Goals For 2017

Image: colemanmediacenter.org

I don't do resolutions, I do goals. My goals last year were to get healthier (check!) and write more (kind of check).

For this year, it's more of the same. My main goal is to get a finished draft on my first novel so I can start figuring out querying to get an agent or if I want to self publish. All that good stuff on the road to becoming a published author.

Working on my health is an ongoing thing. I kind of fell off the exercising wagon at the end of the year. Once we got back from Disney World, things got so busy! So I need to go back to the gym more again.

Other than that, I also hope to have some new costumes for the cons I'll be going to this year. Tina from Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, Princess Leia (white dress and buns) and Anna from Frozen are all on my list.

Beyond that, I'm hoping that 2017 will be kinder than 2016!

Old TV and Gender Roles

Image: jimhalterman.com

Autumn is here! It's the time of year for cooler weather, changing leaves and watching my favorite Halloween themed shows.

Every year, I bring out my DVD of Roseanne Halloween episodes. I watched the show when it was on the air, but I don't really watch it anymore expect the Halloween episodes. I decided to watch a few of the first episodes the other night.

In the episode Trick or Treat, there are two different story lines. In one, Dan is very concerned that his son DJ wants to be a witch for Halloween because witches are girls. He struggles a lot with letting DJ dress how he wants.

In the other story line, Roseanne and Jackie's car breaks down on the way to the Haunted House put on by Dan's lodge. Roseanne is dressed up as a burly mountain man and the costume is good enough that even her friend thinks she's a man. She buddies up to the other men in the bar to see what men talk about when they are alone - it ends up being sex, sex and more sex.

Now Trick or Treat aired in 1990 and the world was not as enlightened as it is now. Roseanne being a sitcom usually doesn't get very heavy but it's nice to see them tackling gender stereotypes a bit.

The sex-crazed man bit got old quickly especially since they implied all men care about it getting laid. But the part about DJ wanting to wear a 'girl's' costume was much more interesting and has become more so since I became a parent.

Eventually Dan gets the advise that it's just a phase that DJ is going through. It's a bit of a cop out, but not surprising for the time period.

This year, Emily wants to be a Ninja for Halloween. She also wants a Ninja birthday party for her 6th birthday. A lot of her interests are 'boy' stuff - it makes me crazy with gender descriptions on toys because she likes what she likes. I don't think her interests are just a phase, though they may change as she grows.

Not having do to with gender roles, I do find it odd to see Jackie and Roseanne having to use a payphone to call Dan after their car breaks down. Even though it's only been 24 years, it's hard to imagine a world without cell phones. At least if my daughter ever wants to watch these episodes with me, I can teach her something about the past!

Dragon Con Cospitality Lounge

Dragon Con is only a couple of weeks away. Lots of excitement on social media as the con gets closer, but there was an announcement yesterday that has gotten a mixed reaction.

The 10th floor of the Marriott is a large open space that has traditionally not been used by the con. It has over the years become one of the most popular places to do meetups and have photoshoots. The only time I've ever been up there was for a BPAL meet & sniff my first Dragon Con ever.

But this year it's being turned into a cosplay rest area where no photography is allowed. The Cospitality Lounge, as they are calling it, is being hosted by Riot Games. I like this idea as a place were cosplayers can go and rest or do repairs. But I never really used the 10th floor before so I'm not losing anything.

I can understand why people who use that area are upset though. It's two weeks before the con and a lot of the cosplay photoshoots have already made arrangements. Now they have to scramble to try and find another area that won't be too crowded and big enough to contain a cosplay group. I've actually never done a photoshoot - but I've seen pictures and they can be large gatherings.

Hopefully those groups will find places to go and hopefully the cosplay area is pretty cool!

Goals for 2014

Now that Christmas is over with, thoughts turn to the new year that is almost upon us. I’m really hoping that 2014 is better than 2013. This year had a lot of down moments though the bright spot was Disney. Next year, we are hoping to have fewer issues and just save in case anything comes up.

A lot of people make resolutions for the new year, but I prefer to think that these are goals. The theme of my goals for 2014 is to finish all the things. I have a lot of unfinished projects and I’d like to get them done.

The first one is finish the 2nd draft of my novel. I’ve been finding it hard to find time to write. I work in the morning and then after work I often feel drained because of my chronic pain. But I really need to make time to finish this novel if I ever want to be published.

