Jeebus... I don't even know where to start. Alright so, the Anthrahconns...

I didn't very much appreciate having to rush through what was effectively my last day in the Navy. My friend  AceFox27 wanted to leave straight from work, and I had to jump through a lot of hoops to make that happen. Naturally I was coming off my duty day and I just stood a 6-hour watch in the early morning. I had a lot of things to take care of too, like printing off a copy of my novel while I still have government office resources to abuse. That was interesting. I knew that I had quite a bit written, but that perspective changed a bit when I ran all of it off the printer and it filled up a 2" binder.

I had to mow lawn too, which never happened because it just would NOT stop raining ALL WEEK. So I had to call up a landscaping service to do it while I was away. They said they'd get to it as soon as they could, which could be while as they were very busy. Apparently after it rained for forty days and forty nights the sun came down to teabag the entire state for the rest of ever. So now the humidity is 9000% and the whole state has a big patch of inhospitable marshland surrounding their house that they want someone else to deal with. A week later I come back to find out it's still not done, totally kneecapping my entire reason for calling them in the first place. Also there's trash piled up everywhere because no one else that lives here seems to understand how public waste management works. Being responsible is hard...

So anyway, day one very effectively proved something that I already knew. Arriving a day early is a good idea, arriving two days early is fucking retarded. I probably spent a cumulative hour out of that day giving him shit for that.

"Man, we're just sitting around in the lobby and there's like, nobody here at all."
"I know right? If only at some point someone had told you that getting here 50 years before the con started was a fucking idiotic plan and told you not to do it. Yes if only there were such a wise and sensible person involved in this decision-making process we might've been spared this!"

I wasn't really mad, I just like making fun of him, especially when he's the one complaining that none of his friends are here yet. We were hanging out in the lobby in our uniforms and a pilot came by to say hello. Naturally, the fun question came up.

"So, what brings you into town?"
"We're here for the convention."
"... the aviation convention?"
"... no."
"Don't tell me that you guys are furries..."
"Okay. I won't tell you that."

Good stuff. In any case, Ace did manage to work out a room for me that night, which was the only reason I agreed to go so stupid early. It was one of those clown-car rooms where they were putting nine people into a double because none of them have money and they're just going to party all night anyway. Fortunately arriving stupid-early isn't popular and the first night had "only" five people in there. I do like staying with furries though, they're always so willing to help people out when they're in a tough spot, even people they barely know.

When  clemfox showed up with the reservations I gave her $60 for the night, a rough stab at my share, and she said she couldn't accept that much. That right there is a big sign that you found good people. When we tried to check in to the room, she found that her bank card was still locked due to some earlier fraud that she thought she had resolved. All the other tenants had already paid her through the bank, so they couldn't put up the cost of the room either.

I've always thought the silly little cash rewards card I got from Navy Federal looked like baby's first credit card and I'd never really use it for much at all. I thought the $3000 spending limit they offered me was rather insulting, but in this scenario it meant that I was the only one with the necessary credit margin to make sure we weren't homeless. Since I was able to help, I offered. I waited until Clementine was done fighting with her bank's customer service line and told her that if she needed me to buy time to get this sorted out.

"Wait, what are you saying?"
"If you need me to buy time, I will. If I put this card on the counter, they'll say 'Welcome to the Westin, enjoy your stay!' and you'll have as much time as you need to sort this out."
"I couldn't ask you to do that."
"You didn't. The power of capitalism does not wait to be called to action."

Since by this time, they were starting to ask us to clear out of the drop-off zone out front and she wasn't getting anywhere with the bank, she agreed. It stung a bit that the cost of the 6-day reservation was over $900 plus deposit and incidentals, but it was better than everyone being stuck in the lobby with a giant pile of luggage. If you're keeping track, which by this point I most certainly was, in rough numbers, my con startup expenses on my statement looked a lot like this:

$575 Pre-existing balance
$180 Lawn service
$135 Oil change and car maintenance
$80 food
$60 gas/travel
$70 Parking
$550 Omni reservations
$140 Omni Deposit
$900 Westin reservations
$90 Westin Deposit

That left me with a $220 margin for the rest of the con. Urf... good thing I'm good at spending hours in the Dealers' Den and somehow spending no money. Apparently I've been practicing for this very moment. I'm really glad I stuck my neck out though. Clem still hasn't worked out her differences with the bank, so this could have potentially been a very unpleasant weekend for a lot of people. It feels pretty good to save the day. Ace wouldn't have made it here without me. Everyone would be literally stuck out in the street without me. I's A Hero! They asked me if the extra delay was going to be a problem for me. Not really. It doesn't cost me anything until the bill posts at the end of the month. I believe that's what it says next to "credit" in the dictionary: "Spending money you don't have but can totally come up with by the 30th."

