Kowabunga

Convergence 2006 kicked off with a blast and never slowed down. There were five ships from the Cold Death Quadrant, and Klingons came from points further to see Robert O'Reilly (Gowron) and J.G. Hertzler (Martok), this year's Guests of Honor. And they were well worth the effort to come out to see, as they dominated the convention's scheduled panels, always entertaining, and very fun.

There are a lot of photos in this report, so I had to make thumbnails of them to improve download speed, so please klick on the photo to see the full-size picture.

During their panel's, O'Reilly and Hertzler gave a good accounting of how they entered the acting field and the road that eventually lead them to their famous roles on Star Trek as Gowron and Martok.

67k JPEG Robert O'Reilly and J.G. Hertzler.	75k JPEG Robert O'Reilly and J.G. Hertzler.
70k JPEG J.G. Hertzler.	69k JPEG Robert O'Reilly and Anna Hansen.
64k JPEG Robert O'Reilly and J.G. Hertzler. Robert is waving at my daughter, Anna.	70k JPEG Robert O'Reilly and J.G. Hertzler with Sue and Anna Hansen.
66k JPEG Robert O'Reilly goofing off with microphone holder.	57k JPEG Robert O'Reilly and J.G. Hertzler.

145k JPEG Boba Fett's on patrol.	108k JPEG Boba Fett's. These are some of the crew of the Black Thunder.
107k JPEG Boba Fett's. These are some of the crew of the Black Thunder.	94k JPEG Bridget Landry, science guest of honor. Bridget is a long time friend and currently works for NASA on the Cassini Mission. She is also a "master" level costumer. And now a member of the Clan MacDude.
119k JPEG Sue and Anna in the 3D stellar neignborhood walkthrough. Th science room guys put this up last year as well. Brilliant idea!	93k JPEGAnna meets Connie.

Convergence has earned a reputation as a hard-partying convention, with parties controlling the cabana area, which is a great space for a party zone, and spreading onto the fourth floor this year. Many parties adopted the con's theme, "To Boldly Go…" with great gusto. The RakeHell's "Viva Las Vegas" was very popular, serving up the specialty drinks that has made it famous; although not Klingon, the U.S.S. Nokomis teamed up with the World Defense Force to form a two-room theme party based on the TOS episode, "Mirror, Mirror", complete with agonizer booth. The Warhammer ran the KPLA pirate radio, and, of course, the North Dakota folks put on "Captain Kirk's Den of Ill-Repute." In all, there were some 40, yes, FORTY, parties this year.

74k JPEG I admit it, I don't recall which party this is.	105k JPEG Bridget and Sqotty imbibing the the Rakehell's specialty drink.
69k JPEG Mirror Mirror Party, this half hosted by the World Defense Force.	75k JPEG Mirror Mirror Party, this half hosted by the World Defense Force. Note the agonizer booth.
70k JPEG Mirror Fluffy.	75k JPEG Fluffy and Anna in the Mirror Empire party room.
49k JPEG Mirror Mirror Party - Feddie Side. Hosted by the U.S.S. Nokomis.	49k JPEG Fluffy and Anna in the Mirror Empire party room.
159k JPEG Viva Las Vegas. Hosted by the IKV Rakehell. Qe'pa is getting a minute of relaxation.	86k JPEG Sqotty in the Rakehell party room.
120k JPEG K'Ditzy at the bar in the RakeHell party room.	91k JPEG Mount Olympus, hosted by the Xenaversity.
133k JPEG Klingon Jed in the RakeHell party room.	104k JPEG Klingons in the RakeHell party room.
133k JPEG Klingons in the RakeHell party room.	90k JPEG Honor Harrington in the RakeHell party room.
93k JPEG Sue-la and Susan at the WDF Mirror party room.	75k JPEG Captain Kirk and his House of Ill-Repute.

The masquerade had 25 entries, with four of the entries coming from the IKV RakeHell, including one entry from the ship's up and coming costumer's, Karin, who appeared as He-Man. Karin is six years old, and is on her way to becoming the youngest master level costumer. Qob, JaPa (IKV Black Thunder), Mordok and Sqotty provided comedy relief as the "Chancellor's Personal Guard," set to the tune of "Men in Tights." I wish I had been able to get a video of it. Patrick put in a non-Klingon entry as a Gargoyle, which looked very good, and Qe-Pa and Mordok entered as "Viva Las Vegas." Karin won Best Young Fan, and deservedly so.

81k JPEG Qob, mentally preparing for the Masquarade.	163k JPEG Lamatron 2112. This was a way cool entry, involving lots of electronics, including ear movement. Nicely detailed. Hard to believe the guy sold his Harley to make this rig.
118k JPEG Jelly Fish, nice costume.	130k JPEG Patrick's Gargoyle. He's one of the many entries from the RakeHell
81k JPEG Hello K'itty, this is just so wrong.	142k JPEG in fact, I had to post two pics to get the point across.

Saturday night festivities include a Klingon Wedding for two new members of the IKV Rakehell: Earl and Holly. This ceremony was conducted by Gowron and Martok and attended by throngs of con-goers, with belly-dancers providing pre-ceremony entertainment and followed by a short dance party. This provided a number of photo ops with both O'Reilly and Hertzler.