The second is to finish Emily’s cross stitch Christmas stocking. It’s one of the biggest cross stitch projects I’ve done and I’m a bit sad that I didn’t finish it in time for this Christmas. But I now have plenty of time to get it finished. I do hope to have it finished early in the year because I have three costumes I want to make for this year’s convention season.

The third is finish Couch to 5K. This one may prove to be the hardest. I’ll run and get pretty far though but often I’ll have a pain flare and end up too sick to do anything but work and take care of Emily. Our tree is where the treadmill is so I haven’t run in quite a while. As soon as we take the tree down next week, I’m starting from the beginning and really going to try to get through the program all the way this time.

These are my main goals for 2014. There are other things I want to accomplish like making three different costumes and organizing my office. But these three things are a holdover from 2013 (and before) and I’d like to be able to move forward.

Happy Halloween!

I'm in the middle, dressed as Annie

Halloween has always been one of my favorite holidays. When I was a kid, there was nothing better than getting dressed up and going trick or treating. I never outgrew loving costumes though as I got older I started enjoying the spookier parts of Halloween, like horror films.

Tonight we’ll be taking Emily out trick or treating at the mall. She’ll be dressed up as Sophia the First and I’ll be wearing my American McGee’s Alice costume. Once she’s in bed, Todd and I will probably watch a scary movie.

I hope everyone has a safe and spooky Halloween!

Disney, Characters and Cosplay

I love the Disney characters. Even though we were both adults, I made reservations for character dining on our Disney Honeymoon. It was such fun to meet Pooh and Minnie Mouse as well as others. But we didn't stand in line to meet any of the characters.

Since this trip will be for Emily, I know we’ll be waiting in line for some characters. I do have two character dining reservations, one for Chef Mickey’s on our first night so Emily can meet the big cheese right away. While the Disney characters are usually well done, it’s pretty much just paid cosplay.

Dragon Con Jack and Sally

We attend Dragon Con every year and the costumes there are usually some of the best at any con. There are always a bunch of Disney cosplayers, which includes me since I cosplay as Snow White. This year while we were waiting for a panel to start, I saw a couple cosplaying as Jack and Sally from Nightmare Before

Christmas. Their costumes were wonderful!

I’m planning on attending the Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party this year, and I was excited to hear that Jack and Sally were going to be doing meet and greets at the party. I was excited, until I saw the picture of the characters. Sally is ok, but the Jack’s head is really misshapen. The cosplayers at Dragon Con did a much better job than Disney! Now I’m not going to bother waiting in line for several hours to meet Jack and Sally.

Image: http://disneyparks.disney.go.com/blog

The meet and greet wait times can be insane for some characters especially for special events. For Friday the 13^th yesterday there was a Villains event at Disney’s Hollywood Studios. People crushed into the park to get a chance to meet some of their favorite villains. A person in my October trip group on Facebook tried to get the Studios but apparently the traffic was backed up all the way out of Disney’s property!

I follow some Disney bloggers and at least one was able to get in. Kenny the Pirate runs a wonderful blog and has a great app that helps you find and meet characters at Disney World. He tweeted last night that he waited 3 ½ hours to meet Oogie Boogie from Nightmare Before Christmas. Other villains had wait times that were an hour or more. I didn't wait more than an hour and a half to see Patrick Stewart speak at Dragon Con – I just can’t imagine waiting 3 and ½ hours for a quick meet and greet with someone who is basically a cosplayer.

I waited about 3 1/2 hrs for Oogie
— kennythepirate.com (@kennypirate) September 14, 2013

I am looking forward to doing some meet and greets for Emily. And I’d probably wait 3 and ½ hours to meet Sophia the First since Emily loves her. But I hope we don’t have to. We have Magic Bands and I've been trying to fiddle with Fastpass +, and I've been picking a lot of characters meetups just so we can free up some time for some rides.

The Tale of a Fat Cosplayer

Me as American McGee's Alice

As a child, I loved Halloween and being in plays in part because of the costumes. I never grew out of wanting to dress up and pretending so it’s a very good thing I’m a geek. But I've also never been skinny at all. As I got older, I got wider for a variety of reasons. I try to exercise as much as I can, but chronic pain issues can get in the way. Despite this, I still cosplay.

