Record of Brony Convention: Day 3 · 1:06pm Aug 12th, 2015
Monday's a good day for writing, and not much else. I'm sitting in Gate B9 at Chicago O'Hare now, waiting on a flight that'll let me go visit my grandparents for a while. Boarding in another half hour, and this one's my First Class leg, so I'll have room to work on the plane. Have I mentioned that I love flying First Class? Seriously, if you do much flying and if you habitually check bags, you should really look into how much it costs to get a First Class upgrade somewhere along your trip. I almost always find that there's one leg where I can buy First Class for about $10 more than it'd cost to check two bags—and when you have a First Class ticket, most airlines let you check two bags for free. I cannot even tell you how worth the money this is. But you're not here for Bradel's Travel Tips, you're here for
Bradel Bound Presents
ブローニコン日記
(Record of Brony Convention)
Day 3 – Backstage Passes
Sunday morning started out the same as Saturday morning—with me sleeping in until 10:30am because I can get away with it, and sweet pony Jesus I love having this room to myself. Cons can be pretty cool, but my problem with them always comes from not being able to get enough downtime. When I'm around big groups of people, I've got this little tank of liquid neuroticism inside me that starts filling up, and up, and up. When it tops out, bad things happen. On the other hand, when I've got a room of my own where I can go grab some quiet time, I have a chance to burn off the convention neuroticism in my tank. I like to think of this as my Internal Con-bustion Engine.
<rimshot>
Anyway, I slept in again, which was awesome. But shortly after I wake up, I realize something. At the authors' dinner on Saturday, Pascoite (the author) gave me a small bag with a sample of pascoite (the mineral) inside. I'd been really excited about this at the time, but because the author's dinner was such a busy scene, I'd tucked it into my pocket with the intention of looking at it later. During the course of the evening, I know there was a point when I fished it out of my pocket while I was looking for something else, and I think I moved it to a different pocket. I think. But when I remember the mineral in the morning and go to look for it, I can't find it anywhere. It's not in the pockets of any of the clothes I wore to dinner. It doesn't seem to have fallen out into the hotel room anywhere. It's just gone.
It would be a slight exaggeration to say I'm distraught over this—but only a slight exaggeration. Pascoite did a really nice thing by bringing these bags for people, and I was really excited to get one, but I never got a good chance to even sit down and look at the thing he gave me because I was in a rush to sort out seats at the authors' dinner. I'm not just missing the thing, for all intents and purposes I've never had the thing. I never got any enjoyment out of it, and I'd really been planning to get some enjoyment out of it. Maybe this makes me sound weird. After all, they're just rocks, right?
No! Jesus Christ, Marie, they're minerals!
There is a bright spot, though. I know where I saw the pascoite last, and it's not that hard for me to go back over to Tir Na Nog and ask if they found anything. The pascoite was nicely bagged up, so hopefully if they found it, they'd recognize that it's something special. On the other hand, it's an odd-looking rock in a little plastic baggie. They might potentially think it's the wrong sort of something special. But let's not worry about that.
Anyway, I headed down to Quills & Sofas a bit earlier this time, and what do I find there but a huddle consisting of Skywriter, Nadnerb, and SR Foxley. I've heard of SR Foxley from Skywriter before, but I've never met him and I've never really had that much interest in meeting him, except inasmuch as Skywriter's friends have some automatic halo-effect coolness. Turns out he's pretty cool, though.
We get to talking, and it's not long before someone mentions being hungry—and given that we're enjoying each other's company, it is quickly decided that we'll all head over to Chipotle. Before we get more than a few steps outside Quills & Sofas, though, somebody comes up and gives Skywriter a big container of loose-leaf Darjeeling tea! He thanks Sky for all the wonderful stories, and Sky thanks him back for the tea—Skywriter apparently has more appreciation for the stuff than Celestia does, which is good. He belongs to the Tea Writer school, apparently—along with GhostOfHeraclitus and PoweredByTea.
You know, now that I look at those names, maybe I should start drinking more tea...
Unfortunately, I can't remember the name of Skywriter's gift-giver. I think we started referring to him as the Ninja Tea Delivery Man or something like that, because he handed off the Darjeeling, said a few words, and was completely gone five seconds later. We said maybe two sentences between us, turned around to look for him, and he was nowhere to be seen. This man is a ghost. A generous, tea-delivering ghost. Fear him.
