Hello to all of my beautiful nerds and welcome back to Nerdy Shique Universe from traveling the vast universe! Sorry for taking so long for doing this!
Convention Impossible: Omni Fandom Expo 2019!
I was ill during the end of March with a Bronchial Spasm, how it happened was that after Omni I was feeling a bit exhausted since I was going to bed around midnight during the convention and had to wake up early for work afterwards and by Thursday of that week that was when I got sick. I could not breathe that evening after work and Sunday night so Gondras took me to the Urgent Care twice and that was when I found out I had borderline Bronchitis. I am healing still, I even did a video Tuesday unboxing the new Jeffree Starr pallet which you get to see me use on YouTube this weekend.
So, since Omni passed and all I have to say is that I had a blast this year and let’s get to it!
Hotel: First was a first for us at the convention and that is staying at the Florida Hotel. As you guys know that this is the hotel that is attached to the Florida Mall in Orlando and a lot of tourists from all over stay at this place every year throughout the year. It is a huge tourist trap. I can see why this is a popular place because not only the hospitality is the best but the rooms are amazing! For the convention discount you get a pretty big room and we got a room with two queen size beds, a couch, and an easy chair. We also got a pretty good sized fridge and bathroom. Plus, our room did have a nice view of M & M World which is also an awesome place.
The convention was pretty much the same layout except Panel Room 1 was changed up where it was slightly smaller this year but I did get to the room very easily since I got to explore the night events on my own instead of waiting for Nerdy Shirts and Gondras to take me down to it. I do love how the hotel hallways are very shoreline friendly with my cane. And in case if anyone is wondering, no worries my cane survived this convention without incident. Since I mentioned events…
Events: This year it was mostly going to evening events since our day was packed with the Press Booth and of course we had interviews on Sunday during the convention. I did go to Derek Steven Prince’s panel Shino & Friends since I didn’t get to check it out last year along with Nobu’s and Sawa’s Q & A Panel since they were both guests and did perform during the convention, which we did catch some of that on Saturday and they know how to work with each other. Didn’t know Nobu was a metal fan either since he was starting to sing “Welcome to the Jungle” by Guns & Roses or I give him props for good taste.
We did check out one of the big shows and that was the Marvel Parody Show. One thing I will admit is that I am a fan of musicals and my z musicals are still Rent, Grease, the one with Travolta and Newton-John, and Repo the Genetic Opera. This was one of those Broadway looking musicals with a contemporary feel with the Marvel Heroes and Villains! It was amazing and entertaining! The only issue I had was Ant Man because he had the song dealing with “All the Small Things” by Blink 182 which is a hard song to sing and the person had bad timing from what I seen. Everyone on the other hand did really awesome and the best songs from it happened to be the one Black Panther did to “Roar” by Katie Perry, Dead Pool doing “Thomas the Tank Engine,” and of course Captain Marvel doing “Immortals” and perfect timing for the newest Captain Marvel film. Hoping this group does another musical like this for next year because they did a really good job with this one. I also did attend the script reading again and it was still entertaining. All thanks to this year’s reading I want to watch Zootopia due to how well Paul St. Peter and Derek Steven Prince reading their parts. Plus, Tia Ballard being a part of it as well. Speaking of which!
Guests: This year’s guests were great again! We still got Bruce doing his balloon creations, heck Gondras even challenged him with one of the many key blades from Kingdom Hearts and had it hung on our wall for a little while. Paul St. Peter still remembers us as usual and we did hand him over our pamphlets which I will get to later. It felt great to meet Tia Ballard since of course she played Happy and glad to get to interview her for the channel. We also got to sit down with Sawa since we didn’t get to last year. We also had Nobu with her which a lot of you may not know this is our FIRST Japanese recording artist interview to date. Yay! Stay tuned everyone we will get those videos up since I was sick after all. What was also awesome was meeting Hisashi Yakawa in person. He was the one who did the art for Pokémon when it came out in 1997 and the first four seasons of Sailor Moon. I have been a major fan of both when I was a pre-teen and still remembered not only reading Teen People, Pop Star and other teen magazines I also collected Pokémon cards and Sailor Moon cards and stickers. I did bring my box set of the first twenty six episodes of Pokémon that got signed by Veronica Taylor and Eric Stuart and now Mr. Yakawa and of course on our wall in our apartment are pictures of Sailor Moon he has drawn to give to people. Did we get stuff signed by Tia in case if you’re wondering, we did get Cat Planet Cuties and a part of Fairy Tail with Happy and Natsu on it? Gondras did bring our Kingdom Hearts 3 art book to get signed by Paul and Derek since they are in the game as well.
