Day 1 - We got to the line for Opening Ceremonies around 9:00.  When they started letting people in, for some reason the line broke and everyone made a mad dash through all the doors and filled up the seats.  MIQ and Yoko both performed a single song, and then did a duet singing the Evangelion OP.  After Yoko Ishida made her comments, we left to get tickets for tonight's AMV Contest.  We went to arcade for a while and then hit the exhibit hall.  After going up and down all the aisles, I ended up with an official Evangelion lighter and a hentai doujinshi of Onegai Teacher.  I also bought a Pita Ten art book for my friend.

We then went to go see Fullmetal Alchemist in Video 1, but they didn't have the dubs and only showed the raws.  We only stayed for a little while and then went off to get in line for the Yoko Ishida panel.  They handed out raffle tickets but never drew for guaranteed autographs like they usually did.  We went back to the exhibit hall for a while.  Then we went to wait in line for the AMV Contest.  My cousin and his friend went down to the Marriot to get a pizza while I held their places in line.  By the time they came back and ate our pizza, they started letting people in.

This year, they decided to go with a color coded sections instead of numbering individual seats.  We had blue tickets and got seats just behind the screens in the back.  They played music for a long while before they started showing last year's AMVs.  Some time later, they explained that they were running late because the computer that had all the entries on it was destroyed and they were busily encoding the AMVs to DVD and had just finished.  After playing Stop the Rock, the contest finally began.  The Drama videos were the first ones shown.  I liked Shattered Dreams(Berserk) and The Despair Incarnate(SaiKano).  The comedy ones were next.  Disney in D Minor and Football!! were my favorite ones(along with pretty much everyone else).  I can't remember much about the action category except for Rock and a Hard Place(Naruto).  I also remember that I didn't vote for that one either.  I believe I voted for End of All Hope(X TV).  AMtv videos were shown next.  Kingdom Fortuna was nice, and I also liked that last one that was a Final Fantasy X-2 with scenes from FFX, FF:TSW, and some Soul Calibur scenes.  One unfortunate video, called Reconfiguration, was not encoded on time and couldn't be shown that night.  My votes went to the The Despair Incarnate for Drama, Music in D Minor for comedy and Best of Show, End of All Hope for action, and Kingdom Fortuna for AMtv.

Day 2 - We got there and picked up the AX Idol tickets.  There wasn't any line at all, just like I had predicted.  I'm still surprised that they even ticketed this event after last year's Idol.  We then went to the Range Murata panel.  I didn't win a anything as usual.  After the panel, my cousin and his friend left to go to other places since they couldn't stand listening to these panels.  I met up with my other friend and we both attended Toshiharu Murata panel that followed right after Range's panel.  I learned that his favorite style of drawing was actually drawing kiddish stuff like Peanuts.  Now the next episode previews at the end of Hellsing's episodes make much more sense.

After the panel, my friend attended Yoko Concert while I decided to hit the exhibit hall.  I bought a Hattori Hanzo sword, two FF trading arts figure boxes(Yuna and Cloud were inside), an Onegai Twins box figure(Mizuho was inside), a Learn to Read Manga set, and two more hentai doujinshi(another Onegai Teacher and a Vandread).  I also bought two Fullmetal Alchemist box figures and a Mahoro towel for my friend.  By the time I was done, the concert was over and we both went around the exhibit hall.  I had completely missed Anime Palace's booth and he took me there.  I had bought from Anime Palace's booth last year and at PMX.  There I saw that they had a very nice Lacus Clyne statue, but it was way too much.  I ended up buying a photo book of the girls from the Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon live action drama and a box of Final Fantasy Trading Art figures. I also bought two Chobits figure boxes for my friend.  We then attended the ROD panel.  They were exactly like I remembered them from AX 02.  The whole panel was very entertaining.  They answered many questions with stuff they pulled out of nowhere.  President Bush somehow came up and they said that they hated him, to which the crowd applauded.  It was definitely the most entertaining panel this year.

