Collectormania Birmingham & Swindon Film and Comic Con 

I’ve spent the past month recovering from a severe allergic reaction from a plant which likely happened while I was at Go Ape or helping my dad in the garden on our staycation. It was a skin reaction to my hands, feet and the back of my neck with redness, blistering and a lot of itching!! 

The Doctor said it’s very difficult to narrow down which plant I had the reaction to bit I’ll be more careful in future and definitely wear gloves if I try Go Ape again. I’ve been on a strong antihistamine and three creams to combat the reaction. As such my training for my race had taken a back seat but I’ve upped the training and did 5.4km last week, my race is tomorrow!! Rain is forecast. 🙁 🌧

Race and skin reactions aside I’ve been to two conventions this past weekend! Collectormania Birmingham and Swindon Film and Comic Con.

Collectormania Birmingham was held at the National Exhibition Centre (NEC) and is the first convention at the venue for this organiser, having previously been held at Milton Keynes Dons Stadium. 

I liked the NEC as a venue, everything was much more spaced out and they were able to have more guests and stalls but I missed the atmosphere of the stadium. Even if it did get wet and windy there!

I went along to meet Ming-Na Wen (Agents of Shield), Julie Benz  (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel), Charisma Carpenter (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel) and Ben Browder (SG1, Farscape). My favourite guest of the day was Ming-Na, she was lovely, very friendly and chatty and having recently had knee surgery attended the convention in a wheelchair. 

All the guests I met were friendly but she stood out for me. I had a brief chat with Julie and Charisma about Buffy and Angel and my dad had a chat with Ben about Farscape – his character and my dad share the same name! Which we had a laugh about. 🙂

I was impressed by the range of stalls and came home with a couple of presents for birthdays / Christmas.

Sunday was spent a little closer to home at Swindon Film and Comic, where I went to meet Jet and Saracen from the 90s tv show Gladiators. It was their first convention and they both said they were having a great time meeting the fans.

Even though the event was on a smaller scale it was very well organised and had a lot to offer, from the guests and stalls to the display photo areas and charity areas. I came home with a Primeval (tv show) board game from one charity stall, I’d been after it for ages and it only cost me £2.50!

Dad bought a load of steampunk accessories ready for his steampunk display, which he plans to wear at London Film and Comic Con in July. He’s going to be a Hydra agent (Marvel), but the concept is his own design. I’m looking forward to seeing it finished. 🙂

Hope everyone has a great week and I’ll do a post race update soon! Feeling nervous…!!