On to lunch. Most of our party hadn't tried Chipotle before, so I lead the way and show everybody how it's done. Then, 'cause I felt like it, I decided to try to treat everyone to lunch. Nadnerb and Skywriter took me up on it quick enough... and then Foxley did too! Skywriter warned me he might not, but he did. So I got to buy lunch for a whole group of friends, which was fun. And they all seemed to enjoy Chipotle, so I think it worked out well. We sat down to eat, and it turns out that SR Foxley is cut from exactly the same mold as TheJediMasterEd. You sit this guy down at a table, and he just has a whole host of stories he can tell. I was a bit hesitant to go there, but I knew he was acquainted with John de Lancie and about halfway through lunch, I asked how their dinner went. (You may remember from the Friday recap that my dinner with Andre Skywriter came about because Foxley bailed on him. To meet up with John de Lancie. I'm sort of guessing nobody's capable of faulting him for this; I'm sure not.)
So I ask about de Lancie, and I think Foxley hesitates a moment like he's not sure how much he wants to say, but then he decides we're cool and he'll give us the story. So he tells us about the de Lancie dinner, which sounds like it was pretty interesting. Then he moves on to telling us about how he got to know de Lancie, including a rather colorful story about the Pirates of the Carribean ride at Disneyland which I won't repeat. Then he moves on to telling us what de Lancie is up to these days, including some really cool sounding science education projects that I'm hoping I can learn more about.
At this point, I think I may actually be more star-struck by SR Foxley than I would be by John de Lancie. And I got to buy him lunch!
Oh yeah, about that. Skywriter tells me that even though he let me do it, Foxley's not going to stand for me having the upper hand on dinner buying. Sky says that if I don't let Foxley buy me back a meal, he'll probably hunt me down, kidnap me, take me to an abandoned warehouse, and treat me to a nice meal there. Under guard, and possibly bound to a chair. This is not Bradel Exaggeration (or not much of it, anyway)—this is seriously what Skywriter tells me. Not liking the whole kidnapping idea much, we agree to meet up later so we can all have dinner together. Am I okay with that? Yeah, I think I'm okay with that.
Lunch finished, I head back to Quills & Sofas, but I don't see a whole lot going on. I decide to make my first foray into the dealer's hall, to say hello to a couple folks (SPark and Alexstrasza in particular). I've already bought one of Alex's mousepads at a previous convention, but Alex wasn't attending himself. Unfortunately, he doesn't really have anything besides mousepads I'm interested in, and I haven't owned a mouse in more than a decade, so the mousepads aren't all that practical for me either. I'm interested in getting a plushie from SPark's shop, but by the time I get there, everything except a Luna-ball has been sold. (There's also an auction for a big Cadance plushie, but I don't even look closely at it. I assume it's well out of my price range. I've got a sneaking suspicion about who might have wound up with it, though.)
Really, there's not much in the dealer's hall to catch my eye. The only thing I spot that I want is a hip flask and shotglass set with custom laser engraving, and they told me straight-up that I'd have to order what I wanted online after I asked. That's fine. I may or may not follow through—though I have to admit, having a hip flask with the Bradel cutie mark on it would be pretty awesome. I'm also thinking of hitting SPark up for a custom Bradel Bound plushie, because that would be seriously awesome you guys. Yes, I'm a nerd and a minor plush fanatic.
I also run into a pretty impressive Crackle's Cousin cosplay down in the dealer's hall. If you've been reading bookplayer's blog, you know where that's going.
Satisfied that there's nothing I'm dying to buy in the dealer's hall (a fact that makes my already weary wallet cheer), I head back up toward Quills & Sofas. I really don't see much going on at this point, and most of the people I know seem to have cleared out. Though at some point I met Pav Feira; he's the first of many people I'll probably figure out I've forgotten in all this... And Haze Fan, I think?—who I totally don't know how to link to on Fimfiction. And I definitely spent a bit of time talking to Jordanis around this time, and mention how things are going down at SPark's now nearly sold out booth. Which, given the drama they've dealt with on the convention front this year, makes me really happy.
