If you are a fan of comic books, science fiction, fantasy, role playing games, blockbuster films — in other words, if you have human contact outside your home –you should try to get to San Diego. Excuse me – Comic-Con International San Diego. It happens in July, tickets sell out in November and you’d have a ball. We did.
MEETING SCOTT EVIL
In July 2010, Sami Jo and I chose to treat Chase for his 7th birthday with a trip to Comic-Con and Legoland. Ask him about the announcement the pilot made over the loudspeaker on the plane. And although Chase will tell you he had more fun at Legoland, he will also tell you about his brief – nay, fleeting – “Brush with Greatness.”
The San Diego Convention Center building is huge, mostly as a response to the size of Comic-Con every year. At the convention, there are hundreds of celebrities you can see, get autographs and maybe ask a question in front of thousand of others. This is not one of those times.
As I said, the building is huge – over a quarter of a mile huge. I knew the building well enough that I wanted to be somewhere about 200 feet away. Unfortunately, it was 200 feet outside the building and there was no clear path to our destination. Lesser men – not Chase and I – would have walked back out to the front of the convention building, squeezing past thousands of fellow geeks and nerds, down the street and back down the walkway to our destination. Ha! I took Chase by the hand and said “Walk with me like we belong here.” We then went through the nearest exit door and into the hallways that make up the bowels of the convention center, walking purposefully, if not completely secure, in our direction. By walking – let us say, striding as if we owned the joint – Chase and I strolled past a group coming the other way. Not wishing to appear that we didn’t belong, I ignored them. Chase, not quite adept at this bit of fakery, looked at the group and recognized Seth Green and smiled at him. Seth Green said, “Hey” and we kept moving. I was not aware of any of this until later, when Chase told Sami Jo how he met Seth Green – and established his “Brush with Greatness.”