It starts out soft and low

[austin_dern]

bunny_hugger and I enjoyed a most rare event Saturday morning: we had the chance to sleep in. For a change, her Bunnies Panel wasn't scheduled for the first thing in the morning. Actually, it was scheduled for mid-afternoon, a great time for us.

So we slept in pretty nicely, and sauntered downstairs where we figured we'd eat the breakfast buffet. We missed, by seconds: as we got in they were taking in the breakfast items. This is the in-hotel restaurant where, last year, skylerbunny introduced the manager to the idea of vegetarian-friendly options, which she didn't seem to understand. They haven't improved since then. So we had portobello mushroom sandwiches which were sloppy but tasty, and considered how much the decor of the restaurant looked like the Recreation Facility Level for a generic actionless science fiction movie of the mid-70s. All it really needed was in-table squares of Star Trek Christmas Light Panels.

bunny_hugger was to be in the Fursuit Parade, of course, so we went back to the room and she suited up. I was infinitesimally better as a handler this year comapared to last, keeping in mind that I would be hard-pressed to be worse. But we got down safe and sound and to the assembly room where I must have missed some announcement that they were finally starting. I had to squeeze out along with the start of the parade, and do my best to crouch-walk through a lot of people's photograph sight lines before reaching the lobby spot I'd wanted to stake out. It was a good spot for me, although my camera decided to enter some mode I've never seen before and will probably never see again. Mostly it just wants things to be dark and a little blurry.

The parade got through the hotel without any great mishaps like the Great Escalator Pile-Up, although since they did insist on having people wearing, mostly, large, motion-restricting costumes with tiny lines of sight getting on a moving escalator --- and again to go down --- it's kind of amazing they got through this without any major injuries.

The gathering of fursuiters outside for group photographs strained the limits of the hotel's available space, which is pretty impressive. There have to be a lot of people there to fill up the outdoors. I believe the overall report was there were on the order of 600 fursuits in the parade; it's beleivable. Incredibly, I found bunny_hugger among that crowd, although when everyone finally had enough pictures and the fursuiters got back inside I promptly lost her again. (I did spot baar_bear, in the Headless Lounge, but since I was trying to find bunny_hugger didn't have time to talk.) She had gone back to our room, hopefully without losing patience with me for not getting around sooner.

bunny_hugger's Rabbits SIG, her traditional panel, was for a change not run first thing in the morning, any morning. So that was a refreshing change. I had anticipated that skylerbunny might be on hand as auxiliary bunny in mediating things, but he'd dropped out to spend some quality time in hospital with the Martian Knee Flu. I was ready to step in as bunny supporter, if needed, but she seemed confident in what she had --- including a variety of roadside rabbit-themed tourist attractions, fitting a broad reading of the convention's Route 66 theme --- and the net effect was that I sat closer to her in the circle of chairs than anyone else without anyone being sure just why I was there.

Still, it was a fun panel, with several reliable topics brought up (it's always stunning to find anyone who's not read or at least seen Watership Down, though I don't believe we saw anyone who'd never heard of it), and a couple fursuiters dropping in. (One was a bulldog with bunny ears made by a balloon hat.) And for a real change I don't believe anyone from the carnivore family poked his head in to call the panel ``appetizers'' or ``lunch'' or so.

We had just enough time to wander around half the dealer's room --- bunny_hugger found a nice, well-formed costume tail, and commissioned another picture of she-and-me for her sketchbook; I didn't find anything I was ready to buy --- before getting back to the conference rooms for a panel about mucking, run by Dingo. The spindizzy_muck community put in a very good showing at this chat about how much better we are for using text rather than Second Life; somewhere around a third of the group was SpinDizzy folks --- including, I should mention, greenreaper, whom we kept running into through the weekend --- and we got at least one person to try us out afterward. A (non-disjoint) third was also FurryMuck folks, and another (non-disjoint) third had experience in Tapestries, which almost spontaneously took on the euphemism ``an other muck''. It felt like shop talk, the fun kind, about how good and under-appreciated we all are, without being too smug about it.

