Bronycon Wrap-Up · 6:59am Aug 10th, 2015
It was definitely a unique experience -- and I say this as someone who has been to a few fan conventions in the past. And it was wonderful meeting some folks from this very site out in the real world. It wouldn't have been half as fun without you.
- I spent time with Scoots2, patron saint of Cheese Pie.
- I chilled with General Soarin, unofficial host and greeter for those coming from outside the area.
- I traded snarky fanfic commentary with Leapingriver, who is more than welcome to fly out to Denver and join us the next time my friends and I get together for Bad Movie Night.
- I chatted for a while with Eldorado. who actually seemed quite amused by all sorts of silly shit I said.
- I discussed hard science fiction with Shalrath, who might have made that one starship just a little too overpowered.
- I met the charming Bookplayer and her husband, who seems to be a man I would enjoy talking to again. (For one thing, when he saw my name on my ID badge, he got the joke.)
- I got to give a big damn hug to Broadway Sweetie Belle, owner and operator of the disreputable Rage Reviews Bar and Grill.
- And there were many others! If I forgot you, I apologize; in my defense, I'm still tired.
Huge thanks to Broadway, for laughing at all my jokes organizing the effort to get me to Bronycon in the first place. He didn't have to suggest the idea, or start threads about it, or nudge other people to help out, or anything. That's a guy I'm happy to call a friend.
Massive thanks also to Scoots, who used her elite travel planning skills to simplify a lot of matters for me. She also pointed out to me that yes, I did want to go, and that I should ignore what my anxieties and insecurities were saying to the contrary. She ranks pretty damn highly in my book for a number of reasons.
Once again, thank you to everyone who funneled some of their very own hard-earned cash into my PayPal account, no matter how much you gave. You enabled a destitute dork to get off his own turf and experience some new territory for the first time in a while. (Of course, if this was all just a plot by an evil sorceror to remove me from my Place of Power for nefarious purposes, I must point out that I survived whatever it was you attempted. I must also laugh derisively.)
Some random thoughts:
- "It's time for another exciting episode of Douchebag Hats and the People Who Wear Them!"
- "Wow, there sure are a lot of people who chose 'Don't worry, I'm from the internet!' as their costume."
- "Good lord, those plushies are expensive! What are they filled with, cocaine?"
- "I'd like to have a costume big and/or elaborate enough to include a fan. Or air conditioning."
- "Clearly that little girl is a fan of Celestia, but with her curly red hair and glasses, I bet she'd make an adorable Twist."
Speaking of Celestia, before the con, based on her voice and her pictures, I knew Nicole Oliver was attractive. Now, after just seeing her on a single voice actor panel? Huge crush. The best part was during Q&A when some idjit brought up the incredibly unfunny "bananas" question. She had him come around to the side of the stage and hold out his hand so she could give it a really good smack. I cheered.
And speaking of Twist, I had a sketch of that sweet little filly done by Andy Motherf
ing Price himself. (I'll have to photograph it later and upload it to Derpibooru.) When I mentioned Twist, he brought up Chubby Checker, so I returned his serve with Joey Dee and the Starliters, which impressed him. So we chatted about classic rock a little bit -- the Beatles, Elvis, Buddy HOlly. I also mentioned one of the more obscure references he managed to sneak into the art of the comics, and he said I was one of probably two people who had noticed that and said anything. At the end, we traded Vulcan salutes and even turned it into a Vulcan high-five of sorts. That was a serious high point of my experience.
And there's a video among the General's data that involves lots of folks making fun of a bad fanfic while a certain someone does a reading of same. I expect it'll be available in the near future, if he hasn't uploaded it somewhere already. I don't know how entertaining it'll be to anyone who wasn't there, honestly, but I had a blast. We've got to do that again some time, folks, 'cause it was "craz-three"...
I'm glad you had fun! It sounds like this year's Bronycon was amazing. I'm just gonna wait for the panel recordings to start rolling in. :)
Great talking to you, man. Had a lot of fun.
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So did I! (Incidentally, have you seen the ass on Strawberry Shortcake?)
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Well, it wasn't all stellar, but the parts that were good were really, really good.
Was fm to meet you, even if it was for but a few minutes.
<Skeeter Thd Lirket
3308686 It's pretty hard to miss.
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It was a shame we didn't get to hang. Maybe some day we'll down some drinks and reminisce about Twilight's Library...
It was great to meet you too Elric! Video should be up by tonight, assuming that don't take the lazy way out and ignore it :P. Regardless, we had a blast, and if fortune allows it I'd love to see you again next year :D
Really wish I could have gone.
Bronycon always sounds like so much of a blast from everybody who has had the experience. Sounds like you had a lot of fun though.
I am profoundly disappointed at my missing the con this year.
*stops sniffing her Party Favor plushie* So that's what they put in them! I should have known!
And yay! Bad movie nights are always so much fun :D
It was really Craz-three.
*EDIT*
Oh my gosh, I just noticed that the URL's lead to not our FimFic pages! Aw, Broadway's is Fluttershy. 2cute.
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Anything's possible.
Plus, I'm always trying to do my part for Colorado tourism by encouraging people to come here. Hint, hint!
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Would it help if I told you about being hot, sweaty, and in pain? 'Cause that was part of my experience as well...
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There are always more. There were lots of promo cards around for the upcoming DerpyCon in New Jersey, so if you live in that part of the country, that wouldn't be too bad a trip. I've been wondering if I should try to get myself to Running of the Leaves here in Denver in a few months...
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I'm not saying they should be cheap, by any means -- I get that they're labor-intensive, and I'm sure the really good fabrics can't be cheap. But I have to wonder what's going on when someone is selling them for 150 bucks a pop, and two booths down someone is selling ones that are only slightly larger for 350 and 400 dollars.