After that I went to go grab a pizza to eat and sat down at the Marriot for a while.  We then went to the arcade for a bit before we lined up for AX Idol.  We had yellow tickets and we were allowed to go up even further to the pink area when they realized how little actually showed up.  The first contestant for singing and the first contestant for voice acting won their respective grand prizes.  The first contestant for singing also happened to be the winner of PMX's karaoke.  So it wasn't a surprise to me that she won.  I thought all the singers and monologues were great.  It was much better than last year's Idol.  One of the singers (I think her name was Katherine) did forget the words to the song she was singing, but she still did a great job.  During the intermission, a Chinese martial arts school performed a small show.  A group also presented a short show of Whose Line is it Anime?.  The winners were then announced.  They then proceeded to start the on stage dubbing with the winner of the voice acting.  She would be voicing Integral Hellsing from the Hellsing Anime.  After going through the different pieces of the scene, they then did the whole scene with Crispin Freeman.  She voiced Integral perfectly and matched all the lip flaps, but Crispin actually missed some of his lip flaps.  I found that funny since he's a professional voice actor.  When they were finished, the show finished off with the winning singer singing her song(the Chobits ED).

My friend wanted Crispin's autograph so we stuck around until he got out and got his Hellsing DVD signed.  I then drove my friend all the way back to his house in Glendora.

Day 3 - We left early and started to wait in line for Masquerade tickets at 9:00 A.M.  My friend arrives a few minutes after we sit down.  Two hours later we finally get tickets.  Three very long lines were formed by the time they started giving out tickets.  We were near the end of the first line.  I thought we had a good chance of getting the last few yellow tickets, but we got blue.  I doubt that the third line was able to get any tickets at all.

We headed for the Geneon Panel right after.  At the door we were greeted by a very hot girl cosplaying as Hakufu from Ikkitousen.  She handed us a 10th Anniversary Limited Edition Tenchi Coin.  The panel had already began as they rolled trailers for their newly announced Anime licenses.  Samurai Champloo and Tenjou Tenge were the only ones I recognized.  We left when the music portion of their panel started and Yoko didn't show up as she did at the AX 02 Pioneer Music Panel. 

We headed to the exhibit hall where I went to wait in line for the ROD guys at the Geneon booth.  They had already cut the guaranteed line off, and I was first in line for the "people who wanted to take a chance and see if there was enough time" line.  After waiting for a while, they finally came and started signing stuff.  The staff passed out ROD TV sign boards and I was able to get that and my ROD DVD insert signed by all four of them.  I don't exactly know who signed it, but I know for sure one was the director and another was the writer.  We wandered around for a bit and then went to Artist Alley and the Art Show.  I saw 3 prints I really liked, but they didn't have any at the time and told us to come back in around 30 minutes.  We went back to the exhibit hall where my friend waited in line at the Geneon booth for Yoko Ishida to sign his CD.  The line was a lot longer than the one I stood in and he was still able to get it signed.  I didn't bother to buy a CD and get it signed because I'm not that big of a fan of hers.  I enjoy her songs, but no one can really hold a candle to my favorite J-Pop idol Ayumi Hamasaki-sama. 

After he got it signed, I took a picture of him and that Hakufu cosplayer.  We went back to Artist Alley and I picked up those three prints.  We came back to exhibit hall to buy something to eat.  I bought a single hotdog and a 32 oz. cup of Sierra Mist.  It was about 4:00, and that was basically my dinner for that night.  After resting for a while, we went to go see Crispin Freeman panel.  They were in the middle of showing some video.  After it finished the floor was open to questions.  We decided to leave when someone started talking about the religious symbolisms in Final Fantasy VII. -_-'

