My Weekly Adventures #40

The incredibly work-related April is upon us! April always is the month that murders us at my work, so if it gets a little sporadic in the next few weeks, I apologize in advance. However, it has been a whirlwind of busy for the first quarter of 2017. However, everything’s been going pretty great. I love being a workaholic especially if it means working with a ton of great people and getting to do all the things I love. The last two weeks of March has been pretty awesome. I did manage to just get in those new segments despite being a little backtracked by the trip I took to Toronto. In fact this is where I’ll start this Weekly Adventures segment!

Toronto ComiCon (with Drew’s Movie Reviews)

For the second year in a row, I went down to Toronto and met up with Drew, my fantastic blogathon co-host for the Toronto ComiCon weekend. We jam-packed our schedule with tons of panels and went to a party and even found time to eat some good food and visit a beautiful touristic attraction, Casa Loma. You can find the recap for ComiCon here, Casa Loma here and the Toronto haul here.

On that note, one of my prints are already framed! I’ll be framing the other two in the few weeks. Our office is going to look awesome! 🙂

2017 Parks Canada Discovery Pass

More geared towards my fellow Canadian readers, to celebrate 150th birthday of Canada, Parks Canada has offered up the Discovery pass which allows free access to National Parks along with some other centers and whatnot. You can find all the info on the Parks Canada site. I ordered this pass a few weeks ago and got it in the mail some time before or after the Toronto trip and we’re super excited to plan out some more hiking day trips this summer especially since we managed to pick up another set of hiking poles for myself also. We will eventually have to change the hiking boots soon but we’re still looking for a good pair. On that note, if any of you in Ontario or fellow Quebec residing bloggers or have visited and hiked, do tell us where you suggest.

Course Update: Guitar & Photography

Both the courses ended this week! At this point, I’m done with the Guitar course final assignment (yay! and why this is going up later) and preparing for the final assignment for Photography, continuing after this goes up. I did have to work overtime to play catch up. One of the few things I’ve realized happen when I lose a weekend to going away. I think it also is because I don’t own a laptop anymore and when I’m away, I don’t feel like working on my phone as much so its really just watching TV and relaxing, which is a good thing. Actually, it was very refreshing to recharge even if it took a while to recuperate. Does that make sense? I was tired but more motivated to write. Anyways, point is, courses are over and hopefully these great time management skills I’ve used this past month (for the most part) will stick around.

One New Segment FINALLY Live!

In case you missed it, my team-up with Phoebe of Starry Traveler’s Road for this new segment, Battle of Ingredients is finally live! If you missed it, you can find it HERE! We started simple but we’re going to be doing a hopefully monthly deal with this. Planning time to meet up and gathering up friends and then coming up with recipes all take time between our own work, blogging duties for myself and parental duties for Phoebe makes it all so hard to make this more frequent. However, I am quite pleased with how the post turned out. Hopefully you all are and will enjoy it.

Learning a New Tools: Canva

Would you look at the image for Battle of Ingredients? I actually learned about Canva a little while ago but I’m truly enjoying working with it to build simple images and giving the blog a more professional header image for various segments. I have one for Music Obsessions coming up tomorrow and working on one for the new segment. Also, I’m trying to get something together for the actual blog header.

Birthday Month

March is THE birthday month of our family. My in-laws and my husband and even myself has birthdays in the second half of March. My birthday was yesterday and I turned 31. It was a pretty calm day which is always great. There were a few a little things that bothered me for a short while but overall, it was pretty relaxing and efficient, which is great. My husband and I will celebrate this weekend by going to a movie, Ghost in the Shell, which I’ll probably have the review ready for Monday.

Cute Kitty Pic

Upcoming:

• New Youtube project 
• Ghost in the Shell review & more

What have you been up to? Anything new?

Toronto ComiCon 2017 Recap (with guest: Drew’s Movie Reviews)!

Toronto ComiCon 2017 was from March 17 to 19th at Metro Convention Centre. I headed out to meet up with my awesome blogathon co-host, Drew from Drew’s Movie Reviews who met me over there (just like last year). We stayed for a few days and picked up the weekend pass for ComiCon. Call it our little celebration for a successful blogathon, maybe it’ll turn into a tradition of some sort. Who knows, right? Our highlight was the ComiCon so this post will focus on some Q&A panels and cosplay, etc.