Vendor Room: Finally, I have to include the Vendor Room. I felt this year it was more organized and sectioned off with Bruce doing his work in his corner, long with anything on display, then of course we had the guests along one side of the wall, the cosplay guests in one box, and then the vendors selling items in another. I only bought a few items in the room since we were busy all weekend and did go into the mall for food and I did have to drop by the NYX store for some stuff.
First off is the Tyaki stand! I loved this girl’s little cakes and glad she came back. Funny thing was while being in the Press Booth, we found one and Gondras thought it was our Japanese Snacks friend who brought it and we took it and when I ate it I felt the familiar taste since it was cookies and cream. On Sunday, I found her stand and happy I did since I got a sample pack this time where I got to not only have her classic flavors but also two new ones which were white chocolate caramel and the breakfast delight. I still love the chocolate peanut butter one as usual since I am a Reese’s lover and of course the chocolate chips in these are really good. I did buy from the shirt stand that helped us during Holiday Matsuri with my cane. I did get the United States of Smash shirt since that was All Might’s most epic battle in My Hero Academia and the guy at the stand remembered I loved Steven Universe and had a new one where Steven is Dr. Strange and made sense, I even worn it when Daddy Blue Cat visited me last month. I did thank them for the help during Matsuri by the way and did mention how I posted my story time video about it and used it on the Omni group to say, “Hey! This happened so watch out!” And finally, Japanese Snacks Guy was around yet again and picked up some new snacks. One of them happened to be takoyaki chips. If you guys don’t know what this little dish is its octopus dumplings and they are delicious! I had them during a Japanese culture festival in Orlando years ago and squid is one of my favorite seafood of all time since I do love Calamari. These chips to me tasted like plain Lay’s since I felt like I didn’t taste anything. I was hoping to be hit by a slight touch of fish flake and octopus mixed in or at least seaweed but nothing. Another item was melon flavored Kit Kats which was interesting to say the least. I was dying down a bit on Kit Kats since I have so much chocolate to eat still but ever since I moved I haven’t eaten it much due to how mellow I’ve been. I did try one and it felt like I was eating cantaloupe covered wafers and it was a light chocolate taste mixed in. Not bad in a way. I haven’t tried the gummies I bought in apple and peach since it’s been forever since I had Japanese gummies. I hope he will be at Ranger Stop since that is the next con we will be aiming for!
Verdict: CONVENTION ACCOMPLISHED! I have to give it an Accomplished because I felt like we have accomplished some things and that includes getting some new things made to promote ourselves and they are shirts and pamphlets. Yes, ever since Holiday Matsuri last year I had an idea to get pamphlets made to show our work even to handlers since it feels like our work is not being taken seriously. Gondras did say it was a good idea to do and it worked out well since we had them made at FedEx and he did the design with a template and got them done in time for the convention that weekend. FedEx has pretty good prices so will be printing with them instead of Staples. And now onto shirts which people did like. Last year while doing the Customer Service Basics class, the teacher told me that we do cosplay and enjoy it but should dress the part of representing a blog and looking back on it I do agree with that. So, for a few months I looked into Vista Print and even Custom Ink for shirts and all thanks to the excellent customer service that Custom Ink has done even helped with the design after understanding that I am blind that the shirts came out amazing! Even had a sample for GOndras to try in his size because we have to make sure he could fit in their shirts and he did. Definitely will be having these shirts with us and I will be going back to Custom Ink for anything else because they do other items too and I have some ideas. Also, we still have our lovely business cards to pass out to attendees too. So hoping our new promo material keeps going.