One of the things that stuck me about the fandom early on is that it's not really a Lifestyle of the Rich and Famous. The amount of moaning and panhandling on Furaffinity and the like had made me wary of this fact at first. And yet, every furry I've met in person has been the stalwart sort that wouldn't take money even if it were offered. Well, except for Ace, he still owes me like $600, but he's still good people. I had to shove money into the hands of a friend of mine who was moving to Nebraska to become an Air Force officer, even though he would never have made it to his new job without it. I've known people with very legitimate reasons as to why they can't find work at the moment that refuse to go on unemployment because they don't need or deserve the help. "It's not my money. They took it from someone who has a job. I'm not going to steal to support myself." It's a beautiful thing. That demographic gulf has been one of the many things that has made me something of an odd man out, what with all this "responsibility" nonsense and my steady, relatively lucrative job. Perhaps I'll fit in better later on when I'm a college student.

So anyway I spent the day hanging out with Ace, Clem, Yazoo, K2, Rashia and anyone else that happened to filter through the rubber room during that time. We got to the hotel pool before it turned into con soup, so that was nice. There was tequila, and of course my gut instinct was to refuse since I know tequila is like a punch in the balls for your tongue. I changed my mind when they said that the little 20oz. bottle in front of me had cost over a hundred dollars. I'm well aware that tequila is not a particularly consistent drink. Scotch, gin, vodka... a lot of things give you a good idea of what you're getting into without needing a whole lot of extra info. Tequila runs the gamut from "the best thing that's ever happened to my mouth" all the way down to "I would rather drive staples in underneath my fingernails than let that caustic demon piss near any of my orifices ever again." So bearing in mind that I was being offered something very expensive for free I went for it. "Free" is my favorite flavor after all.

It went down real smooth and I'd almost say I enjoyed it. Everyone was impressed that I didn't want salt or lime. That's what you use to desensitize your mouth to the onslaught of high-reactant industrial solvent that they sell as cheap tequila. The good stuff doesn't need any of that. The 1800 they had wasn't quite a pleasant experience, but I made it through that okay. Also two double-shots of tequila when you haven't eaten for 8 hours serves as a nice science experiment in how quickly alcohol is transferred to the bloodstream. I'm having a great time you guys! Oh, let me pick up this brick that just hit me in the face. Hm, there's a note attached to it that says "YUR DRUNK NOW HURRR!" Wonder what that-hruubluwugghuh...

The good news was I stayed hydrated so burned all that off just as quickly as it came on, so I didn't make an ass of myself or get a huge hangover or anything. Ace was wiped out from the trip so he just went to bed. Yeah, all that office work now that he's a Yeoman and riding shotgun in the car and asking to smoke or go to the bathroom every five minutes must've really worn him out. Whatevs, I still had fun and got to bed at a rather reasonable hour. I had not much else to do and I knew that sleep was going to become scarce in the coming days.

All the head-butting with Ace really highlighted a fundamental difference in our personalities and reasons for attending. I don't think he goes to any of the convention events. He didn't even do the fursuit parade this year. It made me a little mad that he didn't get back to me about it because I totally would've guest-starred in his suit again this year had I known. Again, not something I can legitimately be all that mad about. No one's obligated to share their suit with me. Still, near as I can tell his days are filled with booze, sushi, room parties, hanging out and crippling sleep deprivation. I really didn't see the appeal. The way I looked at the schedule, every minute had three things I wanted to be at, once the convention actually started anyway. I couldn't imagine not trying to do ALL the things all the time. Still, he seemed quite adamant about it.

"You're totally doing Anthrocon wrong, dude. Get out there and talk to someone. Meet awesome people and have fun with them. You'll have the time of your life, I guarantee it."

Much as I have great love for the writing panels in a practical sense of learning how to refine my craft and have great fun doing them, I'll admit that writers tend to be a quiet and introspective crowd, as befitting their chosen artform. We all just kind of ghost through there and then break up once the panel is over. It was something that I had always thought a bit odd, so I kept his words under advisement as I made those always-difficult decisions about where to be and when during those far-too-scarce hours of the convention proper. I did wander about a bit, managed to say hi to  Alty, who was killing some time in the lobby after his bags had been lost on the flight in. He wasn't having the best day ever, but it was still nice to see someone whose name I recognized.

