TrotCon 2018 Recap · 4:25pm Jul 24th, 2018
Has it really been six months since I last posted here? Sorry I've been so absent. Still haven't been reading as much as I'd like
So! A convention happened this weekend, and although I don't watch the show anymore, ponies are still cute and I wanted to see my friends. I'm really glad I went! To be perfectly honest, I haven't been in the best mental space lately, but spending time with people has helped quite a bit. Hasbro may've been onto something with MLP's subtitle 
I almost didn't make it. My mom was freaking out about the weather and tried to convince me to stay home. You'd think she'd be used to the tornadoes by now. Luckily, she still drove me to Columbus (yeah, I still don't have a car or license), and I made it a little after 10 AM on Friday. The front desk clerk managed to get me checked in immediately, several hours before the guaranteed check-in time AND he didn't misgender me! That guy was amazing
I had to wait a bit to get my badge, because TrotCon still doesn't get how to handle pre-registration ("Oh, you paid several months ago? Stand in a separate line while we take care of everyone else first), but didn't miss much of the first panel, Sharks and Minnows: Asymmetry in Game Design. It was OK, though nothing spectacular, and they didn't have nearly enough material prepared for two hours, which actually worked out great because I had to skip the second half for Bad Horse's panel on Aristotle vs. Fan-Fiction, which was really interesting and I ended up quoting BH on Facebook. That's also when I got to meetup with Trixie and Admiral Biscuit. My memory's a bit fuzzy, but I think Zyrian was also there, and ROB may have been too, though I wanna say we met up later. I also spotted Sunny, but didn't get a chance to say hi before she left
A few of us, including Braeburned, had lunch at the hotel, which was pricey, but at least better than their breakfast (seriously, never get breakfast at the Crowne Plaza, or pretty much any other hotel). Then we met up with Present Perfect and Max around 2 P.M. and checked out the vendors hall. You'd think falling out of the fandom would mean I wouldn't buy so much merch, but you'd be wrong — I spent over $130 on buttons and prints! There were just so many adorable Sylveons and foxes, I couldn't help myself 
This is usually where I'd share pictures of my haul, but I need to be getting ready for work soon and don't have to look for quality pictures or figure out who each item came from, so instead I just want to mention that AfroThunder is an amazing artist with the coolest OC ever, and a really nice person to boot! Also, Luximus draws the most expressive faces
We were supposed to continue our usual tradition of eating at the Old Bag of Nails, but they couldn't accommodate such a large party at that time, so we went across the street to Jet's Pizza, where about all the workers were little more than half my age (I just turned 30 today). Those kids did a great job and really seemed to care about customer service. While we waited on our pizza and subs, I learned about Silver Diva jeans from ROB's friend Val. I may need to buy a pair sometime, because hers looked great
The next day, Zyrian, Bad Horse and I went out for Waffle House, except then we ended up going to Fitzy's instead. They play the best music there! Afterward, we went to ROB's Speed Fics R Us, which I didn't help out with this year. I seriously have no idea how y'all write whole fics, because it seriously took me fifty minutes to eke out maybe 320 words. Creativity is hard! Sunny showed up toward the end, but I still didn't get to say hi. Immediately after that, a few of the guys did their usual Q&A at Writers Waffling about Writing Willingly, which led me to waste too much time struggling to remember the name of Karazor's Outside the Reaching Sky thanks to Zyrian
With about an hour until Trixie's party, Bad Horse, Biscuit and I decided to go out to eat at the Sermat African Restaurant. I'd never had African food before, and opted for something fairly conservative, but it was pretty good. I'd definitely recommend it. Unfortunately, we spent way too long and missed more than an hour of the party! I got to try Zima and we played Twilight's Secret Shipfic Folder, but I've never been one for card games aside from CAH and quickly grew bored. Don't get me wrong, it seems like an interesting enough game, but I don't have a mind for strategy and have trouble following the action. One of the girls there — I think her name was Totty — looked an awful lot like this artist I used to follow. She and her friend seemed pretty nice. Trixie's a sleepy wolf, though, so her party didn't last terribly late
The last day was spent chatting with friends and saying good-byes. I finally got to say hi to Sunny! She's been too busy to attend Trick's parties this past year, so I hadn't seen her since the last TrotCon. She was wearing a Love Live! cosplay (which I've never seen) which I thought looked great. Hopefully I'll be able wear skirts and such one day, but my transition's been a bit slow thus far. Some of us got breakfast and then made one last trip to the dealers room before my mom picked me up. Unfortunately, I really had to pee, but had already checked out of my room, so I had to use the men's room 
It's so gross, and I've always hated it, but I'm still too scared to use the women's room. At least Present was kind enough to hold my bag while I went
Overall, I had a great time and I already miss everyone. I just wish Setsune could've made it and that I'd gotten a chance to hug Zyrian and Bad Horse goodbye, but I couldn't find them as I was leaving. Love you guys! You're all amazing and I can't wait to see you again sometime
Reading this, it occurs to me how much con we experienced at the same time. XD
Except the African restaurant! Holy shit, I'm going to have to remember to go there next year ifthereisanextyearandIgo c.c
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We've been over this every year, you are going. I can always help with expenses and we'll figure out your ride if Max can't do it
I forgot to add that I've learned an interesting fact about Bad Horse from our African dinner: he can't handle spicy food at all. He's even worse than I am. So, should he ever cross any of us, we now know his weakness 😈 He also can't have spinach, but that's going too far
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I can't, either. <.< I had pad thai at Helen's the first time and basically couldn't eat it. D: Their menu is hard to understand.
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Don't worry, it's only the dip and a few dishes that were spicy, so you could still try it next year