The Galacon/Sicily trip, Part 2: Galacon: can we get an opening bid on the air? · 9:14pm February 5th
Yes, this got a huge time divide from the last. Let's try to wrap them up in February because in March or so, I get to try and learn whether y'all are willing to put up with this sort of thing again. We're not going to seriously talk about the possibility of a 2024 convention until after I finish telling you about what happened in 2023.
So go back with me. Time and mileage...
September 16th & 17th
My insomnia is trying to follow me. Shortly after it comes into the hotel room, I get up and bash it over the head with an OTC sleep aid, then try to get back into bed. This isn't the time for a nightwalk, nor is it the proper portion of the planet. I don't mind exploring in the dark, but I need to sleep. I'm still trying to make up for all the rest I lost during the flight, plus there's the whole problem where I got up way too early for it in the first place and... I need sleep. Plus there's the minor problem of having no idea what the local cops are like. Mine are, to some small degree, accustomed to spotting me on the sidewalk at three in the morning -- and I still get detained once a year for Suspiciously Putting One Foot In Front Of The Other.
I only have so many hours and days and so much time. But if I don't sleep...
...back to bed and when I open my eyes again, it still isn't quite daylight. But it's at least a lot closer to the local 6 a.m, and I force myself to stay in the hotel room for a little while longer.
Siri is consulted for walking directions to the convention center. (In Germany, the procedure for finding anything becomes 'mispronounce the name horribly, then correct the resulting popup manually'.) It should take less than an hour each way on foot. There are buses -- in fact, there's buses everywhere I go -- but I don't know how they connect to each other and the truth is that over a short distance, you just see more while you're on foot. I consider three miles to be a relatively short distance. One which, at home, still has to be covered on foot because I don't have a car any more, but at least it's manageable. I'm more worried about my data burn. Just about nothing except video consumes data like live GPS directions, and I've only got a 40GB SIM on the tablet. It has to last for the whole trip. I don't know if the convention has wifi -- and it doesn't -- if my various stay points will allow me to hook in... Caution is advised.
Check in on the chat server. Good morning -- oh, right. Closer to midnight in my home time zone. Good something.
I get breakfast free with my room, and I have to pass on it because they don't start serving until 8 a.m. I don't know what the lines to get into Galacon are going to be like, and even a three-mile path can take several hours if it's going across strange terrain. (That thought is a preview, but not for a couple of days.) Opening ceremony is at 10. It's best for me to have some temporal leeway. I still wind up checking to see if anyone's put bread out early, and -- nothing. Still, it's not as if I shouldn't be able to find bread at this hour. There's going to be food everywhere...
(Hello, past self! You are an idiot! Didn't you learn anything from Bellevue?)
Shower. Fresh clothing. Locate the nearest laundromat via Siri -- okay, that's a couple of miles, and the hotel has no laundry service. Due to the limited space of the suitcase, I'm carrying, at best, a six-day supply of clothing. Finding places to wash up is going to be a regular concern, and it's eventually going to leave me sitting on a curb predawn.
First hints of sunlight. A few more rays.
I can't treat this as nothing more than the stop before going home. (Back. Home. It's hard to sort between the two.) I was the tiebreaker vote in the poll. I chose Germany as this year's pipe dream, and now I'm about to head for Galacon. I need to have the full experience, as best I can --
-- and that's enough light. Leave the room, as quietly as possible. (Three people are staying in the one next to mine, all wearing soccer merch. No idea when they got to sleep.)
Let's hike.
The trail initially takes me back the way I came in, past train station and armored houses. I then have to climb the hill back towards the Lidl, and there's very little traffic on the road at this hour. None of it really looks at me, at least not in that '...what the @$#%?' sense. Not beyond the usual. I'm not decked out in show images and I'm not one of the people doing cosplay or wearing a fursuit. I can stand out, but you won't ID me as part of the fandom.
In Bellevue, Baltimore... they're used to us. Waiblingen is hosting Galacon for the first time, because the original venue -- well, as I understand it, the rent was raised beyond the point of endurance. The convention needed to host a Ko-Fi drive just to pay for the new place (and dear gawds, do I have empathy there), and no one in this city is accustomed to the comings and goings of Pony. I don't doubt there's going to be some staring at the strangers today.
(There are normal parkgoers. There are also a few double-takes.)
