PC Meet Up Report

Picture stolen from Kura; she is epic at drawing.

The Great PC Meet at London Expo
Work is quiet so I have some spare time.

So, out of the total of 4 people who met up from PC, Kura, Mr Cat Dog and Drakow, I am the last one to post a report, so here it is. If you would like to read theirs, click on their names above; I highly recommend it.

Note: I am going to be stealing some pictures and such from their blogs to make mine prettier and such.

Friday
So as usual with travelling to any Expo, it is an early start. I was awake at 6:30am to make sure I had everything packed. I was cosplaying Dr. Franken Stein from Soul Eater.

Taken by Kura on the Sunday

I did like the anime, obviously, but I really liked the character of Stein and how he was very cool, so I thought 'why not?'

So I got to the train station easily, got a taxi there with this crazy and awesome Jamaican driver, who was just bouncing off the walls with happiness. We ended up talking about football for most of the journey on what teams should sign who over the transfer period and what players we would like to see signed. I got to the station and he gave me a discount on the journey and he went off on his merry way.

I bought my tickets and waited around on the platform for 20 minutes. Already, it was a lovely day and getting warm. Due to only deciding to pack everything in my two bags. (Camera, 2 lenses, flash gun, laptop, full cosplay, boxers, socks, toiletries, converse, chargers and more) I couldn't fit my massive Stein boots in my back because it took too much space. So I ended up wearing them, same with my jeans I wore them too and packed my shorts. I was already boiling with those on and it got worse on the Underground due to the heat.
Anyway, the train pulled in and away I was as it was on time... FOR ONCE. I had a little sleep on the train, woke up and got some breakfast, which was a bacon and sausage bagel with some orange; was lovely.

We pulled into London about 10:30am and I jumped off and got on the underground Circle line to Tower Gateway, then the DLR (Docklands Light Railway) to the ExCel Custom House. I got to the Ibis hotel, where I was staying, about midday, where I checked in and bumped into some friends that I hadn't seen in a while. I caught up with them and went for a shower because I was boiling. I unpacked all my stuff, hung up my cosplay and then went back downstairs. The original plan was to go to one of the bars outside and drink, but when I got to the reception, my friends from back home walked in and nearly jumped on me. Was lovely to see them. (This is the group the PC members met and hung with). So, the drinking plan went out the window... for now. I helped my mates with their stuff from the car to their room and we relaxed for a little bit, as they had driven for 4 hours to get there.

Once we had relaxed a little bit more, we decided to go get our wristbands and wander inside the venders hall. At this point, the wonderful Kura was around the Expo centre somewhere, but wasn't sure where. We lined up and queued up, only having to wait 20 odd minutes in the queue before they let people into the hall. However, before all this I saw a very excitable, little pink haired girl having her picture taken with another Lightening. I wasn't sure if it was Kura because 1, my eye sight is shocking and 2, I didn't have my glasses on.
So I rang up Kura and it turns out that it was her. After some amusing directions and yelling 'right, right, right, look in front of you, the guy that is waving at you.' The amusing thing was, there were about 4 rows of people, segregated by barriers and tape, so we shouted over them talking for a few seconds before Kura, using her ninja like size, dodged in and out of the spaces found herself in front of me. I remember the conversation we had before we came expo that our first hug would be feeble, due to her having armour on, so I gave her a kinda, soft hug/pat on the back; was very amusing at the time.


Me and Kura - Drawn by herself

I knew Kura was, say, smaller than me, but when we actually stood side by side, it was a very funny sight to behold. Kura is 4"11 3/4 and I am 6"3, so you can guess the hilarity of it all.
I introduced her to my two best friends I was with and they really liked her straight away, which made me happy because I wanted them to get on; which they really did.

So we were let out of the line and wandered around the venders all, me and Kura were chatting for most of it and not really paying attention to anything. From the moment go, me and Kura got on really well as it wasn't awkward at all and, we both agreed later, that our online personality reflected our offline, which made it easier because then it wasn't like trying to get to know a completely new person. We talked about loads of different things, but mainly us and how long we have known each other and so on, so it was nice. Then after catching up, we rejoined my two friends and went around as more of a group than two man pairs. Then, one of my mates had to go meet up with others, so it just left the three of us to wander the geeky, heavenly stores of goodness.

