My brother thinks I am a total loser because I want to go the the Supernova conference in order to meet Tahmoh Penikett from Dollhouse. <3

Granted, he is probably correct. However, I am entitled to be a fangirl.

This however, will be the first time I actively seek getting an autograph and meeting a star. Sure I have gone to concerts (oh the tragedy when Mandy Moore did NOT perform at Rumba in 2001 due to fears after 9/11) and even was in the audience for the first season of Australian Idol (wow, I am a dork) but this time, I want to go out on a limb.

However, the conference is charging an insane amount of money ($400AUD) if you want the “Whedonverse” package which allows you one autograph only, one photo and the right to sit in a VIP section during their Q&A time. And if I just want to see Tahmoh?An autograph? $30. Photograph? $40.

I would willfully wait in hours at a queue to get an autograph. I would also write a forlorn fan letter and send it to some third party in the vain hope that it gets read. But what I struggle with is that really, I am just a poor student. I mainly live off the largesse of Centerlink (yay for the Government) and well, a ticket to the conference plus an autograph and photo is pretty much what I get in a week.

Seriously, only someone who is working (and without a mortgage) could really afford it. Though I would (wo)manfully cough up a weeks earnings (or lack thereof) to meet my beloved Tahmoh, I could not possibly dream of scrapping together $400 to meet the cast of Dollhouse (I mean come on, I decided I could not afford to pay $80 to see Russell Peters perform stand up comedy live).

This makes me kind of sad. I know that in todays world, you do not get something for nothing. Their time is valuable and someone has gotta cough up. And like the Howard Federal Government pushed in the last two decades, end user pays. However, the amount is more than nominal, and the legion of high schoolers and university students that make up most of the fan base suffer.

Ultimately, the money probably goes to sponsoring the stars to come out to Australia in the first place (which is not cheap because we are so far away) and also acts as a filter so that people who go merely for the sake of autographs to sell them on eBay are stopped in their tracks. And in reality, when I finally do get to meet them, I will probably be so starstruck that I have forgotten my name let alone what I paid to get there. Just that now, the reality check that everything costs money saddens and frightens me.

I shall persevere in my pursuit to be a fangirl. Because if I had One Week to live I would do it in a heartbeat.