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Sakura Con is one of the greatest things ever (and not just because it's the largest anime convention within driving distance of our pathetic excuse for a town). This is my second year attending, and my third con total. I love it. And so I'm going to sit here for the next fifteen minutes or so writing about it because I'm still in ultra fangirl mode, and I don't care that the only person who's going to read this already knows about it because she went with me.

Day 1 (Thursday): True, the con did technically start on Friday, but when you live a state away from the convention center, it really starts the day before. So I woke up late (my idiot sister didn't wake me up like she promised) and ended up running around my room trying to find the parts to my cosplay because I'm unnaturally good at losing things. So after ten minutes I finally found all of my plushies (why I feel the need to take them to every con I go to even though I leave them at the house anyway, I will never know), my headband (which I had to wear and not take it off because if I set it down for even a second it disappears forever), every Chibi Vampire manga that I owned (volumes 1, 2, 3, and 5), and non-cosplay clothes (that I never wore anyway...). A smart person would have done this the night before, but I don't plan ahead well. After I got downstairs I was greeted by my mother who, as much as I love her, is insane. In her hands is a bag with three things of English muffins, two huge a** cans of soup she'd made a few days ago, three things of tuna, a thing of pita bread, and a bag of white cheddar popcorn (which is my favorite so I was ok with that one). She then tells me that I have to bring this with me along with all the other crap I have packed, and goes through a list of how to properly handle all this food (because apparently even though I'm sixteen I don't know that soup needs to be put in a fridge) and then listen to her mother-speech which I ignored. At around noon Mustard-chan showed up and somehow managed to not run into the creek while pulling into my driveway of doom. We got to her house (after having to turn back at one point because I forgot the camera >_< wink and spent a few hours playing on the computer/watching Hana Kimi (Nanba-senpai heart ) because we're insane like that. At around 5:00 or so, Near (our friend who's over 18 <3) showed up and we sort of helped with dinner before looking up Vampire Knight anime and watching more Hana Kimi even though we should have been sleeping. At about 11:30-12:00 we got to bed where Near and I laid on a bed with our eyes closed and Mustard-chan slept (how she manages to fall asleep with her brother in the other room making a bunch of noise I'll never understand) and at 2:00am we were up, getting dressed and in the car.

Day 2 (Friday): We arrived at the con at 5:30am, found the parking garage (which is hell when you don't know the area and are relying on Mapquest), and we made into the con to go stand in line for another hour. While in line we had to do Mustard's hair (because if we did it before we left it would have come undone in the car) which is REALLY hard to do when she's twice as tall as me (I'm ChibiPenguinChan for a reason) and we had a really nice chat with a Sai-sama cosplayer in line ahead of us. At 6:00 they let us go into the registration room to register where we spent another hour and a half waiting in yet another line (there sure are a lot of those...), and since they loved us so much, we got to go into a special line for people who were having problems with registering. Oh the joy. You really don't want to hear about that though, so we'll skip that part. We finally got our badges and went... to get coffee. After Near and Mustard were caffeinated (I don't drink coffee so none for me) we went to go stand in another line for opening ceremonies. I'd give you another link to the video I was able to take there, but youtube hates me and refuses to let me upload it. After the ceremony we wandered around the dealer's room for awhile torturing ourselves with a constant "the price will go down on the last day, just look around more" when really we wanted to buy anything we saw. But I did end up buying volumes 4, 6 and 7 of Chibi Vampire because I wanted to get them signed (and I'm obsessed). After that... I really don't remember because we were exhausted and ended up sitting in a hallway waiting for Mustard's aunt to get home so she could give us directions to her house. I think I fell asleep at one point, but I don't really remember. A few hours later we got the directions and one confusing car ride later (Mustard wrote down how to get there and then couldn't read her own writing >_> wink we managed to get to our home base where we went out to eat (Near and I still in cosplay, but she left her keyblade behind) and then passed out upon our return. I've never been so tired at 9:00pm...