The benefits of an early arrival became more clear Wednesday, when the lack of crowds and foot traffic allowed me to catch up with  FastTrack37d, a favorite artist who I was very excited to meet. He was a personable British gentlemen that still seemed a bit worn from crossing the pond. Our conversation actually started with him wondering exactly why it was that I was so excited to meet him. I didn't necessarily come prepared to answer that, but I was working my way through that when he greeted his friend as he walked over to us.

"Oh hey  EasySpark, lookit! I've got a fan! Fancy that, eh?"

Naturally EasySpark was another favored artist of mine. I didn't even know he was going to be there. He was quite happy to have someone to chat with as well, so we all got to know each other a little bit. I learned that Easy has been in the game a lot longer and he's been showing FastTrack the ropes, leading to his meteoric rise in popularity. I don't think I mentioned the comparison to them, but they seemed a lot like Holmes and Dr. Watson. FastTrack was the prodigious but eccentric genius with his own mind pulling him in a thousand directions at once. And then EasySpark was the calm and determined professional trying to keep this lightning in a jar so that his best friend's talent can be used to its full potential. I can't count the number of times he said "We've gotta go. FastTrack has work to do." to us, even though FastTrack was the one out smoking like a chimney or trying to learn how to play guitar from a homeless man or whatever.

The two of them had to go before long. They had many things to do as they had come here for reasons of commerce and not leisure. Still, they asked if I'd come by the Artists' Alley later to visit and I agreed. After the lunch/dinner whatever-you-call-it when you eat at 3:30 PM, I got a message from  lionkingcmsl saying that he'd arrived and was staying at the Omni as well. After I wrapped things up at the Westin I stopped by and had the chance to meet him and his friend Kamau, a retired Chaplain, in person. More interesting conversation and catching up to be had there. I was wondering where the time went by the end of it. I had enough time to get all my stuff moved into my new room and then it was bedtime. Again, stocking up for the drought that was sure to come.

Thursday I bumped into LK again, and with  McClaw we made a little Cross-Time Cafe circle down in the Westin lobby. Probably could've chosen a less obtrusive spot, but good talk nonetheless. Lots of machines and technical stuff, befitting the audience. After that I spent approximately forever in the registration line. I was disappointed that I couldn't find someone to wait in line with this year. Last time  PattheCat and I passed the time chatting and enjoying some "real coke taste" (mix drinks in innocuous bottles). Still, I got my notepad out of the car first, so I got some writing done in the 3.5 hour wait.

A lot of people bitch about the line, but it's not really something you can blame on the con. You can't exactly fault them for being too popular, as that's very much an indication that they're doing something right. You can skip the line by pre-registering or sponsoring, which were kept out of reach of me by the Navy's chronically poor scheduling and my sudden financial glass ceiling. And having worked with untold dozens of those 'deceptively-simple yet cost-fifty-brazillion-dollars' machines I can safely say that the Anthrocon Inc. Official Badge Printing Machine™ is certainly in that class of device. Getting another one or risking its safety by asking too much of it are both expensive and unwise. Really though, my time wasn't worth much right then, so I was okay with the wait.

After that I hung out at the rubber room some and went swimming with them again. Someone at the pool had this little bluetooth-controlled rolling ball there. It was a simple thing that blinked and lit up, and then rolled in whatever direction it was commanded. It was watertight, so it even industriously paddled its way across the pool a few times. Cute little widget, it was. It may have been specifically designed to entertain furries, as racing it or chasing it about the pool was great fun. The red error light that it gives off when it gets stuck is rather satisfying to see when you went to great lengths to catch it.

We ended up getting locked out for a little while afterwards as the room had many more occupants than keys and no one was home. That was partly on me as mine had stayed in my pocket when I changed into my swim trunks. Earlier the same thing had happened to my wallet when we went to eat and someone had to cover my bill, so I was clearly not learning from my mistakes. Still, I probably could've thought of a better way to summarize the situation than: "Dammit! Every time I take off my pants everything just goes straight to hell!"

I don't know how long I spent waiting or trying to get in there since I didn't have a watch either, but it didn't feel unreasonably long. It was actually kind of a nice lull amidst the mounting urgency that the start of the convention was bringing on. After I got changed, the Inspector and the Good Doctor had finished setting up their table at the Artist Alley. I and Alty met up with them and we went out for pizza before we all turned in. I considered watching the fireworks that were meant to be happening, but I was pretty tired and it was raining, so once again I favored sleep.

