Convention Vignettes #1 · 6:26pm Aug 5th, 2018
This is a new experiment. It is also a Canadian attempting humour, so it will either be absolutely hilarious or utterly cringey.
Be warned: My memory may have modified itself to be more dramatic. Those who were there, feel free to PM me any needed corrections.
Some names have been redacted, just in case.
More to come later in the month.
* * *
Thursday evening. I am in a Baltimore tavern, not drinking. The place has put on a Pony theme night: the soundtracks blast over the loudspeakers, and the screen that usually displays sports is running an Equestria Girls marathon.
I spend a couple of hours chatting with a rather agreeable older gentleman, about our various creations, future plans for such, classic authors, and so on. As conversation winds down, we find ourselves drifting toward the aforementioned screen.
After a few minutes of watching, something occurs to me. "Hey," I say, "do you think our liking this makes us dirty old men?"
He holds one hand out flat and tilts it from side to side, in the manner of a delicately balanced scale.
"Yeah, pretty much," I say.
* * *
Day one. The other two members of the Canadian Delegation, GaryOak and Reia Hope, are walking through the Convention Centre, just minding their own business. It so happens that Reia is carrying a Starlight plushie under one arm.
A passer-by, seeing this, sneers and says, "A fan of Starlight is no friend of mine!"
"Okay!" Reia says brightly, and walks on by.
* * *
"Thorax is so gay, he goes all the way back around to being straight. And that's why I ship him with Ember."
--Bookish Delight
* * *
Late evening. A friend, having ingested some interesting substances, decides to go on a quest for enlightenment. As I am sober and kind of look like I can fight, she asks me to be her bodyguard. I spend the next couple of hours answering to "Lancer" as I follow her around outside the Convention Centre, making sure nothing bad happens.
Somehow, it is equal parts weird and flattering.
* * *
Friday Night. GaryOak, Shakespearicles, GAPJaxie, and myself are doing a panel on the How's and Why's of researching for stories. Unfortunately, the Con's driest panel takes place on Friday at midnight, so both the audience and panelists are struggling to stay awake.
As we fight through fatigue, at times barely holding on, I notice a strangely familiar-looking figure in the far left of the front row. On its shoulder is a gaudy OC plushie. Both the figure and the plushie are wearing variations of the same odd medallion.
No, I think. It couldn't be.
The lights in this room are programmed to respond to movement, and to switch off when they don't detect any for a while. When one does so, one of my fellow panelists laughs and declares, "That always happens to me! I must be cursed!"
"It always does that!" the mysterious figure shouts impatiently. "Just keep going!"
There is no mistaking that voice.
We have just been heckled by Chris-Chan.
I don't believe you.
Did you immediately shower afterwards?
I've already decided I'm coming to the next one on a motorcycle, cosplaying Sunset.
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denver.mylittlefacewhen.com/media/f/rsz/mlfw993_large.jpg
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These stories are 100% true.
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I'm gonna!
Just gotta price out a bitchin leather jacket and calf-length riding boots like hers
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I believed it until Chris-Chan. Last anyone heard from him he was in jail.
Yeah, that's Bookish, alright.
Also, now I remember the look of utter delight on one Thorax cosplayer's face when I introduced him to the term "faerie bug moose."
This sounds like a character origin story for Mage: the Ascension. I kind of wish I'd been there. And that I could've been at that tavern not drinking with you.
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I can assure you I saw Chris-Chan at Bronycon, and she was in the audience for our panel.
I remember that guy yelling. Was that Chris-Chan? I keep hearing about this mythical monstrosity. I don't think I registered him one way or the other. I better remember the woman who was walking around waving her arms like Asok the Intern from Dilbert. If only because that's a mainstay of doing panels in the BCC when the staff haven't gotten the time-out motion-sensors properly disabled.
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Jesus.
Did you shower inmediately afterwards?
Ugh. I'm even sadder that I missed this con now. More stories, we demand it!
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No dude I narrowly evaded an encounter myself but the friend I was with got talked at by the one and only. I had to call her away to bail her out.
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It kinda was an MtA origin story.
Ha! I forgot about that quote, but I completely stick by it, problematicness be damned. ^^; God I love Thorax.
Final Fantasy is weird, yo