Before we start, what type of person would I be if I didn’t bring Drew into recapping Toronto ComiCon with me! When you see K, that’s for myself in normal font and D will be for his italicized part! 🙂

Day 1

K: First part of getting to Toronto ComiCon is to get there. Of course, I always forget that I can just keep Google Maps open so we didn’t get lost. There’s a huge apology somewhere here that I need to tell Drew how I got us lost a few times. I have a horrible sense of direction, something that I’m sure is super apparent, at this point. However, after a little detour, we did make it there! The first mission is coat check and picking up our tickets/weekend bracelet.

K: Next was a few hours to scour the Artist’s Alley and other Exhibitors as we wait for 7:30pm to start lining up for Q&A panel for Ray Park. We chatted with some artists and it was super inspiring and cool.

D: Visiting Artist’s Alley early was kind of an impromptu decision. It ended up working out really well because it allowed us to get a good idea of what prints and items we wanted to purchase, which helped us be more focused in the Alley on day 2.

K: Ray Park’s Q&A panel started a little late because of a delay in the photo ops but they came in with the whole troop (as you can see in the shaky video above). Ray Park was a cool panel. He was pretty insightful and kept it light-hearted as he shared little thoughts on G.I. Joe playing Snake Eyes and Star Wars playing Darth Maul among many questions on the floor. The best part was how he talked about he went into martial arts because he wanted to be in movies.

D: Ray Park’s panel was so much fun! He was such a laid back guy. One of the things he talked about that I really enjoyed was his experience as Darth Maul from Star Wars: The Phantom Menace.  Star Wars is a huge passion of mine so getting to listen to his experience on playing one of my favorite characters was exciting.  He also talked about his early experience and how he got involved in martial arts and acting. It was a great start to the convention.

K: Actually, this ended quite in time for us to head back to the hotel, drop off stuff and grab something quick to eat and head out to see Beauty and the Beast for the late showing. Toronto movie viewing experience was definitely eventful. I almost saw a fight break out despite having assigned seating. Anyways, my review of Beauty and the Beast will be out on Thursday. 🙂

Day 2

 K: We started Day 2 with Casa Loma which I’ll share about tomorrow. By noon, we were back at the ComiCon for three panels in a row.

K: The first was the Gotham panel with David Mazouz (playing Bruce Wayne) and Sean Pertwee (playing Alfred Pennyworth).  This panel was pretty packed and we were sitting further back so the picture isn’t great however the talk itself was. I’m personally a fan of Sean Pertwee. He’s done some great roles and I love his take on Alfred. I haven’t quite caught up with Gotham (halfway through Season 1) but seeing how these two get along and respect each other as actors despite the age difference and experience really shows true professional and bond that spills outside of the show.

D: I have a bit of a confession to make, as much of a comic book and Batman fan as I am, I have yet to watch a single episode of Gotham.  Do not fret, it is very high on my to-watch list. This panel was purely Kim’s idea but it was a good one. After seeing these two at the panel, I am even more excited to watch their show now. They spoke with such respect for each other that is hard not to want to watch and see how that translates onto the screen.

K: Maybe I can bring Drew in to do a TV Binge of Season 1 eventually, if he’d like. 😉

K: Next up, immediately after the Gotham panel, was a first look at an upcoming web series called Deep Six. These are the cast and  crew. Its written about a story set 250 years in the future where both military and civilians are sent to scout out a planet to live on. Its focus is on the realistic take on the space aspects. I chose this one out of a whim and well, it turns out Drew knew the producer/director and some of the cast that wasn’t there on this show and it turned out to be a very cool choice to go check this out.

D: It sure was! As Kim mentioned, I knew of the producer/director, Davin Lengyel, from my absolute favorite web series, Space Janitors. I kind of lit up and started raving to Kim about how awesome of a series it is (sorry Kim).  However, the best part was I got to meet Davin after the panel and talked with him for a few minutes! The conversation made my day, which Kim didn’t hear the end of (again, sorry Kim).

K: To be fair, Drew had to endure some stupid moments during the night before watching Beauty and the Beast when I fangirled over “Something There” and then made an odd stupid giggle at my phone when I looked at the picture of the new little Animators’ Collection plushies when we were lining up, plus my amped up caffeine non-stop talking…if we’re talking apologies, I think I need to join in also.

