AnimeIowa 2019
AnimeIowa is an anime convention put on by the Mindbridge Foundation, the same people who put on ICON, an old-school science fiction convention held every year in Cedar Rapids. This year AnimeIowa was held over the weekend of July 12-14, 2019 at the Iowa Events Center in Des Moines, Iowa.
We had just completed InConJunction XXXIX, a hometown science fiction convention, and had to change over the merchandise a second time in as many weeks to go to an anime convention. So I was tired and sore when we hit the road on Tuesday, and it probably wasn't any surprise that we'd forget at least one critical thing. At least we discovered it in time to go back and retrieve it, because not having our laundry basket would've meant going without a lot of our con clothes, which we'd worn at InConJunction and I was planning to wash at my dad's place.
Even with that delay and two stops in Champaign, Illinois, we still made it to my dad's place in good time. I carried in our essential items and got some laundry started. We had supper, and then I got the computer out and did some catching up on con reports and other things that had slid while we were dealing with a convention.
We tried to get to bed early, but somehow it didn't quite work out and it was still almost midnight by the time we were in bed with lights out. And after the drive, I was stiff and sore and had a fair amount of trouble getting and staying asleep.
So Wednesday morning came way too soon, and we had to hurry to get everything back into our van so we could hit to road at a reasonable time. We said good-bye to Dad and headed off.
At first I was feeling reasonably energetic, but after we got gas at the Iowa 80 truck stop, I started feeling steadily more and more tired. As we approached Des Moines, the caffeine started becoming less and less effective, and it was all I could do to keep my eyes open.
I was very glad to finally pull into the hotel parking lot and be able to shut down. Check-in went smoothly and I was able to carry our personal belongings in without too much trouble, other than the heat. Once I got everything in, we just crawled in bed and took a nap.
After supper, I got my computer set up and prepped some blog posts to go up later in the week. I also did some work on various con reports. Because we had been so tired when we arrived, we made a point of going to bed early in hope of catching up on our sleep.
On Thursday morning we did set an alarm to make sure we got to the hotel's complimentary breakfast. However, we didn't have to push nearly as hard to get going, since load-in didn't even start until evening. We did have to get out of the room long enough to let the maids clean it, so mid-morning we went out to the breakfast nook and sat around.
Once the room was freshened, we went back in and had lunch. Then we decided to just go ahead and take a nap so we wouldn't start the convention sleep deprived.
In the evening I got our supper ready to take with us and we headed downtown to the convention center. Getting out of the hotel parking lot proved more difficult than we'd anticipated, since it was a small lot and there was only one entrance, so we had to get the van turned around to exit. But once we were on the road, we found the convention center without too much difficulty, and discovered that people were already going into the loading dock. However, once we got inside, we were told that we had to wait to load in, so we started eating our supper.
Then everything changed and we were told we could start loading in. However, there were some miscommunications about what it meant about not being able to drive onto the show floor. As a result, we started unloading while still on the lower level and were pushing the cart up a steep ramp. Once I had the cart get away from me, and only quick action by another dealer kept it from hitting someone's car.
Then one of the staff members came and helped us get the rest of our merchandise in, so we could get started on serious setup earlier. I was supposed to take the van to regular parking, but they'd parked two rows of cars along the back row, and I wasn't sure I could safely back out. Since nobody was hassling us about getting out and nobody was offering to be my spotter for backing out, I just left the van where it was and concentrated on building our display structures. I got two of the smaller ones done and probably could've made some headway on a third, but my husband just wanted to get back to the hotel when there was about half an hour left.
We drove back to the hotel and discovered the parking spot we'd used was taken. So we had to go down the ramp to the parking in the back. At least I was able to find a pull-through spot, but it was still uneasy-making.
On Friday we got up early and had the hotel's complimentary breakfast. Then I had to pull the van up the narrow exit ramp to get back out. At least that was the worst part of the commute, and we got to the convention center with no further trouble. I dropped my husband off and went over to the main parking lot. It was hugely spacious, so I had no trouble getting a pull-through parking spot lined up with the exit.
I walked through the loading dock to get into the dealers' room and immediately got to work building our last two display structures. Once they were up, I got the t-shirts out and those boxes out of the way, which made it a whole lot easier to get to the rest of our merchandise. As we proceeded, it became increasingly obvious that we weren't going to have trouble finding places to put everything. Instead, our biggest problem was going to be covering all our tables so that our merchandise didn't look picked over and unloved. This was the result of our having expected narrow tables, but the convention center providing wide tables, so the t-shirts didn't spread out as far.
We actually were almost finished when the doors opened and people started filtering in. The slow beginning helped, since we could get everything done and even get signs out before we really started getting busy.
And busy we were. Although there were a few periods when we didn't have much traffic, we had enough that there were some times we could barely keep up with the flow of customers. We even got onto the second page of the ledger, something we hadn't even achieved at Visioncon or JAFAX, which had been our best conventions of the year to date.