After all that and getting bored, the three of us went to meet my other friends, where I introduced Kura to them and them to her. Everyone got on really well, which was nice, so that put me at ease a little bit. A lot of my friends were dressed up from something called Homestuck, which I hate with a passion. If you like it, fair enough but the whole thing grinds on me. They wanted me to take some photos, so we found a quiet part of the ExCel centre, that I liked for the lighting, and stayed there for an hour or so taking pictures and just all chatting and chilling out.


My favourite picture of us <3

After messing around and Kura taking random pictures of me taking pictures, it was time for Kura to go. I walked her to the DLR station and said how much I enjoyed the day with her. I said that she could crash at mine on the Saturday if she wished, because it was easier and we could chill out more then. She said she would have a think, which I thought was no! XD

Once I dropped her off safe, I went back to see my friends and we chilled at the hotel, having many drinks. After this, I went to my room and slept soundly.

Saturday

Saturday arrived rather early. I set my alarm for 6:30am but ended up getting up at 8am. Woops. Quickly got changed into cosplay and had to go to my mates hotel to get a scar drawn on and have scar tissue done. I got there for 9am and did that, while catching up with them.

I was hosting a photoshoot at 11am, a Bleach Anime photoshoot with my friend, so we went and grabbed a drink, before making our way to where we were meeting people. Everyone arrived and we went to the location.
After much screaming at them, we got them organized and the photoshoot began. At some point through it, Kura and Mr Cat Dog turned up. I didn't know Mr Cat Dog was with Kura, so when I saw him I gave him a big hug. :D
I spoke to them quickly, but got roped back into the photoshoot, so I told them I would speak later.
After much stressing, I got the public and private photoshoots finished and rang Kura and Mr Cat Dog. Me and Kura ended up going back to the hotel for a matter of minutes, before I got rang to do another shoot, but it was with some good friends so I didn't mind it at all.

During the photoshoot, this is when Drakow joined us, the mysterious figure wandering out of the darkness and coming towards us. (we were in a carpark so it was dark). I gave him a man hug and then carried on taking pictures. Once we had finished, we all went outside for air and wandered around, taking some more pictures in this windy staircase. The wind was God like, due to the really hot weather, it cooled us all down.

After the photoshoots, me, Kura, Mr Car Dog, Drakow and someone called AJ, went back to the hotel bar and relaxed. I was the only one drinking an alcoholic drink, which was awkward but I couldn't care less; cider in that heat is glorious.


Hate this picture, but what we were doing.

After having a shower, we all chilled in the room and listened to metal music. Me and Drakow talked about yugioh for a bit and I showed him what cards I had, which he seemed to really love.

The plan for the evening was going to a friends hotel room and drinking and having a little party. I invited our PC lot along and they agreed. Kura was always coming, but Mr Cat Dog and Drakow didn't know it was going on. We got there and I introduced everyone to my lot, there were about 14 of them, so took a while. At first, the PC lot must have thought we were all weird, because I hadn't seen half the people in the room for a long time; some as long as 2 years. So there was much catching up to be done. After a little while, everyone started talking to everyone, which made me happy and I let the PC group carry on with their merry ways.

There was lots of booze to be drunk and I ended up, at one point, having a big bottle of apple sours at my feet, a can of beer and a cup of disaronno and coke. This was because my friend over heard me saying I wasn't drunk at all. Me and her always have drinking competitions and such, so she was supplying me with full cups. I didn't end up getting drunk, even though I drank all that crap. Mr Cat Dog and Drakow had to go at 9pmish, so when we went to get more booze, we dropped them off at the station.
When we got back, we were drinking more and more and it turned into a very relaxed but booze filled evening. I went out to get fresh air and when I came back, I found Kura had drank about 1/4 of her bottle and was giggling next to my mate; SOMEONE WAS TIPSY! XD
In her defence, she is tiny and hadn't eaten anything all day like me.