K: After a small 30 minute window to grab a late lunch and take a quick walk, we went to line up for the last panel of the day with Agent of SHIELD’s Brett Dalton who plays Grant Ward. I’m going to be honest that I moved pretty much at the beginning of the series launch of this one and at my new place, I don’t even have bunny ears so no TV and that cuts out a lot if it isn’t even on Netflix so I’m about ten episodes into Season 1 and never had the chance to progress but this panel was Drew’s choice. However, its great that there was a ton of spoilers (in a way) which helped to understand the context but also some fairly entertaining questions like one about which Disney prince Brett Dalton wanted to be and which was his favorite Disney Princess, considering he was wearing a Mickey sweater, I’d say he is a big Disney fan also. Entertaining and fun doesn’t even begin to describe how cool this panel was.

D: Yes, this was my choice.  I am such a huge fan of the show that I couldn’t pass it up. Like Ray Park, Brett Dalton was very chill and easy going.  He answered every question with a mix of humility and humor.  Everything from how he began acting and what he liked best about his character on Agents of SHIELD to whether he was Team Cap or Team Iron Man. I even had the chance to ask a him a question! This was definitely a highlight panel for me.

K: The rest of the day at ComiCon after this was pretty much picking up the stuff we had seen and deciding what we wanted before heading out for dinner. You can check out my haul post HERE. Also, we managed to stop to take some pictures of cosplayers which you can see above. I’m obviously the more knowledgeable Toronto person (although I don’t venture to Downtown Toronto too much) but we ended up going to Asian Legend (which I’ve talked a ton about on the blog before already).

K: My first actual complete meal over the two days. It was really satisfying plus it was a nice chat after we filled our bellies. We managed to get a few hours to relax at the hotel before heading out again for the Toronto ComiCon Cosplay After Dark party at Brassaii Lounge. It was nice to enjoy some nice music, grab a few drinks and converse in a loud voice. 😉

D: I left the dinner decision to Kim and she really came through! It was my first time eating at Asian Legend and everything was absolutely delicious.  I will be sure to look for one around me because it is definitely a place I would eat at again.  Besides my conversation with Davin Lengyel, the afterparty was another highlight of the trip for me.  We drank, we danced a little, and we had some great conversation as bloggers and friends.

D: Our meet-up in Toronto last year was fun but I think this year was even better. I mean, as movie bloggers, we actually went and saw a movie together! The trip was well worth the travel and I thank Kim for being my guide through the city. 🙂

K: Toronto ComiCon was a definite success in my books. It was fun and complete as a blogger meet-up thing. Getting the chance to literally geek out and make friend with the same passions absolutely is one of the best parts of being a blogger over the years . This time was much cooler than last year because we managed to even grab a movie and went to a party other than just going to the main event and doing a touristic attraction.

Hope you enjoyed the recap of Toronto ComiCon. This new take was a cool way to put it together.
Before I wrap this up, I’d like to virtually raise a glass to a successful trip and most importantly, friends!
Okay, I’m getting mushy now…so, remember to drop by tomorrow for the look at our visit to Casa Loma.

Toronto Comicon Weekend Haul!

This past weekend was a fantasticLly awesome one as I headed out to Toronto for Comicon (just like last year). Its been a crazy process getting back and having everything cleaned and put away and getting back on routine so today, I am doing a simple one to talk about my haul.

I will take a few days this week (probably two) to share the Toronto experience because just like last year, as something of a reward or whatnot, I met up with Drew to hangout and visit Toronto and Comicon together. And just like true movie bloggers, we got in a movie as well amd even made it to a party (comicon related) as well as a sightseeing location. Lots of fun and a packed schedule but I think it turned out pretty great. Look for those posts while I get those new segments finalized (something I ran out of time last week for).

Lets check out what I picked up both before and at the Toronto Comicon.

Before the Comicon, I had a little bit of time before Drew arrived so I went out for a little shopping. I had a few stores on my list to hit and they were:

HMV
(because they are closing out of Canada so lots of discounts)

Disney Store
(never been to the one at Eaton Centre)

David’s Tea
(spontaneously remembered  was running out at home)

Toronto Comicon was a weekend thing and we bought the weekend pass so we went on Friday to scout out the show and then did most of our shopping on Saturday after all the Q&A panels. Here’s what I picked up:

Movies & Video Games

I got a super sweet deal for Uncharted 4 at Iceman Video Games which was also there last year. I’m pretty happy about it. They had some awesome choices and selection.