After hanging out at Q&S for a little while, I notice bookplayer across the hall, taking care of Trixie. This is the first I've seen of either of them today, and I really feel like I've been missing out. Trixie and Family were such a big part of my first two days at the convention!
I decide to go keep bookplayer company, and it's very relaxing. Did I mention I can get a bit worn down from the constant stream of people? I did? Okay. Yeah, sitting off in a corner with bookplayer and now-napping Trixie, talking quietly so we don't wake her up, that's just awesome. It's so relaxing after all the running around I've been doing for the first two days of the convention. Bookplayer tells me that Prince Rutherford has been hiding out in the pantomime dragon costume, and wouldn't you know, here comes said pantomime dragon marching down the hall. Rutherford decides to take a break, and he and I sit with Trixie for a while to give bookplayer a chance for a quick smoke break. Yay more relaxing time.
At about 2:30pm, bookplayer and I head back across the hall to Quills & Sofas to participate in the Great BronyCon 2015 Author Photo Op. We get some huge number of writers together (basically the crowd from Saturday night's dinner, give or take a little) and snap a few photos to remember each other by. And that's pretty much it for my BronyCon. I skip out and head back to my hotel very shortly thereafter, once I've said goodbye to bookplayer, Prince Rutherford, TheJediMasterEd, and Bad Horse (who I finally work up the gumption to approach through his wall of minions). I text Skywriter and Nadnerb to let them know I'll be available but not in the con space.
Before I settle down for an afternoon nap of my own (Trixie ain't the only one who can get tired from overstimulation), I log onto Skype and... d'oh. I've been Skyping with Thornwing all weekend, and we've been trying to figure out a time to meet up. He's doing VIP relations for the convention, though, and he's been pretty swamped with work. Still, I'm not leaving until Monday, so there ought to be plenty of time for me to meet him after BronyCon ends. I tell him what I'm planning to do for the rest of the evening: go to dinner with Skywriter and company, and maybe meet up with Ferret if there's time.
And then something odd happens.
I've just mentioned SR Foxley, and I get a message from Thornwing saying:
TELL SR TO INVITE ME TOO! If I'm available. He knows who I am.
Well, I mean, I sort of know Foxley, but I only met him today. And I don't even know Thornwing at all, except through the Writeoff. But he seemed pretty insistent, so I take a chance and text Skywriter about the situation to see what he says. I hear back that Foxley is cool with it—turns out they both met at one of these John de Lancie dinner things at EFNW—and that there are a few people who'd like to meet me as well: Axis of Rotation and... yamgoth? I know who went to dinner, but for the life of me I can't remember who else Sky mentioned. I'm not even 100% sure it was someone who made it out with us, because I think I'd already met everyone there except Axis and Thornwing.
Anyway, there's a bit of phone tag as Skywriter and I try to get things sorted out so our two parties all know what's happening. And, bit of a self-centered tangent here, do you guys have any freaking clue how awesome it feels to be playing phone tag with Skywriter because you and him are trying to organize a party of people to go to dinner and the two of you are apparently the central contacts for the group? This was probably the one time during the whole convention when I felt legitimately horse-famous. I'm party-planning with Skywriter. Pinkie Pie, eat your heart out.
Planning largely done, I sleep for a couple hours, which is nice. Gives the convention time to end, and most people time to clear out of the space. I don't leave my room again until maybe an hour after closing ceremonies have finished. (I am seriously the worst con-goer. I attended two panels, bought nothing from the dealers' hall, and didn't even notice the guests were there except for running into John de Lancie while on Crying Baby Trixie duty. All I did was hang out with Fimfiction people. And I couldn't be happier.)
I take the elevator down from my room and head to the convention center, figuring it'll be a lot easier to deal with now that everything's over. I run into Morning Sun on the way. Morning is staff, by the way—and this is about to be handy. She asks me what I'm doing, and I tell her I'm just walking through, and she's all like, "You know you're not allowed to do that, right? The convention center is off-limits now." And I'm like, "Whaaaaat?" And she's like, "Here, why don't I escort you off the premises." And I'm like, "Oh, cool, that's all I really wanted to do anyway."
