The day is now Sunday. There's nothing to do today except wrap up the convention, spend the last of my funds and get packing to move out. Dealer's room. There isn't much you can buy for $12, but I found at Wizzywig that they had a Xabungle in Action for $15 and I asked if they would sell it for $12 because that's all I had. The woman behind the table told me the boss wasn't in at the moment and to come back later. So I waited about ten minutes before heading back. Not only did I get the figure for $12, but they also sold it to me tax-free. Thanks Wizzywig, you rock. I'll remember to go to your site and buy something expensive. As I was on my way to catch up with my friends, I once again hear a "Ron?" over my shoulder. It was Trish; again. I had hoped not to see her again this entire convention, yet I was strangely glad to see her one last time just to say goodbye. "You missed me in my Chinese dress Steve bought for me yesterday!" she exclaimed. "Oh I did?" I replied, "That's too bad, maybe you could send me a picture later." She asked what I was doing and I told her I had just spent my last twelve dollars. She asked to see what I bought and I pulled out the Xabungle figure, but she looked like she couldn't be less interested. I replied that I've seen too much anime and that I wasn't surprised she never heard of it. I started to say something, but the next thing I knew she had gone over to a booth selling CDs. I did a double-take for the second time this convention. Then I just shook my head and loitered for a bit. When she was done there, I walked back over to her. She kept walking, not even slowing down for me. I turned around and walked backwards in front of her and said that she could IM or send me an e-mail anytime she wanted, and that I'd like to see pictures of all the cool stuff she bought. She just laughed; I'm not sure at what. I stopped walking, said goodbye and softly patted her head as she passed. To this day, I've not received anything from Trish; not a message or a single e-mail. I hope I wasn't a jerk to her. Yes Jeff, I know. No rambling.

Once everyone was done, we went back to our hotel room and started moving things from there to the vehicles parked in the hotel garage. I'm proud to say I once again spent the second most amount of money at Otakon. Tyson had me beat at the last second when he went for a Vash cel and a Kenshin cel for $250 apiece. But still, it took the most combined trips to move all my boxes full of robots from the room to the backseat of Mike's Beemer. Jeff made a spectacle of himself when he walked out of the Hyatt with his Ruri standup unfolded in front of what seemed to be the entire "Groove Phi Groove" conventioneers (I think GPG is a convention of some sort. Anyway, we otaku drove them out of the Baltimore Convention Center last year, forcing them to hold their convention within the hotel itself). I wonder if Jeff drove all the way back to Ohio with Ruri in the passenger seat. And if so, was anybody fooled by the fact that he might have actually had a girlfriend in the vehicle with him? Jeff no lolicon hentai (I'm no better, I was the next in line to buy the Ruri if Jeff hadn't beat me to it). Anyway, with our gear safely packed away and everybody checked out, the entire crew left Maryland behind. I could have stayed over Mike's house that night, but I decided to go home and get some rest and open up all the many anime items I bought or freely acquired. And so ends my second exodus to Otakon. Next up, an anime convention in my very own hometown, Anime Boston 2003.

Conclusion:

The title of this article, The Otaku Strike Back is obviously a reference from Star Wars. And just like in The Empire Strikes Back, where Han Solo is frozen more securely than Walt Disney and Luke finds out that his arch-enemy Vader is really his father, gets his hand cut off and that he's really in love with his sister; I too find that meeting people from online in real-life is generally a bad idea, you can never have enough cash for conventions and I really need something else to pass the time other than giant robots and cat/bunny girls. Essentially, this is the depressing chapter of our story. Fortunately, all goes well for the Rebellion in The Return of the Jedi, and hopefully next year's Otakon will be even better than this year's. And if I'm lucky I'll learn the ways of the Force as well.

Failing that, I'll go to Anime Expo New York and have Tomino sign that Turn A Gundam cel, making me one very happy otaku that can die knowing he's accomplished all that he can.

Failing that, I'll just go back to playing with my robots.