A different build... "TK421 why aren't you at your post?" Documenting my build for the Empire!

It's been two months since I did a troop, last weekend was a 5K for a newborn child but I had to cancel because my mom was still in the hospital so I went to visit her.

But this weekend I finally got back to it at Techfest 2019 at Sinclair Community College in Dayton.  I spent 4 hours suited up straight before my back said you need to sit down old man (the leader made us take a break at 3hrs to at least go get a bottle of water and take the helmets off).  Then grabbed a quick burger and went back to work the booth for 4 hours till it ended.

I wish I had time to see the booths!  I saw a few really cool things I would have geeked out over if still a kid in school.  3D printing, robots, demos of all kinds of science...  Once again I got to hang out with cool people and get my photos with a lot of kids.  This starts 4 weeks in a row, next weekend is a Cub Scout award banquet.

Fantastic work, Jerry. The 501st is very well known in the cosplay world; I’m glad that you found them. Keep it up!!!

Lookin' good!

That Jawa looks like he'd be taller than Vader if he stood up... 

In reply to Rodan :

I don't know.  He's more towards the camera so it's a bit misleading.  Dan is a decent sized guy, but the Vader is berkeleying huge.  6'9" or 6'10", and quite the girth as well.  He's imposing without the costume, add the costume and he just towers over everyone else in the room.  He made a great Vader.

I don't know what you did on Saturday night, but if it wasn't dressing in a plastic space costume and handing out awards to cub scouts, then I win.

Their event was a Star Wars theme this year and they had us come out as a surprise about 1/2 way through.  The room was almost completely dark (they had shown the opening crawl of the movie intro on a screen), I was glad I added that flashlight to the blaster!  A packed room of overly-excited children made for an interesting evening...

Lesson learned - if the event includes a PA system and a loud announcer, don't bother with the voice electronics.  The volume kept tripping my wireless mic and it kicked on every 3 seconds for almost an hour and a half................

Another weekend, another troop.  This one was Friday immediately after work (luckily it was 10 minutes away).  Lakota East High School annual Pi Day (festival for science and assorted STEM stuff).

Another "no weapons" troop so a lot of hands on my belt and various thumbs-up and pointing going on, I feel naked without a blaster in my hands.  But I got to goof around with the kid photos & put my arm on their shoulder, or sometimes flat on top of his head.  Bunny ears are the favorite weapon of an unarmed stormtrooper.

Next weekend is the memorial car show for a deputy sheriff & his wounded partner in Cincinnati area.  I'm a bit concerned about early March weather in Ohio.

Found more photos of the troop Friday night, this is my favorite.  Her expression...

The reaction from the kids is always awesome! 

Here's a super accurate E-11 kit that's new to the market if you want to go off the deep end:  E11 Blaster kit

All aluminum, so a little lighter than the actual de-mil reps.

Not cheap, but the guy makes super nice stuff.  I recently finished one of his ESB DL-44 kits:

Another weekend, another troop.  This one was kinda special, a memorial car show for a fallen officer with Clermont County in Ohio.  I offered us up if they were interested, they responded with resounding yes's!  I watched the weather forecast all week leading up to it, it could have been worse.  We didn't hit the mid-upper 40s as forecast, but the rain held off till near the end at least.

For E36 M3ty weather in Ohio in early March, they still brought in 499 cars!  Each one paying $25 registration to go to Bill Brewer's family.  The department displayed a Mustang that Bill owned and was pretty fond of.  We got a few good photos with the attending law enforcement.

We lasted about an hour before the cold made us take a break to warm up.  I'm carrying the big DLT-15 rifle, and went to change hands and couldn't feel my fingers move.  We warmed up in the locker room at the school we used to change then came back out for 30-45 minutes before I couldn't do anymore.  The rain came as we were leaving the changing room.

Everyone thanked us for being there, and I'd do it again tomorrow for the reason it existed.  499 cars is a great turnout on a good summer day, it's wonderful on a cold rainy windy late winter day.  And SWMBO made sure we got a few photos with the Ben-Gal cheerleaders that made an appearance.

