TJ says-

In the same fashion Richard did some time ago, I wanted to give a good
reference to the happenenings at the oh too cool only con in the deep
south, Anime Weekend Atlanta 3. I had the unique benifit of seeing it
through the eyes of the rest of the staff, as I was responsible for
keeping a few time tables for panels during the con.

Unlike the other con goers. . my con began Thursday. . .

3pm-thursday. Get a call from another good friend of Colliding
SYmphonies, guy named Casey. We planned to car pool together to get
downtown. He told me he has to work that day until the evening but that
he'd catch up later.
bummer. . .that meant I couldn't use the 90mph commuter lane. Oh well. I
went to my mother's to pick a TV and to my father's to pick up some spot
lamps and an easel for the setup. Most of the staff for the con was a
bring your own gear, kind of attitude, which was fine with me as long as
it didn't get burned in its use.

4pm I get lost on the perimiter. Only Georgians could know what kind of
hell that can be.

5:30pm I find my way to the North Central Mariott, the site of AWA3-97
and awa4-98. I begin to hook up with my staff director, Stan Dahlin, and
other figureheads for the con, including Lloyd Carter and Dave
Merril(whom didn't show up until 10:30pm that nite. he says he was
waiting for our guests at the airport. Yeah, right.) We scout the place,
and its bigger than out hilton of last year, and ALOT better than the
Castlegate from two years ago. The staff was nice, and we booked over
half of the rooms there for just preregistry.
Mariott is hoping we stay with them. We bring them money.
We kept setting up, organising the pre-registry packets, which are
incentives to pre-reg for next year; made badges, found videos, set up
audio, connected video games, organised security, helped dealers, and go
to know the people I'd be working with the next few days, including
Jingoro, and Badger.
Later- I found Casey in the head Operations room making badges with some
pals, Yuki and Lloyd. Surprisingly, Lloyd opened registration on
Thursday night. There was a good 20 people already there(no that's not
alot compared to other cons, but this isn't other cons.) After Lloyd got
setup, the U-haul carrying the REAL gear finally arrived. Just as the
cold front hit.
and the rain. Again. 
So in the cold, I and many others, including Keener, and Gordon were
hauling sensitive hi-fi equipment in a very hurried fashion from the
truck to the service entrance.
Did I mention it was cold? 28 degrees in Icey for Georgia. We were
expecting freezing rain and snow for the con. Not that getting snowed in
with a bunch of Otakus and their video collection would have been bad. .
.

uh, where was I?

Oh yeah.

10-11pm- dave merrill finally arrives with guests, including Bill Mayo,
Ed Hill, and special guests Toshifumi Yoshida of Viz, and Amy
Howard(voice of Nove from Starblazers, for those who remember.)
I figure, sure, I'm broke this year, but I'll meet cool people, and
hopefully have a good time. After Making sure all my gear had my name(s)
on it, I met back up with Casey and had a bunch of people meet eachother
that hadn't before. The staff was tired, cold, and wet, but with a good
nite's sleep in site, we were in good spirits. I even drew happy little
symbols on the white board in the Ops room.

with permanent marker. . .

Dave- "TJ! We like this hotel and you've already broken something!"

Went home, slept breifly. Looked at my computer (Was broken at the time
and still is.)

FRIDAY- let the games begin.

I ran the registration desk most of the afternoon with my pal Casey, and
the other staff, Marion. I arrived dressed as Manga Ranma.

You know, Black and White? I had a tough time braiding my hair so I had
to get some girl dressed as Sailor Moon (mercury?) to help me. Keener
sat in the art room most of the time as I passed through the halls, But
being in registration allowed me to meet a few people I had yet to. JD
Farber, and Zen also attended the AWA this year.

Mr. White Wolf said he was, but I never saw a Youngblood in the
registry. Is that his real, real name?

Anyways, After organising it a bit for everyone else how would do
registration after us, I set up a couple sign in sheets for us
Cybrespace people. I hope that sheet gets filled next year when I set up
the fanfic panel. . .
 At about 4pm I finally was relieved of duty to ride shotgun in a van
trip to our local Chinatown\shopping distric we call Lenox, and to a
Japanese book store at Iwase.
I hear on some of the other trips that I did not ride with that a couple
of Otakus tried to pick up the Japanese woman behind the register.

"Uh. huh huh huh. Hey, baby."

ANyway, everything was going swimingly, most of the panels starting on
time and the guests arriving steadily.

Then I lost my ring. It wasn't really my ring, it belonged to the
family. Its so misshapen that I have to take it off to restor
circulation. I was certain it fell out of my pocket at one of those
points. I was bummed most of the evening.

7:00pm Opening ceremonies. Dave and Lloyd got things going, Lloyd
announcing we're a 700 member con! woah! it was 200 the first year! Dave
formally presented our esteemed guests, Amy Howard, Toshifumi Yoshida,
Ed Hill, Carl Horn, Steve Bennette, Jingoro, Kuni Kimura, Lea Hernandez,
Bill Mayo, and many other people who you may not know, but have had
their noses in it for quite some time.
Then we announced the con standards:

No Klingons
No Vampires
and No Magic-to which we burned a Magic card as sacrifce to the gods,
hoping this con would be bountiful.

