Warning: This diary was just TOO good to pass up... so much double 
entendres. n.n

For this con I had Lara Bartram as my con-going buddy.  I picked her up at
the Minneapolis airport and we began our twenty-hour drive from Minneapolis
to Dallas.  The weather was hot and sticky, making rest well-nigh
impossible.  We listened to CD's and admired the Milky Way and talked about
steaming guts and compared dead animals our cats had produced for us.

...  Damn, Lara... what would Mike think? And just after you had gone 
to the trouble of posting YOUR diary as "Lara Bartram And Mike 
Loader", too...
 
Oh well, since Lara recently was engaged to Mike (note the shared 
addy), the tryst with Lawson couldn't have amounted to much...

Eventually we met Nick Leifker, and he let us use the shower in his room.

Uh, Lara and Richard...?

I DO hope you mean separately. Tsk. Mike would be SO upset.

Anyway, in the elevator a large man saw my name on my badge and shook my
hand, telling me how much he liked my Nuku Nuku fanfics and saying "I love
you!".  He also mentioned that he was hoping to meet Nick, and when I
pointed him out in another part of the elevator, he said "Oh, wow!" and went
to effuse all over him as well.

... Oh yes, quite a love-fest going on here.
 

I found Lara with Zen and a couple of other people in the hotel's
restaurant.  I tried to steal one of her onion rings, but her advanced
security system confounded me - the onion ring crumbled in my lap.
Unfortunately for her, the advanced security also affected her own attempts
to eat the rings.

*trying to picture this* Let's see. Rings on Richard's lap.  Lara 
trying to eat rings. 

What the heck kinda security system is this, anyway? o.o
Coaxial lasers?
 

A bunch of fanfic authors got together at 7pm to go out to an
all-you-can-eat sushi restaurant.  It was expensive - $20 a head - but you
could really eat all the Japanese food you wanted, including all the sushi
your heart desired.  During the trip there, Lara was crushed in the back of
Nick's car between me and Zen.  I thought furiously of baseball stats during
each trip.

I'm sure. All those wooden bats... 9.9
  

At one point I got spatula'd in the rear by Zen.  Oh, and Nick is bi-shonen.
Ah, the randomness of con conversations.

Which end of the spatula did Zen use? o.O

Afterwards, Lara and I went out and had dinner at Chili's.  We went back to
the con and messed around for a while.

... ... ... Messed around. Uh huh. Is that what what they're calling 
it nowdays?

Studio Ironcat handed out free issues of their new project "Cutie Honey".
If you like naked bodies, this one's got a lot of them.  They aren't my
particular cup of tea.

Of course not. You'd rather "mess around."
 

Lara and I watched the Tekken 3 contest, then wandered around the con some
more.  It was now late at night.  A dance was being held, but my efforts to
persuade Lara to come dancing with me proved to be in vain (it doesn't help
that I have the rhythm of an arthritic elephant).

How about the stamina of one? That might impress Lara more.

If not, there's always Viagra...
 

We lay on a couch together and watched the people go by.  One man was having
amazing success finding Lara Croft-proportioned women and persuading them to
pose on a couch for him while he snapped some pictures.  Every time he got
them posed, other fanboys would come by and snap their own set of pictures.
Even Steven Bennett wandered by and posed with two of the women.

Lay on a couch together. Uh. O.o Mike, you definitely have to have a 
talk with Richard.
 

Random comment overheard as we went back to the hotel room:  "Is the room
still on fire?"

Slept, got up, packed.

One would hope you two weren't the one setting the room on fire. o.O

Lara and I threw our bags in the car.  We said one final goodbye to Zen and
Nick, then drove back home.  The journey home was shorter - seventeen hours
only - and cooler.  We made it back to my apartment at 6:30am Monday morning
and immediately crashed for a long, long time.  I eventually dropped Lara
off at the airport.

... after getting sufficent rest, I presume. 
 

Still, the fun of these cons is always the people, and I had lots of fun
with Nick, Zen, and especially Lara.  Spending time with them is always what
I treasure most.  I sure hope I can get together with some other people at
Otakon; I'm certainly going to try.  :)

... why not? Have  yourself a big fun ol' love-in. ^_^

_ESPECIALLY_ with Lara, huh?

*RUNS*