What of it?

Some people might call this a dangerous and ludicrous activity.

I call it Saturday afternoon’s activity.

I’m not much of a candy person. I prefer food that once had bones, mobility, and feelings. But I do enjoy snickers from time to time. And since I identify with both guys in this video, it must be shared.

For those of you who don’t know (there’s likely to be few of you), DragonCon is an anual pop culture festival in Atlanta that focuses on comic books, gaming, movies, and really anything that you can have a geek for. For the majority of the year, I count myself as a movie geek, but even I can’t claim that title at DragonCon.

This is because Dragoncon gives new meaning to the term ‘geek’. I speak of the costumes of course. Take this one for instance-

That guy standing next to him was about six feet tall. And the guy in the costume could move fairly well. This is the kind of geek dedication I speak of. A few years ago, one guy went as a 20-sided die. As to who locked him in his costume and kicked him down an upward escalator is anyone’s guess.

See? Geeks.

Here’s Widgett and Ken going in Undercover. Since no one knew they were coming, the first needcoffee panel was invaded by ZZ Top, and the bastard child of Spider Jerusalem and Snidely Whiplash.

They get younger every year. The R2-D2 robot could move, swivel it’s head, and make the sound effects, so you can imagine the baby’s confusion. Ironically, that baby will probably grow up to regard that robot as it’s ‘real’ dad.

Don’t even know what that is.

You get a few of these every year- He’s a Marine from ‘Aliens’. For some reason, this one brought his pet peacock.

You get a few of these every year too. The one on the right should be careful with that lighter, though. We all know how necrotic flesh can go up with one spark.

Oh God, two horrible movies had a child! It will probably grow up to be a sitcom.

We all remember these guys. So I’ll not speak a word. Especially not as to what the one on the right is doing.

SPARTANS!!! TONIGHT, WE DINE, IN that cool restaurant down the street that has it’s own little brewry. Neato. Grab the drunk girl.

DragonCon is the only place where you can find the Predator waiting for the elevator, and run into Indiana Jones helping some Nazis lug the Ark around while both versions of Willy Wonka look on. There’s something extrememly messed up, and maybe a little sad about the people who spend the entire year working nonstop on a costume they will wear for three days, but it’s what they love, so who’s to judge?

Unless they dress up like a 20-sided die. That’s wedgie material.

I try not to get too exited about movies that look really good. Because some of them turn out to be some of the most godawful crap ever to hit Ang Lee’s mind. Did I say Ang Lee? I meant… No, Ang Lee. We all like to pretend Hulk never happened. And Brokeback Mountain was overrated. Yeah, I said it. Now what are you going to do?

Anyway, as I was saying, I try not to get exited by trailers, but when you have a shoot ‘em up movie starring Clive Owen that’s actually called Shoot ‘Em Up, you’re not playing fair.

Apparently the new “in” thing is to put songs to scenes from online video games. Normally, I’d say this is just nerds trying to pass the time as they approach age 40 while living in their parents’ basement, but Jonathan Coulton’s “re: Your Brains” is a smash hit among those of us who are as screwed up as I am. Thus, this video kicks loads of ass.

Oh yeah, for all other things zombie, we continually update contingency plans and inform the public here. So go there and be scared into vigilance.

I don’t normally make a habit of telling people off in the street, but when they start it, I do so with gusto. I was walking out of target to see that a chubby man with a bad combover in a bright red thunderbird had parked next to me. As I was getting into my explorer, we exchanged the following:

“Nice SUV! That thing come with a soccer mom? (stupid pretentious laughter)”

“Nice midlife crisis. That thing come with a forboding sense of your own mortality?”

He was still standing there with his mouth open when I drove off.

I want at least nine of these. Don’t ask why. And don’t try to figure it out on your own either.

It takes a very patient person to be a mother. And if you’re my mother, well that’s an entirely different kind of patient.

First, I was an escape artist from the very beginning. No one ever figured out how I kept getting out of my crib, and as soon as I learned to walk, I learned to work the doors, which is unfortunate when you live right next to a rocky ravine. My mother had to keep me on a leash whenever we went out. But not wanting to appear uncivil, she adapted the system to be more of a phone cord that connected us by velcro wrist bands. The problem with having a mini hellion connected to your arm is that when you’re on a pay phone, said demon baby will walk around your legs until they’re wrapped up, then rip off the velcro and run. The leash came to an end when I finally snapped it as a three-year-old.

Later, at the age of five, I would be climbing in a large tree in the front yard, swinging around pretending to be Robin Hood, when I would fall and land on my arm on top of an upraised root. So I broke my arm in two places, having to be rushed to the emergency room. The same thing would happen again four years later.

After that came the burning of the living room carpet, the insurance fraud, the getting in fights, all before I even had a learner’s permit. In less than a week, my mother will be attending my graduation from college. And she’s going to cry, because she misses those days when all this happened. That’s the kind of patience I’m talking about.

So if you didn’t call your mother yesterday, beat yourself repeatedly with a weighted lash, then call her now, and come up with a convincing reason why you couldn’t do so on mother’s day. Like a car wreck or something. Happy mother’s day to all you mothers out there, and I hope your children are better behaved than I was.

Oh yeah- I wasn’t an only child. I had two sisters before me. One of them was fond of bringing in roadkill for artistic purposes. Just wait until father’s day.