I am a fat cosplayer.

My husband and I have been watching Heroes of Cosplay on SyFy. We both like the show because the costumes are beautiful. But it seems like there is a lot of focus put on perfection and less on the fun. In the first episode, it showed one of the cosplayers freaking out because she had gained some weight. In the second episode, a newbie to cosplay competitions said that she thought anyone should cosplay what they wanted. She got looks from the experienced cosplayers like she was crazy. One said that if someone is going to be 300 lbs. and cosplay, they are going to get negative comments.

I've been cosplaying on and off for about 15 years. I've never been skinny but I've never gotten negative comments before. Even if I did, I probably would just ignore it because I love cosplaying. Now I do try to pick costumes that won’t make me look fatter than I am. I never wear skin tight or skin showing costumes because I wouldn't be comfortable and it wouldn't look good.

Cosplaying is fun and that’s why I do it. Even though I’m overweight, I’m going to keep cosplaying. I already have all my costumes planned for Dragon Con and I’ll be walking in the parade again. I'll also be admiring everyone else's costumes - fat or thin.

Dragon Con Nightmare

My missing costume

This year’s Dragon Con will be the 7th one I've attended. I've had many Dragon Con dreams over the years, but last night I had my first Dragon Con nightmare.

It was the Friday of the con, and we were running late. I couldn't find the costume I wanted to wear that day so I just threw on this blue sleeveless dress that was handmade and looked like crap. Once we got down to the con, I went to another panel at 10 am, forgetting for a moment that I was supposed to be a panelist on another panel.

I got to my panel a few minutes late and there was hardly no-one attending. The other panelists and I talked about Disney stuff, but soon we were alone as the people left. It was sad.

Todd was at the con, but so were several members of my family. Some that wouldn't ever attend something like Dragon Con in real life. My dad was there too, and he actually came to Dragon Con a few years ago in real life. It was just odd.

After the failure of the panel, I decided I looked awful in the blue dress and I needed to go home to change. I looked for Todd all over the con and finally found him pouting because he didn't have any money to spend. We were leaving the con together when my alarm went off.

I think my mind was stressing over the fact that I can’t find one of my costumes in real life. It’s somewhere in the mess that is my office. I thought I had plenty of time, but yesterday I realized that there is only two weeks until the con.

To keep from having another nightmare, I really hope I can find my costume today!

In Praise of Cosplayers

Emily and I as Snow White

It seems like after ever major convention there is a post that appears on the internet that makes fun of cosplayers. I’m not sure why people feel the need to do this. But I do know why I love cosplaying and why I’ll continue to do it, even if I end up being made fun of on the internet.

My love of costumes go way back to when I was a child. Halloween has always been my favorite holiday, partly because of being able to dress up in costumes. As I grew up, I discovered anime conventions. As I started to attend these cons, my love of costumes resurfaced. It is always so fun to put on a costume and pretend to be a famous character. My favorite costumes at the anime conventions were the ones from the Final Fantasy games. I even had a Summoner Yuna costume that is one of my only costumes I still have from my anime days.

I’m not the best at sewing, but I don’t let that stop me. For some of my costumes, like my Kaylee costume from the pilot of Firefly, I was able to just find the clothing items I needed. When I wanted to do Kaylee’s dress from the Firefly episode, Shindig, I had more of a challenge. But did I manage to come up with a plan to make this costume. I've worn it for several years now and it’s my favorite costume.

The vast majority of the feedback that I've gotten on my costumes is positive. I received a lot of positive comments on my Shindig dress last year at Dragon Con. It made me happy to know that other people enjoyed seeing it.

I also cosplayed as a Disney Princess last year at Dragon Con. I was Snow White because that was what my daughter wanted me to cosplay as when we marched in the parade. It was amazing to see small kids’ reactions to me. Their eyes would get wide as I waved at them in the parade. Those kids’ smiles made me feel like a real princess.

I generally talk to people in my geek groups about cosplay. But there are also several websites online, like cosplay.com, where you can connect with other cosplayers. This is a place where you can talk about costumes with people who love them as much as you do.

If you want to cosplay, I say go for it and ignore the bullies. It doesn't matter if you have the best costume or look just like that character. It just matters that you are having a good time.