My friend Jenny met us at my house around 10 AM.

So, although Jenny makes costumes for others, this was her first time cosplaying (unless you count the time she wore her Chun Li costume--that she later gave to me!--to the Halloween Parade in the Village). She made a manga Sailor Mercury costume in ONE WEEK. This is not like the time Lou and I made him a Zell costume the week before the con. This costume looked STUNNING on her. I had bought her a blue wig two Christmases ago, and she had bought herself a metal tiara and Mercury earrings at the con the day before from Catzia's Collectibles. (She and Usagi Seion are on summer vacation, so they actually went to AnimeNEXT on Friday as well, though not in costume.)

Since here was a perfectly good con badge that was going to go to waste anyway, I was Oshidori the rest of the day. :) (I felt a little sad that I wouldn't be able to wear "SunseenLi" or "Crissy" around my neck, but, hey, most people recognize me by face anyway.)

Of course, poor Louis was still stuck in line, so Jenny and I kept him company.

It's a good thing we did, too, because as we got closer to the end, who should appear but Ender!

Seeing there was a line for food right in the lobby (great idea, whoever thought that up--much easier then trying to leave the hotel to find food nearby) Lou and Jenny decided to grab a bite to eat. The lobby was understandably a high traffic area, so while they sat down and ate I got to grab photos with a lot of different cosplayers. I got to see Kelly again, who was a COMPLETELY sexy Draco, and I take back everything I ever said about Harry and Draco yaoi being really wrong. I still stand by my protest of Albus and Harry pr0n though. That's just SICK.

I also got to glomp two Sephiroths and a Cloud. No Terry Bogards, though. Weep.

The overall quality of the costumes was outstanding. Even though I had a digital camera (well, I had Lou's) for the first time this year, and didn't need to worry about film, we were trying to conserve because 1) his battery was already dying, so we were turning the camera on and off for every picture and 2) his memory card only holds around 100 photos or so. So, much like last year, I mostly photographed the characters I recognized and loved, and occasionally a really exception costume I didn't know.

Of course, there were one or two costume shots I missed that I sorely regret. Someone did a lovely Dark Chii (or Freya, if you prefer) costume, the one where she's wearing a frame of a skirt, rather then a skirt. That's a personal favorite of mine, and I always hoped to see it cosplayed. I'm sorry I didn't get to photograph her personally.

I also noticed that non-anime costumes are becoming much more accepted then they used to be. The Michaelangelo I photographed above was really stretching it...but you've just got to respect such a well done costume. And GIR was beloved by all (I've noticed a lot of anime fans enjoy Invader Zim at any rate.)

I met up with some of the other members of NYO!, including Carrie and Chris, and we started to leave to take a group NYO! shot. Before I could reach them, however, I saw a Michiru cosplayer (who I had met last year as Eternal Sailor Uranus), and then I noticed a Sailor Star Healer cosplayer I just HAD to photograph, and by the time I was done, I had lost my group, and didn't know where they had went. So, I missed out on the NYO! AnimeNEXT shot, dammit. Oh, well. There's always Otakon.

Many photos were taken in the lobby, both Sailor Moon group shots (we met up with the three Sailor Senshi we had met outside, and then I got to meet Rhi, who is really awesome and an absolutely adorable Small Lady) and of other cosplayers, so by this point Lou was getting a little bored. He really wanted to check out the dealer's room, so we decided, "No more photos!...unless they're Sailor Senshi" and started on our way there.

For example, on the way to the dealer's room, in the hallway, there were two con staff members, one our left, one on our right. The hallway was pretty full of traffic, obviously, so we were trying to weave our way through. At this point, the guy on the right yells out something to the effect of, "YOU CANNOT PASS CON STAFF!" Uh...excuse me? We're supposed to teleport past you, maybe? Apparently he meant we were never supposed to pass con staff on the left (which I had just done, to the guy on my left) but, 1) you didn't really make that clear and 2) what a weird rule! Getting a tad bit nit-picky there, aren't you?

However, the worst was yet to come.

Lou and Jenny had stayed (more or less) close to the wall as the line moved along, and I had stood with them mostly, but had popped off of my spot (still keeping myself more or less parallel to Lou and Jen) to take photos with Sailor Flare, and to meet Sailor Mo, who I had added to Sailor Moon Avatars many years ago but never had the pleasure of meeting. Now, as Lou and Jenny moved into the dealer's room, I called a quick goodbye to Mo and her friends, as they had already shopped, and hurried after Lou and Jen.

And almost barreled over the suddenly outstretched arm of a con staffer.

"Back of the line!"

"What?"

"You got off the line, you have to start from the back again!"

I paused, absolutely dumbfounded. I mean, usually, I'm a stickler for rules and regulations, they're all that keep a con from becoming chaos. But, uh, I kind of WAS on the line. Moreover, there weren't any signs I could see that said you had to keep up against the wall to be considered on the line.