Also, we did get to stay in the hotel finally since it would be hard commuting back and forth between Daytona and Orlando and the Florida Hotel has some of the best hospitality I’ve ever seen. Better, or shall I say way better than the World Center because I even had text messages sent asking about my stay and the guy who helped at check out even gave ideas on breakfast when I asked him. And not only that, some tourists even helped me when it came to finding the Starbucks and a bathroom too. And I think the hospitality also spreads through the mall since it is attached to it, I got amazing service at the NYX Store too since some of the store attendants, Gondras, and I did talk about how NYX;s complexion items are hypoallergenic and did mention that the primer, Hydro Touch, works out for me. And anyone who wants to know, the location is nice since it’s a lot more roomy than the other one I’ve been to since it fit all the displays and makeup stations very well.
And one last accomplishment would probably be finally getting to interview Sawa and Nobu because we wanted to interview Sawa since last year and due to scheduling we couldn’t get that chance until this time around.
Needs for Improvement: Even though the convention was a success but I do have one thing to talk about that needs to be improved and that is the Press Booth. This year press teams get to have time blocks to promote themselves, even play recordings, and even interview attendees if they wanted and well…I felt…this was a bust! How so? Sorry to say, forgot to disclaim but this is a review based on thoughts and opinions of the lead writer after all and well due to the location of the booth people didn’t stop by. I am a very quiet observer despite my extrovert personality and from what I heard most of the attendees were either with the cosplay guests, the industry guests, or even in Artist’s Alley and the Press Booth was a small alcove in the back of the vendor’s area and it felt hidden away. Heck, even when we played one of our interviews from Omni Fandom Expo past no one paid attention. To me this should have been in an easier to spot area rather than a tiny alcove. We are press and we promote our work and we should be loud and be seen rather than be hidden. Heck, we used the last hour or so of the convention to use for interviews which is another thing which I have noticed where one press team did use the booth to interview Tia Ballard when we did our interview upstairs with her which I think the Press Booth should have been used better as the interview spot rather than upstairs. Which that does draw attention to an audience where people could be like, “Hey, someone’s talking to someone, let’s watch!” I even watched the Tia interview myself at the end. Not only that there was supposed to be a press conference thing with Hisashi and Mamoru but that didn’t happen unfortunately at the Press Booth. If this was used again, I would say just use it for all guest interviews and place it in an easier to see spot because we want to show our work and sucked that not a lot of people paid attention to do so.
And another thing, which I didn’t realize until our buddy Evan said it, guest autograph times should be posted on the booths for them somewhere because there were times where we wondered what time some people would show up and conventions tend to put a small display board saying, “Person Will Be Here At…” Heck, even Holiday Matsuri does it. So, why not have poster board saying it? Thinking about it now…as a joke maybe…maybe I should be in the creative team for this convention. Just saying!
Well, that is it for this review! I am glad we got to do another year of Omni Fandom Expo and this has been the only convention that keeps us coming to do our work every year. I still remember 2014 and how it was a small and very ambitious convention and it has morphed into what we attend today. I would say this has been the best year besides 2014 and 2015 combined. Plus, it is always blind people friendly because my cane is still in one piece and I don’t feel invisible either as in just an attendee with a prop. Which for the record my cane is not a prop! Anyways, hoping next year will bring many more people and there is one guest that should come back and he misses Orlando since I have gotten back in touch with him and that is Neil Kaplan! Reason why I got back in touch is that recently the NFB did a news story talking about the CWB not hiring a blind actor to play a blind character and I remembered Neil having a class teaching students at the Braille Institute in California how to do voice acting. He no longer does it but still stays in touch with students and did mention Omni Fandom Expo and he wants to be a guest. So Omni, if you are reading this, please get Neil! He is one of the biggest sweethearts and he has been on Digimon and of course he did say he wants to sit down with us for an interview which is even more awesome.
So, what is next for Nerdy Shique Universe? Well, my video trying out the new Jeffree Starr Blue Blood pallet tomorrow! Yes, I jumped the gun and picked up one of his bundles from his collection to bring it to you all on the YouTube Quadrant and I will also post the video here for anyone who may be curious little space kitties as well. Of course we have our interviews from Omni Fandom Expo, I am sorry for not getting any events recorded. First, the Marvel musical was not allowed to be recorded, also went to night events that would kick you out if you did record it, and plus I was enjoying attending things by myself since I rarely got to do it. Yes I could have done it at Matsuri but after the cane breaking I would have gotten hurt if I tried. Also Press Booth did keep us pretty busy. Again, sorry about that! And I have more posts to come!
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