So I started Friday with a writing panel that was during another thing I wanted to be at and also ran long into the opening ceremonies, after which I jumped into the next writing panel already in progress and then literally ran back across to the Westin to make the start of the transformation panel on time. That panel burned up six of  Kyell's "Ten Ways to Improve Your Writing" that I also jumped into the middle of. I had the gap between 1535 and 1600 to stuff something edible in my face before getting to "Charades Impossible" an absolutely hilarious event in which fursuit performers have to act out the most merciless and cruel charades clues ever inflicted on someone. I'm pretty sure it qualified as animal cruelty. Nothing can quite compare to the unique humor of watching a white wolf try to act out "Mount Kilimanjaro" or a Skunk silently trying to prompt someone to say "Toronto, Canada". A sampling of the other clues included: "The Battle Hymn of the Republic", "Uranium235", "The Jackson Five", "Cards Against Humanity", "The Western Black Rhino", and "The Dick Van Dyke Show." For some truly baffling reason, none of the contestants were successful.

At the end of Charades, I again asked the foolish question "Is there a writing panel in progress now?" Why of course there was! So I went to that. Afterwards was the first chance I had to check out the Dealers' Den and Artist Alley. It was also at that time that they closed. Still, I said that I'd visit my new friends at their table, so I did, and they invited me to dinner. Now, dinner was naturally going to make me miss like 30 other events, since the evening schedule was even more packed, but this was the only time they had free, and would ever have free because they had to work every day. I decided to go with them for that reason, and because refusing would've been rather rude really.  Fann, a flash animator and Foley artist/musician whose work I was casually familiar with, had joined the group by that time, so I got to make nice with him while we waited in line for FastTrack to get his money.

So we worked logistics of getting everyone's stuff put away and putting together a dinner group that also included Rampack,  TaurinFox and like four people I don't think I ever even learned the names of. A small group of us went first to hold down the reservations while everyone else got their affairs in order. We were working through Fann being Canadian and realizing he was underage here when we tried to order beer when he realized that his phone had died before he could tell Taurin Fox where we were eating. Restarting it, fiddling with the battery and various occult rituals had failed to get us the phone number we needed to relay the info. My time to shine I guess.

I came up with the idea of putting the SIM card into a working phone. That went great until he asked for my phone and realized it was from two decades before SIM cards became a thing, and asked for EasySpark's phone and realized that it was an iPhone and thus told all other technology of dissimilar origins to go fuck right off, and asked for FastTrack's phone and realized it doesn't exist. My and his phone were both LGs, but without a time portal that wasn't of any use. They use the same voltage, but a different generation of battery with a different terminal configuration. In the end, opening up the battery door to Fann's phone and flipping my battery upside down before jamming it perpendicularly into the back of the phone and onto the terminal contacts somehow did something other than fail horribly.

I got the number into my PDA (the notepad) and then re-powered my phone to contact Taurin Fox. We totally win at all the engineering forever. I thought it was hilarious because trying to make decades-old technology jump through hoops of fire for no adequately explained reason and making them do things that should be impossible under an unreasonable time crunch with woefully inadequate technical documentation and only a general idea of the principles of operation at work was what I just spent six years doing in the Navy. So yeah, when you get home, try to get data from an Seagate external hard drive and display it on a graphing calculator using the Ethernet port on the back of a DSL modem with only a set of stereo headphones and a reel of unterminated CAT-5 cable. That is an accurate simulation of my job.

The restaurant was a craft beer and gourmet burger joint that was actually really good. It was called the 'Sharp Edge Bistro' and it gets a hearty recommendation from me. For about ten solid minutes the only things out of FastTrack's mouth were various attempts to convey to the waiter "This is not enough beer. Bring out more beer immediately, preferably sooner." To the waiter's credit he did get some beer piled up in front of him eventually. It was kind of interesting to look around the table at the crowd we had gathered. We had several digital artists, a couple traditional artists, a musician/Foley artist, a flash animator, a 3D animator, and several combinations thereof. I realized that since I was a writer, with our powers combined we could probably summon Captain Planet. The only bad news is that I'm pretty sure I'd be "Heart".

The TV was playing some loud and distracting Nascar event. When I mentioned this, the waiter asked if we'd like the channel changed. I was just being a jackass when I said "Sure, Cartoon Network!" and then he actually did it. Which was, of course, 5000 times more distracting because EHMAHGEERDCartoonNetwork! It was really funny when a second table featuring a big group of furries sat down with every one of them saying "Oh Camp Laslo I love this show!" or some permutation thereof. An astonishingly universal creeping realization went around the table that became the subject of conversation for quite some time.

