Guest post by Ally Beard
Tampa Bay, FL – It’s Wednesday on August 21 st. It’s rainy, sunny, and all the bipolar weather the
south can offer as I’ve made it to the good old sunshine state with my husband. We’re the first
ones to arrive to the Airbnb. We quickly get unpacked and not too long afterwards all our friends
are here, hugs are shared, and the inappropriate humor started. For the next two days we had
played games that leave our morality card at the door, explored the stores everyone wanted to
go to, and I received my passport from one of the Tampa LEGO stores. I can now officially start
my travels across the world to get my passport stamped with the city marker that tells me what
LEGO store I had been to. Now the beginning introductions are finished, let me start what I had
done for the first day of the con: Friday, August 23 rd.
Parking was almost a nightmare. One of my friends dropped all of us off besides her co-pilot to
find parking at the we’re-not-supposed-to-be-dropped-off-here zone, and then we had to figure
out what line to get in. One went to the ADA line without her boyfriend, and I ended up with her
boyfriend and my red-headed ball of hyperness in the General Admission line, we didn’t know at
the time this wasn’t the line. We managed to get into the proper line after a staff member came
down the sidewalk to tell us where to go. I ended up inside, lost the boyfriend along the way, the
building with other Ruby and VIP passes after bag check. Had some communication problems
with my husband and the pilot over the phone to tell them to get in line with us after they didn’t
know where to go. That wasn’t fun trying to describe how many doors to go through and stairs
to climb. Eventually we all ended up together, got our bracelets and badges, and the poor
husband had to get another bracelet after his broke.
I don’t think I’ve beelined and left behind my fellow comrades for the celebrity row half of floors 2
and 3 so fast in my life. All I could think about was: Where’s Mark’s table? Oh, look! Chandler
Riggs table! Oh, David Hayter! Oh! I need to get autographs and selfies at these tables! Wait?
Where’s Mark? Mark? Not Mark. You’re not Mark either. Finally, I get to the other side where
Mark was. He was in front of Hayden Christensen’s, Anakin Skywalker from the prequel Star
Wars trilogy, little doorway leading to his own section, and Katie Cassidy was next to him,
original actor for Ruby on season 3 of Supernatural. I called out to him; he saw me and waved
me over to his table after I made sure it was ok to approach. He had Frankie sleeping on top of
his table and his Starbucks-like chain store coffee next to him. He gave me a hand hug since he
couldn’t get up.
It was a great interaction! We talked about X, music, Frankie, UFC, well my husband and him
talked about UFC I just stood there waiting for them to finish, his missing socks being taken by
ghosts, and some other things that were just little talks that I don’t want to put here. It was a
mixture of talk throughout the day, because I went back to his table many times just to say hi,
and my hyper friend and I did a selfie with him. I almost stepped on Frankie’s bed to get on the
other side since Mark couldn’t get up. I also saw a little tiny rubber ducky on his table! A fan
gifted it to him, and I had to put it on top of his drink. I didn’t want it to get lost, and his coffee
was empty by then anyways. Shoutout to Riley, his handler, and all the staff that put up with me
and my group that entire day. Don’t worry, we’re a polite bunch and didn’t stand in the way of
customers. I am just so happy he finally signed his Devil tarot card, and later I had to ask him
what it said, you’ll see why in the photo below, and it says: “love ya”. Eventually Robbie pulled
me away from the table later in the day to get Katie Cassidy to sign her autograph. I talked to
her about some things too.
After Mark’s table I would be spending the next four hours down in the photo op lines. The first
one starting with Hayden Christensen. I was in session 1 of 4, and boy did they fill up line after
line for photos. From what one of the staff members tell me he had 700 people to take photos
with, and that was just with single photo people! If anyone had duo’s or more then I can’t
imagine how big that number would be. One of my friends from Florida was in session 3, so she
had a way to wait. He was also doing autograph sessions throughout the day. His sessions with
that went way down the alphabet line for that. The only other celebrity guest there that more
than one session was Charlie Cox, Matt Murdock from Daredevil the tv series, and his only went
to 2.
After I received my photo op from the printer, literally takes two minutes print – thank God, I
went straight to my second home for Friday: the photo op room. Time to start my long day of
getting photo ops done. Throughout the day they had VIPs in one line and Ruby and General
Admission in another, anyone having group photos got pulled into VIP. this helped a lot since
two of my friends had Ruby. I had duos, a quad, and a group of 8 throughout the entire day with
them.
