Belated Trek Fest recap, photos & video!

Okay, this post is SUPER belated, but mizuno_caitlin reminded me and I figured better late than never! So at long last I'm sharing my recap and photos and the like from Trek Fest XXV in Riverside, IA. My recap post was SUPER tl;dr and image-heavy, but this com loves embedding, so here goes nothing! (Alternatively, you can just view my photo album alone here if you'd prefer.



I don't even know where to begin exactly. ;adlkjfe Okay, so, Trek Fest started on Friday, and my friend Dana and I headed down in the afternoon to see the Voyage Home Museum I'd heard so much about. The "museum" ended up being about the size of my bedroom. And had about as much Star Trek stuff as my bedroom has in it. Well, okay, not entirely true, they had quite a bit of cool stuff considering the size, but Dana and I found it especially amusing that the walls were basically all just decorated with pictures of Star Trek episodes printed off from the internet, hahaha.


They had some great collectibles and a lot of autographed things, however!


From when William Shatner was in town. That's a check he wrote for four dollars, haha.


Boy, just what I always wanted. . . .

The parking lot of this little museum is also where you can find two of Riverside's permanent attractions:






Please note how amazing our t-shirts are.

We headed to Kirk's future birthplace after that.


It's behind a TINY barbershop, right next to an antique store with the nicest owner EVER. (If ever you go to Riverside, Iowa for whatever reason, GO HERE. She's just the sweetest thing, and she has some really choice antique Star Trek jewelry!)


AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH


AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH


AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

I was pretty excited about the birthstone, if you couldn't tell. ;aldkjfe


Headed to the local Trekkie ice cream shop later that night. It featured such delicacies as "Sulu Sorbet," "Chekov Chocolate," "Klingon Krunch," and "Heavenly Uhura Hazelnut," just to name a few.


It also had this swell painting on the wall, signed by Walter Koenig! :)

We went home not terribly long after that, knowing that SATURDAY would be our day for TRUE elation. AND WAS IT EVER.


The line-up for the parade. It was easily the most random parade I have ever seen. Just this bizarre combination of small-town floats/about a zillion fire trucks and then a few Star Trek floats sprinkled into the mix.


Steve Miller, for those of you who don't know, is the man who wrote Gene Roddenberry and asked if Riverside could officially be named the future birthplace of Captain Kirk, after he read that Kirk was supposed to be born in some small town in Iowa. Gene, obviously, said yes. :)


Wait who's that I see


Who is it


AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. At this point my group and I yelled in unison, "WE LOVE YOU GEORGE TAKEI!!" and he looked at us and yelled back "THANK YOU!!" 8D I wish we'd had time to yell at all of them though ;adjfe :( dlk;jfae Note George's teddy bear.


AHAHAH IT'S A HORTA CAR


The USS Riverside got to stretch its wings!


As did the wobbliest Klingon warbird I have ever seen.


After the parade, a friend and I got our pictures taken with a couple Klingons. The guy kept growling suggestively at us and said as we were walking away, "Ohhhh I can feel my nipples getting hard!" WOOOO GOTTA LOVE THE KLINGONS.

THEN IT WAS TIME FOR THE COSTUME CONTEST. Which was judged by none other than George, Nichelle, and Walter.


Let me just say this was the point at which I started to realize how much I adore Walter Koenig. He just walked to the edge of the stage and started chatting with people from the audience! SUCH A NICE GUY. More on this later.


He was also so endearingly spacey. He'd wander around alone and check things out and stuff while Nichelle and George were chatting, heehee. I am kind of in love with this picture.


GEORGE IN SHORTS


George and Nichelle waiting for the judging to begin. :) LOOK AT HOW STYLISH SHE LOOKS. The woman has so much CLASS, gah.


IDK I JUST LOVE GEORGE'S CALVES


jfad;lkfe Horta. It was a great costume, but believe it or not, this guy was kind of psycho.



a;fdlkje there was a kids' costume portion of the contest and you guys. YOU GUYS. TINY. SHIRTLESS. FENCING. SULU. ;FALKJDFE HE HAD A LISP TOO. I ALMOST KEELED OVER FROM THE CUTE.