"Holy shit, you guys. You realize that we're all adults?"
"I know, right? We like... have jobs and make money and stuff."
"We booked hotel rooms and got plane tickets and drove cars and all that."
"I own a gun."
"I split fucking atoms on a billion dollar warmachine every day."
"I have kids!"
"How is it that we are all allowed to be a part of society and do these things when we have nothing near the maturity required for any of them?"
"How has this not destroyed the world already?"
"How does society still work when we're a part of it?"

I think at some point everyone realizes that you don't go through some grand, sweeping transformation as you mature. You don't become an adult, you just are one all of a sudden, and no one ever stops to explain that to you. It was kind of fun to have a group of 10 people come to that conclusion all at the same time.

FastTrack, EasySpark, Fann and I went back to the Omni to hang out for awhile. Fann's room was crowded, so we went to mine. Big perk of being by yourself is you get a lot of control over the atmosphere and usability of your room. Almost made it worth the cost. Almost. We chatted a lot and shared stories and experiences. Apparently FastTrack has made enough from his art to move to California, and is doing so as we speak. By the way, at this point, he still wasn't convinced that he is a talented and extremely prolific artist. We had to bust out that Furaffinity popularity tracker gizmo to prove it to him. In any case, somehow learning happened, as Fann was starting to help FastTrack branch into animation. That's another area where I'm like 'lolwut', but it was interesting regardless. We decided to break it up before it was tomorrow. There were con events going on at that time, but I was literally sitting on my bed already. A tough position to convince oneself to leave from, particularly when tomorrow starts so early.

The next day was not as densely populated, but I did have to haul myself out at 0730 and get my uniform on for the MilFurs breakfast. Lion King was there, and we bantered back and forth for a little while before I realized that he legitimately didn't recognize me. I was surprised at how common that was. A lot of people who saw me in uniform didn't recognize me after I changed, and vice versa. I guess it really is a pretty drastic difference.  Knifesharpener said it makes me look older, a lot older. Not sure if that's a compliment, but it's a thing that happened. Some say that they might think that they recognize me, but my behavior throws them off. Apparently I act completely different in uniform. Not that unreasonable if you think about it. As I told so many: "You're a different person in your costume, and I'm a different person in mine."

So anyway, there was another writing panel to get to, and after that I was headed back to my room to change. That was when I got the news that Amon was going to be at  Rukis' booth in the Dealers' Den. Amon is a character from 'Red Lantern', a comic that I'm a big fan of. This put me in a difficult spot.

"Did you know that Amon is going to be at Rukis' booth around lunchtime?"
"No! Why did you wait until now to tell me this?"
"What's the problem?"
"Because now I have to go there and I really should change first but I might not have time. You're pitting me against Naval Regulations and that's not fair!"

And so I was at the Dealers' Den in uniform. Amon wasn't there yet, but fortunately I hadn't missed him. I talked with Rukis as well as I could whilst dodging out of the way of people who actually had money. She looked to be doing a brisk business from what I could see. She was very excited to hear that I liked her comic and was really quite personable despite already looking like the con was wearing on her a bit. It's always wonderful to see someone so proud of their work, and that so genuinely enjoys what they do. I'm a little jealous of that, to be honest. Having an enjoyably job is a pretty foreign concept to me. I still can't adequately describe what it's like to look at someone who looks like they've been on the wrong side of a zombie plague outbreak and hear "Oh I'm so excited to hear that! I can't believe someone that's actually in the Navy likes my comic, that's so awesome!" Red Lantern features sailing ships and naval battles and the like, so my seal of approval meant a great deal to her.

I came back there a few times, and attracted attention in so doing apparently. Someone asked me if I liked Red Lantern later in the day.
"Have we met? I mean, yes, yes I do. That question is being asked with inordinate frequency, what's the deal?"
"Oh, one of my friends tweeted about this Navy guy at Rukis' booth that was super excited to meet Amon. I figured, what are the odds?"
"Ah, so good to hear I've been keeping a low profile."

I stuck around in the Den so that I would be there for my photo op. I met  Angrboda while I was there and talked for quite some time. I ended up with something I hadn't really expected, career advice. I mentioned that I was looking at RPI and she said that she had some friends who had gone there. It was only a few minutes before they showed up, coincidentally enough. Throwing a big group of people at me is a great way to make me suck at names and now I feel terrible for not remembering. I know that  Taki was one of them and one went by "spark". There was also the girl with a truly righteous cowbell around her neck that I can't place at all. I'll have to ask around and see if I can reconstruct that event, especially seeing as it may have direct relevance to my future.