First up was supposed to be The Walking Dead Duo, Chandler Riggs (Carl) and Ross
Marquand (Aaron), but Ross was very confused on where to be, and ended up being roughly 30
minutes late to his photo op, so I got pulled out of that VIP line to get into David Hayter’s, Solid
Snake from the Metal Gear Solid video game franchise, for his photo op. I think the poor event
staff lady was so overwhelmed by the whole thing, and I encouraged her to keep going;
because she was doing an excellent job.
As soon as I was done with those, I had to get right back in line for Todd Haberkorn’s, The
Drifter from the video game: Destiny 2, and he was ecstatic to see the medallion that my
husband was holding for the picture, and he told him that he really had to climb a mountain to
get this reward! This reward was only given to Destiny 2 players that finished the achievements
that came with a game mode called: Gambit. It took 7 months to come in, because this was
during the time of lockdowns in other countries, so getting things like this took some time. I did
eventually have to ask for a refund, never received it, and it eventually did come in. might have
been a reward but still cost a bit of money for shipping, taxes, and fees.
Know what I did? You guessed it! No, not get back in line! I went to go to the bathroom, then I
got right back in line, because it was time for Katie Cassidy! Luckily hers went smooth, and I
love her head tilt!
I had a break! You know what I did? I went to go try and find Jimmy Palmiotti and Amanda
Conner, a comic book writer and artist, table so I could get my New 52 Harley Quinn comics
signed! Turns out they weren’t there till Saturday, so I went to go bug Mark again, and I saw
some of our friends hanging around his table. I snuck up and jumped in asking what everyone
was talking about why they were there. Mark was surprised I said I just spent 3 hours
downstairs getting photo ops done. I don’t know what he thinks of the situation, but the look of
what? on his face was priceless! Don’t worry, I have plenty of photo ops to post of Mark and with
Mark’s people. That was also the time I confused him more when I said kbai to go to Katie
Cassidy’s table. He was like OK! To be fair, my husband knew I needed her to sign the
Supernatural Blu-Ray book, so he was trying to get my attention.
Now, I am back down in the photo op room for the 10,000 th time to get my final photo ops of the
day done with none other than the man I primarily came there to see: Mark Pellegrino! It went
smoothly and was so excited to get the duo one done with my pilot of the car done! We ended
up using a “I never claimed to be God” shirt that has Lucifer from Supernatural snapping his
fingers. We prayed to it while Mark held it up. It was funny!
After the photo ops were done, I made my way back to celebrity row to see who I could snag
selfies and autographs before the day ended. I managed to get a selfie and autograph with
Chander Riggs! He’s so cool! I talked to him about how I started watching The Walking Dead
again and seemed interested at it took me 11 days to watch 11 seasons. I had a lot of free time.
I ended up calling him sir when I am twice his age. I was like what am I doing? My husband had
to open his mouth that Ross Marquand was late for the duo in a joking manner. Chandler
explained the same thing about the poor guy being confused where to go.
The second to last table I went to was David Hayter’s! He asked me during the photo op to
come talk to him about his adventures in Japan, since I was the one who asked the question
online to start with, that he stupidly did. He didn’t want to explain to all the internet what he had
done. I told him I didn’t know he lived in Japan for some time, and I really didn’t know much
about the celebrities here. He makes a good point to saying why would I know? I told him I
respected the privacy of others, and he seemed to like that answer. He even did his quote from
the Metal Gear series where he says: you’re pretty good!
What I asked and answered to him on twitter: https://x.com/DavidBHayter/status/1825715306737840329
To end the autograph journey, I ventured to Todd Haberkorn’s table! He signed my husband’s
medallion twice, because sharpie on velvet doesn’t work at all. As my husband was talking to
him, he was using lines from Destiny 2 in his character’s voice to counter everything the other
was saying. It was cool to hear him say all that! Him saying “Bank those motes!” was my
favorite! It’s interesting to hear voice actors say these kinds of things in person. The wording on
the box says: motes. I know it looks like mokes. I promise it doesn’t say that. His handwriting
rivals mine in legibility.
By the time that was done, the day was starting to end, and my friends had bought stuff and
were done walking around the convention floor. They were all waiting outside by the coffee bar,
and I went out to meet them. Now, I know what I am getting the very next day when I come
back! I did swing by Mark’s table to say good-bye, but unfortunately, I didn’t get to, because he
had a line, which is a good thing! There’s always Saturday and Sunday to say hi! For now, I say
good-bye to Friday, come back to the Airbnb for some food and relaxation! Till then see y’all on
Saturday’s blog post! But incase y’all don’t want to wait to talk to me then, I can be found on X
at @NephthysPhoenix!
Ally Beard
