Letters From The Loft
Stuff From The Desk Of Chuck Thornton
DAY TWO - PAGE 6
It was getting close to 5:00, and my legs were telling me that I should either find a chair or hijack a Rascal Scooter. I wanted to see a panel featuring B-movie producer Roger Corman as 5:30, so we went to that room a bit early and again crashed the preceding panel. It featured a company called Archaia, which I think is a comic book publisher, and a new book called Lucid that they're producing in partnership with another company called Before The Door, which I think is a development company for media products. As you've probably gathered, I wasn't paying close attention; I was just glad that there were plenty of empty seats available...
...which sort of surprised me when I noticed that one of the panelists was actor Zachary Quinto, who is one of the founders of Before The Door. Even if there wasn't much interest in Lucid, I would have thought that Quinto, who was a major player in the TV series Heroes, and played Spock, for goodness' sake, in the most recent Star Trek movie, would have attracted a bigger crowd. I expected a Q & A session characterized by, "Hi, Zach, Lucid looks cool, now what's up with you and Uhura?" But either this panel slipped under the Trekker radar, or people with Federation uniforms were turned away at the door, because the panel proceeded as if Quinto were just another producer promoting his project.
We stuck around for the Roger Corman panel, but Roger mostly deferred to the other folks on the panel who were promoting the DVD release of his old exploitation movies, so I didn't get to hear a whole lot of stories about how he made movies with whatever change he found in his sofa cushions.
After that, it was early evening, and we headed for the car. We were stopped by a couple more admirers of our Smallville bags, and we dutifully directed them to the Warner Brothers booth, or as we started calling it, "Snipe Central."
We were starving, so we asked the GPS to take us to the nearest Hometown Buffet, and it turned out to be the same Hometown Buffet that we had used almost every night of our stay the year before. When we walked in, we recognized the lady at the front counter as the same lady that had greeted us and taken our money every night the year before. Eerily, she also said "Welcome back!" when we walked in. We hoped that was her standard greeting to all patrons... the possibility that we had somehow made a year-long impression was discomforting.
We killed some time, then headed over to the train station to pick up Ben, who was supposed to arrive via the Amtrak Pacific Surfliner at around 10:00.
The main San Diego train station isn't located too far from the Convention Center. It wasn't very busy at that time of night, and there was plenty of parking nearby... in a lot that also served as Convention Center parking and still had a sign indicating a flat fee of $20.00. Since I was only there for what I hoped would be less than a half hour, I decided to find parking somewhere else. I circled the train station, but there wasn't anything around except a loading zone populated by buses. I considered dropping Sam off inside the station, then cruising around till he called me to come back for the pick-up. But I wasn't crazy about cruising the San Diego downtown area, which is a latticework of one-way streets that could very easily lead me to Temecula before I could turn around. Another scenario was doing the Sam drop-off, then riding around in circles at the 20-dollar lot pretending to look for a parking place. But that would be a tough sell, seeing as how there were only 3 other cars in the lot.
Finally, I capitulated, parked the car, and we went over to the kiosk-type box where you're supposed to pay your money. It used to be these were just wooden mail-slot type units where you slipped your money into the box corresponding to your parking space number. But most have upgraded to an ATM-like arrangement, where you punch in your space number, then either swipe your credit card or feed in your currency and it dispenses a ticket while playing a recording of Snidely Whiplash laughing maniacally.
I would have been lost with either arrangement, because, between the limited lighting and the faded paint on the pavement, neither Sam nor I could determine the parking space numbers... on any parking space, not just ours. It was as if someone had decided to sandblast the pavement for a game of parking roulette.
So I'm ashamed to admit it, but I applied some situational ethics and just walked on into the train station without paying. This made Sam very uncomfortable... he kept looking around guiltily, and if we'd been in an airport, we'd probably still be in a Homeland Security interrogation room.
The train station was sort of old-timey:
... and as you can see, not really bustling at this time of night. Sam and I sat down, but after a couple of minutes, I decided to look around outside. I got up and walked out without saying anything to Sam. When he saw me walk out the door, he followed me to let me know that the proper protocol would have been to at least excuse myself or tell him where I was going. I don't know where he developed these abandonment issues; I don't recall ever absent-mindedly setting him down as an infant and then having to pick him up later from the lost-and-found, but, then again, if I was that absent-minded, I probably went the extra mile and erased the whole episode from my brain.
From there, everything went like clockwork. Ben arrived, we high-tailed it back to the car and made our getaway from the parking lot, keeping our heads covered in case of any satellite surveillance. We stopped by a MacDonald's drive-through so Ben could have the second of his customary two evening meals. Then it was back to the hotel room to prepare the air mattress. After inflating Ben's belly and bed, we filled him in on our adventures so far. He hid his excitement very well by closing his eyes and regulating his breathing, and that gave us the idea to retire for the night, so we'd be fresh for Saturday.