This was taken later, but it's me with the woman who won the Starfleet portion of the costume contest. MIRROR UNIVERSE UHURA FTW!! She even pulled a phaser on George Takei. THAT TAKES SOME BALLS.


After the contest we took a quick photo-op at the float George and Nichelle and Walter rode on. ;falkjdfe I also met jacketpotato, mizuno_caitlin, and gentlest_sin, fellow ontd_startrek folk! I didn't get any pictures with them though. D: That was dumb of me!

And finally, it was OFF TO THE CASINO for the Q&A!

The Q&A was utterly, UTTERLY amazing. I was so incredibly charmed because it was just really apparent by the way they interacted how much these three LOVE each other. They were all so sweet and charming and funny and they bickered like an old married, um, threesome, and GEORGE IMMEDIATELY CONGRATULATED IOWA ON VOTING FOR OBAMA SO EARLY AND FOR SUPPORTING MARRIAGE EQUALITY. ♥ To quite a round of cheering, too, which I thought was pretty impressive considering the whole town-of-900 thing! They each had their distinct quirks, too--Walter acted like a total grump but really he was just really dry in his humor, and he kept calling out Nichelle and George on how much they talked, LOL. Which is especially funny because when he got going, he totally did the same thing. And Nichelle told amazing, AMAZING stories about like, overcoming racism in Hollywood and SHE SANG A SONG FOR US FROM HER ONE-WOMAN SHOW and George and Walter kept fighting affectionately fa;ldkjfe.

OH GOD AND AT ONE POINT WALTER SAID IT WAS HIS BIRTHDAY, RIGHT, and everyone started cheering and stuff, and then he was like "Well my birthday is actually the day George and Brad got married so I always say, even if my day isn't going so great, at least someone's having a good time!" ;dkfje And after everyone laughed at that George was like ". . . but Brad and I got married on the 14th of September." And Walter was like "I know! Today's not really my birthday." f;ladkjfe And everyone started laughing again and then the three of them fought about how gullible George is and how much Walter messes with him and Nichelle was like, explaining to the audience that this is how they always are. ;flakdjfe AMAZING. (This is one of the segments I recorded video of!)

I don't want to go into a blow-by-blow of everything they said, but some of the topics they covered: racism in Hollywood in the 60s, why the series got canceled after three seasons, what they're doing now, "the part that got away," how they felt about the new film's Spock/Uhura business, and Tribbles. Lol. If you want me to elaborate on any of these, just ask me in a comment and trust me, I'd be happy to. :D They literally only answered about five questions in two hours because Nichelle and George talked so much, which Walter kept harassing them for. ;falkjdfe

Pictures: (most of these kind of suck because the lighting was terrible, I apologize D:)




George came out and immediately lectured Steve Miller on mispronouncing his last name, LOL.




I think George was calling Walter out on being a grump, hahaha.




After the Q&A it was photo-op and autograph time. The photo with all three of them cost $60, and it was $15 a pop for autographs, so I decided to splurge on the photo and just go for one autograph. I chose George, since I just that day bought a pretty phenomenal miniature Sulu collectible plate. :">


Just creepily taking pictures of other people's photos, don't even worry about it.


I actually made friends with this guy while waiting the bazillion hours it took to get our pictures.


Annnnnd of course, mine. I was kind of awkwardly nervous and excited when I went up there so I felt kind of dumb and frozen, hahaha. I mean, it wasn't that bad, I just wish I'd said more. :x ("I may throw up on you" came to mind, lol.) I got up there and Walter gave me his seat, and I was like "Oh, I get your spot?" And Nichelle said, "Yep! You're a navigator today!" f;lakjdfe :D So I said "Thank you!!" and then we took the picture, basically, and Geroge was like "Have a nice day!" and I was like THANK YOU and kind of floated away f;aljfe but luckily enough for me, I got to make up for my tight-lipped awkwardness later, at least with George and Walter. :) PS ARE YOU EVEN LOOKING AT WALTER'S FACE RIGHT NOW. JUST. FLIRTING WITH THE CAMERA. He was such a tease.