127k JPEG O'Reilly, Qe'Pa, and Hertzler.	108k JPEG Crowd scene for the wedding.
100k JPEG Ceremony.	99k JPEG Ceremony.
94k JPEG Herzler and Orion Slave Girls. The one on Hertzler's left knee is the bride.	128k JPEG Wendy and Alois at the wedding.

As the festivities continued, O'Reilly and Hertzler were inducted into the Clan MacDude by Sqotty and Qob, joining the ranks of John Colicos (Kor MacDude), William Campbell (Kolath MacDude) and Michael Ansara (Kang MacDude).

89k JPEG O'Reilly and Hertzler join the Clan MacDude, becoming known as the Brothers MacDude. We can still call them Gowron and Martok.	98k JPEG A bunch of MacDudes...except for one.
102k JPEG A bunch of MacDudes...except for one. Same one, in fact.	102k JPEG Sue-la, Gowron, and Sqotty.

Qob then proceeded with KAG promotions and honors, with Gowron and Martok participating in adding to the honor bestowed on a number of fine warriors.

86k JPEG Gowron and Martok preside over promotions, with Qe'Pa receving honors and Qob in the background.

95k JPEG JaPa on the left, Krom second from right, and two other Klingons (okay, one is Sam, but I don't know his Klingon name).

This large gathering ended with a group photo of the all the Klingons gathered around O'Reilly and Hertzler.

82k JPEG Gowron and Martok in a group shot with the Klingons present.	106k JPEG Hertzler and Alois.
125k JPEG One of the many Klingons present.	90k JPEG Hertzler, Qob and Sqotty.

Sunday, last day of the con, was a slow day as people began to wind up their stay.

55k JPEG a space pod from 2001: A Space Odysssy marks the entrance to the main stage.	101k JPEG Hal 9000. The screen ran clips from the movie 2001: A Space Odysssy.
85k JPEG Anna visits Con Ops.	159k JPEG Anna at one of the panels. Would you believe this is her FOURTH convention? It is.

The high point on Sunday for the members of KAG was its presentation during closing ceremonies of a Death Howl Memorial for cast and crew of the Star Trek series who have passed on.

At this point the crew, and many in the audience, let forth with a thunderous roar, and ended it with a tumultuous applause. The dialogue was written by Qob.

During closing ceremonies, J.G. Hertzler announced that he intends to move to the Twin Cities. This will be a welcome addition to the region.

KAG run panels included a Klingon makeup panel lead by Qob.

Convergence was a real blast this year, and consistently delivers lots o panels of interest, from costuming to hard science.

Here's some picutes I didn't exactly fit in wit the above, but wanted to include...

123k JPEG Steve and Terri doing Pigs in Space.	94k JPEG Grommit being stalked by a sheep. No idea who is in the costumes.
115k JPEG Sue-La.	245k JPEG Sqotty MacKlingon.
111k JPEG Batman and Anna.	79k JPEG Patti, stuck between Mirror Empire and a Klingon.
154k JPEG Ivan gets a parting shot.	123k JPEG What would "Viva Las Vegas" be without K'Elvis.

Posted by Sqotty at 6:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)
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Now that I've spent a good chunk of the last couple of days playing with windows Movie Maker and have figured out how to include it on my website, I thought I should share the fruits of my labor.

During the run of BayCon, I indoctrinated one of the Klingons, Pete, from the IKV Blackdragon into the Clan MacDude. Although I flubbed which hand to raise (it really is the left hand), we did get a video of it.

Drop a comment and let me know what you think.

Pete, dude, welcome to the Clan!

Posted by Sqotty at 8:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)
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Yesterday was the Minnesota Highland Games, at the Dakota County Fairgrounds in Farmington. Only one of my friends, Jerry, made it down there. the rest of you missed out on a very good highland gathering. This gathering is the replacement for the one that used to take place at Mac Allister College in the Twin Cities.

There were five or six pipebands in attendance, and the massed bands performance was excellent. There was a pipeband from Iowa and another from Nebrska, the rest coming from the Twin Cities Metro Area.

The the athletes for the heavy events made up a fine field. One of the competitors made numerous huge throws with the weight for distance, falling just short of 90 feet.

There was a pub area where beer was available, and an array folk music bands played entertained their audience with a variety of Celtic Music.

A second stage was set up for additional musicians as well as presentations. One presentation I watched was on Falconry, with three birds: A peregrine falcon, a red-tailed hawk, and a kestrel. The guy making the presentation spoke on how to get into falconry as well as a bit of history behind the sport.

What would a highland games be without a living history section? There were several living history groups in attendance, providing a taste of what it was like living in the various ages they recreated.

Finally, there was the sheep herding demonstrations, which is something I have always enjoyed watching. The dogs do a magnificent job, and you can tell by the way they look that they love what they do.

There were some 20 or so clans represented in the glen of Clans; various food booths; and quite a number of vendors selling Scottish and Celtic goodies.

The weather was excellent, the Fairgrounds provides plenty of parking (unlike going downtown), and was well run. I'll be looking forward to a return next year.

Posted by Sqotty at 9:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)
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An article posted on the Clan MacDude newsgroup lead me to a site that describes building a home PC out of a bottle of Ballantine’s Scotch. This is way cool. I want one.

The article is four pages and is a photographic tour of how to build one, and a list of components used.

Check it out.

Posted by Sqotty at 9:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)
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