Hey there everyone! This is Erik aka erkman27. I'm 23 and have been an Al-Aholic since the age of (I think I said 6 before but is actually) 8 after listening to "Fat" from a copy of "Even Worse" a friend made for me before I moved away from him. And here's the story that I will tell my grandkids and they will commonly refer to it as the Alcon Story I'm sure. So here goes....
I had decided from day 1 of hearing about The First Ever Weird Al Yankovic Convention that I had to be a participant! I began the plan: My girlfriend, best friend and I would take the Amtrak to the hotel in Chicago, spend the night, party all day at Alcon, then come back that night. Well...first of all my Dad was NOT happy with this idea. He not only nearly disowned me but forbid me to ever speak of Al around him EVER again. Well...as any true Al fan in this situation..I decided to go anyway. We arrived no problem from a relaxing trip on Amtrak and made our way to the hotel. I strolled up to the front desk, told them who I was and that I had a reservation.(I had reserved months in advance) The guy behind the desk started looking around behind me and asked, "Uhm, may I ask where your parents are?" To which I patiently replied, "Uh, no, they're not here. I'm 18." Desk guy: "Oh my..I"m sorry, someone should have informed you. You have to be 21 to check into a hotel." He also said we cold still get in..but we'd have to have someone over 21 sign us in. I was like holy frikkin monkey! After all I had gone through with trip preparation and stuff with my Dad and now this! Well...I wasn't leaving. Not until me and my friends got to enjoy all the splendor of Alcon! So I told the guy we were going to hang out for a bit while we figured out what the heck to do. So while we hung out in the hotel lobby I had an epiphany-my best friend's dad used to be a state trooper-so...maybe I could have him call the hotel manager and work things out. Well, it wasn't as easy as I had hoped. The hotel manager and his dad ended up in quite an argument over the phone and still we sat in the lobby...UNTIL....About an hour later the manager got another call from none other than the Chief of the Chicago Police saying he would personally sign us in when he got off his beat. Unfortunately that was 3am! After what seemed like forever later, me, my girlfriend and my best friend still lay asleep in the hotel lobby across from 2 other guys who seemed to be in a similar predicament, the officer arrived and we were off to get some much needed sleep. We awoke the next morning eager to enjoy the fruits of our patient labor...and my friend suddenly decided he didn't feel good and that he was going to hang out in the hotel room. Oy vey!!! Anyway..thanks to Amanda Cohen, I was an Alcon volunteer so I went to start helping set up. Later...well into Alcon's events..a video was played with Al saying hello to everyone and that he would love to be there. Then as in a deeply seeded dream of everyone there he said something to the effect of, "Welllll...maybe I will join you." Knowing at that point what I had suspected from hearing about the convention on day 1 I knew he was about to come out so I sped with fire under my feet, camera ready to the stage...just as Al came out on it!!! So right after that he, of course, did the autograph session, and let whoever had a camera (me) take a pic with him!(thus the avatar-thanks again scottidog for helping me put it up!) We were then treated to twinkies and afterwards he just hung out and talked to all of us at his leisure. What a guy! So that's my incredibly long story. Hope I didn't bore you all to death lol.
-Erik
but what can I do?
, but I know I need to keep it in the fantasy world. (Now that he's married that's my excuse, but before that it was just "yeah, right, like he'd ever go for *you*" I like the married excuse better, since it is easier on the self-esteem. 