After the photos it was autograph time. Which also took FOREVER. I creeped over to take pictures of them at the autograph line during the downtime, but George and Nichelle were at the front of the line, so the only one I could get a clear picture of was Walter.


He appears to be getting told off by the head of the Riverside Community Activities Board, LOL.



When at last it came time for me to get my autograph, I was a little nervous again. Also, they were REALLY ushering people through so everyone who paid for a ticket would get an autograph, so I knew I wouldn't have much time to chat. I finally got up to George, though, and put my little plate on the table, and he laughed at it and said "This is a small one!" and started signing. So I took the opportunity to say, "I wanted to congratulate you on your wedding!" And George looked up and smiled real big and then he gestured over his shoulder and said, "Thank you! Here, meet the hubby!"

;LFAKJDFE MEET THE HUBBY. JUST IMAGINE GEORGE TAKEI'S AMAZING AMAZING VOICE SAYING "MEET THE HUBBY" TO YOU AND DIE A LITTLE WITH ME, PLEASE.

jfi;j;elkae So Brad came forward and SHOOK MY HAND and said "I'm Brad, nice to meet you!" And I was like "It's so nice to meet you!!" and then fa;dlkjf god it's kind of a blur in my mind, honestly, but I believe I said something like "I really appreciate that you are so active in your support for the gay community" and they were like "Thank you!!!" :D And I finally got shuffled away. :(

OH, AND THE PRIZE I CAME AWAY WITH:


So after this point I was basically like OKAY, LIFE COMPLETE and ready to go, right? I waited around a while for my picture, but they had some printing issue so we all had to either agree to have it mailed to us or go pick it up later that night (which is what I opted to do, naturally). And basically the entire room had emptied out and I was packing up myself, when I thought, hey, I should peek back over by the tables and see if I can snap any more photos! AND AM I EVER GLAD I MADE THIS DECISION. First off, I noticed George was off talking with Brad, and Nichelle was getting interviewed by some TV guy.



But Walter? Walter was just IN THE AUDIENCE, MINGLING WITH THE FEW STRAGGLERS WHO WERE STILL LEFT.



I worked up my courage and kind of shuffled my way into the little group he was chatting with, and after a brief awkward pause, I finally started talking to him! AND HE WAS AMAZING. LIKE, SO FRIENDLY AND FUNNY AND JUST WENT OUT OF HIS WAY TO START UP CONVERSATION WITH ME/THE OTHER STRAGGLERS AND LIKE. I CAN'T EVEN DESCRIBE IT, I HAVE NEVER BEEN SO CHARMED BY A HUMAN BEING IN MY ENTIRE LIFE. By the end of our five-minute discussion I basically was about ready to ask this 72-year-old man if he wanted to elope with me. :(

The blow-by-blow: I first asked him if he'd met Anton Yelchin/how he felt about him. ;alkdjfe AND HE WAS SO COMPLIMENTARY. IMMEDIATELY HE JUST SAID, "Oh yeah, he's great! I met him at a party" -IJE;ALK;ELFKJAE- "and he was so funny. Right away he just grabbed my hand and said," -AND HERE HE WENT INTO A LITTLE ANTON YELCHIN IMPRESSION, NOT EVEN SHITTING YOU- "'It's so great to meet you! I'm so happy, I finally have an action figure!!'" FAIOJDF;AE I ABOUT DIED. And then we just like. a;fdlkje Chatted about Anton Yelchin for a while. a;fdlkjfe He asked if I'd seen Terminator f;alkjdf and I was like "Yeah! It was uh, not as good as Star Trek, but Anton was great in it." And Walter told me he was going to be in some other movies coming out and we both just generally agreed that Anton is very talented and we're glad his career is taking off. :DDDD THENNNNN someone else asked him about his plans for this summer! So he told us he's going to a convention in Madrid, and then going to Barcelona for fun. I chatted him up about Barcelona, too, since I have a couple friends who've studied abroad there, and he wanted to know if I'd ever been and stuff. :DDD He said some Babylon 5 fans are also paying for him to go to a convention in Moscow, which he was really looking forward to, since his parents are Russian but he's never been. We chatted a bit about how we hear Moscow is amazing, too. ;fakjdfe