However, I really want to talk about Raven Banner where we stopped by to look at horror movies. They were fantastic and we had a great talk about horror indie films in general. Not sure they’ll read this post but that chat was a highlight of the ComiCon for myself. It really defines why we do this movie blogging thing and meeting people who are equally passionate about this. It was a fun and enlightening chat.

Novel and Comics

Let’s look at this from left to right.

• Toronto Comics‘ Yonge at Heart is a Canadian comic author that sets in Toronto. This is a free preview to get a snippet of their comic for their Kickstarter campaign running right now till beginning of April, I believe. I saw them on Twitter before the trip and really liked the art style and the idea of using a Canadian setting. You can check out the Kickstarter here.
• Remy’s Dilemma by Andrew Snook is a novel with this plot below from their website. A part of selling your work is being passionate about it. And Andrew does a great job at it. To be honest, his enthusiasm as he told his story and the joy he had recounting the story was so genuine that I could feel the awesomeness in the story. I haven’t started reading it yet but this looks like a fun journey with Remy especially when its set in two provinces in Canada that I’ve visited numerously  and live in.

The world is coming to an end. That’s what Remy believes, anyways. While double-checking his lifelong to-do list to ensure he has led a rich life, he realizes he hasn’t come close to completing his goals. Panicked and short on time, Remy embarks on a chaotic road trip to complete the most important item on his bucket list… – Snook Books

• Moonshot & Titan from AH Comics: Moonshot is an Indigenous Comics Collection (Volume 1) with various stories from different artists. With the purchase of this one (inspired by my peaked curiosity after my playthrough of Never Alone a few weeks ago), they also gave the gift of their graphic novel Titan: An Alternate History, which is great because then they saved me having to decide on which one to get with my purchase.

Artwork

Foiled Art makes this beautiful little pop culture pieces. They do a lot with gold or silver (or both for limited edition) but I honestly thought that this galaxy one looks superb. It really brings out the art and pops. This is going right over my work station at home because its so fantastically awesome!

Howl’s Moving Castle by Chasing Artwork

I love love love Miyazaki art and Chasing Artwork is a great artist. There are two comics out currently which I passed up on but these pieces are so atmospheric and creative. I actually stood there pondering which to get. He also has one for Nausicaa which just took my breath away. I’m personally a huge fan of Howl’s Moving Castle so this one is great.

Betty and Veronica by Dan Parent (with autograph)

For those of you who don’t know (which you might not because I don’t review comics), I love Archie comics and really I haven’t looked much at the newer ones although they do look cool but these traditional ones. I know I have a few volumes sitting in a box after we moved. I just can’t remember where so I couldn’t take it with me but Dan Parent was there who does a ton of these illustrations. I particularly loved this print and look he signed it also. Consider me a little star strucked when I saw him because I wanted to say a ton and just couldn’t.

The haul could have been so much more. There was so many great writers and artists that the choice was hard to make. However, I retain the idea of picking up stuff from the ones that I skipped but has an Etsy shop or other form of online retail. I have to say this was a pretty successful weekend!

What do you think about the haul? Anything that catches your eye?

Toronto Comicon

Its rare that I head out to Toronto so frequently but I’ve been wanting to go to Toronto Comicon and while my husband and my road trip buddy couldn’t make it, I managed to meet up in Toronto with Drew at Drew’s Movie Reviews (also my Ultimate 80s Blogathon co-host). We’re both not from Toronto so it was double amazing that this was able to happen. Plus, you could even consider this a little celebration for having that absolutely successful collaboration. 😉

After some planning, I booked a train for Friday evening to get there and stayed at Chelsea Hotel who upgraded me to a Club Lounge room which had access to free breakfast. Other than the confusing elevator system, it was a very pleasant stay. We headed to Toronto Comicon on Saturday morning and ended up going to 4 panels and checked out the exhibits and the artist gallery.  It was a ton of fun and lots of amazing stuff to look at.  There was a good bit of fantastic costumes!

Let’s check out our day!

