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Since Fanime and Clockwork Alchemy are under the same admission, there was a whole track of fiction and world building panels at CA I know.  Some was specific to the genre, but others seemed quite general from the descriptions.

There was a dealer on the front row who had an absolute ton of japanese promo posters for older series, but you had to look through a binder so it wasn't terribly obvious.  Ranma, Orguss, even a Nausicaa, Macross.  Definitely was some Lupin, I didn't look about Bubblegum Crisis. Don't remember the shop name.

Doubletree Thursday - Monday

Pros:
- As an HHonors member, I could check in and make a specific room request off a hotel map on Thursday morning. When we arrived, keys were already programmed, we were handed cookies and water, and that was that.
- Zero problems with keys working the whole weekend
- Easiest checkout ever, took the keys, asked if a receipt to my email on file was good, and done.
- Shower was always hot, ice bucket actually kept ice for several hours
- Never heard any sort of loud racket, and elevators were all working

Cons:
- The bed...was not terribly comfortable.  Slept on worse for sure, but it was quite hard and the pillows quite floofy but with no actual support.
- The shuttle shuffle.  Never waited more than 10 minutes for one, but it made planning days harder when it could be 2 minutes or it could be 15 until a shuttle arrives.
- Nothing nearby for food.  Hotel cafe and bar were okay but pricey, everything else was near the convention center or Fairmont

I have determined that onigiri are the solution to food at a con.  Bring my rice and rice cooker to the hotel, some furikake or lunchmeat, make a bunch and stuff 'em in a box that goes in whatever bag I'm carrying around and whenever and whereever I am hungry, instant food :D

Time slot set, Sunday 9am to 11am.  Early, sure, but then if you don't finish in 2 hours, you'll have a small project to work on while waiting in lines later ;)

Make your own Kimono! has been accepted for those who were interested by the way!  All supplies for this will be provided, I'll have a thing in case people want to throw $5 at us to offset costs, but it won't be required by any means. :)

I'm not sure about Fanime, but if you can/want to help, its worth asking if they need someone to check an email account and make reports, or compile notes from forums, or other non-local things.  That's very much up to the con staff but I have done remote volunteer work for groups before, so it might be possible :)

No volunteer organization ever has all the people it needs.  Fact of life.  All of them do the best they can with whoever they can get, one day a week from someone is better than no one. If you think they are understaffed, volunteer.  If you think they aren't doing enough, offer to help out.  Let's be honest with math here.  At $60/badge, lets be really generous and say they could find someone willing to give up a job for a part-time 20 hours a week at $8 an hour, round that out to the cost of 8k to afford one part time person for a year's salary.  Now, of course, some entity is paying that person, and they have to pay into unemployment, social security, all the associated business things, which include lawyer's fees, bank fees...let's be super generous and say about $1k. So, which $9,000 worth of con are you okay getting rid of? Pretty sure there isn't that kind of money sitting around in a bank account with people going 'I have no idea what to spend this extra money on'.

Man, Guitar Vader......
There was a time where the soundtrack to Jet Set Radio Future was my all the time every time music :D

Actual kimono at 1/6 scale :) Get to see and use all the process in a portable size, and it directly scales.

I have taught both at other conventions and events, I'm a big fan of doing stuff amongst the talking about stuff!

Ohayou minna, coming out to Fanime for the first time this year.  How's the crowd? Many DIY/creative types?  Would you attend a hands on workshop on making your own kimono, or doing kumihimo?  Thought I would get a feel for what would go over well before panel submission opens.

So after many tries changing each registration field, finally got registered.  Apparently the forum doesn't support three letter usernames, but the error it reports is 'User <name> at email <email> (IP: <ipaddress>) is Spam. Please contact the forum administrator'.  Might want to indicate someplace that there is a minimum on usernames!