My friend posted this later.  I had no idea that kid was downthere.

I'm supposed to ask you if you're doing the Columbus dam shoot?

In reply to wae :

Yes!  I'm thinking that could be pretty interesting.  How'd you hear about it?

Also, last night was my second hospital troop to Dayton Children's.  We had a good crowd, plenty of smiling faces (even behind the surgical masks) that included the staff.  This time I knew all but one person so that made it more fun to joke with everyone.  I kept giving the rebel pilot crap when I could, but he took it in stride.

In reply to Jerry :

My wife has been hanging out with some boba fett people up in tri county on wednesdays.  I've also heard that a photographer friend of ours from down in Eastern KY is considering going up there as well.

In reply to wae :

The build party that I used to go to when I could was on Wednesday nights in Tri County. Curious if that's at Chuck's place.  I remember a few Mandos.

In reply to Jerry :

Yep! That's the one!

Yesterday was the Red Kids Opening Day parade & festival, except thanks to the crappy forecast they moved it inside the stadium & dropped the festival around the stadium.  That didn't stop a crapload of kids and parents from attending.  They let us use a room on the lower level to change, and we took two elevators up to the main level.  I remember the employee hitting the floor button & stepping aside, the elevator stopped & the door opened, and holy crap there was a sea of kids & parents!  I thought "oh E36 M3" and we headed out like "uh hi!".

They hid us around a corner then sent us out when it was time.  Since they moved inside they took us to the middle of the parade route (red carpet) & I was 3rd in line, the official guy was like "both ways both ways!", the first two turned right so I turned left.  Suddenly I'm leading the way!  Well, here we go!

I'm way up there, SWMBO is in the blue "racing shirt" behind the Red Guard.  We had 3-4 handlers to help at least.  I also tried a new experience, kids wanting autographs!  Notebooks, ball caps, baseballs, after the first one I made sure she was nearby & she would hand me the marker & I motioned for her to hold it up high ("I can't see a thing in this helmet!").  Looked out the left eye hole and thankfully my number is mostly straight lines TK-40418...

I'm signed up for the regular Star Wars Night in May, this was a good practice.  They said that night is even crazier.

And now I realize Celebration in Chicago is next week!  That's the next time I'll be wearing the suit, around 30k other people.  I actually bought a combo lock for the costume bin.  Local troops are like rally/autocross to me, where I leave my stuff without worry.  But this many people, yeah lock that E36 M3 up.  We even have volunteers guarding two dressing rooms, I signed up for a Saturday shift.

It is time.  Tomorrow early morning I leave for Chicago for 5 days for Star Wars Celebration and will hang out with about 70k other geeks.  SWMBO will join me Friday late afternoon by plane (I'm hauling the luggage in the Crosstrek for her).  I plan to troop at least sometime Friday and Saturday.  I scored a good seat for the Episode 9 panel and viewing on Friday (you'll be able to see it probably 2 minutes after me).  And plan to spend quite a bit of $$ while I'm there.  Not even counting the parking.

Star Wars Celebration was last weekend, 5 days actually.  I left Monday morning because I didn't want to deal with parking after checkout from the hotel, parking is $$$ in downtown Chicago...

Thursday goal complete - Anthony Forrest autograph on this old lunchbox.  He was the sandtrooper that did the "move along move along" scene, and I let him pick between a figure or this lunchbox.  He thought the box was pretty cool.

Didn't troop as much as I'd have liked to, it was logisitics between SWMBO not there till Sunday, massive crowds, and getting the 50gal tote to and from by taxi/Uber and plans for evenings. But I had fun with that on Sunday (far left again). Oh well, still had fun the other days with Ep 9 panel at Wintrust Arena & seeing the trailer with the actors.

As you can see I wasn't hurting for fun activities out of costume.

But trooping was fun.  Lots of selfies & playing with the kids.  I'm far left.  Went up after the official 501st photo to troop for a few hours, got a few selfies then found a Vader with his wife as an officer.  Walked over to joke if he needed a guard, couldn't leave for 30 minutes because people lined up for photos.  Then wandered a bit and found 3-4 other troopers & one waved me over to hang out.  We wandered for a few hours and got tons of photos.  One was from Puerto Rico, another from Seattle, not sure the others.