Angrboda said that I was welcome to attend a Transformation Art Jam that was happening that night. Another tough decision, but that night was spoken for. There was Kage's Story Time which I'd really like to see, and Kyell Gold's novel writing panel, which I had to HAD to go to, and the standing invitation to dinner after the Alley closed. I felt bad for missing it, as it sounded like fun and I didn't get another chance to see Angrboda the rest of the con.

By then though, I spied my target and went to get my picture taken with Amon. I actually caught him just as he was about to leave for the fursuit parade, but he held back for me. My camera chose a truly perfect time to flame out due to a bad memory card. Fortunately someone nearby that went by 'Bowser' had a working camera and he e-mailed the photos to me. Lucky save, there. I'm very grateful to you, wherever you are.

I had a lot of people I knew through FA that I had been trying to meet. That scenario has been the first time in my life I genuinely wished I had a smartphone. Without one, I couldn't use the Twitters to track people's location, couldn't check FA updates either, and it was hilarious how many people just went with. "Oh yeah! I was at the Dealers' Den an hour ago. On the off chance I'm still there, maybe you could comb through the 2000 people who are in there to find me based on this vague physical description! See you there!" Oh, good. I'm sure there won't be too many "Pale skinny white guy with jeans and a backpack" in there... Even though I was wearing what had to be the most conspicuous outfit in the place I realized the hilarious futility of this effort. I gave up on that pretty quick and just noted everyone my cell number.

I successfully found  Nevir like this and we met up at the zoo after our respective panels were over. He's a musician that I follow and was very excited to meet me. A few of his friends came by the table as well and we had a grand old time. I mentioned that I didn't remember the last thing I ate and he produced half a Subway sandwich from somewhere and gave it to me. Real lifesaver, that. I didn't have any other chances to eat in the near future. Of course I ran off again, but I promised to stay in touch. That was on me of course, as it's not very helpful when someone asks what your plans are and the only answer you have is "BLAWAGH! ALL the things!"

So, my questions burned up about 25 minutes worth of Kyell Gold's noveling panel, as well they should have. It ran a little long and I got out of there hoping to get in touch with FastTrack again. Indeed I did and we hung out at Fann's room for awhile. In there I met  LanHao, an upstart transformation and general sketch artist whose work was new to me. Turned out that he was originally from Western New York also, so we've got something of a connection there. Circumstances knocking me about as they were, I had only a bare minimum of time with him, but we still got along famously. Turns out he was a part of Angrboda's little circle. One that I do hope to get in touch with someday. Our group powwow there was cut off by the realization that it was half-past-tomorrow and we needed sleep to live. In that vein, if there was one thing I could say to describe Anthrocon in a sentence it would have to be "Oh thank God I've run out of awesome things to do I can finally go to bed."

If you've been paying attention you'll note that I got suckered into spending a whole day of the con in uniform. And if you haven't been paying attention then go get some coffee or something. I didn't spend all day writing this for you to ignore me, asshole. Anyways, that attire prompted some mixed responses. Just like last year, a lot of people were really enthusiastic about it. They wanted to hear stories from me or tell their own, thank me for serving, or just remark on how what I do is awesome. There's nothing like spending a few minutes correcting the saluting posture of a silver fox to brighten your day.

There were also a handful of people who did the right thing, that is to say, chastise me for wearing an unauthorized uniform in such a ridiculous location. I felt uneasy about that part of it at times, but I just really didn't want to give it up. That's not an easy crowd to stand out in and the Navy is really my only hook in that regard. This was my last chance to say that I was indeed in the Navy when people remarked on how good my cosplay was.

It also led me to an experience that I'll take to my grave. Somehow in all the din and insanity in the hotel lobby, I heard a woman ask: "Do you want to pet the kitty, hon?" Not an unusual thing really. Some of the hotel's "normal" guests really enjoy the con and the unique opportunities it offers. What was unusual was what I heard after I had started to walk away.

"I wanna see the soldier!" What. No. There's no way-

"Oh, well hello there." Good, I managed some words, now remember to breathe in. I don't believe it. I have more appeal than a thousand life-sized, talking stuffed animals! This. Is not possible. I'm really glad that he's small so I have a non-effeminate reason for dropping to my knees because I don't think I can stand anymore.

"My daddy used to be a soldier."

"Oh, really? What was his job?" 'Daddy... Used to'? Oh dear. He's... here with just his mom...