We ended up all leaving there about 2am and walked back to the hotel, which was only a short walk away.
Me and Kura said good night to everyone when we got back to the hotel and decided to watch a crappy Pokemon movie on my laptop because I had downloaded all of the not to long ago. We watched the fifth one I think it was, and talked for actual hours.
It was about 5am before I fell asleep mid thought, which is very embarrassing. Apparently, Kura asked me if I thought she was what I expected from her online personality. My reply was:

Will: Uhhhh...
...
...
...
Kura: Will? WILL?
...
...
...
Kura: Oh...

Not one of my finest moments, but I had been up so early and was shattered. :(
We both slept soundly.

Sunday

Sunday came around farr too quickly. The alarm being set for 8am, but we ended up getting up at like, 9am. Woops. I was meant to be at my friends hotel by 9am to get my scar redone, which wasn't good. After running around and us having showers, we got out and there by 9:45am-ish, so that was fine.

I had another photoshoot at 11am again, but we did a different strategy for this one, as I was only in charge of the paid photoshoot, the public one was left for others to do, which I was very happy with after the chaos of the Saturday shoot.
Kura and Drakow were with me during this, as they relaxed and talked to the other people that were around.


Don't ask why...

After the photoshoot finished, we wandered around the hall, looking at the different shops and such and found ourselves outside with my other friends, who were cosplaying from Homestuck once more. We all huddled in the shade because it was, once again, so damn hot. We didn't move for a while from here, only to go the toilet. By this point, I had gotten out of my cosplay because I was so freaking hot and tired already, that I just couldn't be bothered; GO POLO AND SHORTS.

Nothing much happened for a while, we just relaxed and played "who's that Pokemon?" which was a barrel of laughs. I must say, I was pretty darn good at it and was always amusing when Kura had been drawing for about 2 seconds and I got it spot on. Everyone, including Kura, was like "da fuq?". We spent time doing this and just relaxing as everyone was very tried, we chatted about random things and then the video happened; I don't need to explain this.



After our random shenanigans, we were all pretty hungry and decided to go have some food with a couple of my friends from back home. We had food in the Ibis restaurant and it was actually very nice food, which is surprising, at times, for hotels. There was football on at the time, France Vs Iceland and we were laughing at the scoreline since it was 2-0 to Iceland. (Finished stunningly as France won 3-2.) After the meal, it was getting late and everyone had to go who wasn't staying at the hotel. We said our good byes to them and then I turned to the PC Crew and gave them all heart felt hugs, picking Kura up at one point too.
I waved them off and said 'Fabio out' as they walked off and they all saluted me, which made me smile.

I went back in and sat down with one of my best friends and told him now much I really enjoyed the PC lot coming and how awesome they were and sat they were gone. He said that he really liked them and would love to see them again. I thought about them all and missed Kura's talks that evening in bed.

However, it wasn't time for bed yet. My best friend plays Yugioh and so do I. The rest of the group were having a midnight photoshoot, but me and him were having none of it and decided to stay back, have cider and play Yugioh all night, and we did.
We played downstairs for 4 hours, discussing different decks, adjusting outs, talking about the expo, watching random UFC and Wrestling that was on the TV one after another, until everyone returned at 3am.
We all decided that we would retire and go to bed, as we had to check out in the morning, so I went up to bed and fell asleep pretty quickly after packing all of my things.


Monday

Monday came quickly as well, but we didn't need to check out of the hotel till 11am, so I woke up at 10am, got showered and changed and double, triple checked over the room to make sure I brought everything, which I did.
I went down at 10:30am, where everyone was relaxing and talking and we stayed there for a while, before I helped people pack their cars and get them all ready to leave. We decided to get some food and sit outside on the grass, as it was a beautiful day once more.

We all talked and reflected on the weekend that we had and all agreed that we enjoyed it. About midday, I said I had to go catch my train and the people who were going to the train station joined me, the rest decided to leave to, so we had a big hug and good bye session with everyone before we parted ways.

It was very sad to see them go, as I don't see some of them very often and I do love them all dearly in a friends way! <3

Nothing much happens after this. I got the DLR, the underground then the train back to Bristol, where I dumped my stuff and sat in my chair and died a little.

It really was an amazing weekend and I am really happy the PC people came; was made loads more fun with them, since I knew they were not far away.

Well that is my report on the weekend. I hope you enjoyed it and sorry for making this rather large! XD
This is over 3,000 words, so have fun reading over it.

And one final picture of us:

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