Day 3 (Saturday): The day that should have been awesome sucked the life out of me. We had all of Satuday planned out, Kagesaki Yuna-sensei was going to be signing autographs, then there was a Gaia thing going on, and Story, Story, Die after that. The signing got moved, there wasn't enough supplies at the Gaia panel, and the lady who usually ran the fanfiction room couldn't make it. I was ready to rip my hair out (though nobody else with me was allowed to because doing Mustard's hair is a pain in the a** and Near was wearing a wig). But instead we got to go to the Chibi Vampire Q&A (Kagesaki-sensei is so cool <3) and that was fun. I got to ask a question (a really lame one, but a question nonetheless) and I think it was the highlight of my life. I'm that nerdy. I remember thinking "I am talking to Kagesaki Yuna('s translator)!!" Afterwards we went to see Vic Mignogna's concert (such thing happen when your best friend is obsessed with FMA...) which was fun, despite the technical difficulties that lead to everyone there singing Wheels on the Bus while waiting for the sound people to figure out how to make the sound and the video match. It takes real skill to be able to play a DVD. After that we wandered around the dealer's room and I got a Gaara plushie which is made out of love. And another Fai plushie because the painting, bigger plushie, and key chain I have of him aren't enough. After we were done we went up to see the Cosplay Contest which (from what I saw) was amazing. But it started snowing half way through so we had to leave early. We got "home", pumped up the air mattress, and passed out.

Day 4 (Sunday): Last day of Con crying Such a depressing day... We ignored the fact that we had to leave soon and ran around in fangirl joy. We got to get an autograph from Kagesaki-sensei ( heart ) so I now have two volumes of Chibi Vampire signed <333 (and I haven't set them down since ><; ), and used up the last of our money. On the way out of the dealer's room we stopped in the door way (though not in front of the door, we were out of the way unlike SOME people), and somebody asked to take our picture. We said we would and we set our stuff down to take the picture, and just as the guy was about to take it two guys in full ninja gear ran up and attacked us (I was in the middle though so I was safe <3). Near jumped, and I couldn't tell what Mustard did, but they had kunai to us, and we were somewhere between surprised and amused and I'm sure we looked ridiculous. I wanted to hug the guys but as soon as the camera was gone they ran off... But a few other people were walking by when this happened so I think there's multiple pictures, so if anybody has a copy of a Deidara, Hinata, and Kairi getting attacked, please send it to me, I will love you forever. Afterwards we got a call from Mustard's kaa-san saying that she was on her way to pick us up. I died a little inside. Since we had to leave soon (T__T) we found some comfy chairs to sit in on a mostly abandoned floor so that we were close to the exit where I pretended to read but really alternated between staring at the autograph and watching people walk by and wishing that we could stay longer. Ten minutes later we got another call saying that we had to go outside. I'm sixteen. Near is eighteen. Mustard is a few months older than me. She lead the way as Near and I yelled "We don't want to leave!!!", "Five more minutes... days... years...!", "But we like it better here!" and so on. Amazingly, we managed to say all of these in perfect unison in the same tone of voice. Mustard tried to stay at least four steps ahead of us so that there might be a chance people didn't realize that we were with her. Despite our pleas, we followed her outside where we stood in the cold while the van of doom (which is actually very nice) pulled up and took us away from our beloved con. I ended up taking pictures of the outside of the building as we drove away. We got back to Mustard's aunt's house, packed everything up (going as slow as possible to stall having to leave) loaded everything up and then had a group hug in the parking lot while Mustard's sister gave us weird looks. All too soon we had to leave, so we said our goodbyes to Near (with another group hug and fake crying) and we drove into the sunset (eventually... it was only 4:30 or so when we left).

And now I'm at home, still wearing my headband because my brothers keep trying to steal it, watching youtube videos of the con while trying to upload my own, listening to way too much J-pop, and writing about what happened so that one person will read it. I WANT TO GO BACK!!!! T________T