So the doors open and people file in, more like rush in actually because there is no assigned seating so you can seat wherever, unlike Creation Conventions. Chris and I got seats in the front row, about midway on the right section. Not a bad place to be. It's really impressive the camera gear some people bring. I don't know if it was this convention or the last one, but the woman next to me had this professional camera with a mount and an external flash and extra batteries. That requires skill, which requires time, and I'm not willing to put the time to learn to be a good photographer.

The guests were a bit late, but when they came in they made an impression. Alexandra Tydings had a red knee-length dress with a burgundy sweater which she took off a little later. Ms Leick had a more elaborate costume, as is her wont at conventions. She had a mostly red plaid sleeveless thigh-length dress with black boots, fishnet stockings, a dark green sweater, and a black and white bandanna wrapped around her head. Metal studded collar and bracelets completed the punk-girl look. And the only reason I can describe this is because I can look back at the pictures.

My memory is pretty bad and if I didn't have some notes I wouldn't be able to describe what happened at all. The two women disdained sitting behind the table and sat on the table, getting closer to the audience. I've seen Alexandra before and she's quite a nice down to earth type person. With Ms Leick it's a little different. She's also quite nice and if given the chance she's a normal person who hams it up a bit. But the audience tends to expect certain behavior from her -- her occasional wackiness becomes a feature attraction so she has to keep doing it. I'm sure she doesn't mind, but what happens is that you only see glimpses of Ms Leick because most of the time she's playing this "convention" role.

Alexandra talked about "Hourglass", her special project with Claudia Christian. It's a television series which they're trying to sell, about two time-traveling women police officers, or something like that. She's only gotten a couple of nibbles from a couple of studios, but they're still working on it. She's obviously enthused about this project, which sprang partly from the lack of good roles for women.

The last episode of Xena was supposed to be a musical and Aphrodite would have been in that, but they couldn't get the rights to the music. She got to make a list of props she wanted from the show and for some reason there was this awful looking statue in "Married with Fishsticks" (in the beginning in the Temple of Aphrodite) which she asked for and got, plus other things. Alexandra has two dogs, both mastiffs. She's a good dancer, spending her childhood taking lots of dance classes, though not ballerina, and still likes to learn new dances. She also is into Tae Kwon Do and wants to learn this obscure Brazilian martial arts which is more dance-like than other styles.

Ms Leick said that she had taken a break from acting (I think it was more than a year), but was going to start auditioning in November. Asked about Callisto, she was glad that the character was redeemed in the end (a bit different than what she said in Memphis, but it's not as if people can't change their mind or it's not as if people always mean exactly what they say). She did say that she was quite disappointed that she didn't get the starring role in "Witchblade" (which went to Yancy Butler). Ms Leick was on the short list but she came down with a virus. Still, she almost made it to the callback but was half an hour late, which didn't make the producers happy at all.

During her vacation, Ms Leick went mountain climbing in Nepal. Hot water is precious there and Coca-Cola is everpresent. She did say that she met a nice Australian man in Nepal, and that's all I remember. Ms Leick also visited South Africa, which is still a bit unstable since the Afrikaans lost power. Lots of fences, lots of crime, lots of people carrying guns. I don't think she mentioned why she was there.