Someone asked him if he'd been born in America or Russia, then, and he said he was born in Chicago, grew up in NY, and has been living in LA since the 60s. I asked, "Do you see George fairly often, then?" since George lives in San Francisco, and he said, "Yeah, pretty often! Mostly at conventions, to be honest, but you know, I was best man in his wedding." To which I tried to as non-creepily as possible reply "Yeah I know afldkjfe" because, y'know, it's not like I've stalked pictures of George and Walter and Nichelle at George's wedding or anything. I think we talked about a couple other things too, but I can't remember the exact details. Right when it was starting to wind down, Walter TOOK OUT THIS LITTLE LIKE, FAN COMIC SOMEONE MADE HIM TO SHOW ME AND THE OTHER STRAGGLERS. ;ALDKJFE Like, it was a photograph from an earlier convention of George, Walter, Nichelle, and James Doohan up onstage doing another Q&A thing, and George has the mic and is talking but everyone else is just slumped down looking bored as hell. ;afkjfe So the fan had captioned it to have George saying something like "Why, that reminds me of a story . . ." and everyone else is thinking NOT AGAIN or SHUT UP GEORGE or whatever a;dlkjfe very cute. And finally I decided I should stop annoying him, so I shook his hand and said all the typical thank-yous and nice to meet-yous, and he said the same.

BUT I WAS GRIPPED AT THE LAST MINUTE BY A BURST OF CONFIDENCE, AND EVEN THOUGH IT WAS FORBIDDEN EXPRESSLY, I SAID: "I know it's not allowed, but could I maybe get a picture?" And he just said "Oh, of course!" and let me take A SUPER UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL SHOT AND LO AND BEHOLD, LAY YOUR EYES ON THE MOST ADORABLE MAN ALIVE.


I'M NOT EVEN KIDDING, I JUST LOOK AT THIS PICTURE AND MY HEART FEELS LIKE IT'S ABOUT TO BURST. He was just so unreal in his sweetness, guys. :( I went into this con with George solidly as my favorite cast member of Star Trek, and of course I still ADORE him and I adore Nichelle even more than I did before, but Walter just. ;aldkjfe I KIND OF WANT TO MARRY HIM. It was just really amazing of him to go above and beyond the call of duty and actively TRY to engage himself with people in the audience, I think. And his dry humor and humility and general demeanor really, really clicked with me. It probably shouldn't surprise anyone that his autobiography bumped its way up to the next slot on my to-read list. :">

This was obviously the highlight of my day, although it's hard to pick. Later on a friend of mine ALSO got to pee next to Walter in the men's bathroom ;adkfe and I passed him again and nodded once, but that was the last I saw of him. I saw Nichelle one more time, though, just as we were leaving. We passed by a swimsuit shop right next to the pool, and OH MY, WHO SHOULD COME OUT BUT NICHELLE AND BRAD. They were actually HOLDING HANDS AND GIGGLING. LIKE TWO SCHOOLKIDS, NOT EVEN KIDDING. And they saw me and smiled at me and I smiled at them and watched them go to the elevator up to their rooms and basically died. I'm kind of regretting not just getting into the elevator with them and pretending I was staying there just for the ride but I'd probably already maxed out my creepy fan allotment for one weekend.

Annnnd at the end of the evening we watched Star Trek-themed fireworks from the float the celebs rode in. Perfect end to a perfect weekend! :)

I realize this post is like, a novel, but uh, if somehow you have any questions that I didn't answer, please feel free to ask!


I also put up a few Youtube videos of the Q&A session with Walter Koenig, George Takei, and Nichelle Nichols!








And, y'know, just to entice you, have a picture of me, Walter, George, and Nichelle on the bridge of the Enterprise. Try not to be TOO jealous.