Then she shows off her new-fangled backstage pass she got once the convention ended. Not really good for anything anymore, but it's a fancy piece of plastic that almost nobody gets, and she managed to convince one of the high-level staffers to give her one after things wrapped up. So good job, Morning Sun! I mention that I'm on my way to dinner with Skywriter again, and that we're meeting at the Pepper Palace (remember: Morning Sun is the one who rocked the Pepper Palace 2,500,000 scoville challenge on Friday). Unsurprisingly, she wants to tag along at least to the Pepper Palace so she can say goodbye to Skywriter.
So we head out, and a little ways further down the road we encounter the cowardly lion Thornwing, who's waiting to meet up with me so I can show him the way to Pepper Palace and dinner. Thornwing has a backstage pass of his own, and a greenroom pass, both of which it turns out he got during the course of the convention. We head on to Pepper Palace and meet up with Skywriter, and Morning Sun says her goodbyes. Then we head on to a Brazillian restaurant to meet up with everyone else.
But before we go there, a quick pascoite/Pascoite update. I drag Morning Sun and Thornwing back to Tir Na Nog to check whether they have my pascoite sitting around. I go over to the front desk and ask, and it turns out they've got a whole big lost-and-found closet of stuff. They go check... and nothing. They go check at the other end of the restaurant, too... and still nothing. Ugh. Okay, so yeah, I lost my pascoite. I am still pretty bummed about this. I know it's an understandable situation, but I just feel like a bad friend now. I've got kind of an inordinate sentimental attachment to gifts and certain other inanimate objects, and I feel like I've failed both Pascoite and the pascoite which is now probably lost somewhere in Baltimore, discarded or in the hands of who knows who. Hopefully nobody tries to break it down and smoke it, anyway.
Poor pascoite... 
Okay, digression finished. I go to dinner at the Brazilian steakhouse, Fogo de Chão, with everyone else. Who is everyone else? Well, by the time we all got together, the dinner consisted of: me, Skywriter, SR Foxley, Nadnerb, Thornwing, Axis of Rotation, yamgoth, GaryOak, and Skeeter the Lurker. Like Skywriter warned, Foxley picked up the tab for the night, which is pretty amazing. I kind of expected it, but that's still kind of crazy. But as nice as that was, and as good as the food was, my favorite part of dinner was almost certainly getting Thornwing and Foxley in the same room, because the two just started trading MLP celeb stories like wildfire.
Why do you think I titled this chapter "Backstage Passes"? It's because my Sunday was defined by hanging out with people who knew all sorts of cool behind-the scenes stuff. I'm also being really cagey about repeating any Foxley and Thornwing stories, show-related or not, because I keep wondering whether it's appropriate to publish some of this stuff (even the truly innocuous stuff). I'll give you two Thornwing stories that he was very open with, though, and I promise I'll give y'all one juicier story toward the end, too.
Thornwing's two stories. First up, it sounds like he was in charge of making marker boxes for a couple of the guests. One of them is MA Larson. The other I don't remember, but I suspect he'll say if he reads through this blog. And when I say "marker boxes", I mean big, honking cases of sharpies for signing things. Unnamed Guest got a nice box with two of each standard size on black markers and a full range of special colors—nothing exceptional, but a very nice sounding collection. MA Larson, on the other hand, is apparently a signature fiend. He got the full range of black markers, going all the way up to the stupidly large kind. He also got all sorts of crazy types—like brush-tips, chisel-points, multi-tips, basically whatever you can get. And apparently he was over the moon when he got this box, and started talking about how he was taking it everywhere from now on. Not just BronyCon, everywhere.
So if you've got things that haven't been signed by MA Larson, including your precious human skin, be forewarned. He's all up in this shit now.
Second story. Turns out nobody bothered scheduling for someone to moderate the show-writers' panel at the convention this year, so at midnight the night before it was supposed to go on, the VIP staff get a call that they need to find somebody to do it. Thornwing, who has absolutely no panel moderation experience, winds up sharing the job with some other guy—because really, would you turn down a chance like that? Well, he and the other guy, and probably the panelists, work out what they're going to do. The time for the panel comes around. And he and his co-moderator announce the panelists and bring them out: Charlotte Fullerton, Amy Keating Rogers, and G.M. Berrow. They sit them down and start asking them a couple softball questions... and the Events crew start to silently freak out, because the panel is supposed to have four guests and Thornwing and co-moderator forgot to call MA Larson out onto the stage. Oh no. This is a disaster. What are we going to do?
