A visit to the city

- Dallas rain -

I saw rain this weekend, but it was in downtown Dallas, not west Texas. It rained on and off during the drive back home, as far as Mineral Wells, where I was standing in the rain getting gas. It was fabulous.

I went to the big city to attend an anime/comic convention at the Kay Bailey Hutchinson Convention Center. I have about as much interest in these things as I do a Saturday afternoon college football game (none), but my daughter likes to go and I'm not willing to let her drive or be in Dallas alone.

There is a small contingent of that crowd that uses these events as an opportunity to be nearly naked, sort of like the girls who dress as prostitutes in the name of Halloween. I'm pretty sure I saw one young lady who had no top on, but security gently moved her and her entourage off to a stairwell, presumably to clothe.

I was pleasantly surprised to see that Katee Sackhoff was one of the thirty or so celebrities that were there for autographs and photo opportunities. She played Vic on Longmire, a series that I'm making my way through. I guess she was there for her role in The Mandalorian, a show that I'm unlikely to see. I saw her from afar, unwilling to pay the eighty bucks or so for a signature.

The Omni Hotel where we stayed was nice and fancy, but we left by noon the next day. There's really not much to do at these things but buy merchandise and look at other people's costumes. The traffic from the convention was overwhelming, and there were too many bodies stuffed into that huge space. 

I'm not used to an urban setting, and while it was almost Fantasy Island-like around the hotel, just going a few blocks away to forage at a 7-11 freaked me out. Someone was sleeping in the middle of the parking lot next door, just laying out there. I don't like going somewhere that I don't know what neighborhood I'm in.   

So, we skipped out on plans to go to the aquarium and got the heck out of dodge. Sometimes the big open roads of Texas are quite a relief. I was glad to be headed back home.