We met the real R2-KT, the droid made for Albin Johnson, the founder of the 501st, as a memorial for his young daughter that passed away from cancer.  That was pretty cool.  I have to say one of my favorite things about the weekend was meeting people from all over the world.  I met people from Ecuador, the UAE, Germany, and so many accents I lost track.  They were expecting 70k people, I wouldn't be surprised if it happened.

This weekend was Gem City Comic Con in Dayton, and my first experience at working a 2 day event, trooping both days.  I helped with the booth Saturday morning, then "Blast a Trooper" in the afternoon.  It's a charity donation of $1 to shoot us with a Nerf gun.  The "no head shots" rule is more a suggestion, but no one did it maliciously.  Just kids with bad (good?) aim.

"No, shoot him!"  I was grateful to wear a helmet and a cod piece, just saying......

We had a pretty cool new backdrop to play with for photo ops.  Sunday this guy was there, I needed my own photo:

Next Saturday is May the Fourth, so many events going on.  I'm squeezing in two in the morning, then run to Cincy to be in a friend's wedding, then the other side of Cincy for another friend's wedding reception.  Sunday Revenge of the Fifth will be my couch.

May the 4th be with the rebels.....  you Imperial traitor.  J/K have fun.  I played SWG back in the day myself.  

In reply to AnthonyGS :

Bunch of terrorists.  We just want to bring security to the galaxy!

Speaking of May the Fourth...I was quite busy that day.  Two troops back to back, then two weddings back to back.  Whew.  First up was the Dayton STEM school 5K and fun run.

It was a park that's kind of an island, we were concerned about flooding but luckily the rain held off.  We handed out medals to the runners and the kids, and one kid got a surprise when he was near the finish line and the Tusken Raider hit his sound effects, that kid sped up and kept going!

Suited down and ran over to Bell Book & Comic for their Free Comic Book Day event with Star Wars theme.  Two of the guys from the morning troop work there so they invited us over.  One lives a street over, he went home and parked and walked over, still suited up.  Good mixture of kids and adults, we got more photos and at the end I got a free Star Wars comic book, picked up a Riverdale for SWMBO.  (She dropped me off to go get ready for the weddings...)

Which I grabbed a burger in the drive through and we drove down to Cincy for wedding #1.  Got there at 2pm just as photos were starting.  I suited up for the 3rd time and joined in.  This is my favorite I've seen so far, looking forward to the rest.  We got some fun ones, chasing the bridesmaids, getting chased by the bridesmaids, etc.

Wedding #2 was on the other side of Cincy, and I was pretty wiped by the time we got there about 620pm.  It was an outdoor event and the bride had mud up to her knees!!  Sorry, no trooping for this one,  Those white boots and mud?  Nope.

I left at 7am and got home at 930pm.  Star Wars Day is exhausting when you're in the 501st.  (I know guys that did 3-4-5 troops that day)

Last Saturday we organized a group photo shoot for all of Ohio members of the 501st and Rebel Legion.  It started out trying to get as many regular stormtroopers together as possible, and we added extras like Rebel Fleet Troopers to die for us, and eventually added whoever wanted to show up.

For a novice-first-time effort it went great!  5-6 photographers including SWMBO, someone brought a fog machine and Honda generator, ladders, a few lights...  People at the Alum Creek Dam park in Columbus might have thought we were shooting scenes for Ep 10.

The last one is a group photo someone else took (because I haven't had time to learn the light saber effect.  The lady in brown with the double saber is a friend of ours & I want to do some good ones for her.  SWMBO took the above photos, I did the 'Shopping.)

And I just found out I get to be on stage with this guy July 3rd in Dayton during his concert!!

Yesterday was the Beavercreek Police Dept open house.  Very warm outdoor event but we got to see a K9 demo, an officer get tazed, and we just missed seeing a Careflight helicopter land.  But we got some good photos with it and the pilot.

Badge #66, Order #66........ coincidence???