'Course the whole thing's been planned out in advance. After a couple questions, Larson bursts onto the stage with markers in tow and starts signing everything in sight, as MA Larsons are wont to do. Everybody has fun. Writers' panel continues as planned. I wasn't there, but from what I heard it sounds like Thornwing's first go at panel moderation (on the mane events stage no less) went pretty well.
Anyway, since I'm trying to avoid recounting too many of the conversations here, I might as well just skip past dinner. We all finish and head out, and it's a nice walk back toward the hotels. I get a chance to visit some with Axis of Rotation, Skeeter, Gary, and Foxley as we walk. It's fun all around, though I think my favorite bit was Foxley telling me about how he trolled a certain subset of the computer industry. All I'll say is that there's an obscure but fairly important piece of software out there with a pony-derived name, and apparently very few people are in on the joke. I looked the thing up on Monday and yeah, it's pretty awesome.
We pause for a while on the street corner between the Hilton and the Marriott. About half our party wanders off to their hotels, while the other half hangs around and talks for a while. There are more Thornwing and Foxley stories. Thornwing has a big one for us, though, and this is one that may deserve repeating.
So it sounds like on Saturday night, some asshole guy got really drunk and stole one of the room signs from the convention. Like, literally picked the thing up and ran out of the convention center with it tucked under his arm. And he's running down the street like a maniac with this stupid sign, crowing like an idiot, when he runs into DustyKatt and Spike—I'm guessing Spike means Spike Firemane, but I'm not entirely sure. Firemane seems to be a pretty big guy, though, which was implicit from the next part.
'Cause you see, this next part really shows off Drunk Guy in all his glory. DustyKatt tells him to stop and give the sign back, and what does he do? He picks a fight with DustyKatt and Spike. You can guess how well this is going to go over. So DustyKatt takes the sign away from him, because seriously, an annoyed DustyKatt versus some drunken idiot? He hands the sign off to Spike and grabs Drunk Guy's arm to hold him still. Drunk Guy doesn't like this, so he tries to fight back. So DustyKatt shoves him back into a wall and tells him he needs to calm down. Drunk Guy moves on to trying to kick DustyKatt because Dusty's got his arms held pretty securely. DustyKatt, from the reports, sounds like pretty much the image of patient restraint here—simply because he hasn't killed this guy. Drunk Guy has also moved on to some crazy-lame 4chan type behavior, yelling "Horse Fucker!" at Dusty and Spike. Basically, Drunk Guy is being a perfect example of everything bad in the pony community, and Dusty is being a perfect example of everything good.
The cops show up, because Baltimore, and they tell Dusty to let the other guy go. He complies immediately, and offers no resistance, because obviously. And then despite the number of witnesses to the rampant assholery on display here, it sounds like the cops basically treat this like a he-said/she-said kind of thing and let the guy go. Despite being publicly drunk and disorderly, and trying to figt u m8. Thankfully, at least DustyKatt and Spike have the sign, and they know enough about the guy that the con staff can pull his membership. Still, it was a bad situation all around by the sounds of it, and there were some real worries that Dusty and Spike might wind up taking heat for this—which just out-and-out sucks, because I (and everyone else listening to Thornwing's story) feel like they're really being exactly the sort of stand-up guys we want in this community. Thornwing has apparently been crashing with Dusty for part of the con, which may be how he found out about all this. Anyway, he tells us the story (which hopefully I haven't embellished and/or ruined in translation) in large part to make sure folks know what really happened in case somebody decides to do a hit piece on DustyKatt for brawling with other attendees at BronyCon.
And that's about it. We break up shortly after that, and I head back to my room.
But it's worth going just a little bit farther with this recap blog, because two things happened Monday morning. The first was that Ferret invited me to join her and some other guys for breakfast (though I took long enough to get there that they were done and all I could really do was say goodbye to Ferret before we both headed our separate ways).