Climb the hill, and then we get what I call a D.C. Left: climb a staircase to reach the road which is passing overhead. Car wash, car dealership, convenience store which isn't open, almost have a little bit of highway and then I walk through a residential neighborhood until I hit a park. I'm trying to trust Siri here, and she hasn't really been wrong yet. ('Wrong yet' will be Taormina.) The area is mostly clean: the only place I really see debris is along the major roads, with a bit near an exit ramp because I need to go across the entrance. Then Siri directs me to walk through the park, and --
-- it's the squirrel which sets it off. The sense of displacement. Because in the States, a squirrel will run past me in the park all the time. A flash of grey fur --
-- wrong.
This squirrel is red.
I stare after it. No notice from the squirrel. There's nuts to reach.
...okay. The path twists past a cemetery, ducks through a construction area, exits through the shaded walkway next to an art gallery, and now I have to cross the street and go through another park. Off to the left, Waiblingen proper is just starting to wake up. A few more cars, lots of buses, and now I've got a well-labeled hiking route. Labeled in German, but that's my problem. Statues go by. I pass a kids' area with its own sailing ship.
Then I see the convention center.
The convention center has... problems.
It's actually in the park. You can step outside any time you like, lie down on grass for a while. Plenty of room for sports. In a touch of absolute brilliance, the parking is underground. And if you go a couple of blocks off to one side, you'll find Old Waiblingen. The city's half-medieval section, carefully half-preserved.
That's for tomorrow. Today, I'm looking at the center, and... it's small. Two above-ground floors, and I never find any way into a theoretical basement. There's enough space for a good-sized auditorium: one which hosts over a thousand people. You've got a conference room on the second floor: there's in-house food being served nearby from a large lunch counter. Walk around the building, find a smaller entrance, and that's what leads to the gaming area, kids' activities, and costume repair.
And that's it.
One auditorium. One panel room. There are, for the most part, two activities scheduled at any given time. You're at one or the other. Trotcon had more event venues than Galacon, for what might have been a third of the attendance. (I'm guessing here, but I think there were around 1200 people at Galacon.) And you might be asking yourself where Huckster Hall is, if there's that little space. The answer? It's actually Huckster Hall. As in 'the hallways'. Just about any space along the walls is being used for vendor booths. Vaunted German Efficiency, and the convention's guidebook has a map.
There's benches outside. People are slowly starting to gather: some wearing merch, many carrying plushies. One event I'm going to miss is in the conference room: build the largest possible plushie tower, and I swear I've seen some of these custom pieces before. World travelers. One person is wearing EFNW gear, and I don't ask how his flight went.
No one is wearing a mask.
No one at all.
...oh no.
I masked up for the flight. For the trains. This is going to be a building teaming with 1200 strangers, and the dominant scent of the convention is sweat. (It isn't horribly hot for the convention. The heat wave is lurking to the south, waiting for me to arrive. But that many bodies in close proximity -- people sweat.) We're going to be in tight quarters: I can see that from the outside. All breathing each other's air.
I'm as vaxxed and boosted as I reasonably can be. (I get the winter '24 shot less than a week after returning to the States: release schedule plus Time Since Last Injection.) But...
...I'm trying not to shake on the bench. But this thing killed my mother. I have no reason to believe I'm immune, and those of you who've been here for a while might go into laughing fits if I said 'lucky'. I've been trying to go lighter on mask use, but there's so many people here, possibly from all over Europe and a wider part of the world. CDC set up in a JFK terminal, hoping to spot new variants as they enter the country --
-- I'm trying to go unnoticed. Not stand out in any strange ways. I can be identifiable as a stranger, but that's it.
No one can look back and say "Estee? That was the only one with a mask."
...I...
...wow. This is more lingering trauma than I was expecting...
...just -- put it in the tablet bag.
More and more people go by. One of them is in a wedding dress. Another has a fursuit, and a third carries a plushie roughly the size of their body. We be conventioning now. And people are starting to use sidewalk chalk on the ground outside the entrance, someone has started to play show music at Way Too Loud and the population keeps going up. Just about all of them are speaking English to each other, and this continues through the convention. Every panel, every function? English. Sometimes it's accented -- I get a price wrong in Huckster Hall because I swore the seller said 'eighteen' and when it turns out to be eighty, I can't buy -- but English is the language of Galacon.
Get the tablet out. Bring the badge purchase email up. I need it for proof of purchase. Staff start to come out of the building, mostly checking on the chaos. It sets off a few attempts to get in, as whoever's closest to the doors decides this means Open For Business: having the front of the building as glass doesn't help there, as we can all see the precious Merch.