We had thought we'd go out somewhere to eat. We'd forgotten about the Variety Show. There just wasn't any getting out to someplace, eating something, and getting back, unless we had another portobello sandwich or got something from the convenience store. So we got snacks from the convenience store. I'd got a couple singles back in change here, and they were damp. The cashier apologized for that but explained the bills were damp because they'd just been in the register. I admired the Holden Caufield-esque perfection of that explanation: there's no hint of clarification in the statement, and yet, on what grounds could I question it? Certainly the bills were in the register. I've remembered and smiled over this explanation almost every day since I heard it.

The Variety Show was the typical sort of mix of things, although I think it came out better than the last couple. There weren't any sketches which flopped over and died as an attempt to do ``Who's On First'' last year had; and the Monty Python Quota was filled with two pieces that were arguably not actually Monty Python --- one, a rewrite of the ``Four Yorkshiremen'' sketch for fursuiters which was doing pretty well until it got to copying the structure of the original too closely; the other, a pair singing ``Once In Every Show'', the ends-up-with-a-kiss song from Spamalot. bunny_hugger hasn't seen Spamalot and had no idea what the song was about or for, so she was hit full-on with delight in a song that very carefully parodied conventions of the Big Broadway Romantic Ends-Up-With-A-Kiss song, including several mockings of the Obvious Key Changes which the song, in its glorious excess, does about four times over.

(She asked a good question when, later, I identified the song: how much is Spamalot a rewrite of Monty Python and the Holy Grail? It's hard to say exactly; I settled on saying it's about like how the various versions of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy are rewrites of each other. The premise and overall structure, yes, are constant, but there's quite some variation in instances.)

I'd say the best part of the show, though, was the puppets, and the debut of Vixie's new rabbit. There was also a pink dragon-y creature I wasn't sure I'd seen before. They debuted as a band, playing, and with really good, tight puppeteering. I mean of the kind that made the Electric Mayhem so much fun to watch; they were moving, and moving in ways that made it look plausibly like they were playing. I'm sorry there wasn't more of that.

Another, late-evening panel we attended was titled simply Sparkle Dogs. Who could resist the title, besides roofae, inexplicably? It ended up being less talk about why the heck there are Sparkle Dogs all over the fandom lately and more a creative project. They passed out outline drawings of a couple kinds of animals, spread crayons and candy over a few tables, and gave them to us to color in. And to eat candy. It's a perfect event for people who feel naturally like embracing their silly sides.

There was dancing again in the night, and we went to that, with bunny_hugger again doing her best to instill in me some semblance of rhythm. That didn't work, but it couldn't have, and we were there together anyway.

Trivia: Prior to 1846 Wisconsin's western border ran to the Mississippi River, out to the Lake of the Woods. The 1846 adjustment made the border follow the Saint Croix River where it departs from the Mississippi. Source: How The States Got Their Shapes, Mark Stein.

Currently Reading: The Fleet The Gods Forgot: The US Asiatic Fleet In World War II, W G Winslow. Winslow mentions wanting to rescue the Asiatic Fleet from obscurity in the introduction to this 1982 book. So, um, not quite there yet. But the Asiatic Fleet never operated as a whole, and was only an administrative unit during the war for a couple of months, and all grim months at that, so its getting lost within the Big Story is pretty understandable.

PS: One Explanation For Friday the 13th's Chance, getting back to my puzzle of two days ago.

Comments

[bunny-hugger.livejournal.com]

The Sparkle Dogs panel was the surprise hit of the con for me. (I think overall the MUCK panel was the best, but not as much of a surprise that I enjoyed it.) There were a bunch of animals to choose from -- a dog or two, a fox, a cat, and a pony -- and they were drawn in that very distinctive Sparkledog style, and had nice clean lines to color in. And they gave away free glow sticks too. A really fun panel.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

Sparkle Dogs was definitely the surprise hit. I admit going in with a sense of ``what could this possibly be about?'', but it paid off with the simple glee and of course activity.

[greenreaper.livejournal.com]

I always love an excuse to mess around with crayons and pretend I can do art!

