Hall of Heroes Comic Con 2022
Hall of Heroes Comic Con is a small comic convention put on by the Hall of Heroes Comic Museum in Elkhart, Indiana. This year it was held over the weekend of March 5-6, 2022 at the Northern Indiana Event Center in Elkhart, Indiana.
Because we needed to be up there on Friday to load in and set up, we drove up on Thursday before the con. As we were heading around I-465 to US 31, we saw the beginning of the convoy of trucks that was heading toward Washington DC to protest government mandates. I was happy to see that they appeared to be orderly, with no evidence of agents provocateur. However, I didn't get to see much of it because we soon reached our exit and headed north.
The trip up to South Bend was familiar from many trips to Grand Rapids. The biggest thing was remembering to get off at the eastbound exit to US 20, rather than the westbound US 31/20 exit. This exit took me past some familiar roads from my year in South Bend, which brought back some nostalgia for the apartment that I had loved, and less comfortable memories of the job, leading me to wonder if I'd made a mistake in broadening my job search to public libraries, and whether I might've had a more successful library career had I stuck to academic libraries -- but that I had found success with self-employment in small business.
We arrived at the hotel in good time and got checked in. I had some difficulty getting our belongings in because of the way the door was built, but still managed to get settled in without too much trouble. However, I discovered that, in my haste to get my computer packed up, I'd failed to get the mouse. Because the trackpad on my computer is flaky, working without a mouse was a total pain, but it didn't make sense to try to pick up a spare mouse.
So I decided to switch to pen and paper and make some more notes on a novel that I've been writing on and off since the 1980's. I ended up sketching out a good bit of the second and third books, as the two protagonists are doing the dance of avoidance, both certain that a romantic relationship can't possibly work and it's best to forget the other and move on. I also figured out what's actually going in in the scene that was the inspiration for the whole thing, way back when I was still in high school. This version is completely different from my original impression, which came to me in a dream shortly before my creative writing teacher assigned us to write a short story.
Since we had a busy weekend ahead of us, we decided to turn in for the night a little earlier than we usually would. Best to be caught up on sleep before it would become a scarce commodity.
On Friday we got the hotel's complimentary breakfast, which they actually allowed us to eat in the breakfast nook. In fact, they had gone back to requiring us to eat there, and they even had hot sausages in addition to the cereal and other packaged items.
Then we had some time to relax before we could start loading in. I used the time to do some more work on the novel, as I did when we got to the convention center early and had to wait for the doors to open.
Once the doors opened, I got stuff hauled in so we could set up. Because we had a smaller setup for a two-day convention, we were actually able to get set up by closing time. On the other hand, we ended up running out of space before we ran out of stuff. We then headed back to the hotel, where we had supper and I did some more work on my novel before we turned in for the night.
On Saturday we had the hotel's complimentary breakfast and headed back to the convention center to finalize our setup before the doors opened for the buying public. Mostly we just needed to put up signs, so we actually had time to walk around and see other vendors' setups. I talked with one of the other vendors about the current international situation, and both of us agreed that we found Putin's eyes creepy.
Then the doors opened and it was showtime. Foot traffic was slow at first, and all my doubts about the event came back. But after a little while things picked up, and we had a fair volume of sales. Although there were a few lulls here and there, by the end of the day we were on the third page of our ledger.
After the vendor hall closed for the night, we headed back to the hotel to have supper. Then I did some more work on the novel before we turned in for the night.
On Sunday we had another complimentary breakfast, then headed back to the convention center for a strong finish for a two-day show. We got our booth open and took a look around before the doors opened for sales. I also went ahead and bought our booths for next year's show.
Then the doors opened and we got down to business. The flow of foot traffic and sales was up and down through the day. Sometimes we'd be standing around idle, and other times we'd be struggling to keep up with the customers trying to give us money.
It did slow down as the end of the day drew closer and we needed to start packing the fragile stuff, so there wasn't quite as much conflict between the need to get out in time and the desire to avoid losing sales. When the doors closed, another vendor with a smaller setup came by and helped us get everything out. Unfortunately, due to a miscommunication someone thought our broom and butler set belonged to the venue, and it got left behind. However, given that it was something that had been abandoned by a vendor at an earlier show, losing it wasn't a complete disaster.
We actually got finished with about half an hour to spare before the deadline, and for a change we weren't the last vendors out. There was even some sunlight when we pulled out, although it was fading fast, and by the time we got back to the hotel, it was definitely dark. We had supper and I did a little more work on my writing before we turned in for the night.
On Monday we got up and had one last breakfast on the hotel. Then we packed and got everything out. This time I didn't have so much trouble getting the cart through the door, since I was going down instead of up. We actually were finished and hit the road almost an hour before our target time, so we were ahead of the game. We stopped at the branch of our bank in South Bend and made the cash deposit, then headed south on US-31 to get back to Indianapolis. We even had time to carry stuff in before heading down to the free community meal at one of the local churches.
Copyright 2022 by Leigh Kimmel
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Last updated March 25, 2022.