Before I say anything else, I want to make a full disclosure: I am not what you would call a true fan of steampunk. I find it very hard to explain to other people: it's not any one particular work that one is a fan of, nor is it only a fashion choice like Elegant Gothic Lolita (although I know some lolitas do try to incorporate it into their lifestyle). I've heard it explained that it's like an alternate history if the industrial revolution had never happened, but none of this really explains exactly what fans of steampunk are fans OF. For my part, I find the fashions and the entire aesthetic beyond gorgeous, but I have a limited budget and my first choice is always going to be anime and manga.

My trip out was amazingly smooth, and the only bobble was my fault: my cell phone has developed this annoying habit of jumping out of my jacket pocket when I get out of a car. As I started to check my baggage with Delta outside of the terminal, I realized it was missing, but my cab had already left. However, the guys at the baggage check were AMAZING: one guy used his smartphone to look up the number of the cab company I used (I don't know it by heart, because I have it stored in my phone), another guy tried calling my cell phone to see if the driver would hear it ring. Eventually we got through to my cab company, and the driver was already on his way back to drop off my phone. Crisis averted! (And let this be a lesson to ALWAYS leave more time than you think you need to get to any location!)

I hadn't been to LaGuardia Airport in two years, and they have UPGRADED! It was amazing: the waiting area featured bar stools set up at a long, high counter, and at every "station", there was a free outlet to charge the electronic device of your choice, and an iPad that had free internet on it, as well as the ability to order food from the various vendors within the airport to be delivered right to your seat, AND if you entered your destination, it displayed your flight status at the bottom of the screen at all times. I can't even imagine what the first class people must have!

It's funny; even though I had only been there once before, the Denver airport seemed as familiar to me as if I had been there only a week ago, and I was able to get my bag and get on the Super Shuttle with no problem. Once again I was mesmerized by the view on the drive to the hotel; I don't know how this works, but they have so much more...sky...than we do. I don't even mean horizontally, I mean vertically: when I landed in Denver, there was a vast expanse of blue sky...then above that, some white, fluffy clouds...then above that more blue sky...then above that, the sun was shining. I don't know how they fit it all in there, but it was glorious.

Because I can only take one day off of work and I can only afford two nights in a hotel, generally speaking I always start my journey to the convention center on Friday morning. This saves me money, but it usually also means that I miss a good deal of the con that day. However, in this case I lucked out: the Dealer's Room only opened at 4 PM, and they were only allowing vendors in to set up at 3 PM, so for once, I wasn't going to miss anything! (Well, not much.)

Before long, I had entered the Marriott Denver Tech Center--also familiar to me, because of Nan Desu Kan--and made my way up to the second floor and our hotel room. I knocked, the door entered, and the next thing I knew, I was enfolded in the arms of my girls. Nothing, absolutely nothing, beats the first moment you see your friends at a convention. Absolutely nothing.

As we started to unpack, the girls had a surprise for me: a beautiful necklace they had banded together to make. Koi had made the beaded part, and Patti and Steph had made the pendant that hung from it. They, and the rest of the girls of Last Chance Myu, knew that I had been going through a tough time recently, and wanted to give me something that I could keep with me to remind me that I have more love and support than I realize. It's an absolutely gorgeous necklace, one that I wore every time we were out of costume, and incorporated into my costume on Sunday. I really am truly blessed.

Since we had a little time, and I'm more or less used to regular meals, we decided to hop on down to the Starbucks located on the ground floor of the hotel for lunch. I'm going to spare you the details of our lunchtime conversation, I just feel bad we couldn't spare the Starbucks staff. We may have requested turkeys at some point, and not been able to tell the difference between "two" and "three". Also, one of us was filled with something which may put you off your appetite. But it felt good to laugh so much and for so long.

We headed back up to the room after that, but had just enough time to unpack and catch up a little when it was time to head down to the Dealer's Room to set up our booth. When we got down to the hallway outside of the Dealer's Room, we found most vendors were waiting their turn to be called in, sitting on the couches or resting against their wares (some people had GIANT boxes of merchandise!) At first we were a little nervous about having to wait, but staggering the vendors made sure that there were no traffic jams (or accidents) at the entrance (there was only one), and that everyone was at different stages of set-up, so you didn't have tables knocking into each other and what have you. Plus, the con staff had already used masking tape to mark out your spot, so you knew exactly how much space you had and where its borders were.

I tried my hardest to help set up, but unfortunately I was not as helpful as I would have liked to be: Patti, Steph, and Koi had set up the neat little wire cages (for lack of a better term) that displayed their wares many times before, so the best I could do was separate the pieces with the big holes from the pieces with the small holes. But they built a really neat display from all of the pieces despite my all-thumbed help, and that's when I learned that the building isn't really the heavy work of the setup; the display is. When you have forty rings, thirty necklaces, twenty vests, ten hats, and a wide variety of other accessories, how DO you display them so that every piece is exhibited, and no one piece is accidentally hiding another? This is when the girls' artistic eyes really came into play, and by the time they were done the entire table looked absolutely gorgeous.