Eventually, the true time approaches. I force myself to move into the pack. The plan was always to take a covid test before the last flight and that is going to take an unexpected toll -- but it feels like the odds of my getting sick are going up by the minute.
Breathe.
Just breathe.
...that's how the viruses get in...
...breathe anyway...
The doors open.
Several forms of chaos begin.
I want to talk about the opening ceremony.
The auditorium is large, with good sight lines. I find a place to take pictures of the stage and, with misdirection accomplished, go to sit somewhere else. (This becomes a habit.) And there's a piece of opening animation to celebrate the convention. There's a note in the film which says that no one interfered with the animator's vision and dear gawds, if only someone had stepped in before it was too late...
And then there's a dance.
Also just a little fiasco.
At the Galacon prior to this one, they had a ribbon dancer. Hang thick drapes of fabric from the ceiling, have an athlete move between them and set those patterns to music. It takes a lot of core strength and no fear of heights, because they're usually doing it at twenty feet up and this stage has the ceiling height to allow it. A skilled ribbon dancer is a joy to watch.
So here we all are, a thousand-plus strong, sitting together. Watching the stage, where the curtain is down because the screen came out and we just have to wait for the fabric to rise on the next act.
The curtain begins to lift.
Keeps lifting.
Very. Slowly.
It is, by my estimate, going up at a rate of about a foot per minute.
First year in a new venue. No one knows how to work the curtain. How to make it go any faster. And you can see the ends of the ribbons now, they're twisting around a little and I realize that the dancer is already up there. Situated in a position to begin her performance. And right now, all she can do is quite literally hold on for dear life because the curtain is going to reach her feet in about twelve minutes or, if anyone tries to tinker, sometime Monday.
The utter ludicrousy of this begins to spread through the auditorium. People can giggle, laugh, rock in their seats -- but ultimately, all we can do is watch and hope the dancer hangs on...
Eventually, toes appear. We have to keep waiting. And when we get a face, it's time for a round of Smile, Smile.
She's a great ribbon dancer. Really hoping she was paid overtime.
As with EFNW, there's a giant scroll of paper to sign and decorate: this one is on the first floor, near the entrance. Multiple cartoons about the curtain fiasco appear within the first hours. I need to wait for a clear shot before I sneak in and sign 'Estee' to the official record.
Move around, when there's so few places I can move to...
The vast majority of what's on sale from vendors? Plushies and prints. I can't afford the major plushies. I spot an absolutely adorable Yona on Day One, start a total joke of a Ko-Fi drive for bringing her home, and don't make it because 'twas a joke. She sells sometime early on Day Two. Also, she was 500 Euros. There's also a great Fleur around, and she's closer to 1200. My merch budget is a couple of hundred altogether, and I'm going to struggle with spending it because pieces exist in two price states: relatively low or Mortgage Please.
(If there's a 2024 convention drive and y'all want me to bring home a big plushie? Budget has to go way up.)
Over 70% of what's available is in those two categories. And for the rest... there's almost no books. (I was hoping for books.) A few home-printed comics -- glossy, professional, completely out of my price range -- and maybe two bound items. Toss in pins, CDs, and some shirts to complete the set. Apparently giant pillows are more of an American thing.
Speaking of Merch? Here's the Celestia and Luna statues. $500 each. Just a minor markup.
Shopping on Day One is just about impossible. I look at things, but I'm trying to figure what my budget can do when there's so little which truly works within it. Nearly all of my purchases are on Sunday, and most of my Saturday time is spent in the main auditorium. At one point, I get out and look at the gate to Old Waiblingen, but -- tomorrow. For today...
There's an animation panel about constructing pony shorts in Source Filmmaker. Naturally, SFM does its part and tries to crash. Just to provide the full experience.
I sit in on Thom Zahler's presentation. He's an MLP comics writer who got into the franchise because he was trying to impress his girlfriend of the time and like me, he crossed the Atlantic to be here. He talks about being sent notes from Hasbro on script revisions, one of which asked him to pull a line which had Pinkie considering kissing a villain before she realized it would set off a whole new fandom. Hasbro loved that line. Thought it was perfect. And ordered him to get rid of it immediately and permanently, because they were fully aware she was right. Also, he likes the new literary adaptations and wants to do one. Namely, he wants to do Hamlet. He's almost sure he can get through it without any deaths.
