The Long Con

 Minneapolis, MN

We got free t-shirts but how much does free cost?

Twin Cities Con

This weekend we volunteered for Twin Cities Con, a comic convention across the street at the convention center.  We figured it would be fun and if we volunteered 2 days we would get a pass good for the whole weekend.  We signed up for Registration positions for Friday and Saturday.  We chose the early shifts because we are a 10 minute walk away.  

Friday

We arrived at the volunteer suite at 9:15am on Friday.  We were given a t-shirt, a water bottle, a lanyard with a badge, a pin, and minimal instructions.  Our shift was 9:30 to 2:30.

All of the Registration volunteers headed to the registration area where we were given our assignments.  Donna and I hadn't done this before so we were given assignments that needed minimal instructions because we were all running behind.

I took a candid photo of Donna working her magic.

I was given the VIP and GA coral.  The show opened at Noon and people with VIP badges got in at 11:45.  I kept the queues organized and made sure attendees knew which coral to be in and when things started.

I talked to a lot of fun people and everyone was in high spirits.

After the convention floor opened I moved to checking badges at the entrance.  I answered questions as best I could and took a few photos.

We ended up working from 9:30 to about 1pm with no breaks.  At 1pm we were sent to the volunteer room for a 30 minute break and told there was pizza for us.  Donna and I both had pizza and rested up for the rest of our shift.  It was already a long day for us and we were questioning the wisdom of volunteering.  We returned to the show floor at 1:30 and to my surprise we were released a little after 3:30pm. I had expected to be released at 4pm.  We walked out via the show floor and saw some of the places people were asking for during our shift.  We could use this new information for tomorrow's shift.

Saturday

Our shift on Saturday started at 7:30 and we were pretty exhausted.  We are used to doing activities each day, but we aren't used to standing for 6 hours at a time and interacting with 100s of people.  I was given the same assignment as Friday because, I hope, I did such a good job.  Donna was trained on passing out pre-ordered badges because she wanted a sitting shift today.  Our Saturday Shift went the same as Friday except we didn't get any lunch because they didn't order the pizza until after our shift had ended.  2:30 came and went and I still hadn't gotten my relief.  I knew Donna would come and get me when she was relieved so I waited.  Donna showed up at 2:45 and said, "we are done!".  I left my position and checked in at the registration desk and there was a volunteer futzing with something or another (it didn't really register to me what she was doing).  I said I was off and there was no one checking badges and she said she was just about to head over.  I took that as my cue to leave.  After leaving I found out that Donna hadn't been relieved, she simply stood up and said, "I am done" and left. It could have been a much longer Con if it wasn't for that. 

The calm before the storm

There were some great costumes.

Captain Great Brittan giving me the Meh face.

Can you tell which dog is the Real Service dog?

His Schwartz wasn't that big...

This tall man costume was awesome1  People loved him.

It was a very tiring 2 days and we didn't end up using our free pass to see the convention on Sunday.  

Pros of the Con

- Seeing tons of great costumes

- Talking to tons of fun people

- Asking attendees if they had any flying or teleportation powers when they asked for directions to something

Cons of the Con

- Working 6ish hours without a break

- Having to say, "No I'm Not Good" to get a break when the lead came by and said, "You good?" after 5 hours with no break

- Having to deal with understandably frustrated people because they had to wait through a long security line to get their badge only to leave the area to attend a talk and then having to wait in the same line again to see the show floor

I am pretty sure we won't be doing this again.  It was just too chaotic and disorganized.  We are used to doing things The Disney Way and this was not that.  We did decide that in general, we enjoyed the experience.

That's it for today.  If you missed, Evil Has Come To Town, check it out.  We went out for Dinner and a Movie on Halloween night.