We went up to the third floor to line up for the Masquerade, but we were told the line was in Hall C.  When we got in line, we were roughly in the spot we were in earlier today.  I thought this was a horrible idea.  They should've just made the line outside on the third floor like last year.  The Masquerade started late as usual.  They kept replaying trailers for ADV Anime and movies.  By the third time through, people were booing at the start every trailer.  Beach balls were also brought out by people.  The MC finally showed up and started the show.  It was surprising that they didn't have any special acts to begin the show like the past two years.  I was looking forward to hearing that cosplaying band that started the show in the last two years.  In between skits and pauses, a logo of ADV/Suncoast was shown.  The crowd would chant "A-D-V" and then scream "Suncoast" each time it was shown.  They stopped doing it as the Masquerade went on.  I thought this year's camera work was horrible.  I don't know if it was the cameramen themselves or the techs that pick which angles to show, but they angles they showed of each of the skits was horrible most of the time.  As for the show itself, I would have to say that the mecha costumes stole the show.  There was a Transformer car costume that actually changed from a car to a human suit.  His transformation took way too long though, but he looked great when he finished.  There was also someone in a huge ass Optimus Prime costume.  He had to have stage ninjas walk with him to make sure he didn't fall over.  The last mecha was a Astray Gundam that included his own detachable weapon.  He also needed a few stage ninjas to help him out.  All three of them won an award of some sort.  One skit I really enjoyed was the Fullmetal Alchemist one.  I believe they too won some award.  After the last skit, a bunch of people actually left.  For the intermission, the Chinese martial arts school did another exhibition of their skills.  After that the judges still weren't done and the beach balls were brought back out.  Then the staff decided to throw out free t-shirts.  Everyone ran towards the stage to get old AX 01/02 shirts.  A few people dropped their stuff.  Some girl lost her purse, another lost some sunglasses, and someone dropped their Gameboy Advance.  The judges finally finished and the winners were announced.  After they were done, I had to drive my friend back to Glendora yet again.  =P

Day 4 - With not much to do this day, we left around 10.  I went to go watch the encore and awards of the AMV Contest.  It was a bit surprising that Essence of the Heart won Drama.  I thought Shattered Dreams had the best chance.  Disney in D Minor won for Comedy, and Rock and a Hard Place won for action.  These weren't surprising.  Personal Jesus(Witch Hunter Robin) won for AMtv.  This was most surprising to me.  I didn't think that video was all that great at all.  I thought the FFX-2 one would've won for sure.  The Judges Special Award was Macross Apocalypse.  The Judges favorite, Creator favorite, and Fan favorite was Football!!; so it was named Best of Show.

After that was finished, I went to attend the Whose Line is it Anime? panel.  I really enjoyed the Anime themed "Whose Line."  It got a bit corny at times, but it was funny.  I went to the exhibit hall one last time and looked for one last thing to buy with the $9.50 I had left.  I ended up buying a box figure of Onegai Teacher.  I headed over to the Charity Auction next.  Thankfully, I didn't see anything I really wanted there.  If Range Murata had drawn a sketch of Tatiana instead of Lavie and Dio, I think I would've ended up with a big ass charge on my credit card.  After the auction, they quickly did the SPJA Awards.

Closing Ceremonies finally started.  They thanked a lot of people and announced the winners of the AMV Contest and Masquerade.  They also announced that the preliminary number of attendance this year was 23,000.  Since so many new people came, they actually ran out of lanyards and badges and had to use last year's stuff.  When they got to the part where they're supposed to bring up the Guests of Honor, they found out they weren't there yet.  So the crowd screamed for them to play Football!!, and they did.  After it was done, they still had not shown up and the crowd then asked they play Disney in D Minor, and they did that too.  The guest arrived after that and the guest made their closing comments.  After the third guest made his comments, he noticed something about Taka(the person that usually does the translating).  He wore Taka's hat and had his ukulele, but it actually wasn't him.  The real Taka came out and grabbed his things and went away.  The rest of the guest made their comments and AX was declared officially ended.  To which the crowd booed and started saying they want another four days.

Somewhere between the Charity Auction and Closing Ceremonies, they premiered the trailer of Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence.  It looked very good.  They said that a theatrical release was in the grasp of their hands, but they couldn't get it.

Edit: Official attendance for AX 04: 25,000+

Things I bought:

Freebies:

• Autographs from ROD guys on my ROD DVD insert and on a ROD TV signboard

• Ikkitousen wet napkins

• Dokkoida antenna head

• ROD TV post-its

• Fans

• Viz sample manga

What I wanted to buy:

• Lacus Clyne statue

• Quistis statue

• More Onegai Teacher hentai doujinshi

• Mizuho sitting down on chair with box of Pochy statue

• Gundam Seed box figures

• 8" figure of Cagalli Yula Athha

• Naruto gloves (replacements since mine are pretty torn up now)

• Fullmetal Alchemist figures of Armstrong and Winry

• Ayu-sama fastener

• ROD TV Limited Edition DVD box with first DVD

• Justice 1/100 Gundam Seed model