There's a cosplay contest. Grandma Applejack wins. We have seniors in this fandom. A buckball game starts up outside. Normal parkgoers are confused. Meanwhile, the auditorium is hosting minigames. The loser gets to be Trixie's assistant. The winner gets away. I may have gotten those two things in reverse.
I move around. Quiet spots are hard to come by, but -- I can get a few seconds, here and there. The food at the lunch counter isn't too horribly overpriced, and it keeps me going. I just have to be very careful about how long I stay. There aren't a lot of night events here, and I don't want to fully walk back in the dark. Gotta get to the restaurant attached to my hotel and get some dinner.
At one point, I get to check on the data burn from the walk in. It's lower than anticipated. This gives me a little more freedom to take pictures and show them to the chat server, but I still can't risk video.
And when it comes to socializing, just talking, making friends...
...it's still me.
I do exchange words with a few people. At one point, I'm directly asked where I'm from, because my English is -- well, as good as anyone else's, and most of the people here have a stronger command than the average American. But I don't have the local accent. The person who gets the national answer isn't from the area either.
Prices are checked with merchants. There is a point where I wind up in the Ask A Question line. I'm not totally silent, nor am I utterly shy. I interact. But my badge doesn't say 'Estee'. The waveform possesses a thousand images of who that is and to collapse them into one is to disappoint at least 999 of them.
I'm just another person at the convention. One who isn't quite as dressed up for the occasion. Who doesn't completely fit with all of the demographics.
One running joke of my chat server is that it's 97% trans: the remainder are waiting for the wakeup call. This serves as something of an exaggeration. We're probably closer to 20%.
...maybe 25%...
...don't bother waiting on me. At best, I'm hoping for reincarnation and depending on how that coin lands, it'll be Trans The Hard Way --
-- the point I'm trying to make is that there are a lot of trans people here. I don't know what the legal situation is in Germany for trans rights, but I'm standing in the middle of a substantial voting block.
We also have robot representation. The robot gets some attention. (See below.)
Half the convention is people. The rest is plushies.
The scroll gets signed. New, fresh paper comes out. More doodling. I make the rounds. The Fursuit Walk takes a tour of the most open area. People go outside, get some air, watch the buckball match. As evening approaches, the auditorium turns into a karaoke lounge and the one-and-only panel room becomes a maid cafe --
-- that's my cue. The maid cafe (with musical acts and dancing) will be going until midnight. I should get back to the hotel. Just a quiet, pleasant three-mile hike, and I pass happy children and relaxed adults as I make my way down peaceful sidewalks, all the way back into my separate town just in time to discover that I can't eat.
There is a restaurant attached to my hotel.
It is closed on Saturdays.
...welcome to rerun season. I spent just about all of my Bellevue time unable to scrounge a meal, with eateries shutting down everywhere I went --
-- seriously: is it me? Am I doing this somehow? Hire me to sabotage your least-favorite restaurant! Reasonable rates available!
I check the area. The place where I got dinner last night is open, but full: they're hosting a big party. The convenience store where I got the drinks has shut down for the night. There's pretty much nothing else around that's open and when I check with Siri, the nearest fast food is six miles.
...trail mix. I have trail mix. (Once Sicily hits, I won't have it for long.)
...go to bed.
Sunday morning is a workday.
I am carrying, on the tablet, the first four chapters of Diamond Tiara And The Economics Of Love.
I've been writing extra material for months prior to this, trying to get ahead. I need to have five postings in a month in order for my Patreon income to be normal, and I can't really try to write on the road because each day dedicated to stories here is a day where I'm not doing anything else. So it's time to paste in the first chapter. Get it formatted for FIMFic, and then launch.
There's the first chapter. And the second. And the third. And a duplicate of the third.
...where's Chapter 4?
I check the tablet. My email, because I sent myself a backup.
Nothing.
Chapter 4 is gone.
...mispaste. I somehow put in Chapter 3 twice. And I didn't see it until just now.
I posted one thing before I left the States. I thought I was carrying everything else I needed to not be broke when I got home.
What am I going to...
...breathe, me. Breathe..
The chapter may be on my hard drive -- for the desktop. So I have two options. I can try to recreate it, or I can hope to Have An Idea. Write a new short story.
...during the trip.
It's not just finding the hours. It's about finding the Idea. Those aren't free or instant. I sure don't have one right now. What if I can't come up with anything? I can't try to continue another ongoing: I didn't bring my notes --
-- breathe...