Oh, I admit it's possible I didn't see the signs--but if that's so, this is a pretty big rule, and there should've been a BIG HONKING SIGN to match. Plus, I'm being overly fair. I really don't think there were any signs.

Torn, I almost decided to go to the back of the line anyway, even though I had no clue how long it was, and it would mean being completely on my own, as Lou and Jenny were already inside.

However, for the second time that day, my con experience was saved by the kindness of others.

Sailor Mo and her friends noticed what was going on, and came back to help me.

"She's with us," her friend in the catboy costume said.

"I don't care, she has to get on line," the other staffer said (or something along those lines.)

"You don't want to do this," Mo said.

I believe at that point the con staffer called for help on her walkie-talkie, but Mo just breezed past her and motioned for me to follow. I hesitated, and then followed after. Hey, I might like rules and all, but I like Sailor Mo a lot more. :)

At this point, I was staring at the guy in the kitty boy costume. He just looked so darn familiar, but I wasn't quite sure how. "Can I see your badge?" I asked him. He nodded, so I grabbed the badge dangling from his waist and read it.

And promptly had a heart attack.

Those were more innocent times. Back before eBay had us sending our home addresses to complete strangers just to own a burned-to-VCD copy of the Corey Haim's Video Diary (don't ask) we were much more careful about who we met, and indeed who knew our real names.

Krystal was one of the few people I decided I wanted to meet someday. (The others were Hime-chan, my sister site-owner, who I thankfully have gotten to spend a few weekends with, and the other is my costume maker, Setsuna Kou, who unfortunately I have not had the pleasure of meeting in person yet.) To run into her, and so unexpectedly, was a dream come true for me. I leapt into her arms, and promptly forgot my friends for at least a good 15 minutes hugging her and saying, "I can't believe it's you!" over and over again.

I barely even got any time to look around the dealer's room. In all honesty, there is little there I'd want that I can't get at Midtown comics. I'm not a fan of cels, there are few plushies I want (interesting note: I don't like human character plushies at all, but I desperately want a stuffed Ein from Cowboy Bebop, and a life size stuffed Kero-chan from Card Captor Sakura), and translated manga and subtitled anime are plentiful. It's a mark of the popularity anime has reached.

I had told every Sailor Moon cosplayer I had met up to that point to meet up in the main lobby at 5 PM so we could coordinate a massive Sailor Moon photoshoot, so before I knew it, it was time to leave the dealer's room, and pick up as many people as we could in the lobby.

Originally my intention was to have the photoshoot outside, where we could enjoy the lovely lawn and the natural lighting. However, it had gotten even windier, so we abandoned this plan.

David Ng, official photographer of Usa and myself, found us at this point, and suggested that, since outside was a no-go, we head up to the second floor where there were several places specifically set aside for photos, including Kevin Lillard's photo suite. This sounded like a good idea, so we waited only two more minutes or so to give people a chance to arrive, and then I, being the bossy senshi that I am, herded a group of at least 20 Sailor Moon cosplayers up the stairs.

We had a BALL. Right here I have to stop and say a special thank you to David Ng, of Ng-Master.com, and Kevin Lillard of A Fan's View, for enduring us, switching poses, calling more people over, and just generally taking what would be the digital equivalent of rolls upon rolls of film of us. All the pictures (which you can access from their websites) came out WONDERFULLY.

And we took such interesting shots!

Finally feeling bad over having manipulated so much of Kevin's time, we decided to move on. David mentioned there was a lovely sunlight hallway just up ahead, so we headed that way for, you guessed it, more photos.

The photos we took there came out particularly vibrant, I'm guessing because we had sunlight streaming in from behind us and on the side, without having actual sun glare. Once again, only the goofy ones will end up on my con report page; the best ones will grace the "halls" of Avatars.

The rest of the con sort of petered out for me after that. We were all pretty hungry by this point, so we got some dinner at a deli-type place just outside of the hotel. The boys wanted to check out the games, so headed back to the con. Originally the girls were going to watch the cosplay, but seeing as how it was scheduled to begin at 8 PM, and Murphy's Law is always in high gear at a con, we knew if we did, we wouldn't be leaving New Jersey any time before midnight that night, so we all decided to go into the game room. I ended up having this epic battle of Puzzle Fighter with this little Asian girl.

I lost. I have never had a harder fought battle. I was honored.

We watched a DDR tournament and this guy was like amazing...a 333 combo on something on Hard, for a double A. I got to see B-chan, this really wonderful Anthy cosplayer I had met the very first day I went to BAAF and had a wonderful talk with. I remember B-chan helped fix my Mars tiara that very night...so, appropriately enough, I was wearing what I had been the very first time we met . (B-chan was too--I remember B being Anthy at BAAF in 2001.) I also got to meet B-chan's lovely girlfriend, the lady who was cosplaying Black Lady, and who I asked to join Avatars before she quietly informed me she already had. Oops. LOL. The perils of having over 260 cosplayers on your website...

At any rate, we left soon after that, exhausted but happy.