I wanted to write this journal a bit earlier after the con had concluded, but then FurAffinity sort of blew up for about a week and so I wasn't able to post any journals anyway.

Recently, as in, today,  MiaFillene MiaFillene posted her own journal expressing the absolute disgust at the current state of the fandom and how traditional media artists are just seemingly left by the wayside. Its short; its brief; its here. https://www.furaffinity.net/journal/11145200/ . But reading it really lit the fire under me to get me to write this journal before its memory grows anymore vague.

Las Vegas Fur Con left me with a lot of decidedly mixed to lackluster views that make me wonder if I should ever return to it because it just isn't...doing...anything for me. Where do I even begin here?

Hotel:
Because I didn't shell out the uber-bucks to buy into a "lifetime attendance sponsorship scholarship" it means I don't get first offer on the rooms at the Alexis Park main con hotel; instead I have to fight and scrap with the scum class to get into one of the overflow hotels and I wound up at The Serene. Honestly? Not too bad, a bit of a hidden gem if you will. In the grand context of travel The Serene put you CLOSER to the actual con event than the Alexis Park did because the convention space is located at the very front side of the Alexis Park. Staying in the Alexis Park itself you have to deal with that god damn annoying meandering walkway that snakes and curls its way around its three god damn swimming pools. It just feels like a lot of unnecessary travels to just get anywhere. Staying at The Serene, you just left the complex, went down the street, and you were in the con area.

The roomshares we had were  strega Strega ,  essynkardi Essynkardi and  nutcasethegreat Bish and I got nothing negative to say about any of them. Fantastic roomshares all around and Essynkardi even is a multifur friendly artist that I managed to get a sketchbook art from towards the end of the con, because...come on, how could I not? :)

The con sort of bugs me because of the insistence on staying from Thursday to Monday; four nights mandatory. Why do we have to arrive early on Thursday when there's literally FUCK ALL happening with the con on that day? I feel its just a waste of time to stay in a hotel the day before a con event actually gets going. To me, I want to just get in and get out; keep the stay as brief as possible and that's just not possible with LVFC's format.

I've come to the conclusion that the Alexis Park is just not an idea place to hold a con like this.
The meandering walkway is fucking annoying having to loop around the first swimming pool all the time to get into the room buildings, to the Dealers Room, or through the hotel lobby to go outside to the Apollo Rooms at the front. The layout is fucking garbage. There's just no place to sit and chill at the con unless you retreat to your room it seems, for reasons I'll get into a bit.

Dealers And Panels:
Dealers Room let me down, hard. A backpack full of sketchbooks anticipating that there'll be dealers to take them, and I found...no one. There wasn't "no one", but there was only TWO in the entire room; Brian Reynolds and Recurrent both were able to take sketchbooks and do some arts and I have wanted to get something from Brian Reynolds for some time when I see him at MFF but I just never have so this was finally that time to do so.

But the rest of the Dealers Room? My fucking god.
Acrylic charms; bracelets; keychains; books; rugs; posters; wall tapestries; fursuits; fursuit parts; fursuit plush props; prints; leashes; collars; body harnesses; sex toys; FUCKING PINS; FUCKING STICKERS; wearable clothing merchandise; and probably other artifacts that you could imagine being created, and NOWHERE will you find people offering to take FUCKING SKETCHBOOKS. And if someone is taking traditional media it seems their way of going about it is to build a waiting list to take home from the con, to then do the art, and mail it back to you. This just defeats the whole aspect of bringing a sketchbook to a con. I live for getting an art piece, an idea, a fun creative thing drawn IN THAT MOMENT, IN THAT WEEKEND, as a lasting memory and this just doesn't happen as much anymore. More often than not my sketchbooks come home from con empty and I make a single tour of the Dealers Room because I just don't want any physical shit to bring home to stuff into my closet. Twenty-five years in this fandom and I just desire to take LESS shit home with me from the events.

So if Dealers Room was a bust, what was there else to do?
Well...not a whole lot of fuck all anything, because the panel schedule was lackluster at best. I skimmed the schedule and just...nothing. I found myself sitting in on a panel for an hour or so with the Guest Of Honor of the con talking about first person Japanese dungeon crawler games not because I was even interested in the topic but just because I wanted something to fucking do and it didn't matter what it was.

