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Thanks to the wonderful http://www.celebritybooksigningsandevents.com, I noticed that there was going to be a VERY local signing. I'm 10 miles away from Philly, 100 from NYC, and 100 from Baltimore. If I go to a signing, it's usually at one of the first two. But wait... a signing at my local mall?! I haven't been to one of those since I was little! Well.. two of them. At the Deptford Mall, I once met Bret 'The Hitman' Hart and 'Stone Cold' Steve Austin. Now... 'Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief'??? What the...
I've never heard of this 'Percy Jackson', but once I got to the mall at 4:30pm (for a 6pm signing), I noticed that everyone from 6 to 16 did... and apparently LOVED it! I saw the movie posters, and the first thought to cross my mind was "Goody, here comes another Harry Potter-esque craze!"
Appearing at the mall (and other locations! it's a short signing tour) were Jake Abel, Logan Lerman, Brandon T. Jackson, & Alexandra Daddario. One of them played Percy, but I couldn't tell you which one without going to IMDB. Only one of their names stood out to me, and that's because he was already in a movie that I love love love. Brandon T. Jackson played Alpa Chino in 'Tropic Thunder'. Sweet.
In order to obtain some autographs, you had to go in to the Hot Topic store and purchase a shirt:
After this, they give you a wristband (which I don't have anymore since they snip it off of you and throw it out. damn. I usually save these kinds of things as "proof" in case I have to sell it later on.) The shirts are $25. TWENTY FIVE DOLLARS! What kind of nonsense is that? Thankfully, Hot Topic offers a 10% discount to Active Duty Military Service Members, so I whipped out my ID and promptly knocked it down to $22 and change. Go me. Oh, and another scam they're doing is, the only way you got to do the whole shindig is to sign up for their Hot Topic HT+1 or whatever card. I already did that before since it's free. I bet that store reached their quota that day.
Upon purchasing my shirt and feeling like a sleezeball since I'm at least 7 - 11 years older than everyone else there, I made my way to the food court and enjoyed some delicious Chinese food. No pictures, sorry.
I made my way back to the line, which grew surprisingly! Not much, but it still grew. Here's video:
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/vide ... 048&ref=mf
Let me know if the video doesn't work. I never linked to FB videos before.
I sat down and time traveled by Twittering my time away.
Minutes (many minutes?!) pass and Hot Topic staff scrunched the line up so they could fit more people in. rightfully so!
The line isn't bad! I was less than 100 people away from the door...
...and the line after me couldn't have possibly added another 150, 200. I heard kids saying "I'M NOT STANDING IN THAT LONG LINE!!!" Kid, when you get older, and if you decide to keep on collecting autographs, THEN you'll realize what a long wait and a long line is! I wanted to butt in and tell them my tale of spending the night outside of a Walmart in Dundalk, Maryland... "I got there at 10pm... the signing wasn't until 7pm the following evening! I sat out there in the POURING RAIN AND WIND! It was FREEZING since it was November. It was only 21 hours later that I got to meet Stephen King." Then, I realized that I'll let him learn on his own.
Once they successfully scrunched up lots of screaming tween girls, they started to hand out little cards. This is when I started to get antsy! I'll have to admit that I wasn't very excited to meet these people (Well, I was meeting Alpa Chino, so that was cool!) I got my card and saw this:
So, I guess I WILL see the movie after all. I found out later that only the first 100 people got these things. Deptford Mall staff followed a couple minutes later with some goody bags (in nice cloth Deptford Mall bags!) with coupons, a map of the mall, and a piece of chocolate. Poo. I was hoping for some lucky signed copies of the book that this rubbish was based on. Oh well.
Time went by, and I got closer to the entrance.
THIS is when they dropped the bombshell.
"Only one item will be signed. It can be anything, but only one item. We will be giving you posters. No cameras at the table, either."
NO CAMERAS AT THE TABLE?
NO CAMERAS AT THE TABLE?
I've been to signings for Sir Roger Moore and Stephen King: two of the most famous goddamn people, and we were allowed to have "cameras at the table". Sure, no posed photography... but, come on! I promptly turned my camera on, and the 'Flash On' icon quickly appeared.
"No cameras at the table", my ass. I wasn't heartbroken that I couldn't get a picture with Alpa Chino, but that's the way the cookie crumbles. By the way the kids in line were acting, this movie will potentially be huge. It also gives me a reason to stand outside of premieres to get Uma Thurman and Pierce Brosnan to sign the poster, as well.
Also, "fan" my autograph page on Facebook. I'll be posting the next signings and events I go to, as well as updating the status in real-time as I'm at the event... with videos, pictures, ramblings.
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/page ... 7488216048
To go to the Discussions section to see my current list of autographs. I am currently up to 998. TWO TO GO!
Thank you for reading.
