Docent Tour

[kevin_standlee]

Only two people showed up for my personalized tour of the Fan Guest of Honor exhibit: Ewrin "Filthy Pierre" Strauss and Steve Forty. I do think there were a lot more people who had either the time or the interest but not both. And Emerald A was a bit off the beaten path, being around a corner from most of the function rooms. I expect a lot of people didn't even know it was there. It could have been worse -- they could have put it in the Radisson, in which case nobody would have seen it.

Two people is no problem, though: I showed them through the exhibit and explained the history around the various artifacts, some of which are for conventions or activities of mine with which they were totally unaware, such as my costuming stuff. I showed them the photos of the Skywise costume from Elfquest and of course the mannequin with the pink dress is standing in the display with the blonde wig and 4 1/2-inch high heels. There are photos of me in that dress, from Eclecticon 5 in Sacramento, on account of otherwise people are unlikely to believe me when I told them I was wearing it. Over breakfast, David W. Clark said to me, "I have faith in you, Kevin: You will wear the dress again."

And if I lose the necessary weight to fit back into it -- something that seems much more likely now than it did a year ago -- he may well be right about that.

Comments

Wish I had Made it

[johnnyeponymous.livejournal.com]

I had planned to make the tour, but I had Evelyn to deal with and when she gets her mind on something, it's not easy to change her minds.

I did love the exhibit, and the Science Fiction Museum thing was good too. How did you ever walk in those shoes?

Chris

Walking a Mile in Her Shoes

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

How did you ever walk in those shoes?

Seriously, with a fair bit of practice. My girlfriend at the time said, more or less, "I don't want to have to deal with you with a sprained ankle caused by falling off those shoes. You're going to have to practice." So for some time before wearing the outfit, I had to spend some time practicing in the shoes to learn how to balance and walk properly. It's not at all easy, even though a 4 1/2-inch heel is less of an elevation than it would be for someone smaller. Besides, it seems less silly wearing them with the full outfit than just in my ordinary clothes.

(Incidentally, in my opinion I looked better in person wearing than I do in the pictures; the flash messes up the makeup.)

Note that I didn't buy such killer heels because I really wanted that much height gain -- I'm already 6 ft 3 in. tall. But at the time, the only shoes I could find that were close to my size had these super high heels. Indeed, the 4 1/2-inch heels were the shortest heels the vendor of such shoes sold. Admittedly, most of their shoes were aimed at the fetish-ware market. At the time, I wore a men's 12 1/2 E. Those shoes are womens 14, which still isn't really big enough. I stretched them as much as I possibly could. Even today, when the shoes aren't being worn -- and I haven't worn them for many years -- they sit with those shoe stretchers in there to hold their shape in case of need. I later, for another outfit I did, found some less-aggressive 2-inch heels, which on feet as big as mine look almost like flats, but I reckon if I really wanted to cause a stir, I'd use the tall shoes for as long as I could stand them (which probably would not be for that long).