I get the story's first chapter posted. Try to tell myself that it's midnight in the States and a low reader count is normal. Tell the server about this latest mini-disaster, and force myself towards the shower.
Maybe I can think of something.
I need to think of something.
Quickly.
It's not like an Idea is going to just present itself.
(I am so wrong.)
I set out early. I want to explore Old Waiblingen.
It's a small protected section in the center of the city, and it's as if time had shattered and no one knows where all the pieces go. Ancient streets, old buildings -- but there's also open renovations and hey, feel free to hook into the local wifi. There's sculpture around, flagstones, and the bakery is open early. I find it mostly through trying to see where everyone else is going, then get breakfast at the first open restaurant. Which is named after Rome, and has a sign showing two infants suckling on lupine teats. Unfortunately, I don't get to see any American tourists have freakouts as their personal standards are violated.
This, BTW, is where I get to see the convention guests. Most people aren't looking around. They are. All of them. At one point, I pass Ana Sani, Thom Zahler, Mark Acheson, and Jennifer Weis having breakfast together. The most I do is politely nod in their direction and keep going. Grant them their privacy, people. They're just in town for the weekend and they'd like a chance to relax.
There's a bookstore here. It has been there since 1593. Salute.
I sit quietly at an outdoor table, having a Belgian waffle breakfast in Germany, and watch the birds enjoying their little pool.
...I'm... here.
It's a thought which keeps playing tag at the edge of my awareness. I came all this way. I haven't been in Germany since I was six.
How many people left tips to make that happen?
What right do I have to be the one sitting here?
I'm... here. Try to just be here.
So many people have walked through these streets. I'm not even an eyeblink in the history of this place. Just sitting quietly, on an early Sunday morning at the end of summer.
My insomnia didn't hit last night. For a moment, I wonder if I ever truly had insomnia at all. Maybe my body just never got off Sicily Time.
It's... beautiful here. Cool and quiet. The convention is less than a third of a mile to my left, and you'd never know it. Just about no bronies are walking around here at this hour. I'm just -- having breakfast in Germany.
Eat while you can, sucker. The food situation ain't gettin' any better from here.
Sunday starts with the voice actor panel. Konrad Bosherz is here. He's the local voice for Hitch, and this is his first convention. Ever. He has been in voice acting for three decades, and all of the other panelists keep asking how old he is. He looks like he's in his twenties. Huzzah his skin care routine. And as you may have spotted above, Tirek is here. I resist to urge to announce that I killed him.
(At one point, they wind up trying to imitate each other. Results are mixed.)
We have Pinkie's local actress here, and I learn something interesting. She doesn't get the scripts. She's been given lines to read, with very little context. Sometimes none. There's been times when she didn't know what the plot was until she saw the episode. @#$$ of a way to make a living.
There's a talk about the Ashes of Equestria game. This is followed by a panel which I have to attend; the one which talks about conventions outside North America. This is where I finally see picture proof that the Japan gathering exists, and we still can't get a badge page.
And then it's the premiere of the Griffin Village short. After eight years of work. It runs overtime, and no one cares because the next auditorium event isn't until four p.m. and y'know, eight years. (I'll link it below.)
We're down to the end-of-convention charity auction. They do this every year and this time around, it all goes to Make-A-Wish, which is a fine choice. They were also the recipients for the prior Galacon, and they were very happy with the results.
I'm not sure how long I'm going to stay. The auction is listed as running until seven. Sticking around for all of it means losing just about any chance to find dinner. But this thing has its own traditions and history and what's supposed to be utter insanity.
I wind up being there for the whole thing.
They sell everything.
Ev.Er.Y.Thing.
There were multiple donations made of pony merch. Those all sell. A custom plushie of the convention's mascot, with a custom Fanta drink? Four digits. Pure silver Equestrian coin? I tried to bid, even when I knew I couldn't pay the final price. Just to get an opening in. No one heard me and it sold for 450 Euros.
Prints of AJ and AB, signed by their voice actresses? Sold.
Beautiful woodcarved box. Gone.
Saul Goodman is here. He wins a figurine.
The art scroll from the foyer went. Someone now owns my signature.
Then they sold the auctioneer's hat. (It gets sold every year. For ten years.) For 2500 Euros. The Make-A-Wish rep is stunned.
They sold the cup she was drinking from. She had to sign that first.
There's a custom neon sign. Goodbye, sign.
The convention's mascot is on the screen, encouraging bids. If we hit 420 Euros, she asks people to Blaze It.