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

The one oversight was they'd forgot any glue, so while they had glitter, it couldn't be applied to any of the artwork.

[chefmongoose.livejournal.com]

This year's MFF parade was huge. 574 people, 22% of convention attendees involved. That's.. astonishing numbers.

Sounds like a nice day at the con, all told. The Sparkledogs panel sounds fun. I may have to suggest that about at AC.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

574 people is astounding. Remember the days that would've been a massive furry convention? Like, three years ago?

I'd recommend doing something Sparkle Doggy. It seems to attract people who're going to be delighted to have crayons and fun-size candies.

[chefmongoose.livejournal.com]

A 574-person furry convention this year would have been the twelfth or thirteenth-largest, depending on whether or not the ELE attendance figure is anything close to reality. (I suspect not, with all politeness to ELE.)

Three years before that, it would've been the ninth-biggest.

Three years before *that*, the fifth-biggest.

Mind, with Anthrocon's fursuit parade at 854 and threatening to cross a thousand next year.. that makes my mind reel. By 2013, Anthrocon's fursuit parade will surely be bigger than Anthrocon was the year I first attended. Crazy.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

I think everything's past the size of the cons I first attended, but that's because I had a couple cons back in the mid-90s, when furry was dooOOooOOoomed by such things as Vanity Fair and MTV and everybody knew each other well enough to be arguing over whatever the heck seemed so important back then.

[chefmongoose.livejournal.com]

Which cons? I'm curious. Heck, a general listing of your furry convention attendance would be interesting. (For me, it's Anthrocon since 2000, Furfright since 2003, Furloween 2002 and MFF '05 and '06.)

[bunny-hugger.livejournal.com]

You didn't ask me, but mine's been the same three cons each year since 2008: FCN, Morphicon, MFF. I'm leaning heavily toward skipping MFF next year as it's gotten too expensive for me, and going to some other third con.

[chefmongoose.livejournal.com]

Furlaxation and Indy Fur Con are probably the next two closest small conventions for you; or perhaps one of the Canadian conventions. I do recommend you check out Anthrocon at some point; In part because I'd finally get to meet you, in part because Austin could take the train there without much trouble, and while there would be some expense.. it's still within a reasonable drive-or-train range.

--Chi

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

Also there's the Kennywood attraction, which is also on our to-do list.

My 1990s conventions included CFEast 2 --- the one in Cleveland, anyway; I think I missed the one in New Jersey --- and then the Albany Anthrocons from the beginning; then the first couple Philadelphia-area Anthrocons. I think the last one I attended was in 2000.

There were also all the Genericons from 1995 to 2002, plus sneaking in to Genericon 2003, but those were only sub rosa furry. That's probably changed since then, though.

[chefmongoose.livejournal.com]

Did you ever stay at the Adam's Mark? If so, you made it to 2001. If not, then that would be the Valley Forge Hilton (1999 and 2000).

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

I definitely wasn't there for 2001; I was in Singapore that summer. 2002 too.

[bunny-hugger.livejournal.com]

IFC is the most obvious one to add since it's during a time when I'm not in classes and I've considered it. I hadn't heard of Furlaxation before; my first reaction is, "Wait, why does Columbus need two cons?"

I hadn't ever thought to look at Canadian cons before, but it looks like the only one that I'd really feel up to driving to would be Condition, which I've never heard of. The next closest would be in Toronto and that's a bit further than I like to drive solo. The four hours to Columbus is about my limit.

I admit, I'm starting to think I spend too much on cons, particularly cons with expensive hotels, I'm looking at you, MFF. I have just as much fun at Morphicon and the hotel costs about 2/3 as much.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

Shame they don't have train service to Toronto anymore. It'd be fun taking in Ontario with you.

[bunny-hugger.livejournal.com]

Amtrak doesn't cross into Canada from Michigan at all anymore. They cut down on how many international crossings they do because it's gotten too complicated.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

Yeah. There's so much screwed up in how the United States deals with borders; trying to wall Canada off is only a little part of it.