"He was in Iraq."

"Y-yeah..." No. NO! OhGodohGOD I can NOT HANDLE THIS!

"... now he's-" AHHHHHHH! "a pilot."

"Ah... that's good." GUHARGH! Heart. Start beating again. Dammit. Need... blood to move...

The other things that he said escape me now. I was busy having apoplexy and trying to not turn inside out. I gathered that his daddy was a commercial pilot now and had been in town for that aviation convention. He was just busy at the moment.

"Thank you so much." She said as she collected her child.

"Of course... no problem." Now if you'll excuse me I have to go puke up the mealy sludge that used to be all of my organs.

The takeaway from that, other than the fact that jumping to conclusions will get you in trouble, was that from that little encounter I experienced approximately ALL the feels ever. A month before I get out is a hell of a time to find out that I'm so passionate and invested in my service to the armed forces. They told me this day was coming, but I really thought that I'd be filling out for my AARP membership before that.

One thing that made the financial gut-punch of booking a King room by myself kind of worth it was having a quiet place all to yourself to pass out in when everything was all done for the day. I'm certain that was a big part of what let me keep my higher brain functions while everyone else ran themselves into the ground. It was always pretty funny. I'd go to bed just because I logically knew I needed to. I was too jazzed on con-meth to calm down or feel tired at any point. Every night I laid down thinking "Well this is stupid I'm not even sleepy or anyth- oh it's 0930 I'd better get up I have a thousand more things to do."

Naturally every good day starts with a writing panel, and this was actually my last one. There were still a couple left, but I brushed them off because this whole "human interaction" thing I had going was working out pretty well for me. I got a text from  Zennithm and met him just an hour or two before he had not leave. Not much of a contact, but some things can't be helped. Still, I was really glad I caught up to him. It was worth it just for the fact that we went to the fursuit dance competition finals together. That's something it never would've crossed my mind to go to, but he offered, so why not? I was absolutely knocked on my ass by the performance these guys put on. There is an utterly outrageous and mind-boggling amount of talent on display up there. Such precision, such rhythm, power and agility, such reckless disregard for one's personal safety, and all while effectively blindfolded, wearing a restrictive carpet over their entire body and boxing gloves on all four limbs. Fucking phenomenal.

After that, another ping, this time from  Voxian. He and his better half, so to speak,  CatNamedFish, were in the Den and also wanted to meet me. Fantastic news, as this was a chance I had missed last year. Vox has been a fan of my work for quite some time and it was a joy to make this connection successfully. We talked adamantly for much longer than we should have whilst standing in the middle of the Den's traffic lane. Fish had to run off after awhile, an obligation I could hardly call myself unsympathetic to. Vox and I found ourselves a better place to chat. I talked at length about my in-progress novel, but only because he asked me to. Nevir did the same thing, actually. It was a real boost for my excitement about the project. I'm sure I'll be writing like a fiend once I'm done burning up hours and hours trying to chronicle Anthrocon. So, another friend, another writing contact, and another reason I was so stupid for not dropping everything to find all these people sooner.

After that, another Artist's Alley cleanup and another dinner with a big troupe of people. FastTrack turned out to be the highest-grossing artist there in the Alley. The ever-expanding brick of cash he was dragging around was going a long way towards convincing him that perhaps he is indeed a popular and successful artist like I've been telling him this whole time. Considering that a months' pay for me would buy precisely one sequence commission from him, I'd say he's doing alright for himself.

Anyways, there were cab rides and such on the way to get everyone's stuff in order before we went to dinner. On one of them I lost my eyeglasses. This led to me wasting half the evening looking for them and the other half looking like a twat wearing my sunglasses everywhere. I still could function okay because they're ground to my prescription, but that put a bit of a damper on my mood and made me really preoccupied the rest of the time.
Everyone really hated the Italian place we went to, I wasn't too passionately moved in either direction, but they did charge a bit much for some outstandingly average food. Regardless, we split the party to make our way back and it took a bit to pull back together. The con was over by then and it was quite late at night. I wandered about the Zoo a bit after I had given up the search I couldn't get a response from anyone for about half an hour, including Ace. I had checked out, so I didn't really have any place to go either. No room, no friends, no glasses, no intel... it was not good times. No comms with Ace was particularly problematic because I didn't know when he planned to leave. That was a big deal since I didn't have a place to sleep Sunday night if indeed that was the plan. And, to a lesser extent, it was a big deal because Ace actually has to go on the underway while I don't, so if he wasn't back on time the MPs would come after him.

