Nocturnal Dreams

Otakon: The Harry Potter Release

Posted on 2007.07.23 at 09:16
Current Location: The Office
Mental Status:

sleepy
Current Play: Harry Potter OST1
Tags: cosplay, harry potter, otakon

sarielchan and

ms_monypenyawaiting their Deathly Hallow's book.

Dante: But you hate people!
Randell: But I love gatherings!
- Clerks

Friday night, the people who could not get enough madness at Otakon took the short walk to the Inner Harbor to the Power House Barnes and Noble. At 9PM started the Harry Potter release party that steadily built until midnight. The party was filled with live music, real owl's, cosplay contests, face painting, art contests, and general madness. Really, this place was crowded at 10PM, it was past firecode at 11PM, and at midnight, it looked like the scene from Empire of the Sun where people were crushing themselves to get out of Shanghai. But we HAD to be part of the event. I think it will be something we can look back on years later and say "WE WERE THERE!!"

lordkhyron gets his passport to be stamped at the different stations. I was 198 in the reserved line which actually put us ahead of a great many people.

Jim, Amanda T. and myself. Amanda was an Otakon Staffer that we met at the party.

Amanda love and loyalties lied with Slytherin.... but she IS going to be an attorney someday. ;p

They brought several owl handlers in for the evening.

The owls were beautiful to see up close.

The Power House Barnes and Noble is in a 100 year old power station... I love the real industrial equipment fused with the surroundings!

There were a number of Harry Potter cosplayers.

Slytherin was well represented.

Uncle Sirus

The trio

Professor snape... in sneakers.

pantherpg joined us after a little while. To avoide the crush of people, we camped out in a small corner near the Middle East books.

Amanda sporting her glow in the dark Harry Potter glasses.

One of the few pics that you see of me this weekend. The sideburns were gone by the next day. Most of the blonde hair will be gone this Friday.

It didn't matter that we were a low number, people would not get out of the way for us to get to the register to get our book. Jim ran down an up escalator. Jeanie and I were lucky to get on an elevator and I pushed through the throng of people to get up front.

We got our books and ran into the night around 12:20 AM.... A lot of poor souls were there well past three. Funny, I never got a picture of my book. I am reading it right now, I hope to be done soon so I can join in talking about it with everyone.

If you are interested, here are all of the photos that I took of the evening, the good and the bad.

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Comments:

unlock at 2007-07-23 15:14 (UTC) (Link)

Oh man~ I'm so jealous I didn't make it to one of those things. DX;;

I did nab and finish my book by Saturday tho'. XD

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bobbarker at 2007-07-24 03:33 (UTC) (Link)

We were really lucky to get a party like that in an awesome venue like that. I was almost worth coming for that alone.

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ms_monypeny at 2007-07-23 15:20 (UTC) (Link)

We were so lame that we were actually considering flying up to Harvard Square for the book release and then flying back to Baltimore for the rest of Otakon. ^__^;

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bobbarker at 2007-07-27 16:28 (UTC) (Link)

That's not lame, that's hardcore. But really, how could we have gotten a better book release than the one we got? ;p

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sarielchan at 2007-07-23 15:28 (UTC) (Link)

Hey!! I'm so glad I got to meet you in person, you're absolutely awesome. And you were totally rocking those sideburns. ^_______^b

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bobbarker at 2007-07-27 16:30 (UTC) (Link)

Thank you very much! You were very gracious and inviting and made me feel welcome. I appreciate that. :) Plus looking through your index of costumes is very impressive!!

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angel_vixen at 2007-07-23 15:39 (UTC) (Link)

Possibly one of the coolest-looking Barnes&Noble stores EVAR.

/ bookgeek

AngelVixen :-)

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bobbarker at 2007-07-27 16:31 (UTC) (Link)

Even without Harry Potter, Otakon is not Otakon without a trip to this B&N

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pamelaneko at 2007-07-23 15:40 (UTC) (Link)

Wow, looks like an awesome party! I was at a Borders in Manhattan Friday night... maybe it was b/c I came late, but there were very few cosplayers there! I was sporting my dark mark tattoo, though.

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bobbarker at 2007-07-27 16:32 (UTC) (Link)

;p We had an awesome party here, but it got too crowded before the end. You ok with me flying down on that Friday morning and leaving late Monday afternoon?

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pamelaneko at 2007-07-27 18:08 (UTC) (Link)

That's fine with me! I should be at the hotel around 1:30pm, and hopefully I will be able to check in at that time. I will be getting in touch with everyone then so they can bring their stuff up to room.

And check-out on Monday will be around noon... My flight leaves at 7:15pm so I will probably leave the hotel at/after 4pm. Did you get that email I sent you on July 11?

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