Not quite Seattle

In previous posts, we referenced a nerdgasm of sorts: Battlestar Galactica and Mass Effect together at last. A TV show we enjoy and a video game we're looking forward to. The only hitch... to participate we need to get to Auburn, Washington, just a half hour south of Seattle.

Road trip, anyone?

The special showing was on Monday, November 12... that involved taking a day off on Tuesday to drive home. We would have left on the Saturday, but we had tickets to another geek-fest, Video Games Live, which was brilliant and we couldn't miss it since we'd bought tickets more than six months prior.

So we (Natalie, Daorcey, Vanessa and Tony) left at 6am Sunday morning for a 14 hour drive through BC to hop the USA-Canada border in Abbotsford. It was a fun trip that involved visiting Tony's dad in near Salmon Arm and listening to too many hobo names courtesy of John Hodgman.

Snow, mountain roads and Tony's had enough of us already.

Coming up on the new mountain pass near Golden. It's pretty amazing.

Crossing the border was a little interesting. I've never driven across the border before, so I was a little nervous. When the American border agent asked me what we were planning to do, my response was that we were driving to Auburn from Calgary to watch a made-for-TV movie two weeks before it's release date... on tv. Not only did he look a little incredulously at us, he responded with "you know, that's a pretty lame excuse to be coming to the United States."

What do you say to that? I mean, it's not like his statement was incorrect.

"Yeah, I see what you mean," I responded. And then he let us through. I guess people wouldn't make up such a sad reason to cross the border.

The hotel was nice (as nice as can be when you're being cheap and making four people share two beds... I may have kneed Tony in the back) and we spent all of Monday shopping at a sad mall (the largest in the northwestern United States... meh) and waiting in line for the EVENT.

The mall had a seating area with giant bacon! Natalie was excited.

And this is where I rant: I won't complain about the trip... the road trip was nice, the company was good and no one was seriously injured. But as far as the "Battlestar Event" went, it was a non-event. Granted, they probably didn't intend for giant geeks like us to drive down from Calgary, but someone at Microsoft or SciFi or whoever was in charge could have tried a bit harder.

We started lining up (front of the line, baby!) to register our attendance at 3:30pm. At 5pm, we were registered and moved to another line where we would stay until 6:30pm. The theatre employees had no idea what was going on and even had an argument with the single (!) event coordinator (a contractor who wasn't keen to let me know who was paying the bills... fine, do your job) over where to put the lineup of 100+ people (most who made me feel rather young... didn't expect that, but I guess I'm not the only target market for BSG). Tony left us in the line while he went to go watch another movie for free... there was nothing else to do anyway.

When we were eventually let into the theatre, we sat watching the same 2-minute music and logo loop over and over again until the movie started. And the fanfare? Well, there was none. The event manager (not joined by two assistants who didn't seem to know what was going on either) told us to enjoy the movie and then let the movie role. It was rather underwhelming.

Now, I don't think I had unreasonable expectations. I mean, a fairly significant tv show and an equally significant video game (see the Globe and Mail review) are having a co-sponsored event. Maybe there'll be a special preview, maybe some swag, maybe a special message from the creators of either product... something... anything. But, no. Instead we are treated in a way that feels a lot like "watch your stupid geek movie, enjoy the uncomfortable companionship of other sad fan bois and grls, here's a series of ads you can see on TV... sucker".

And we even made special t-shirts.

Vanessa's t-shirt design

I'm still glad we did it. It was a fun, spontaneous trip that involved some cross-border shopping with good company and a bit of geekiness thrown in. And the drive (when it was light out) was pretty nice.

Here we are at a gorge/dam in east Washington... I'm sure it has a name... Natalie's not in any of our shots.

Here's the gorge in panoramic view. Click for large image.

I might still write a letter to someone at Microsoft recommending they try a little harder next time they host and event to promote a new game, music machine, etc. How Canadian, eh?

And I will make an effort to NEVER drive through Montanan mountain passes in the dark and snow again.