Setting up the audio gear for the whole thing proved to be painless with
Gordon overseeing it, so everybody actually heard him this year. (at
least, those who were sober and tried to.)
I swear there was one guy in the bathroom about 8pm who was already
smashed. He kept calling me Commodore. Some people. . .

Immediately after the Opening ceremonies was the Karaoke feat. I tried
to help set up the Karaoke gear, but I lacked alot of the wiring. Again,
Gordon was needed. So I left to tell everyone about it while they did
the technical shtuff. When I got back, I tried to help keep people
interested in making asses of themselves by clapping and cat calls. It
didn;t work too well, but I had fun trying. I left the main hall for a
moment to check on Casey, in registry and then I heard my song.

"Ya pappa, ya pappa, ii shan ten. . ."

I flew back to the main hall to find a bunch of fan girls of SailorMoon
and Ranma (what else?) up on stage. Of course I jumped up with them, my
family ring now forgotten, having a jolly old time looking like an
idiot.

Following the Karaoke was the tradition from Dragon Con.

Japanese Animation Mell. . .uh Hell.
(The closed ciruit Marriot channel called it Mell. . .go figure.)
Lotsa weird shit in that, including the Han Solo Vs. Captain Harlock,
courtesey of Corn Pone Flicks. 
That lasted until after Casey and I left, Him driving since I got no
sleep.

SATURDAY

Whew! Unfortunately, the Master of Isshinryu, Uezu Angi, was touring
atlanta this morning. Sensei said, "GT's gone, your going to come." so I
did. I trained with the master for most of the morning and left directly
for that part of town to the convention. When I got there I met Amy
Howard personally.

Let me tell you, she was really great person. Most people I've met under
similar circumstances were real jack-asses about their history.

"Get away from me, fan boy! I don't want to remember that part of my
life!"

Not Amy, tho. Granted, she didn't know about Anime until June of this
year, but she was cutting up, running around and having a good old time.
She was really polite to everyone she spoke to(including myself) and was
generally having a ". . .Kick-ass time!" 

Again things were looking pretty good as I helped get the Living In
Japan panel goin`.
After that panel, I wanted to Talk to Toshifumi Yoshida, so I followed
him to ops, Where we chatted breifly. Casey was in there at the time and
he made fun of my braid (which was coming undone because the girl didn't
tie it tight enough.) I played with it a bit and said, "I need to find
those girls again. My braid need work."
I swear, without missing a beat, Toshi took my comb and hairband from my
hand and began braiding my hair. After about 8 seconds I feel a final
tug. "There," he said from behind be. I pull my hair in front of me and
its perfect, tight, neat. I looked at him in stupefaction and all he
said was, "I had to do the same for my sisters alot."

Toshifumi Yoshida from Viz Communications braided my Ranma pigtail.

Bitchin`.

I bowed really low whenever I saw him around the con for the rest of the
weekend.

Coming off of that high, I had a great and fun job ahead. The music
Video Contest, hosted by Jingoro, with me as aide. We had some really
great entries and replayed last year's winners.
Including titles:

Why me?- Mike and teh mechanics--NAUSICA
Super Charger Heaven- White Zombie--DEVIL MAN
I've got a girl- Tripping Daiseys--VARIOUS
I must increase my bust- Lords of Acid--VARIOUS 
whats new pussycat?- Tom Jones--VARIOUS
Dust In The Wind- Kansas--PLEASE SAVE MY EARTH!

and who could forget. . .

You alll wayys hurt <BANG>
The ones youuu love <CRUNCH!>

Then it was time for the constume contest to set up. A side note here- a
Television crew working for a Japanese brodcaster from Japan was there
to film our cos-play and contest. In exchange for seing strange Gaijin
cosplaying anime, AWA got rights to use the videos for any purpose we
need it.
I myself didn't appear in the cotume contest, I was too busy trying to
make sure they had everything they needed. When they didn't need me, I
was MST3K ing the acts next to Keener.

We had 44 entries making in over 2 hrs long. among the cooler ones were:

A mirage night at 8'7"
4 Akane's (one male)
A Lupin, and a Rupan- (watch the video)
Terry Bogard
A Cabbit- (Boy she was obnoxious)
A girl doing Tora (most excellent, she fingered the mike and sniffed an
everything.)
Iria- took grand prize
a very good Tifa Lockheart
Rei- who did this bitchin monologue
The guy from Tank Police also did a monologue
And a Porco Rosso. . .

"If God gives you the face of a dog. . . If God gives you the face of a
pig. . .Live life. . .

	. . . and kick ass."

