Another Year, Another Bronycon · 1:38am Aug 12th, 2015
And as seems to be the trend, I enjoyed this one more than I did the previous one.
Part of that is probably how I'm making myself progressively more available. First year I had to take a bus downtown whenever I wanted to do something. Last year I was in a downtown hotel, but it was still a considerable walk from the convention center/harbor/everywhere else people tend to want to do things. This year, though, Wanderer D had us (me, Professor Plum, Flashgen, Corejo, RazgrizS57, and eventually CSquared08) in the Sheraton attached to the con center.
And on the top floor no less, at least for the back half of the nights.
Most nights tended to be spent playing board/card games (Cards Against Humanity mostly, but also some Thunderstone and Shadow Hunters on the Sunday) amongst ourselves or with the many fic–y people who wound up there.
And speaking of fic-y people, I don't think I was outside the company of another writer/editor/etc. for more than an hour at a time throughout the whole of the con. To list all the people I met up with would be prohibitively difficult, but in terms of who I wound up spending the most time around/interacting with apart from the other guys in my room, that would probably boil down to a list something like this: Capn_Chryssalid (great, long conversation about TPC/BNE, just like when I met him two years back), Pascoite, Pav Feira, GaPJaxie (who is somehow exactly like and quite apart from how I was expecting him to be), RedSquirrel456, Aquaman, Skeeter The Lurker (with whom I bumbled my way back to Penn Station), Themaskedferret, Archonix (whose voice I now can't stop hearing when I see his posts anywhere), FoughtDragon01, and a few others. I also happened to meet a number of fellow OC Slamjam participants (namely Admiral Biscuit, Razalon the Lizardman, and WIL_I_ZIN), which was very interesting. There were a great many incidental handshakes and familiar faces besides, though they didn't monopolize my time like the aforementioned folks. Though, special mention: it was great to meet OleGrayMane and his son in the flesh.
Getting into what I actually did at the con apart from spend time with people, there's not very much to say. I spent a good deal of time in the vendor hall, coming away with A.) the rest of what I needed to have a complete set of Twilight Sparkle's Secret Shipfic Folder (the lines for which were hilariously bloated),
B.) a good many prints, and
C.) these three wonderful commissions from GlacierClear. An incredibly friendly, creative (I just named characters and told her to go nuts) girl that CSquared and I proceeded to crowd for a new drawing every day of the con. It bears mentioning that those first two were just $15 apiece, and the third a mere $5—I loved her stuff before this, but I'm now convinced she's one of the best folks around to get commissions from.
After the vendor hall, the place I spent most of my time was Quills & Sofas, which I hope never stops being a Bronycon institution. Whenever the creatives at Bronycon don't have plans, we pretty much always say to each other, "Let's head back to Quills & Sofas." And if you're lucky, as the con winds down, you can snatch some free, silly sketches that folks have made and left on the tables, like this beauty:
The style is very familiar, but I can't quite place the artist. Glorious, either way, and it's mine now.
I went to very few panels this year as compared to the years previous, and all of them related to fanfic. In nearly every case, I thought they went very well in terms of both attendance and content. As I said in my previous blog, I was on two of them, but videos don't seem to be up yet, so I'll hold off on talking about how those specifically went until then.
And as per usual, there were a lot of great lunches and dinners had.
I ate an awful lot of top-notch salmon, in particular.
Not very much to say about that beyond mentioning the big author dinner at Tir na nÓg. That was a little different for me this time around. Usually it involves meeting/talking with a number of authors I haven't really met/talked with much before. This year, though, the authors in my immediate vicinity were a sort of jilted-seeming Pegasus Rescue Brigade who spoke very infrequently, a yamgoth who seemed to be talking more with the folks on his other side, and Flashgen. So it wound up being a dinner-long conversation between Flash and I about respective stories of ours (we've never quite read each others' stuff yet) and our future plans, which was pretty cool.
Again, I'd say this was about the most fun I've had at a Bronycon yet. It did wind up costing me somewhere in the area of $2much, but all in all, it was worth it. I hope next year is at least on this year's level, assuming I can make it again.
I still can't get over how amazing those commissions were. Geez.
Also, I found her dA. Everyone should go follow her or something.
Also also, we need to play more Shadow Hunters and Thunderstone and stuff.
It was great talking to you at the dinner and before we left, BP. I'll make sure to get to finally reading some of your stuff in the next week or so, if I don't get hit with another laze about bug.
It was great hanging out man let's do it again soon if possible!
Seeing you again was beautiful!
Hope to see you again next year, too.
~Skeeter The Lurker
It was great meeting you face to face Burraku. Glad to see you had as much fun as I did, and I hope we can meet again next year.
Pleased to meet ya.
Glad to see you enjoy Steven Universe.
NEXT YEAR
I swear I'll make the next one.
Most exquisite to hang out with you again this year!
It was a real treat to meet you face to face, man! Quills and Sofas is really the place to be!
That sounds so fun. I need to do this next year. I still don't know how I'll manage it, but we'll think of something.
Were you one of the people who went to Noodles and Co with Pav Feira and Professor Plum? I was there, but I didn't make much of an impression.
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Ha. Yes, I was there, sitting on the opposite end of the bench from you, next to Corejo. I was the tall, hefty guy with dark hair in a ponytail, a thick but short beard, and glasses.