(Continued from Part Four...)

There is one major problem with The Office convention, as I see it: the people are normal.

Here's what I mean -- the average Office fan is someone who really likes the show and enjoys watching it with other people who really like the show. They are, in a word, average. At no point did I run into some crazed super-fan who spends every day dressed like Dwight or is currently converting his house into an exact replica of the Schrute farm. In just about every case, the people I talked to were kind, courteous people who made the trek to Scranton to a) meet the people they'd been talking to online and b) perhaps get a chance to hear their favorite stars talk.

This is not what I'd been hoping for.

When I agreed to the assignment, I thought it'd be an interesting trip because I had imagined a Star Trek-type convention for The Office. I pictured the same obsessive geekiness that lead to William Shatner screaming "Get a Life" to the people asking him ridiculously specific questions at his own convention appearances. I got none of that -- it was almost like having a big Office watching party at my own house. Hell, I wouldn't have minded any of these people over my house, and that's something I can't say of any science fiction convention I've ever been to.

I think the main difference between those other conventions and The Office is that this convention drew women. In fact, by my eye, there were actually more women than men at it. Women, though they may get obsessed enough to wear an I Heart Jim t-shirt, they're not usually insane enough to, oh, I don't know, convert their apartment into a replica of The Starship Enterprise.

It was therefore impossible for me to enjoy this convention on an ironic level. I went up there in the hopes that I'd be able to come back here and write an article about how freaky all the fans of the show were.

The fact of the matter is, I can't. The Office has a group of normal, nice fans. It's good for The Office but bad for snarky bloggers who like to mock things!

Some final stray thoughts to leave you on:

-- Creed is a bad-ass guitar player. I knew he played with The Grass Roots, but it's hard to put that together until you see him perform. It's a little disconcerting to see a character with whom I associated some of the creepiest comments in televised history leading a group of a thousand Office fans like he was Jon Bon Jovi playing a club in Jersey.

-- Kelly: much more pretty in real life than on the show. Jan: not as much. That's not to say Jan is ugly, just that from the way they're filmed, you'd figure that Jan would be the Pamela to Kelly's Boof. In real life? I'm making this bold statement: I'd totally go after Kelly before I'd go after Jan. (And, uh, I'd probably be rejected by both of them).

-- It's weird to see Stanley smile. He did so, a lot.

-- Not every sign was all that well produced. This place had four months to prepare for this and this is the best they came up with.

-- Apparently, the night before, Andy, Kevin, Meredith, and a few others went out to a place called The Bog and sang Karaoke until the wee hours of the morning. This, to me, is brutally cool, and a reminder, I think, as to why the show is so popular. The people that populate the corners of The Office are not huge stars who wouldn't set foot in Scranton no matter how many free coal-mining tours the organizers threw at them. They're hard working actors who have achieved a minor level of fame, but not so much that they don't enjoy hanging out with their fans. I'm sure that the second one of them gets a movie deal (like, ahemDwightahemPamahemJimahemMichael) the appeal of coming to Scranton and rubbing elbows with the unwashed masses might be a little less exciting. Until then, though, I can recommend The Office convention as a place to go if you actually want to meet the people you're fans of, instead of just paying them $20 for an autograph.

And that's it, kids. If you have any questions of me (assuming you made it this far without falling asleep), please feel free to ask them in the comments. I'll be monitoring this post closely and I'll try to answer them as quickly as possible!