And yeah, I could have linked to profiles, but what I did instead was more fun.
3309703 Was it worth it, though?
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...yeah. Ultimately, I'd have to say yeah, it was.
Hell, having a nice conversation with Andy Price as he drew art specifically for me -- that made it worth it by itself. All the other fun convention stuff -- like hearing Amy Keating Rogers tell the story about Jason Bateman being her grade school boyfriend -- was a bonus.
3309703
I live in Seattle.
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I wish I could have gone to the "Make your own plushie" panel. I could have gotten the patterns and gotten rich XD
I am a fan of sewing and making crafts, so yeah, I understand making stuff is hard as balls that are getting off to Spitfire. But yeah, there was a Cheese Sandwich plushie that was going up for $110 or something, I honsetly forget, but it was cheap. And it was a large one, very well done, with hair made from the hair used in wigs.
At another booth they were like $400 and were slightly smaller. Like what!?
What I also found absolutely outrages was that some artists were selling the tubes to store the prints. Otherwise you were stuck just carrying them. I did buy prints from a very lovely artist, she was very nice and really appreciated people liking her art ^^ she didn't really take it for granted. She gave me a free con exclusive print too. So that was awesome :)
So glad you thought it was really worth it! It really exceeded my expectations. Though, I do feel like I missed out on some things, and I didn't really get to hang out with a couple of you as much as I wanted to.
3309703 I would love to visit Colorado sometime but I will be hurting moneywise for a very long time because I got a 12 day school trip to Germany coming up in April....I cannot hold my excitement, I've been wanting to go to Germany all my life :D
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I've been there a couple of times -- that's a nice town. But I'm sure there's something of a pony nature going on at some point -- there has to be!
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I know, right? It's like printing money!
What?! That's a dick move. I understand they wanna make money, but the way to do that is to bump up the cost of the print to pay for your own purchase of the tube, and then when you throw it in "for free", you look like an awesome human being instead of a money-grubbing bastard. Tube costs you two bucks? Add five to the sale price of the print up front and include the tube automatically. No one will care about the print being thirty-five instead of thirty, or whatever.
Sounds like an artist Scoots told me about, who was very gracious about the whole thing, and even a little awed that people wanted to give her money.
3309785
Same here! I mean, yeah, that's the nature of fan cons, but there were some things I wish I had been able to see. And I agree with you about wanting to hang out more with some folks. Here's kind of how my thought processes went:
Friday: "There's not enough time!"
Saturday: "There's not enough time!"
By Sunday, what with my flight not being until 7:30, I had Warren Zevon lyrics running through my head:
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I can't fault you for that. As much as I love Colorado, you should definitely jump all over the chance to visit and experience another country. I'm sad to say that I've never left the US -- unless you count flying over the international waters in between the mainland and Hawaii.
3309814
3309747
I think the one I bought for my posters was going towards Bronies for Good, not going towards the seller.
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Well, Seattle has Everfree Northwest. I'm not sure if Everfree or BABSCon has a bigger convention, but they both claim to be the second-biggest brony convention.
I didn't go to Everfree this year because I'm more focused on saving up time off than spending it right now. I have a con in a couple weeks and have to take off at least two weeks in April for Disney World, which I'm struggling to save up for as it is.
A Vulcan high five has to be the most amazingly nerdy thing I've come across in a while.
Glad you were able to make it out Elric. I gotta say that the last three days in
ficwhores anonymousQuills & Sofas was a burst of color in a rather grey and somewhat depressing year. It's good to be in the company of friends.btw, that spaceship is more ridiculously overpowered than you can possibly imagine.
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It was obviously me who made it the awesomest
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I know right!? Like, come on people. It was hard to be super mad though since the artist is like, my idol.
Yeah, she was african-american I think, or some sort of hispanic/latina. Her name's Earthsong9405, the artist who drew this fabulous piece of Tirek and Scorpan art:
orig03.deviantart.net/d237/f/2014/185/3/2/scorpan_vs_tirek_by_boomythemc-d7p90o7.png
(Well, she drew the characters, collab partner added the background and coloring.)
I have to admit, I'm intrigued. Not sure if I'll ever get the courage and cash needed to go through with this kind of thing, but I'm intrigued.
Damn. I guess I missed you. Did you perchance see a man in a rather attractive Celestia cosplay? The one with the shoulder sash colored like her hair. That was me :3
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My sister is a huge Disney junkie, so I can't fault you for your priorities. She has nothing but good things to say about her experiences at the two parks and on the one Disney cruise she saved up for.
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Nerdy, yes -- but additional evidence of just how awesome Andy Price is.
One might even say it's magical.
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Yes, Earthsong -- that was her. Scoots said that Earthsong was very appreciative.
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I didn't have the cash, but people raised it, 'cause that's how spectacular this fandom is. And I wasn't sure I had the courage, but I was persuaded otherwise.
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I don't recall. (Sorry.) I saw a number of Celestias, after all -- so piss on the haters who wanna call her a tyrant and all that.
Joke? I now imagine Elric of Melnipony wielding Hoofbringer in some pulpy self-loathing fic about what it means to be good or evil.
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I've thought about what it would be like to write an adaptation. (I probably never would, just because I can easily imagine how often I would have to explain it's not a self-insert.)
Melniboné would be 100% unicorns, while the majority of the Young Kingdoms would be almost all earth ponies, with unicorns popping up here and there. The exception would be Pan Tang, of course, where the unicorns might make up as much as a third of the population. Since they correspond to the winged people, the pegasi would all live in Myyrrhn. Arioch would appear as a giant, golden alicorn...