The second was that, on my way to meet up with Ferret, I ran into DustyKatt in the Hilton lobby. Took me completely by surprise. I walked right on by him, then everything hit and I spun around like, "Hey!" I'm sure he must have thought I was your regular con-goer just wanting a photo op with the famous guy or whatnot, so I suspect he was a bit surprised when I just jump straight in to telling him that I'd heard about what went down Saturday night, and that he might be taking some heat for it, and that I want to let him know that I think he's awesome for how he handled it and I'm behind him 100%. Not that he knows who I am, but whatever. He tells me that it seems like nothing's coming of it, which is good—because honestly, nothing should. And that's it. I let him go back to his room. I head off to meet up with Ferret. And BronyCon is officially done for me.
I hope you had fun with my recap blogs. I certainly had fun with the events themselves.
When this happens to me, James and I call it getting "over-socialed." Cons are a good way for that to happen, but also holidays and other multi-day family events, or just too many separate social activities in a row. (And like you've mentioned, there are certain people who are exempt from over-socialing me.)
Great recaps. Thanks for typing them all up, there were a lot of interesting details and analysis in them!
My issue with cons is that I take the approach of constantly trying to get the most out of it. This means scanning the schedule for anything I might want to see, going to all those things, and spending all the intervening time trying to track down people who I want to meet before the con is over. (I still never got to speak to Bad Horse, and a few artists that slipped by, though I did finally catch bernd before the Sunday dinner) Mostly this meant either lurking in Quills&Sofas or blocking traffic in the vendor hall chatting up the artists. Not only is this physically exhausting, (my 'Moves' app informed me that I had set an all time record for steps walked in a single day on Friday, and my shoulder hurt for most of the weekend from lugging that bag around all the time) but I also slowly accumulate worries that I'm leaving a weird impression on everyone as a result of essentially pretending not to be a huge introvert for 72 hours straight. I don't so much get tired of socializing so much as I get increasingly paranoid that I'm doing a terrible job of it.
I wouldn't trade it for anything though. I haven't had such a good time in years. I have to do this again. There's no choice now.
Also, big thanks for writing this up. We need a record-keeper, and this series reminded me of a few events that I'd nearly forgotten mere days after returning to regular boring life.
These are definitely fun. You forgot to mention what that dinner was exactly, though. I'm still recovering from that much delicious meat.
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Oh. Uh.
...maybe I'm spoiled. When I say "Brazilian restaurant", I assume everybody knows it's one of those places where they bring around all the giant slabs of meat, and you can take as much as you want, and there's a fantastic salad-and-everything-but-grilled-meat bar. But I guess maybe other people don't go do that quite as much as I do.
(I spend my whole life thinking I'm normal. I keep forgetting that I'm probably not.)
You, my friend, are not neurotic, but are very definitely an Introvert. Introverts become enervated by too much stimulation and need quiet time time to recharge. I'm very much the same way, fwiw. It's not a bad thing: it's just you.
Thanks for con blogs, by the way!
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Ya know, I hate the word 'enervated'. It's a perfectly cromulent word, but it sounds so much like energized that it always takes me a second to realize it means exactly the opposite thing.
3314423 I've always hated that word, and am ashamed that I ever used it without looking for something better. In my defense, I was on a short break getting some liquid brains (aka coffee). Forgive me.
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Bradel's Blogposts:
Come for the stories, stay for the arguments over word choice in the comments.
It was great getting to hang out for a bit, Bradel.
You had better come back next year!
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Skeeter and I had no idea what we were in for. Skeeter was BSOD the whole dinner, and I almost exploded from a combination of surprise, happiness, gratitude, and MEAT!
That travel tip of yours is also pretty interesting. I'll need to remember it for when I do a longer trip. See, I only bring one duffel bag for the overhead and a backpack for the seat. I can fit everything for a con trip in those with room to spare.
Thanks again for the entertaining blog posts. I've got about 3,000 words I need to sift through and post in the next few days. You have my permission to harass me until I follow through with this.
3314499 Sorry if I offended. I love reading your posts. And I certainly appreciate the time you put into sharing your experiences.
It sounds cool to be organizing a nine-man dinner of Pony writers until you realize that you have a last-gen flip phone and have to do all the texting on a ten-key. And you're not that good with a ten-key. Oh my technology.