12PM: Celebrity Q&A with Starship Troopers’ Dina Meyer & Casper Van Dien

I haven’t seen Starship Troopers in forever. To say that I actually remember a lot of it would be a huge lie.  But, being at Toronto Comicon took a little bit of planning and I kind of wanted to hear what actors and actresses had to say. Usually, they are fun even if you don’t know much about the movie in reference because it gets more general experience and whatnot.  That is exactly how Starship Troopers turned out.  Dina Meyer and Casper Van Dien were hilarious together as they answered the Q&A and it was a ton of fun listening to their experiences.  It makes me want to go find a copy of Starship Troopers and give it a watch soon 🙂

Game Testing at Reptoid Games

Reptoid Games

In between the two panels, we had a little time to go check out the showroom with exhibits and artist alley.  Its there we met the two guys behind Reptoid Games who had a reveal of their alpha multiplayer game.  We gave it a test run.  I’ll cover more on that over at That Moment In once it goes back to normal operations. 😉 I didn’t expect to get the chance to try out a game so it was really cool.

2PM: Live Improv Show: In a Galaxy Far Far Away

Next panel we checked out was the live improv show called In a Galaxy Far Far Away.  Obviously, it had to do with Star Wars, the one thing I knew so little about.  We started the show with the audience giving them names and colors and objects.  We ended up with Trump Tower, Purple and Shoemaker (in reference to something evil, a color, and first job). This was so much fun and OMG, was it ever hilarious. Plus, it didn’t need a whole lot of knowledge on Star Wars, because they actually made jokes out of what Star Wars would do and the normal tropes it had and whatnot. That was even funnier!

Lunch at Hank Daddy’s Barbecue

Smoked Sausage on a Bun

Pulled Pork Burger

After two panels and some bit of lining up, we went for some lunch.  After some debate (mostly on my part), we ended up giving Hank Daddy’s Barbecue a go.  Their specialty is this Pulled Pork Parfait which we didn’t get.  However, I was having a huge hot dog craving and the Smoked Sausage on a Bun (which had a gluten free sausage but probably not the bun) was the best option.  I’m not usually a fan of onions but it was a good mix with the sauce.

Costumes and Cosplay!

5PM: Celebrity Q&A with The Flash’s Robbie Amell

Robbie Amell’s Q&A was a lot of goodness.  The line-up was intense and immense.  He started us up with teaser trailer of this short that was released yesterday along with the Indiegogo project launch with him and Stephen Amell for a full-length feature called Code 8. I linked it up in case you wanted to check it out. He told us the story about his funny/embarrassing moment on Whose Line Is It Anyways? which I did go check out afterwards.  He talked about working on The Duff and with Mae Whitman and of course, a ton of questions was about The Flash and Firestorm and all that lovely stuff.

6PM: Comics Panel: “Q&A” with Deadpool Creator Rob Liefeld

Rob Liefeld was really the odd one for me mostly because I didn’t see Deadpool yet and well, I know nothing about anything when it comes to source material and superhero origins and whatnot.  However, this man talks a lot and he told us about how he came to create Deadpool and get into the business and being a comic book artist and the film and whatnot.  He talked all the time away and there was really no questions but I think he may have answered everyone’s questions with his speech.  It was still super entertaining.

My Comicon Haul!

Teeturtle –> It glows in the dark!

I love Teeturtle.  The last time I got a shirt was at Montreal Comicon and it was a Miyazaki character themed one that I love so much and wear all the time in the summer.  This one is glow in the dark and actually works.  I tried it out at the hotel. The moon lights up in the dark. Its pretty cool.

A lovely booth with beautiful art but this one matches my den the most!

I believe this booth is called Gillian and Brian.  They  had a ton of really cool takes on pop culture art.  After much debate, this one won because it matched the Chinese theme I had going on in the den where this will go once I get a customized frame for it. 🙂

2nd Book in the ongoing 10 book series called Nemecene

Last thing was a lovely book. The author Kaz Lefave was at the convention. She convinced me to get this second book in her 10 book series.  She is currently working on the third book and had the first book available on digital copy for free.  That is a pretty sweet deal.  She’s also designing a game that goes with it which looks super amazing. I can’t wait to start reading it and enter into the Nemecene world 😉

Toronto Comicon was a ton of fun! A little tiring and whatnot but it was great!
The fun doesn’t end yet! Drew and I met up again on Sunday to go check out Ripley’s Aquarium.  That post is coming up next Wednesday!