Today marked the beginning of the Irish anime and manga convention which will be lasting until the end of Sunday afternoon. I avoided the anime screenings largely due to the fact I had already seen everything on offer. I did however attend the anime quiz which was based on music , image and general knowledge rounds. My team managed to come in third however unfortunately unlike last year there were only prizes for the team in first place.
It was amusing to see my brother in his trollplay and a male friend of mine dressed as saber from fate stay night.
Chances are I will probably only be going for the Saturday though but we shall see. In the end I didn't go through with any plans to cosplay myself.
I am hoping to pick up several things at this convention:
-Rozen maiden dolls
-Rozen maiden artbooks
-The pandora hearts artbook.
-At least one volume of fairy cube.

Other than that I have already done my Christmas shopping but am completely unsure of what I want when people ask me , its a difficult choice between hellblazer volume 2 , rozen maiden graphic novels,
sandman 1 , swamp thing 4 , Fables 1, 2, 3 or Alan Moore's from hell.

Update: In the end I was unable to acquirer anything on that list, I did however manage to purchase a code geass poster though. I chose not to buy any merchandise, manga or dvds available as I had already seen/read/owned many of what was available, some several times and I felt it was just unfair to purchase something that I had alreasy experienced and another may have not.
It was fun pointing out/spotting who all of the attendees were going as . I also enjoyed the cosplay show and am debating wheather I should go to the goth or maid show (on one hand I find this highly appealing but at the same time a bit demeaning of women so I am rather hesitant ). I got the chance to spend time with good friends of mine and was able to be closer to my brother . My favourite part of these events is not so much the screenings and items on sale but simply talking with other people there.
I made several compliments to the artists that were there which were thankfully well received. Funnily enough I saw two very young girls dressed up as rosario vampire characters which seemed as odd as it did inappropriate but the most peculiar of all was a little girl dressed up as Lucy from elfen lied. Other than that my ear is now temporarily infected due to careless showering and I've let it become stuffed with water, its hurts but it is getting better and my hearing isn't not as bad as yesterday though it plus my terrible eyesight really made the quiz on friday harder than it should have been.
I looked forward to simply trading humour with friends as is the usual when we meet up.
A few in our group went dressed as Resident evil characters .
The most awkward part of Saturday though was when I sat down to discuss comics and animation with a suigentou cosplayer and a friend of hers , she'd heard of Godchild , Kaori yuki , rozen maiden and the revolution of ludwig and seemed okay with yuri. To add to this she was one of those Naruto/yaoi fans that weren't biased or annoying as hell , she even had a reasonable view on the the whole subs/dubs thing acknowledging that not all dubs are bad and it depends on the show.
Though the awkward part came when I started to realize that I was getting very nervous around her, shy and blushing, it became evident I had a crush on her of sorts and nearly blurted out that I thought she was "very pretty". I was further concerned by the fact I felt genuinely creepy that I was keeping an eye out for the girl and kept approaching her and trying to think of something to strike up a conversation . Eventually at the end of the day a sorry sight, more so than I was as I was unknowing of my emotions while initially speaking with her managed to man up and tell her how I felt about the whole thing.
Embarrassed as I was I never even inquired about the girls name, details, e-mail/msn address. Quite unfairly and after the fact (that is after the attraction was realized I learnt a troublesome truth , there girl was only 14 or 15 years old.)
I guess I felt a little disappointed by the response I got but I was happy the girl just listened and actually spoke to me in the first place. Beside this I also learnt of a future upcoming convention next year.
Lastly on an unrelated note I will be attending compulsory jury duty in December which I feel a mixture of both excitement and worry about.