JoeLanta, the huge GI Joe convention in Atlanta, Georgia, starts this Friday, and yours truly will be there.

But I’m not shooting any video this year. I want to experience going to this fun show as a civilian and not have to worry about lugging cameras around or making sure that video gets shot properly.  I’m also really looking forward to arriving home without a ton of video editing hanging over my head like a sword of Damacles. I’m not retiring from shooting video at toy shows by any means, but just this once…since there are so many other video creators slated to be at this show…I’m going to just go and enjoy it.

I will take a few photos to share here, but no video will be shot.

However, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t check out my previous videos (shot with invaluable assistance from my dear wife, Mel Larch). Up above you can see the raw footage I shot at last year’s JoeLanta, and below you can watch the epic, back-breaking travelogue I shot last year when I hit JoeLanta in Atlanta, and PowerCon in Columbus, Ohio on the same weekend, which also happened to be my birthday weekend.  That grueling slog played a large part in my decision to forego the video this year.

Fun shouldn’t be that much work.

For tons more of my JoeLanta coverage from the past decade-plus, check out this huge INDEX to previous PopCult coverage that traces the evolution of JoeLanta into ToyLanta and then into two separate shows.