Final Destination 3

Curious George

Terror in Texas!

By popular demand, here is the non-story of my trip to the horror convention in Grapevine, TX, a small spot on the map betwixt Dallas and Fort Worth. As mentioned earlier, long after I agreed to do this thing I learned that my reading had been scheduled for 7 pm on Sunday. Now, I know how things work with festivals and conventions and whatnot, and the way things work is, everyone is gone by 7 pm on Sunday. So I was halfway to bailing out on the thing entirely, but I had already ordered a supply of books from my publisher, so I figured I’d just go up for the day on Sunday and make the best of it.

Not trusting my bucket of bolts to get me there and back safely, I rented a car. This was the highlight of my trip – a brand new Pontiac G6. It was like driving the space shuttle. I never saw so many red lights on a dashboard. I wonder what all those pretty little buttons were for. Life is a happier thing when viewed through a spotless new windshield. Going back to my crappy little Toyota was like returning to a loveless marriage after a weekend with Scarlett Johannson.

But anyway. I drove up to Grapevine on Sunday morning, checked into my Motel 6 by the airport, then found the convention center. I was directed to my vendor table, which was not in the VIP room with the likes of Joe Bob and Leatherface, but rather in the main room, with two guys selling vintage soundtrack albums on my right and this woman on my left:



That’s Jami Deadly, hostess of a UHF horror show in Dallas. For some reason, she was getting all the foot traffic and folks were passing me by. I can’t figure it out. Anyway, I did get a few perusals of my book and some appreciative snorts of “Hick flicks! Har!” and even a few inquiries as to price. But sales? No sales. The longest conversation I had was with a fellow who introduced himself as a music journalist. He said he was there to take pictures, but the camera he had was one of those disposables from the drug store. After asking a few innocuous questions about the convention, he revealed his true purpose. “So, are you into porn?” “Uh…porn?” “Yeah, I’ve got some good, cheap porn. Just looking for some people who might be interested.” Well, I’m so glad I had that look about me, but I declined the man’s kind offer of good, cheap porn.

Anyway, the convention was good for a couple hour’s worth of people-watching. It looked like the Paradise Lost trailer park had emptied out for the afternoon. Lots of this sort of thing:



However, around about 2 pm I thinks to myself, I thinks, “I can’t possibly sit here for five more hours. Think I’ll go get me some lunch and maybe watch a little Super Bowl back at the motel, then come back for my reading.” So this is what I did. And when I returned to the convention center at 6:30, the place was practically deserted. About 20 people were still hanging around for the panel discussion following the screening of Nail Gun Massacre. The guy in charge of the fright fest asked if I still wanted to do the reading and offered up a cash settlement if I decided to pass. This sounded good to me, so I took the money and ran. I suppose I’ll always have to wonder if there was some poor dejected soul who sat through Nail Gun Massacre in hopes of hearing my hilarious tales of hixploitation.

In any case, the trip was not a total waste of time, as I was treated to lunch on Monday by some of the Fort Worth newspaper brass, who proceeded to sing my praises for an hour and a half. And I did manage to find buyers for my unsold Hick Flicks amongst my imaginary internet friends. Plus I got to drive home in the G6. But now the G6 is gone. Only the fond memories remain.