Also I am happy to confirm your suspicion.
Thanks for the recap posts! I don't think I could have done so well. I would literally have to have been cribbing notes. And yes, the tea ghost. The name came and went in the swarm of other names that I recognize, and I'm so sorry; but I'm nonetheless appreciative.
Here's a couple clarifications...
I said this tongue in cheek seeing as I didn't have any dinner plans that night, wanted to see you (Bradel), and I think SR is an absolutely great guy. We met at Everfree this year. I knew he would be picking up the tab for everyone, because that's the kind of guy he is. If he wasn't picking up the tab for dinner, I would have been doing that myself. I'm going to try and twist his arm to let me buy him dinner the next time I see him.
Green Room pass was part of my job. Backstage came from doing the panel, and also being part of my job. It's not something I take lightly. It's a lot of hard work. Very rewarding, too.
The "other guy" is Drew Fain - he's a convention regular in working VIP Relations. He's been at every con I've been to, and a bunch more besides. We're pretty good friends. We both jumped at the chance to host the panel and ended up deciding to co-moderate instead of duking it out. I hope it turned out okay in the end.
I made the cases on my own as a personal gift to M. A. Larson and Kelly Sheridan (Starlight Glimmer). I met them both at Everfree Northwest this year and we had a great time talking about the fine art of signing and equalizing everyone. It's not really an inside joke or anything, but I wanted to spur some friendly competition to have them face off in a signoff competition.
On the Dusty part - he only took the sign from the drunk guy. To be absolutely clear, Dusty did not assault the guy or start anything. Dusty took the sign, which wasn't all that hard or involved given the drunken state of this loser, and then the drunk guy attacked him. Dusty didn't retaliate, but defended himself while trying to get the guy to go back to his room and cool off. It's one of those unfortunate situations where you have drunk people doing stupid things at pony conventions. Kudos to Dusty for being an awesome guy and for standing up for what's right!
Thanks for the recap - I love reading how things went down for everyone seeing as I didn't get to spend a lot of time on the attendee side of things.
That's it, I'm definitely getting in on these shenanigans next year.
Man, you have got some serious food mojo. That's one more dinner than I've ever managed to buy SR.
But anyway, I'm glad you had such fun, and it makes me happy by proxy to hear that so many of my ponyfriends had such a great time!
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I remember this stuff clearly, but these are the sorts of background pieces of information I just forgot to share in the writeup, even though I can see how they can color the situation a lot. Thanks for providing some commentary on this post, here and in a couple other places—especially the Dusty stuff. This is exactly why I was a bit worried about going back through even the more innocuous stories other people told me.
Also, I kinda said this but I'll reiterate. I was really glad I got a chance to run into Dusty the next morning. Never expected it would have happened, but glad I could give him some words of encouragement after he had to deal with that crap on Saturday.
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Oh, things I need to respond to.
Just to be clear, I'm really, really not offended. Not in the slightest. I was a bit worried I might come off that way, but I just wanted to yell about the word enervate because it irks me every time I see it.
I love you. I just have a very small, non-transferrable issue with some of the words you choose to keep company with.
Likely hazeyhooves.
Don't feel bad about just hanging out with people. I mean, how often do you get to hang out with these people? That's all I ever do at cons, besides writing panels. I couldn't care less about the guests, though I always seem to end up interacting with them somehow. <.<
This con experience is so hilariously different from my own. Gotta love the vagaries of social interaction between large numbers of Fimfiction writers, though! You should write a fic like this, it's so exciting in that peculiar gossip-esque way
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I did actually have an idea while I was at the con about a fic involving three characters going to a convention, but it's got a lot more plot in it than this, and it's mostly a parody of a major Fimfiction trope.
I believe you promised to follow up on the story of your pascoite... Of course, I'm invested in knowing.
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AAAAAGH! This is what happens when I try to write in the airport.
Okay, a couple new paragraphs and some general edits. Got it into the story. Look at the very beginning of my day and right before I go to dinner (since Tir Na Nog is right by the Pepper Palace).
Also
3315826 Ah. Well, PM me your address here or on Skype. I still have two left, and I'll send you one.