Let’s pick up with Friday

It’s go time! I was up and in the shower by 7 AM. Breakfast was chocolate chip pancakes from Steel City Diner. There are very few problems in this world that cannot be solved with a plate of SCD’s chocolate chip pancakes. Then it was back to the DLCC to put the finishing touches on everything and make sure that we were ready for the first artist to walk through the doors.

Signups started at 10 AM, and as expected it was a bit of a madhouse as everyone rushed to get their names on the list (for all that the names were selected at random and the order in which they signed up had no bearing on things). This year we had an hour for signups, then an hour for seat selection and setup. That worked perfectly! We had 135 artists sign up for 128 seats, so we had to hold a lottery. No problems there and we got down to the hall with enough time to load the artists’ names into the cash registers so they would print on the register receipts.

Once we opened the doors to the attendees at noon, the rush was on. Fortunately, all of my staff was well-prepared and we handled the crush well. Although at times during the day we had quite a line, I heard from customers that they never had to wait more than five or so minutes before getting to pay. Sounds like a win to me! I stayed in or near the Artists Alley/Con Store registers for most of the day, only leaving for a few minutes at a time. Small issues kept popping up, questions needing to be answered, that sort of thing.

We closed the Alley at 5 PM and payout followed immediately thereafter. Although not quite as smooth or as quick as in previous years, we were able to get everyone paid in under an hour with minimal discrepancies. It was an amazing day – we paid out $19,930, an average of $148 per artist.

After we wrapped things up and got the Alley reset for the next day, Dan and I had a quiet dinner together in the room with pizza from the place downstairs (which wasn’t terrible, surprisingly enough!). Dan returned to the DLCC, and I ventured upstairs to be social with Genet while Nyuni and Roho were off on a Wal Mart run.

We had a really nice chat over a beer, then the bird and the fennec returned and we chatted some more. It was a lovely time, and just what I needed after a long day. Alas, I had to get up early the next day so I took my leave at 11:30, going to bed at midnight. Dan finally came in at 3:30 AM, having wrapped up his duties in the DLCC.

Saturday

7 AM came mighty early, but at least I didn’t have the “OMG I want to die” feeling in the shower. I went downstairs only to be dismayed that Crazy Mocha didn’t open until 8 AM! I had to live with a bagel sandwich and weak coffee from Brown Bag Deli instead. Signups went well again, with 137 artists signing up.

The Alley hummed along well that day. My staff, amazing folks that they are, were happy and comfortable with the processes we’d set up. Although I tried to schedule myself some time away from the Alley, once again I wound up spending the majority of the day there, with a few minutes away to walk through the Dealers Room and make a quick pass through the Art Show. Bless their hearts, Frosty was kind enough to pick me up a latte from Starbucks later in the morning and Dan brought me a sandwich from Brown Bag Deli; those kept me going through the day. We had a few more glitches at payout, but things seemed to work out pretty well otherwise. At the end of the day we paid out $22,401, an average of $164 per artist.

One of the definite highlights of the convention for me was dinner that night. Rooth and I were joined by Brophey and Karwood, two great friends who I don’t get to see nearly often enough, for dinner at Sushi Kim. The food was tasty, the sake even better. And Rooth was kind enough to cover my meal, which was very thoughtful of him, and much appreciated. After dinner we stopped by Crystal to pick up dinner for Dan, and then walked back to the DLCC. We got there just in time for the fireworks.

Wow, the fireworks. We had an awesome seat on a second floor balcony of the DLCC, right next to Registration, with a perfect view down the river at the barge which they were using as a launching pad. We had a couple of bridges in the foreground, all crowded with people, and once the show started it was just amazing. Dan thought to grab a tripod and our Canon digital SLR and got some fantastic time-lapse shots of the fireworks and ensuing boat migration once the show was over. The weather was perfect, the company was great, and it was a very satisfying end to the day.

After the fireworks, I walked back to the Westin. I stopped by the Cheetah Lawn Party and stayed long enough to be sociable, but unfortunately had to leave just as things were really getting started. I was in bed by 11:30 PM. Once he finished up in the DLCC, Dan came to bed at 2:30 AM.

Sunday

6:45 AM came and I was awake. I had time for a slightly more leisurely breakfast (and crappy coffee) from Brown Bag Deli. Signups were extremely mellow, since everyone was still a zombie from the night before. We had 103 artists sign up that day, with another 10 signing on as the day went by. At this point I was too darned tired to wander far from the Alley, and spent most of the day either hanging out there or in the show office.

We closed the Alley at 4 PM. Things went a lot faster this time, with minimal discrepancies. We paid out $12,334, an average of $109 per artist. For the weekend, we paid out a grand total of $54,655, up from $41,000 in 2008. Once payout was done, it was time to tear everything down. Once again, my staff rocks! We had the whole place torn down and onto pallets in an hour and a half, finishing at 6:30 PM. This gave us a half-hour to get over to the Westin for the Sunday night staff dinner. Most of my staff wound up at one table (sorry Shy!), and we were joined by Nik and Gir. We had a raucous and enjoyable meal, and through Kage’s semicoherent speech, I learned that I am apparently co-chairman of Midwest FurFest, along with Dan. Who knew? 🙂

After dinner, I ordered a pizza for Dan from the ever-reliable Ephesus Pizza, and then brought it to him over in the DLCC. He and his crew were too busy packing up and I wasn’t particularly helpful so I walked back to the Westin. I stopped by the Dorsai’s Shore Leave gathering, but I was just too tired to be particularly sociable. I ran into Kwik in the hall and was able to chat with him briefly, which was nice. I retired back to the room and stayed up long enough to see Dan come in; we both crashed at about 11 PM.

Still to come: The trip home, thanks, and final thoughts.