it's already been 4 quick days since the show...
after 12 years since my last attendance, I finally headed to Allentown to check out a Philly Show again.
way too long in between shows, and something I need to work on
I didn't really expect to find too much in the way of cards, but I did complete my cereal billboard set for the 50th, picked up a couple nice sketches and a wacky shirt at Matt & Greg's table.
The big surprise was finding the very last X-fractor I needed to complete that Chrome set at Marc Simon's table. I figured this set would remain incomplete until the end of time, but there it was, a Jolly Mean X-fractor just waiting to be grabbed!
The real highlights though were in meeting all the artists and the forum members that were there.
From Smokin' Joe with his Wacky paintings and his personal sets, both the old 'wacky' ones and the new Creepy Containers, to George Wright and his Galactic Grocery cards and his Lost Wackys he had on view, to Fred Wheaton and his portfolio of Wacky and GPK art (that Hello Kidney piece is a thing of beauty to behold!), to Joe Simko, Jeff Zapata, Chad Scheres and Layton DeJarnette. Just fantastic to see all the original art and talk with the people who create these masterpieces!
And seeing more forum members than I can remember, old and new, Dave, Tom, Cheryl, Joe, Mark, Greg, John, Kevin, Rob, Dennis, Richard, Andrew, Marc - the latter group who are all part of the Buyer's Club as well, and awesome to finally meet in person.
Plus a huge and special shout out of thanks to my Wacky Uber drivers: Rob Hall and Joe Leonard, who got me back and forth from the hotel and show on Saturday and Sunday. And especially Joe, who went above and beyond on Sunday to make sure I checked out of the Garden Inn on time - after I stupidly forgot to before heading to the show that morning.
The other highlights of course were the great dinner and tribute to Jay on Saturday, the post-dinner hang-out at the Red Robin and the Sunday morning card talk session.
Great time all around and looking forward to doing it again some time!