Also was a Shinji, Nick Baka again as Totoro Hunter D, The Armitage
Chick made an appearance again this year, adding a bit more cleavage in
her age. Also an Overfiend (ugh) a Lum, a Ryouga (who also did well),
Many sailors, a most excellent fight between Fuu of MKR and Pretty
Sammi. a big skit which involved Toshifumi- entitled, "What if John Woo
directed anime?" Ho yon phat was his part, (is that how you spell it?)
Anyways, there were alot I didn't mention and we all had fun. It took a
long time for the judges to deliberate so they got all of the Costumers
up on the stage for pictures, including me. 
We were cutting up as we got flashbulb burn when someone picked my
pocket.
On the stage.
In front of about 300 people.
He picked my pocket.
Of course I felt him invade my ki and I seized his arm with a few
pressure point grabs and before I even said anything he started shaking
his head. "no, no!"

Like I said, I went to the con broke so he didn;t get anything out of
me.

Had there not been a large crowd of small girls having a good time, I
would not have hesitated in throwing him off the stage and out the
emergency exit. However, it is my experience that people can be slow
witted when a fight evolves and not be able to get out of the way of it
so I just held on to his arm until we started clearing the stage. I let
him go and saw my wallet strung on the floor along with my staff badge,
so he got rid of it quickly. He was Dressed as Larva so I didn't get a
look at his face, but he registered to be in the constume contest, so I
just flipped through the registration sheets. Later at the con, I was
talking with Joe and he knew exactly who I was speaking of without
hesitation. It turns out he was involved in a major plotted theft of
JACO's(florida anime club) equipment some time ago, lotsa vcrs and tapes
and the like. All I knew was if I bumped into him again during the con,
then he was coming outside with me and Casey. Joe told me as soon as he
cheked the tapes that if he can, he will ban the boy from AWA. 
Go Joe.
Dave pulled me in front of the whole costume contest audience and told
them what happened to me over the course of the con.

"Some chincy guy picked TJ's pocket. Didn't you already lose something?"

"Yeah my ring."

"Are you just like, destined for bad luck? And why are you still
smiling?"

"I dunno, but I'm still smiling."

"Now here's a fan-boy for you."

after the contest, I had dinner at a waffle house. Not the one on the
near side of the freeway, the far side. I went with Keener, Wayne, JD,
and Zen and had the most intersting guy named Mario serving us. I
intended on crashing with Keener, having been up since thursday, I was
still in no condition to drive, and Casey left already. I crashed with
them for about 3 hours before I finally took of to check on Sissy at
home about 6am. . .

SUNDAY

I picked up Casey that morning and the first thing I did was talk to the
Resin Kit Modlers on how to get started.
http://www.gremlins.com
Check out this link if you ever get into this sort of thing.
Sunday was pretty much everybody coming together to say good-bye at
various points in the day. The dealers packing up, the closing
ceremonies, etc.

One most excellent note. . .In the anime KEY there was an episode where
a mass crowd chanted KEY over and over again, and it wasn't computer
generated. A small theatre full of people watching some anime were
recorded chanting that.
As you all might know, KEY is being published by VIZ in the states.
Another series of Chanting KEY was needed, and Toshi had AWA do it.
We'll be mentioned in the credits for KEY.

Cool.

As we were dismantling everything, the video rooms, the video game
rooms, the dance and audio equipment, I got to speak at length with Amy
Howard. She was moving along and having a great time even as we were
taking down everything. She mentioned that she would be trying to get
back into voice dubbing after having been inspired by AWA attendance,
and she plans to be a regular attender in the years to come.

She also told me after about 10 minutes of conversation that I should
really look into a voice acting career. Whoa, me dubbing. What a
concept.

Everybody of the staff was planning on heading to our Downtown Japanese
dive to hang out for a while. 
A place called Yakitori Den-Chan's.
Think like Okonomiyaki U-chan's- except Den-chan is a white guy named
Dennis. He's also a great guy who loves anime and AWA and we brought him
loads of customers during the con.

I looked around at the hotel ball rooms where the Hotel staff was just
beginning to clean-up the mess we made, the light's set low because of
the lateness. People yawning and carrying their luggage away. Our boys
putting the stereo gear back on the U-haul (no rain on sunday).

I just stepped back- First ones to arrive and the last ones to leave. It
felt good to have been a part of something. I glanced at the lobby at
the piano as some girl was casually playing "Walkin' in Memphis." I held
the cd's that a few of my cyber friends very kindly bought me from the
dealer's room, and thought of how cool my friends were. My ring turned
up later in the wash, all nice and shiny. I realised something. The most
important part of the entire weekend.

I met a girl.

In a Fuku.

Who was Japanese.

GT, better watch your back, I may be hot on your heels.

_______________________________

TJ-
Colliding SYmphonies
_______________________________

PS-1 a fanfiction panel will be organised next year at AWA, and I may be
a part in its planning.
-2 preregistry began on monday, and you can save as much as $15 if you
register now for next year. (more money to spend in dealers room) You
also get the benefit of not waiting in line with the people who walk in
off of the street and get your badge immediately.
-3 a making music video panel will be arranged for next year