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The line for this convention wrapped around the Concourse atleast once. Around 2000 people attended. It was a year ago that the very first X-Files convention was held in the same place.

Inside, as you first walked in the doors, there were tables selling everything from pictures to T-shirts to membership in Creation's Official X-Files Fan Club. Upstairs was the prop museum, displaying props from a variety of different episodes. Such items included Mulder and Scully's trenchcoats, Tooms' dog catcher uniform, the alien found in the desert in "Anasazi", file papers, police reports, and many, many other items. The line for the museum almost always strecthed downstairs. Across from the auditorium was the dealer's room where you could find X-Files, UFO, and Sci-Fi merchandise 'til your heart (or wallet) couldn't take it any more.

The auditorium included reserved seating on the main floor, general admission seats on risers (making it easier to see over the person in front of you) and balcony seating. Upfront was the stage and the large view screen where the videos and slide were shown. The only problem with the set up as I could see (or hear in this case) was the sound system. The echo in the auditorium was really bad at points, especially during the Q&A sessions.

The program consisted of the usual montages of clips, slides, and music videos as well as trivia contests and a charity auction. One of the contests was to see who had the best theory of how Mulder and Samantha would be reunited. A little boy thought that Mulder would find her while in New Mexico on a missing persons case. He would be out at night in the desert and a UFO would come and drop Samantha off. He tied with a lady for first place.

The auction was a small one this time. Only 5 items were auctioned. Several scripts with various autographs went between $200 and $650. A poster from the X-Files vidoe tapes with Gillian's autograph went for around $200, and an international poster with her autograph went for around $250. All money when to Chris Carter's autism charty.

The first speaker of the day was of the San Diego County Coroner's Office. He gave a really informative talk about what the purpose of the Coroner and doing autopsies are. The Coroner uses the autopsy proceedure to determine the time and cause of death as well as the condition of the deceased person before death, if possible. He brought along some "mild" slides to demonstrate various things. Some of the slides were a little more than mild, even for my fairly strong stomach. Slides included gunshot wounds from various distances, knife wounds, blunt object wounds, and some diagrams. The presentation was very imformative and gave us a better look at what it is Scully does when she does an autopsy.

Mat Beck came on next. He showed some wonderful video of how a lot of the special effects are done using techniques such as matting, blue screen, and green screen. We got a behind the scenes look at what it is Mat does during shooting and some of his directing techniques. I found his whole presentation really great. Since most of it is visual it is really hard to explain in writing. The saddest news was that we would be losing Mat to a movie called "Volcano". Although, in my opinion, no one can take Mat's place, I hope whoever it is has worked with Mat and knows his style so that we don't lose too much of what we are used to.

Bloopers... everyone loves bloopers! And today was no exception. This time though, the bloopers had been expanded to include some from the third season too. My only complaint was that there were no new Mitch or Nick Lea ones. One of the funniest new ones showed the little dog that played Quequeg panting to the sounds of an opera singer. Another one showed David in a boxing match with one of the stuffed cats from "Teso Dos Bichos". Naturally David won :-) There were many others that consisted of flubbed lines and giggling fits.

Nick Lea came out after a brief introduction video that showed Kyreck beating up Skinner, telling off Cigarette Smoking Man, with Mulder in the airport and the woman in the bathroom, and the scene where the alien ooze is coming out of him. He received a warm welcome from the audience and I immediately had flashbacks of the Reno con when he put his hand up to his eyes and asked if someone could turn up the house lights. The Reno people had a bit of fun with Nick when he asked them to do this. This time however, the lights were raised without any jokes. Nick briefly greeted everyone and said how happy he was to be there. He also said that everytime he does this his heart just pounds. Someone from the audience replied "So does ours!" He immediately opened the floor up for questions but because of the bad echo, I wasn't able to capture the whole session so this is just from memory.

I kept up with tradtion and gave Nick flowers. As I walked in front of the stage to get to the mircophone, he said hi to me. Then when I got up to the mic I said that I hoped it wasn't getting old but I had some flowers for him. He smiled sweetly as I walk part way up th stage stairs to hand them to him. He kissed and hug me which got quite a response of whistling and shouting from the audience and made me blush big time. He said thank you and that I was very sweet.

