On October 27 to 29 I had the chance to be with Mandi Gordon (my writer on Writer’s Block and editor for Dragon Run as well as my dear friend) in our very first american convention as sellers, Spooky Empire at the Hyatt Regency in Orlando.
We went as Kaliko Dragon, our joint effort (As hers alone is Dragon Crest, and mine… well, you’re here in Calico Chimera) and had a blast. We had Dream Keeper Robin 1 and 2, Dragon Run and the very first Writer’s Block compilation for sale, as well as a ton of brand new prints (seriously, the only “old” one was the Sugar Skull Horsemen, that is still available in Mexico through my Calico Chimera store and will be available for everywhere else soon at the Kaliko Dragon store)
Now, Spooky Empire is a convention specialized in horror. So I wasn’t quite sure of how things would work and a bit nervous. Still, Mandi didn’t need to pull me out from under the table at any time and I even go to the Celebrity autograph hall on Sunday without being poked too hard by her so that was a win against my usual anxiety. But people did like our stuff, and they were all very nice when talking to us. I saw a Ton of great cosplay, some of which I had never seen before -ok, so there was an overflow of Pennywises. That was to be expected. But they were great Pennywises. Funny thing about the Pennywises… at some point, they started to lose their balloons. So the roof of the Hyatt was filled with floating red balloons. Between that and the Freddy Krueger mannequin that I swore was moving on it’s own as every time I lifted my head was in a different position, the atmosphere was amazing (Later I found out that Mand asked the people with the mannequin to move it, just to freak me a bit. I loved that because it proved that I was right: it WAS moving)
We were joined by the amazing Amelia Poole, Harlequinarts (https://www.facebook.com/harlequinartscosplay ) as our official Janna, Horsewoman of War. And she was perfect! I am almost 90% sure she didn’t kill anyone or started some conflict at the times she didn’t have coffee, but trust me, Mandi and I could have a full spinoff Janna strip with all the hijinks going around. You can check her page for more pictures, but at the end of the post you can see some (she still won’t tell me how she got those red balloons).
I could only see Richard Dreyfuss from afar (he had a TON of people all the time), and didn’t have the chance to see John Cusack, Molly Ringwald or Anthony Michael Hall. Fairuza Balk looks JUST as she did in The Craft, I swear (I also saw her from a distance). On the other hand, Eileen Dietz is a great lady, really funny, and Ken Foree already had me as a fan for life, now even more so. John Kassir was really fun, and, to my eternal glee, Jamison Newlander bought Writer’s Block! That made my day. I also had the chance to say hi to Jaeden Lieberher, Wyatt Oleff, Jeremy Ray Taylor and Sophia Lillis. All of them were amazingly professional -still staying long past the time they were supposed to sign autographs in order to accommodate everyone-, and really nice.
All in all, I loved the experience and can’t wait to go back to Orlando again. Florida man stories aside, everyone was really nice and welcoming! So if you’re a fan of horror, definitively hit the May edition of Spooky. Can’t promise Kaliko Dragon and Calico Chimera will be there -as we’re totally doing Conque in Mexico- but I can assure you you will have fun.
(BTW, all the pictures taken with an obviously better camera and an obviously better photographer were taken by Mandi Gordon)
The Pennywise Parade…
And now… some fun with Janna
