Saturday, August 3, 2013

Sherlocking In San Diego July 18 - 19, 2013.

One of the advantages of living in Dallas and having an office in San Diego is the opportunity to visit there on an irregular basis. I recently was there for work and by pure luck it was also the same weekend as Comic-Con, the largest such convention on the planet. One of the regulars there is The Baker Street Irregular's own, Les Klinger. I contacted Les and we arranged to meet on Thursday night at the party sponsored by Kristina Manente and the Baker Street Babes.

Off  I went and before I knew it, I was absorbed into more than 100,000 Trekkie's, Zombies, Vikings, Superheros, and Baker Street Babes that were wandering the Gas-lamp District in beautiful downtown San Diego. I saw more Spidermen in two blocks than I could count. I even spotted a homeless man, pushing his shopping cart load of aluminium cans dressed as Captain America!.

The Baker Street Babes are into Sherlockian fandom and can quote Benedict Cumberbatch and Johnny Miller better than many Sherlockians can quote the Canon. They rented an entire bar and drew more than 400 guests. I met Kristina, Betsy Rosenblatt, and Les at the upstairs bar. Our conversation consisted mostly of hand gesticulations because the noise level were louder than the roar of Reichenbach Falls.
Don Hobbs, Betsy Rosenblatt, Les Klinger, the BSI contingent at the Baker Street Babe's Party
We arranged though a series of written notes, signal flares, and an assortment of other non-verbal communication methods to meet the next night for dinner.

On Friday we met at Masala's, an Indian restaurant that amazingly had enough room to host a small army. I am glad that mere mortals have not discovered Indian food. We were joined by Tony Lee, or more correctly we joined Tony because it was his restaurant of choice. It turned to be one of the best I have ever visited. Tony is a friend of Les' who is a writer from London. He was elated upon arrival, having just signed a 2 book deal. 
Kristina Manente, Betsy Rosenblatt, & Tony Lee.

It was nice watching the group dynamics as we ate and chatted everyone up. We were approached several times by other patrons of the restaurant, asking Kristina for her autograph. Curly, as she is known in the Baker Street Babes, was always gracious and did not seem to mind at all for her many dinner interruptions.

Les will be joining me as one of the Speakers next week in Minnesota as part of "Sherlock Holmes Through Time and Place". Betsy announced that this was an official meeting of the O'Lunnatic West, referring to the group of crazies that flow into O'Lunny's Irish Bar during the annual Birthday Celebration Weekend. 

It was a nice diversion from the mundane work week getting to meet up with so many of my Sherlockian buds and budettes. 


Happy Blogging!

1 comment:

  1. Glad to know there are such perks to a life of travelling.

    ReplyDelete