Memorabilia@theNEC or Geekfest2003

Memorabilia@theNEC or Geekfest2003

"I'll just pop over here and get my wookie signed".
Which is the kind of thing is overheard fairly often at sci/toy/memorabila/nerd conventions.
Which is where I was at the weekend
Which is handy as thats what todays blog is about

I was at , to give it its full title
Memorabilia@theNEC'03
Or as I refered to it in the pub the night before:Geekfest2003
A friend of my Girlfriend is a collector of all things Starwars related , and has been at a fair few of these before.So knowing I knew my stormtroopers from my sny Snootles, he recommended myself and heself went.
Now I love my SciFi , but I had a bad experience at a star trek convention in Wynns hotel a few years back (in that I went to a star trek convention in Wynns hotel), so I was a bit worried.
Thankfully the cringe factor wasnt too bad, yes there were strange people in home made uniforms , a forlorn looking bloke pushing a leaky dalek about , but it was actually fairly cool. On the way in there were the usual out of work actors dressed as vader and stormtroopers .These are kind of like those guys dressed as Mickey and Goofy in Disneyland , except for nerds, it feels very similar.
Only for some very shaky social barriers you wouldnt be able to move for happy geeks having their photo taken hugging Darth.
Anyway , getting inside the hall ( and to my RDS attending eyes its feckin' huge), things had the comforting look of a massive jumble sale , only with all the houseplants and minipops albums removed , and a massive donation of booty from forbidden planet.Also there was scattered around, a large amount of early eighties home computers and handhelds, which being the kind of guy I am gave me a warm and fuzzy feeling
Myself and herself circled the stalls a few times and eventually descended into an orgy.

What?

Sorry , wrong convention , we actually decended into an orgy of buying.The people working the stalls had same kindly manner as mental healthcare workers, theres possibly a parrallel here , I'm not sure.
I managed to nab a few star wars bits and bobs (tasteful stuff, the 12" talking Darth Vader is a work of art missus honest), a few transformers (seeing people 10 years my senior nearly welling to tears over getting a "jap-import-boxed-mint-Soundwave, with lazerbeak" made me feel more normal , well a bit ), oh and one of the tomy 3d games I mentioned in one of the earlier blogs (I love this ,but,God ! I can feel my eyesight going already).It occurred to me that I'd managed to buy a load of junk that I had gotten for Christmas as a kid, theres probably a fairly deep psychological reason for this, but I'll save that for my therapist.(I dont actually have a therapist , but I speak to my cat so I'll tell him and see what he comes up with , I dont think its working though as the best he's come out with for my rage issues is to make a kind of a ruaaarw noise then look to go out, still hes cheaper than the dog, anyway where was I ?)My Girlfriend nabbed a few bargains herself , best of all a singing christmas Homer , which , if it doesnt drive her workmates to a crazed mess by Xmas , means I owe her a tenner.
Refuelled on tea and limp sandwiches we met up with her workmate.
He's a really cool guy , and seems to know everyone there.
He's also a real collector , unlike myself who loves to paw his toys (oh-er) K. (no he's not from MIB, its his secret identity for this blog, anyway he'd probably think Mint-in-box first rather than men in black)is a keep it in the box and get another protective box to cover the first , kind of guy.
He has this great idea of getting star wars figures of whatever people are doing signings at the conventions and getting them to sign the boxes.
Now I'm not really into getting autographs , and I'm even less into it when you have to pay a tenner a pop per sign.It makes it kind of like prostitution.I'd no qualms about standing around gawking at them though , even if that gives it a bit like Zoo kind of feel .
I can tell you though that

a/ Tom Baker has snow white hair ,its that white
b/ the guy who played Jaws has a huge head
c/ the guy who plays the cat from red dwarf looks different in person
d/ theres a guy called derek who looks very,very,very,very,very,very much like Patrick Stewart.....But isnt.
e/ David Prowse does the letter D the same way I do (ok ok I make an exeception for autographs in his case as he's Darth Vader after all:))

There's a good bit more I could talk about , like the three hundred pound posters, wheelchair klingons ,skintight spiderman costumes "urrgh my eyes!!" ,asking a fat comic book guy look a like with a simpsons stall if he had a comic book guy figure :"no I do not", but I cant be arsed
Anyway after walking around some more we met a few of K's mates, who are nice people , did one more circuit and then made our excuses and left,we'd no money left at this stage and I'd kind of O'D on scifi.

On the way out I hugged a Stormtrooper, it was a good day.