Orobouros.net @ Nekocon 6
00/20
Location: Virginia Beach, VA
Venue: Holiday Inn Executive Center
Date: November 7th to 9th, 2003
Attendance: 1400
Pictures: ~460
NOTE: I've decided to switch over to CSS for my formatting. The pages are already mostly done in the old style, all that would be left to do is fix the navigation buttons on the bottom of each page. I'm not going to do that, at least not yet. The pics are up, and fairly easy to find. The finished css pages will have fully functional novigation buttons. Those pages are about half complete, and should be up soon, but no promises since I'm a little busy. Until then, enjoy.
Nekocon was, as expected, quite fun. Nothing particularly noteworthy happened -- at least, not that I heard of. The false fire alarm Friday would be the only thing that came close, but that wasn't nearly the same as the previous year's events, a number of real minor emergencies which had the fire department come three times.
But, that's pretty much what I really like about Nekocon. It's not the colossal pandemonium that's Otakon or Anime Expo. It's small enough (this year due to a registration cap) to still be friendly and accomidating. What this means is that you don't have to rush from event to event, you don't have to have a plan for the whole thing from second one to keep up. It allows for the spontanious wierdness and randomness that are the hallmark of cons.
The two most memorable events of the weekend were the Saturday morning photo shoot and the Saturday Grate Steak dinner.
The photoshoot was my first of the sort, driving out to the Atlantic shoreline with cosplayers (Carolina, Jenny, and Kat) and fellow photographers (Danny, Terry, Alex, and Jenny -- working both sides of the camera) to take costume photos in good lighting and plesant surroundings. 
And by "pleasant surroundings, I mean pretty backdrops; the weather was cold and quite breezy, with dry sand blowing in our faces and clothes. At least the sky was a bit overcast, allowing for good pictures. Though my lack of artistic skill (and luck) give me no spectacular shots, the subject matter was definitly quite enjoyable, and I'm quite happy with what I got.
In a feat that probed my limits, the Grate Steak dinner had me eating a 32 oz top sirloin.
Thing is, at this place, you cook your steak yourself along with everybody else at a huge grill. Though I do consider myself fairly capable in things cullinary, I wasn't about to waste a great steak on an experiment. Jenny cooked it for me (along with at least three other steaks), asking for more and more Worchester sauce. After about 4 bottles, the waiter told me they were out, likely because he thought it was just me going through it all. Well. we managed to finish, and the steak was great -- cooked to my personal taste, afterall -- but just a wee bit dry cause we ran out of sauce. It's not something I'd want to do often, but it's a nice, welcome departure from the norm.
Speaking of Norm, who came along, in the trunk of Chuck's car, he drank some vile concoction including various sauces and conditements. As for Chuck, he quite possibly ate even more than me; if he even came close, that's quite a feat. I always enjoy this company, even more so when food is involved. And best of all, neither Lionel nor Sara died of undercooked steak.
Anime Con "refugees" waiting in line for the cosplay. I call them refugees, because that's what they looked like without closer inspection: People huddled up together in smaller groups under shared blankets, the occasional smoker standing off to the side, the low murmur in a slightly disgruntled crowd. Of course, looking closer, people were huddled aroud laptops to watch DVDs (or more likely AVIs), or passing the time with GameBoys. And, interestingly, most people talking weren't complaining a lot about the cold, but having heated discussions of all matters anime and not.- The lobby couch next to the elevators is quite comfortable, particularly on Sunday, and also require extra effort to get out of. In fact, I really like that hotel layout, even if it's become too crowded. It's nice and linear, so it's easy to get around and hard to miss anything.
- You do not garner respect shouting through a hollowed-out styrofoam cup.
- Partying is damn fun, but a nice, warm bed is usually a lot more comfortable.
- Even though I've came close to stopping cosplaying, it still hasn't lost a bit of it's charm. In fact, as far as cosplay goes, I was quite happy seeing lots of nice costumes, especially since I haven't had a much chance to cosplay myself recently.
Of all cons, it's at Nekocon that I hope to see people. It's the best place to see a lot of the people I care about, and have the time to do so. Part of that is it's prime location, very central geographically, cheap during that time of year, and during a time that's usually not too busy for people to travel. That's almost an endorsement for the convention, but a lot of Nekocon's appeal is that there's not much con programming to get in the way of things. In the end, I think what makes Nekocon great is that it's got a good balance between everything. Needless to say, I'll be going back again next year.
This page created on a Macintosh with help of PhotoPage by John A. Vink. These images, HTML code, css stylesheets, and text is © 2003 Oliver T Oberg. You are granted permission to use these images for your own personal use (such as cosplay sites, personal web pages, etc) provided they are not altered in any way except for rotation, cropping, resizing, resolution, and mirroring. Any other altering of these images requires my permission. I reserve the right to revoke use of these images at any time for any reason. This is done for the protection of the subjects of these pictures. If you are the subject of any of these pictures, and wish your likeness to be removed from this web page, please contact me with the file name and the page it appears on. Unless there is considerable doubt that you are not the subject of the picture, your request will be granted in a timely manner.