The audience chants for the sale of the venue. It's explained that the convention doesn't own that. SELL THE AUCTION TABLE. Same.
We are at full lunacy and accelerating. Hey, let's sell the pen which signed the cup! 350 Euros there...
Grand total: 21,000 Euros to Make-A-Wish.
And then twelve hundred people smile, laugh, cheer, and head for home.
Tails whip a little as they clear the exit. Some of the fursuits and cosplay was full-time.
I go back to the hotel.
I stayed for the whole auction.
There's nowhere to get dinner.
Would I go back?
The honest answer is 'Not immediately'. If we have a convention poll and subsequent Ko-Fi drive this year, then I don't want to return to the same place two years running. (And yes, that means Everfree Northwest would be a vote option for this year's destination poll.) Also, I recently learned that they have the same venue for this year. It's still going to be a little cramped.
But...
...I talked to Harwick.
I won't try to go into Germany this year. (I may never get back there.) But we're going to try and be there in spirit.
Harwick is going to create gloss prints for every 'verse piece of cover art. He will then sign them, which may bring up the value. (I'll pay for his expenses.) After that, he'll mail them to me.
I'll sign the prints. (This lowers the value.) And then I'll mail them to Galacon, to be part of the charity auction.
Yes, I know what's going to happen. The proper response when someone says 'Estee' in that auction is usually 'Who?', with a slight chance of 'KILL!' But they may know Harwick. And everything sells. I'm hoping the set will go for at least a hundred Euros: ceiling is probably 225. And then we just watch the YouTube stream of the auction (because there is one) and see how they actually do.
Harwick has suggested making three sets. One for Galacon, one for me, and the last for wherever I might wind up this year. For their charity auction. EFNW has one. Maybe other places run their own events. Ciderfest certainly did. But I'd have to be at a convention, and I'd have to pay for three sets of prints. To that degree, commitment to a triad is still up in the air. But for Galacon '24 -- I want to send something.
If so, please let me know if anyone shouts 'KILL!' Just in case.
And now, Estee's Photo Album.
First, because I promised: here's the finished animation for Griffin Village. I'm proud to have attended the world premiere.
But for my own shots...
First-ever sighting of a Misty plushie.
Sleeping through an SFM panel is a natural act.
I almost got the I Go To Gala piece.
Yona! (There was one non-serious inquiry as to whether I could bring back the Sprout for someone else.)
Gate to Old Waiblingen.
When Siri says 'take the path', she means it.
Actual Sweetie Bot.
Fursuits on parade...
Our Mascot.
The ship in the park.
My hotel room.
Old Town birdbath.
"MY NAME IS KAREN AND I WANT TO SEE YOUR MANAGER!"
Everything we know about the Japan convention. (I'd put it on a poll list, but that's everything we know.)
Auction items.
Same, but Forcalor got this shot from the stream.
I tried to bid...
Do you see it?
View from my Sunday morning in Old Town.
Sleeps through everything...
Art? Art.
One of the last auctioned items.
Just moving around town.
I had to come to Germany to find a manga shop.
Bookstores, bookstores everywhere...
So. Many. Plushies.
Okay, fine: I got a plushie. Y'happy now?
(Hitch was a mere 20 Euros. I'm still not sure why. And I picked him up because for the official Hasbro releases, he got Applejacked. I'll show a few other purchases at the end of the blog series.)
There's one more full day in Germany, followed by a partial and a little side trip. One I've been waiting to take for most of my life.
The next blog is about September 18th.
The trains, and the rain, and nearly getting hit by a few cars, and the gift of an Idea.
I sort of envy you for this. I'm nothing but ideas for stories. But just the idea with very little to no substance to turn that idea into a proper story.
I've got moments, not stories. Ideas but no follow through. I just wish my muse would focus on what she's already given me instead of finding shiny bright new things to show me.
Thanks for the recap of things and I'm glad you were able to have some fun and relaxation.
Yeah, thank you very much for the recap and glad you had fun (I admit I gave my vote to Galacon when you posted the poll on where to go).
Woo! Nice!
From the time I was there in 2022, I remmeber they had some good deals on plushies. Though, then again, say that after dropping a few hundred on a giant Lyra plushie
Do they? I thought they had announced going back to Stuttgart for this year.
(suppresses feelings of jealousy.) Thom had a daily/weekly/some sort of every so often webcomic called Love and Capes (which is available in dead tree and digital format now) that I followed reliably, much like Schlock Mercenary. Amazing artist. Artists.