Hmm — I think I'll post a message from Joey B. (probably not Joey Bishop) and then respond to it…
I've never been to Comic-Con in San Diego. I keep hearing it's packed and you can't walk down the aisles and it's really noisy and everyone is shoulder to shoulder for four days. I'm claustrophobic and crowds scare me. What do you have to say to someone like me?
I say it's kind of like driving on the freeway. There are times when it is hard to get anywhere except via baby steps…but you put up with it because it's worth the inconvenience to get where you're going. Not every part of the con is that way but a few are and the experience is too often characterized by, for example, the videogaming sections. They're noisy and the exhibitors do things to attract masses to their booths — masses that spill over walkways where you'd like to trod.
Actually this year, the main impediment to getting around seemed to be folks in costumes staging photo ops right where congoers were trying to walk. I appreciate that some people spend a lot of time and money on dressing up as some character but that does not entitle them to stop all traffic so they can pose for attendees with cameras or phones with cameras…which is, of course, everyone these days. The posers all seem to think they are so entitled, especially if they're an attractive woman in a sexy outfit and/or they're brandishing a weapon.
I have to tell you that I don't find it all that hard to get through that maze of humans. Now admittedly, I'm 6'3" and kinda large in other directions as well and I have a badge on that says GUEST…but I don't think that's it. I think I've just decided not to let the mass of humanity stop me from getting to places where I wanna be. In that room, I scan the turf ahead of me and quickly chart alternate routes when the real estate before me seems heavily congested. I have this new G.P.S. feature in my car that tells me when there's slow going ahead and it suggests detours. Apply a little of that strategy to your convention hall navigation and you'll get places faster and with fewer delays.
If crowds scare you…well, maybe you shouldn't come. Or maybe you should try to get over that reticence because you'll miss a lot of great experiences in life…and yes, I know that's easier to say than to do. Increasingly as I get older, I find that some things that annoy me can be best handled by accepting and even embracing them, rather than to bitch and moan about that which is not going to be changed one bit by my bitching and moaning. This of course doesn't work with everything but it works with a lot of things that I used to let stop me from doing what I wanted to do. Often, I can even find a way to appreciate that which I used to complain about. My attitude about the crowds is like: Yes, they make it hard to get places but many of those people are attractions unto themselves and there's also something exhilarating in being among so many folks having such a good time.
One tip: Few conventions are as jammed as the biggie in San Diego. You might try a smaller one before you swan-dive into the deep end of the shark tank. You might also heed the advice a friend once gave me about Disneyland. Understand before you get there that you're going to get overwhelmed, you're going to wait in a lot of lines, you're not going to see or do everything you want to see or do, and that the crowds are part of the fun. If you can go into Comic-Con with that mindset, you may be able to have a very good time. The reason it's so packed is that most folks do.