San Diego Comic Con

First off for any Brits reading this... Think BOTH London Expos. Add 'London Film and Comic Con'. Imagine the WHOLE of the building housing London Expo as one enormous Dealers' room. Then ramp that up to 11. That's how big SDCC is, with added ballrooms, meeting rooms and the now infamous Hall H.

THURSDAY 22

Arrived at the new age space port....San Diego Convention Center [sic] at about 9 a.m. Got through registration quite quickly. Gold star, SDCC peeps. My big swag bag had the SDCC logo on one side and the main cast in suits from 'The Big Bang Theory' on the other. Located the California Browncoat booth in one corner of the humongous Dealers Room and handed over my Jayne hats. Mooched about quite a bit, finding out where everything is.  Got into Stan Freberg's panel [with his lovely wife Hunter].  They share an identical sense of humour. They have a new CD out; 'Songs in the key of life'.  They talked about Stan's impressive and extensive back catalogue and showed two of his vintage adverts. These two :-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tiC9IBNlrGw&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SE-NdrzfFOo

I found Mr Freberg's desk later and he kindly autographed his CD for me. I also got my Buffy and Angel books signed  by Camden Toy [one of the creepy 'Gentlemen' in 'Buffy']. In the late afternoon, I went back to my hostel changed and rested before setting out for the CSTS screening of 'Serenity' down town. Sadly none of the BDHs turned up :-(, but we had fun and raised a lot of $$$ for charity.

FRIDAY

Got to the EE desk for a FREE signing with Seth Green. After that, made a flying visit to the rest room and the long, LONG line to see Joss Whedon on stage. Writing process = fun, hunger, porn, depression, fun [GG]. Other people have better and more fulsome reports, I'm sure, but the panel was enlivened by a certain Mr Fillion [in fairly heavy disguise] crashing it at the end [GGG]. I went downstairs for the signing, just to see Joss up close and personal. Helen [Cappy #2!] was there with a couple of others from Browncoats: Redemption. They spotted ME and we went for a juice and a natter after they'd got their autos. Michael Docherty had his 'Joss gives his blessing' letter autographed by Joss [GG].  Joss said he was looking forward to seeing it.

Friday evening was the 'Chuck' Tweetup. I met a whole bunch pf people I'd only 'spoken to' on line :::waves::: At 10 p.m., a number of the cast arrived: Zac, Joshua, Mark Christopher Lawrence, Ryan McPartlin and Sarah Lancaster. The bar went crazy!!! My personal thanks to them for turning out for us.

Second part soon....

Belated update

Apologies for the break in service! Lots of LIFE happening here. However, I plan to be back here soon-ish with a report from the T2 convention and other animals.

Podbean podcasting news

Latest 'episode' up. This is the first 'round table' character discussion for this UK based 'Chuck' podcast. Shirley, Adrienne and I [Philippa] discuss the characters of Bryce and Jill.

http://chuckgeekuk.podbean.com/

Next time - Chuck's stable of ho's!

UK 'Chuck' Podcast!!

http://chuckgeekuk.podbean.com/

Darshan with Mother Meera, Bristol

Reflections on my encounter on Wednesday 10th February

I opted for the 10 a.m. Darshan in Bristol. I was planning to do some shopping or see a film afterwards, but the weather had other plans. I deliberately didn't read about Mother Meera beforehand; I wished to go with no pre-conceptions. I'd heard from others that they had found the experience positive.

The venue was a converted church about halfway up Park Street in Bristol. I arrived in good time, had my name checked off the 'guest' list and went in. The church was constructed somewhere around the Georgian era and has a balcony going around three sides of the central worship area. On the East wall is a carved and painted tryptych with Christ in the act of ascending in the middle, bordered by sculpted & painted Corinthian columns, plus two angels in separate bays to each side. The colours are mostly muted shades of brown and red with gold leaf highlighting the halos; so much so that the paintings almost look like marquetry work.

We were directed to sit in silence with footwear removed and placed under the seats. We waited in quiet and almost silence for about 40 minutes or so until 10 a.m. Right on time, we were directed to rise and Mother Meera came in. I heard definite, firm and fairly quick footsteps behind me before she swept past, wearing a glorious red, orange and gold sari. She seated herself on the stage in a chair provided.

The Darshan proceeded with people being asked out in rows. Each row of people knelt on a carpet down the central aisle. Anyone who could not or had difficulty kneeling was allowed to stand until joining their alloted place on stage. Those who could not kneel at this stage could also stand and were provided a chair to sit for the actual Darshan. Anyone who would not be able to get up the stairs would receive Darshan at the end, with Mother Meera coming to them.

So, people knelt or sat in front of Mother Meera in turn, bowing their heads. She gently placed her fingertips on each head, around the temple area. After about seven seconds or so, she withdrew her hands. At this point each person could look up at Mother Meera [and she would look at them]. The gaze was longer than in 'polite conversation' and wordless, about seven seconds yet again. Try it with someone you know; it's longer than it sounds.

After about 45 minutes or so, it was the turn of my row. I went and knelt on the central carpet. By this time, I was calm and fairly peaceful within and just waiting to see what - if anything - happened for me. Mother Meera's touch was gentle and confident, nurturing. As for looking at each other, she saw me. Complete, dispassionate and with loving acceptance. If you've seen 'Avatar', my perception is that the gaze of the Na'avi and their, 'I See You' is intended to be like this.

As I made my way back down the hill after-wards, the snow started! Since snow on the Mendip hills between Bristol and Glastonbury on untreated roads has proved a problem to traffic in the past, I decided that I'd rather get home while I could.

My bad

Apologies. We've had this thing called Christmas and New Year, then a whole heap of cold white stuff decided to fall out of the sky. I will post a proper blog soon, promise!

Coming soon - UK based 'Chuck' podcast! Audio blogging courtesy of Podbean.

Go find some historic audio files of varying quality at [chuckgeekuk] on Podbean.

Now back to your regularly scheduled programming...

Remembrance Sunday

The U.K. remembers:-

My late father was a Squadron Leader in the RAF Regiment and my late mother [amongst other things] was stationed as a WAAF officer at Biggin Hill during the Battle of Britain.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8348225.stm