Anyway, Nick was asked a wide variety of questions, some of them asked before. We did find out that he just finished a pilot for Fox. I don't recall the name though. He says his contract for the new show specifically states he will be made available for any X-Files shooting. He has signed for the X-Files movie. And Krycek will be coming back. Hurray!!! He talked about shooting the last scene that showed with the ooze coming out of his eyes and how he had to be fitted with a special mask that took forever to put on. Then he got called back because they shot the scene too dark. By the time they finished putting on the mask again, it was time to break for lunch, which of course Nick couldn't eat. Other news also included the fact Nick is no longer seeing Melinda McGraw (who played Melissa Scully). They had been dating for about 2 years and he is currently available. A lot of the questions dealt with Krycek getting his due when he gets out of the silo and comes back. It seems to be a safe bet, Skinner will get a bit of revenge. But nothing is certain. Nick says he loves being on the X-Files and doing cons and traveling. He even visits the set when he's not in the eps. Nick said that he and Mitch are getting ready to do another UK your that included England, France, and Spain. It was mostly a promotional tour, doing interviews with a few public appearances.

Mitch was introduced by a variety of clips that included Skinner telling Cigarette Smoking Man to "pucker up", him in the hosptial with Sharon, and several other wonderful scenes. The crowd gave him a wonderful welcome. He introduced his mother and brother both of who I had the please of talking with. He said he was happy to be here and that he was going to open up the floor for questions so that he could answer as many as he could. I made my way over to the mic with the flowers and got snagged by two BRAWS (Braod Reform Advocates for Walter Skinner) members and placed at first in line. Mitch and I said hi and I gave him the flowers. They were slightly wet cause I spilt water on the floor near where they were. As I walked off stage he asked if I had a question so I just took the first thing that popped in my mind and that was what was his middle name. He asked if I meant his or Walter's and I said his. He told us it is Craig. Then asked if we knew what Walter's was. When everyone shouted it out he asked "How'd you know that?" Apparantly, Walter's middle name "Sergei" is really the name of one of Chris Carter's schoolmates. Next up were the two BRAWS members, Steph and Muffy. The presented Mitch with a shirt that read "The Walter Skinner topic - it's not just a forum it's a church and stae of mind." On the back was a sketch of Skinner and the words "Surly Pectoral God". They also gave him the BRAWS Manifesto. He thanked them and showed off the shirt to the audience.

A lot of the women who came up told Mitch how sexy they thought he was. Someone asked is he though Skinner was going to get the chance to get even with Krycek. From my vantage point I could see Nick peaking out from behind the curtins. So Mitch really played this up saying that the only reason Krycek got him the first time was because he had help and he wouldn't be so lucky next time. The question of if he and David really got along came up. He insisted they did and that the rumors of him getting into a fist fight with David were untrue. Jokingly he add, "David knows better." Mitch is not currently working on any projects other than things that concern the X-Files like cons and the UK tour. He's very happy and content with doing that. He was nice enough to blow kisses to several people in the audience. Someone asked where they could send fan mail to. Mitch started to give them the address but couldn't remember it all and said "Where's Paula? She knows..." So he found me in the front row and I gave him the information.

The funniest of the questioners was one "Norbert Weiner". He approached the mic, chomping on his gum, and said "Hello, Mr. Pileggi. I just wanted to say that I was watching the show the other night while eating peanut M&Ms. And as I was about to place one of these M&Ms in my mouth, I noticed they looked a lot like Little Mitch Pileggi Heads." Okay for those of you who haven't figured it out. Norbert was actually Doug "Tooms" Hutchison. And the M&Ms reference was a joke between him, Mitch, and the MPEB/MPPB. So those of us who understood the full reference of it were howling with laughter. I must say, the looks on Mitch's face during all this were totally priceless. I do personally apologize to Mitch for the extent this joke has been taken too.

Another memorable moment was when a young and very flexable girl approached the mic to give Mitch a picture of the two of them at San Francisco. In the picture, Michelle had pulled her leg up above her head. Mitch was quite fascinated and impressed with how flexible Michelle was and had her show the crowd what she had done in the picture. I had a chance to talk to Michelle briefly and she was very sweet.

Mitch's time was finally up and he thanked everyone for coming and said goodbye. And that ended the main portion of the con. Things where then set up for the autograph sessions. I got to meet a lot of great people at this con and I am looking forward to meeting more of you at the Burbank Con August 24 & 25. Please feel free to look for me and introduce yourself!