When we got back to the hotel, we discovered that even the pull-through spots in the back were taken. When I headed up the ramp to take another round, I wasn't lined up and scraped the front bumper against the retaining wall. At least it didn't seem to take any serious damage, but I still had to back up and get lined up properly before I could go around and get the one spot where I wouldn't have anyone behind me. It pretty much solidified my determination that we were never coming back to that hotel.
Once I got us parked and were in our room, I got us supper. Then I tried to rest my sore feet as I got a little writing done before we turned in for the night.
On Saturday we got up early to get the hotel's complimentary breakfast. Then we headed downtown for another day of sales. We were busy for almost the entire day, and we were making serious inroads on the order of emoji masks that I had just gotten. I decided it was time to put through another order so we would have more for our next convention.
When we got back to the hotel, we had even more trouble getting parked. We ended up getting backed into a spot near the exit so we could just pull out and be lined up to get back out. Then we ate supper and I put the order through before we turned in for the night.
On Sunday we got up and had the hotel's complimentary breakfast before heading back downtown for the final day of the convention. We wanted a strong finish, but we also knew we needed to get out before the 8PM deadline so we didn't get crosswise with the venue, since our information packet had warned of possible fines and fees for incurring union overtime. So we had to find a balance between keeping things out long enough to get good sales and starting packing early enough that we could start loading out shortly after the show closed.
We ended up starting the packing process shortly after lunch. I started putting away items that had received little or no attention over the course of the weekend, and slowly progressed toward stuff that was selling but still required a lot of work to pack. We were still making sales even as we were packing, although during the last hour of the show the traffic tapered off noticeably. One of the staffers came by and pitched in to help us get the t-shirts boxed up and the structures broken down so I could go over and get the van right about the time the loading dock opened.
I did have some communication problems at the loading dock, but that was more in the issue of not being able to sort out where they wanted me. At first they wanted me to back into a tight little space between two other vehicles, but wouldn't give me any help backing in. I was afraid I'd hit one or the other vehicle, so I opted for another area, only to be told I was sticking out too far. So I went to another place, only be told they wanted me moved over one way or the other. Finally I was able to get into position and get started loading.
At least with no need to worry about going up and down a steep slope, I was able to pile the cart high with boxes, even the heavy t-shirts. That sped up the process, especially once our helper grabbed a second cart and started piling it with stuff too. I was able to sort through things at the van and figure out where everything needed to go, especially now that we'd emptied some boxes and I'd gotten two of them nested inside each other.
We actually got done with an hour to spare, and were back at the hotel by 8PM. We had supper and relaxed before getting to bed reasonably early.
On Monday morning we had the hotel's complimentary breakfast. Then we gathered up our belongings to get checked out as early as possible so we'd be able to get the deposit made at the branch of our bank in Bloomington. I had a close call when I went to get the van out of the lower parking lot and ended up hung up between a big box truck and the high curb of the ramp. My husband finally came out and spotted me so I could go right past the rear bumper of the box truck and get over to the front door. At least it didn't take me that long to get our stuff into the van, unlike some times earlier this year.
We made a stop at a QuikTrip to get gas before we hit the highway. The trip across Iowa went smoothly enough, and we stopped again at the Iowa 80 truck stop for gas. Then we pushed across the Mississippi at the Quad Cities and into Illinois. By then we were getting tight on time, and we had to deal with some road construction.
However, we did make it to Bloomington in time to make the deposit. We'd been planning to get gas at Walmart, but they'd gone up over the weekend. So we just headed on to my dad's place. I'd gotten an e-mail earlier from my dad that he and my youngest brother (who'd come home for a visit to attend the family reunion) were going to Peoria to do some genealogy research with some reference books there, but I was happy to see that they were already back.
My brother helped me carry everything in, which really speeded up the process. Then I got a load of laundry going, and we ended up talking longer than I'd intended. As a result, we ended up having supper later than usual, and I got to bed later than I'd intended.
On Tuesday we got to sleep until we were finished sleeping. At least we weren't as exhausted as we are sometimes after conventions, but it was still nice not to have to get up to an alarm. Even so, I got through breakfast and shower with time enough to get almost everything carried out before lunch. After lunch we took out the last few things and said good-bye. I felt oddly reluctant to actually leave, yet I knew we couldn't prolong our visit indefinitely.
The trip home went fairly well, although we did go through some pretty heavy rain as we approached Indianapolis. When we approached the north split from I-65 to I-70, we ran into a huge backup, which slowed us down pretty badly. But we still got back in time to get our essential stuff in and make supper. Then I got the rest of our personal belongings in as I got breaks in the rain. It was good to be home again and get some rest before our next event.
Copyright 2019 by Leigh Kimmel
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Last updated July 21, 2019.