After setting up, we decided to take turns running up to the room and getting into costume (Steph, being the brightest of the bunch, had gotten into costume that morning.) Patti and I went up first, and I tried my best to recreate the look I had put together for Hime-chan's wedding three years prior, while Patti got into her engineer girl ensemble. Let me just state for the record that Patti looks absolutely adorable in little engineer caps and I think she should wear them at *least* once a week. So let it be written, so let it be done. It didn't take us too long to get ready, and we went back downstairs to give Steph and Koi a break.

As we were setting up, some members of the staff stopped by to introduce themselves, in case we needed anything during the weekend. They were wearing sashes to identify themselves as staff members, which I think is a fantastic idea--they were instantly identifiable, in some way even more than a staff T-shirt would be, as even a brightly colored T-shirt can get lost in a sea of other T-shirts. The first guys we met were Justin, who was in charge of the Dealer's Room, and Andrew, who was part of Security. This was the beginning of a streak of very nice and helpful people we met at the convention, and also of a tradition of mustache bombing. More on that later...

Now, I've said before from a customer's point of view that Fridays can be pretty slow, especially from the Dealer's Room: I myself have a personal guideline not to buy anything on the first day, unless it's one of a kind and I absolutely HAVE to have it. For the first time, I found myself cursing that rule. I've never really worked retail before, unless you count the month or so that I helped out at The Kimono House in SoHo, which I don't, because it felt more like I was getting lessons in Japanese culture while being permitted to admire kimono and beautiful accessories, and once in a while a customer would come in. Now, the sales felt even more personal, and more than anything I wished I knew how to drum up business. I stood next to the booth and smiled at people a lot. That was about the best I could do.

In between sales, we also took turns checking out the other booths, not so much to size up the competition, but we had money burning in our wallets, too! There were SO many cool vendors there, with such a variety of wares; besides accessories similar to the ones we were selling, there were also crayon bandoliers, custom tea mixes, homemade beauty products, loose bags of gemstones…just, an incredible variety. Steph and Koi went first after Patti and I had run upstairs to do our costume change, but we got to take a turn not long before the Dealer's Room closed for the night. I had to work hard to obey my own guideline!

By 8 PM, the Dealer's Room was shutting down for the day, so we covered up our wares for the night, grabbed our personal effects, and boogied upstairs to get out of our costumes so we could go grab dinner comfortably and without scaring the locals. Opera length gloves may look very nice and all, but they're incredibly difficult to eat with (as I learned at my Sweet Sixteen.)

The girls had suggested we go to India Tavern for dinner, and had even sent me an online menu beforehand when they heard I had never tried Indian food. My personal axiom is that I'll try anything twice (the first time, the shock of the unfamiliar keeps you from getting an authentic taste, so you gotta have that second bite!), and when I saw it was served with bread, I was good. I can make a meal of bread. I'm not usually a food person, but the deep-fried vegetable fritters Koi and I split as an appetizer, and the roasted cheese appetizer Steph and Patti let us try, was amazingly good.

The main course was very different from what I was expecting: I ordered saag paneer, expecting it to be, you know, chunks of cheese, and I forget what everyone else ordered, and then the waiter brought out…four bowls of soup. And a huge plate of rice. And you're supposed to spoon your entrée-soup over the rice. And it ended up being DELICIOUS. Again, very different from what I was expecting, but totally worth it.

Oh, and nan? Ambrosia of the GODS. I could eat my weight in nan, no kidding.

After we were comfortably full, we decided to head back to the hotel, and after depositing our stuff in our room, swing by The Lift Restaurant and Lounge, the bar located right in the atrium. As most steampunk "characters" are based on pirates, cowboys, and other seekers of fortune, there were far more (mannerly) people in costume than usual indulging in libations. Koi had been telling me about Colorado Bulldogs, which is made with vodka, Kahlua, milk, and soda, and the functioning alcoholic in me just had to have one. I bought the first round as per Heinlein's Law ("always buy the first round; the party never gets smaller"), and we toasted our first day of AnomalyCon.

As we were toasting, I accidentally caught the eye of a guy sitting a few tables away from us, and included him in my raised glass. He made our way over to our table, and turned out to be a friend of Koi's! Scott ended up talking to us and telling us stories for at least a good half an hour, and I don't think it was the alcohol that had us all laughing hysterically, helpless in our seats. The man is an absolute maniac, but an uproariously funny one.

I was a good girl and I stopped after the one drink, primarily because I was still running on East Coast time, and because I knew we had a long day ahead of us on Saturday. We said good night to Scott, closed our tab, and headed up to our hotel room. Koi gave me one of her melatonin pills, and though I tried to stay up while she showed me pictures of her ADORABLE kitty (seriously, her cat has one of the most expressive faces I've ever seen), I think I was asleep within five minutes.