but I don't think the fans give much thought to how draining these events are. They're just so excited to meet their idol that they can't see the person, just the character. But I don't see Face. I see Dirk, and I realize, I don't want to be as famous as him. Cause that shit taking thank you's from the fans looks like a lot of work to me.

And, Dirk looks great, even bone tired. At one point, I amused hubby by saying, "He's so overworked, and he's still handsome. I think I should go over and say, "Dirk, would you like a blowjob?"

I've got to go through the photos and erase blurries, but once I have the pics sorted, I'll put out a photo slideshow. I drained the batteries on my camera every day, and of course each time it died, that was when the awesomest photo-op ever would walk by.

And a completely random observation: during the con, I watched a boy of thirteen walk up to his gamer girlfriend and smack her butt. He rubbed it a bit and then got behind her to start really playing with her butt while she was trying to play a game. About then I thought, I probably shouldn't be watching this. So I wandered away to go watch something older and less guilt-inducing. But as I wandered around, I thought how this really is a whole different world from the US. In the US, some complete stranger adult would have come up and admonished the boy for mistreating the girl. Here, it's no big deal.

Another example: While I'm paying through the yaoi, a girl of about 14 ran up and starting pulling book, handing them back to someone else to say (I'm translating from Italian) "Here, this is really good. The sex is great, but the story is so good!" Well, I'm still reading another book from the same artist and writer, so I'm not thinking to look back. Then the other woman asks, "But they're both men having sex?" She sounds confused, not to mention a lot older.

So I look around, and I realize that this kid is introducing her mom to yaoi manga for the first time. And as I'm watching the girl explain stories to her bemused looking mother, I was trying to imagine how this same scene would look to an American audience. Would they laugh and find it amusing as I do? Or would they say this was filth and the mother should be dragging the girl away to punish her for thinking unclean thoughts? Or, as hubby has often said as a joke, "We have boobies and ass on TV every night, and it still hasn't led to the youths rioting." I just wonder, if you had boobies and ass on US TV every night, would it lead to someone rioting? And if it did, would the rioters be the sex-crazed maniacs looking for women to molest? Or would it be the religious and moral fanatics looking for victims to blame?

We have beer and wine at the cons, but no drunks, nor drunken fights. When on the last day, the power went out, a resounding cheer of delight went through the crowd, and when the lights came back on five minutes later, the place erupted in applause. Everywhere are people wearing free hugs signs, there's random acts of kindness, and even the cops and bootleggers have a comfy relationship. (The bootleggers sit just outside the con tents at the back. The police only patrol the front and sides of the tent, so they somehow "miss" seeing the bootleggers. And, if you think that's just the cops, I've heard the con organizers talk this up, and they say it's better to let them come and not make them feel excluded. Can you imagine an attitude like that working at a US con? Because I can't.) It's like a con hosted by happy hippies. Which may explain why I love the whole thing so much.

Setting aside the bad meal at Oishii, this has been one of the best Lucca Comics and Games I've attended. The weather of the last two years was wet and cold, but this year, it was warm enough for me to go sleeveless in the afternoons. I never mind con crowds, and even going to the gamer tables to watch the nerdly pursuits, I never once encountered a case of "gamer funk." I got jostled here and there, but half the time, as I was saying "scusa," so was the person who bumped me. One kid I ran into, we even seemed to get into a contest to see who would have the last apology.

Also, Italian cons mess with your head. Like, I'm walking along and there's a little girl and her younger brother who are almost the same height, and then behind them is a woman who's the same height as the girl, but she's like 45. Height is totally not an indicator of age around here. You can't just make a quick glance and assume anything. That cute kid in the cosplay outfit could be thirty. Look closer.

This is kind of the exact opposite way of how I watch the world in snatched moments and fast glances. But at the con, I have to change the way I people watch to really look around. If I don't, how else do I pick out the guy playing Ash from a dozen other costumed guys walking nearby? No, this kind of event requires staring to make sure of what I'm seeing. Which is why I spent so long watching the kid play with his girlfriend's butt where I normally would have looked away after the first spank. I had to stare and go, Whoa, she's really young for him to be… Whoa! he's really young to have that good a technique already! Which was followed by, I SO should not be watching this.

And, even trying to avoid being sexist or objectifying, I saw a LOT of breasts this year. I mean, they just swam into view at all angles no matter which way I looked. There was even a set of girls protesting. One had frizzy hair and wore a sign that said Bello Capelli (Pretty hair) and the other had a sign hung over her enormous breasts that read Grosso Tette (Huge Titties) I loved it, their idea for wearing their labels out as a protest, so of course it made me even more aware not to oogle. So I didn't oogle, but that doesn't mean I didn't see any breasts. The only way to have avoided them was not attending. All ages, all sizes, in all kinds of skimpy costumes. But I couldn't ask "Can I protograph you?" without looking or sounding like a pervert. (It's the drooling that makes it awkward, I think.) So mostly, I just took shots of groups in candid poses, or if someone else had gotten them to pose. No way was I going to ask the Mortal Kombat chick, "Can I see you posed with your legs apart?" And, there was a chick who made a Chelle costume that was SPOT ON, right down to her having the boots and a portal gun made from scratch that brought tears to my eyes for how nice it looked. But my tears were because ALL my batteries were dead, and I couldn't photograph her either. (She had lovely breasts too. Not big, but lovely.)

I got a Star Wars parade on the camera because I was outside at just the right moment, but I missed a chance to photograph the awesome Lord Duku they had who looked just like the movie character, right down to the displeased scowl. Dude was so totally in character, but he turned his head right as my camera clicked, so you get nothing of his acting, just his hair. GUH.

And, the whole trip, I sat across from the two most devious and evil toy sellers I've ever seen in my entire life. One guy is piloting a remote control helicopter and offering flight lessons. This sells the choppers like hot cakes. The other guy is driving a car on the floor, bumping the feet of kids and adults, and then driving the car back to him. Then he gives a big, friendly, handsome smile. EVIL. The dude pulled in a lot of marks with the car and the smile. Both of them had the charm going on, and the whole time we were at the con, my little gadget geek brain was screaming "DO WANT!" Alas, the model I wanted was 50 euros, and that's a lot for someone who has a limited yearly budget for new manga and anime. 50 euros is 3 complete DVD series and a couple yaoi manga from the neighboring booth, so yeah, I loved the choppers, but I resisted their evil temptation so that I could give in to many other evil but cheaper temptations.

And I think that's about the whole con report. I loved Lucca even when I'm having a bad year, but this was actually a very good year for me. It's always a privilege to show up at the con and get the minor celebrity treatment, even if it's just because I'm the "American author" of the group. I keep explaining that no one in America knows me either, but they still think I'm "refined," so I let them live with their delusions.

I show up and get free food, a free room, and escorted rides to the con from the hotel. All we have to pay for is travel arrangements. I've always loved going to cons, and we go to Cartoomics and pay our way in and buy the con food. But at Lucca, I get a staff badge, and I get to wander into a few of the booths cause I'm staff. Hee. Like I said, it's a bit like being a minor celebrity. It's a great trip, and this year was just awesome. I'm already missing everyone, and I can't wait for next year.

And in conclusion, Dirk, if you're ever in Milan and want a coffee, let me know. I mean a coffee, by the way, not a sly reference to a blowjob. But if you did want the blowjob, I'm sure we can come to an arrangement.

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