The former was my problem, and the latter was not, so I set about finding somewhere to chill while my crew got together and also possibly spend the night. I found both with Nevir upstairs. They were cleaning up in his room and had some leftover Jager to offer. They were going to toss it anyway, and well, free is still my favorite flavor, even if warm Jager tastes like used transaxle fluid. I made it through a few ounces before giving up on it, which helped with the nerves of all the awesome things suddenly going tragically wrong.

Finally I had the sense to look outside in the smoking area for Ace, where he is about every 20 minutes. His phone had died and he did indeed plan on staying there Sunday night. That would've irked me another time, but as it was, there was plenty I wanted to do, and people started showing up about that time so I got back to it. I spent some more time with the old crew watching them art at things, as they do.  Aquacoon did an absolutely darling piece for FastTrack that was just bursting with adorableness. I got to watch that whole process, which is always a treat.

There was one point where FastTrack talked about how much he hated fanboys who just fawn all over his art and never buy anything.
"But I'm a fanboy that just fawns over your art and never buys anything."
"Oh, it's not you. Your company has been just fantastic, I don't need you to buy things."
"Awww, that's so nice!" I'll admit it, I made big puppydog eyes for a second there.

The night wound down, and once again: "FastTrack has work to do. We've got to go." We made plans to meet up one last time in the morning and then turned in for the night. I watched a bunch of Archer with Nevir's crew upstairs and got to sleep eventually at godawful O'clock. I packed up and headed down to the lobby once I heard from EasySpark that they had arrived. We talked and handed out the commissions that he had been pushing FastTrack to do all night. Ace was pushing for us to leave by then, but I told him to wait because there was still someone else I needed to see before I left. Looking at all the new contacts I had seen off thus far, and the group of people I was standing with in the lobby at the time, he said:

"You son of a bitch. You went out and made a bunch of friends didn't you?"
"Yeah."
"It was awesome, wasn't it?"
"Yeah. I've been saying my goodbyes to like, seven good friends that I hadn't even met three days ago."
"Hah! I told you so. Alright, we'll wait for this one guy and then we gotta be outta here."
"Okay. I'm sorry about the delay. I'm not used to this kind of thing. I don't usually... you know, have friends."
"Ahhh! What's going on? How do I poppyfur!"
"Yeah. Something like that."

So I finally saw off LanHao and promised to stay in touch before we rode off into the sunset. I was bummed to miss lunch with all those guys, but Ace's obligations were my obligations by that time. It made for a bitter departure, but I certainly didn't regret bringing him. I would've never turned him down when he needed help. He made the drive go a lot faster, prompted me to make all the great friends I'm going to miss so much, and just in general made for a great con. He was crashed out for most of the drive home, so that plus traffic made the trip go pretty slow. I couldn't fathom why all the unconsciousness came on the heels of him describing to me how he had gotten drunk and sobered up three times the previous day. I wore down by the end and asked him to drive for a little while. I laid back to rest for a moment and that moment ended up taking like 90 minutes.

In the end, I'm really glad I got out of my safe little bubble in the writing community. To use entirely appropriate metaphors, writers are like the German Shepherds of the furry fandom. Dutiful, focused, and persistent. They know when it's time for work and when it's time for play, and how to keep the two from interfering with each other. Having dipped my paws into the other end of the pool, I can safely say that artists are more like the fandom's Golden Retrievers.

"Hey! You're new. Look over here, hi! What do you smell like? Oh, that's interesting! I like you! Let's go play I'm so excited this is awesome we'regonnabethemostbestestfriendseverforever BAWHAW I LICK YAH FACE ALL OVARR!"

Well, I suppose I have work to do. I've got to get this lawn business sorted out and there's quite a mess that my roommates left while I was gone. I've got glasses to replace too. I'll have to call up Tricare and see if I can squeeze one more eye exam out of the Navy while I'm still in it. And sometime soon before my memory starts degrading I'll have to sift through all these hastily scribbled notes to cement all the dozen or so contacts I have with all the wonderful people I'm in touch with now. I'd really hate to forget someone now that the con is over and I'm out of second chances to hit them up. Man, is having friends always this much pressure?

Speaking of people I'm forgetting, even with the truly shameless amount of name-dropping I've been doing I haven't gotten to everyone. I've linked so many people that the little icon text parsing macro has stopped working but here goes anyway:  reograyfox  daniskunk  ryoken  catmonkshiro and a dozen others were all around just being awesome in my general vicinity and doing what they do. Thanks for a fantastic con, everyone.