THURSDAY 22 July 2004
The convention started on a Wednesday, I think. I arrived that day but did not go to the convention center. I got into town and crashed at my Aunt and Uncle’s house. The next morning I went there and met the Dabel Brothers. It turns out that we were to share a booth with Spooklight Productions, an independent film company from Arkansas. They’re a great group of guys, and I suggest you check out their film, “FLIP”.
Anyway, Robert Jordan was supposed to do a book signing that day around 5 PM. The signing ended up being later than expected though. About 6 PM, one of the Dabel Bros picked Robert and Harriet up from where they were staying and brought them to the convention center. I met them at the curb along with Bob Kluttz (from Encyclopedia WoT) and Nicole Dubuc (a long-time Dragonmount member). The three of us escorted RJ and Harriet up to his first panel discussion (“Kicking Serious Butt: Action and Adventure in SF and Fantasy”) while Les Dabel went and parked the car.
I think Robert and Harriet were tired because of the time difference, but they still seemed happy to be there. On a side note: RJ looked great. He’s lost some weight, and was telling some fans who asked about it that he’s been working hard to do so.
Anyway, we made it to room 7A which was filled with about maybe a hundred people. At least one fan approached RJ right away asking to have his books signed. After signing several books for the guy, RJ found his way to the table with the other authors (among them was Raymond E. Feist and Harry Harrison). The panel began and was over about an hour later. RJ didn’t speak as much that time as he did in a later panel, but maybe it had to do with jet lag. He chimed in every now and then with the other authors, but he definitely did not dominate any of the conversation.
After the panel, he was almost immediately surrounded by people asking to sign their books. Having no other assistance, I stepped in and told everyone that “Robert Jordan will be signing books outside in just a minute or two.” I got him outside the room (where there was room to breathe) and made sure he and Harriet had chairs to sit down in. I got everyone in line like the people at the book stores always did, and things were much better.
RJ signed everyone’s books, regardless of how many they had. (Only about 20-30 people were in line). He personalized the autographs if the person asked, and he took pictures. He answered questions too, as well.
If you are viewing this on github.io, you can see that this site is open source. Please do not try to improve this page. It is auto-generated by a python script. If you have suggestions for improvements, please start a discussion on the github repo or the Discord.