So... I'm back from ACen. Clearly.

I want to say it was great, But... I dunno. It had some ups, but a lot of downs.

It started off pretty badly. I got up at 7 on Friday morning and left the hotel to stand in line for badge registration. My friends had pre-registered several months in advance, but since I wasn't sure I was going until last week, I decided to wait. Well, I expected a decent wait in line, but what I got far exceeded that.
I waited in line for 10 hours.
Turns out the convention's wireless network had little to no security programs, and some hacker in the crowd got on his laptop and fucked everything up. As such, the printers didn't work, so they had to do all registration by hand. Luckily, they were nice about it, and didn't charge me the 50 bucks for the full pass, instead charging 40. It wasn't much, but it was something.
It wasn't all that bad, I suppose. I made some cool friends while I waited. We talked about making T-shirts for what we started referring to as "LineCon 2008". We ordered a pizza and talked about music and movies and started theorizing about how there was probably an explosion earlier in the day, and we had all died, but didn't know, and that was our hell. Good laughs all around.

Anyway, that day was pretty much a bust for me.

Saturday was fairly mediocre. This brings me to my big topic here.
I think I'm starting to hate anime.
Or rather, I'm starting to hate the fandom around it. More and more, I feel irritated by people who, three or four years ago, wouldn't have bothered me so much.
I mean, I've never been a people person, and I've been told that I'm really mature for my age. But when I was there, all I could do was see the flaws of the "anime culture".
Everywhere I turned there was someone wearing a Naruto headband, or holding one of those obnoxious "Uke" paddles (I still don't get those), or cosplaying as Sasuke (there were so many fucking Sasukes.). It's like, I look at these people, and I feel like yelling at them, you know?

"Don't you see what you look like? Don't you hear how ridiculous you sound?"

And I hate feeling like that! I wish I could go back to how I was my first ACen, during my sophomore year, when Naruto was still trying to find it's legs, where the average anime fan knew, knew that Cowboy Bebop was one of the most flawless series ever created (whether they had seen it or not, they at least were aware that it was widely considered a paradigm of the genre), where a guy dressed like Snake crawling around in a box was really creative and funny, where everything felt pure and right.
But now, it feels cheapened. In order to retain one's "anime hipster cred" one is very reluctant to admit they like Naruto in any fashion, where the average teen had barely heard of Cowboy Bebop, much less seen it, where all fifty Snakes show up to the convention in their cardboard boxes, and half of them are wearing Konoha headbands.

I feel old, I feel bitter, I feel angry.

Maybe I'm just not cut out for anime anymore. We'll see. Maybe I just need to get over this experience.

It didn't really help that there were so many douchebags at the convention though. And I mean that. Ignorant, self-absorbed, loudmouth douchebags. Cutting in line, badmouthing people both behind their backs and in front of their faces, and making things generally miserable for everyone.

Anyway, things were pretty mediocre overall. This morning was pretty redeeming, though. I was only there for about an hour, but I walked around the exhibition hall, and some cool stuff happened. First, I found a really wicked poster shop, and picked up five really badass posters that I've been searching for forever. I just hope I have space on my walls for them. Then I found this little corner booth that sold nothing but Asian cult movies. Like, really really good ones. The guy who ran the booth was really really cool, and I stood there for twenty minutes just talking movies with him. He even gave me a sweet discount on some imported movies, and I'm really excited to watch them. ^_^

And then I met three of the original Power Rangers, which totally made my life. And when I say that, I don't mean three guys dressed like the original Rangers, I mean the actual actors, out of costume. There was Tommy, Kimberly, and Jason, and they were all really cool.

So that was my weekend. If I think of something else to talk about that I forgot, I'll write it later. I'm sort of tired right now.