There was a Vore Meet put on by  tokenspanda Tokens that I walked through just because usually at these things I can find friends at the con and chat a bit.

Really, the only panel highlight was the Poker Tournament put on by  velliwolf Velli, because I stepped in as a dealer to a table, and had a hell of a fun time slinging cards and enjoying the build up of tension that seeds in between players the longer the tournament runs on.

I will say that the con had a marvelous idea in place for a massive "Zoo" room. The "Apollo 5" room at the end of the hallway was set up to be the mother of all meet up rooms. Eighteen tables, projector if needed, ALL of the meet up panels were hosted there, and this concept was fucking squandered to uselessness because they'd stake out a security guard in front of the hallway to shoo people away from utilizing these rooms until the first panel happened to warrant people going down there because they were...scared of someone thieving the projectors or some shit? So this meant that on Saturday when the con has already kicked off at 10am and its ACTIVELY IN OPERATION, oh no, this huge hangout meetup room is closed and off limits until the first panel happens at 1pm.

I'm sorry...what.
Like I said, there's no other places to just park yourself and chill unless you lurk back in your hotel room. This idea of blocking off the massive Zoo hangout room was asinine just knowing that space was not even being utilized. Because believe me, once the security guard got out of the fucking way people flowed into this hangout room to make use of the tables.

So okay, Dealers Room has nothing for me.
Panels schedule has really nothing of interest.
What else does that leave?

Meeting friends, room parties and the dances.
Ugh...
Look I love my friends, but there's only so many times I can pass by them and say hi or something across four days.
I popped in to a few room parties that were hosted by local furs from the Antelope Valley area, namely  khandor Khandor with his Deep Rock Galactic theme, and  paperwolf Isaac with his always reliable Transformation themed party.
But you get more than thirteen people in these rooms and it becomes a crowd to where you're retreating outside onto the porch, and again I'm not really a party fur to where I desire to be smashed drunk at the con.
And I'm certainly not a dancer fur either to where I've ever found myself desiring to go to the dances.

So yeah...that's pretty much the con experience from Thursday night into Saturday night, but then there was this awkward kind of thing on Sunday...

The Mexican Sponsor Brunch:
So Las Vegas Fur Con actually put a Sponsor Brunch on the schedule this time, but it was relegated to the ass end of the schedule on Sunday morning.
This honestly was mildly entertaining because as I walked through the front of the Alexis Park it was pretty fucking quiet, even for being in the 9am hour and the Sponsor Brunch opened at 10am.

There was no one alive at the con.
Con staff were up and about a bit.
There were stanchions of worn brass forming a queue line for the expectation of a crowd that wasn't forming.
The Sponsor Brunch is set to open in five minutes at 10am and...I'm somehow the first person here?
Honestly this just felt like it was going to be forgotten, until it wasn't and the door opened and we were told to take a seat at a table at the far left of the room.

This was just super awkward to me. Because we have wait staff standing around by the food tables expecting people to dish up and go for it, but everyone thats filing in is just taking a seat at the tables and sitting there as if waiting to be told what to do next? Me, I just get up and start figuring out what we have for this Brunch, and its not what I would've chosen to be honest. Mexican tortilla chip salad, enchiladas, rice, beans, choice of meats, sour cream, guacamole, iced tea? Uh...okay definitely not what I was expecting, I was more or less thinking of something crossing breakfast with lunch here but whatever, food is food.

And it was clear that the entire purpose of this con is a party con; I swear everyone must've partied so hard into an all night bender because there was literally a half hour that went by before other furs started to trickle in, adding just more awkwardness to the whole atmosphere that you have this whole giant theater set up and no one is there.

I mean its none of my business but I sure hope the con didn't get hosed with any kind of wasted food charges and more furs appeared as the Sponsor Brunch ambled on in its duration.

Closing Ceremony:
Finally on Sunday its time for this con to wrap up and end. Thankfully the Closing Ceremony event was held on the rooftop this time instead of a giant theater like last time and it was extremely brief; like twenty minutes at most if I'm exaggerating. There was no frantic cult like chanting of "trans rights" this time around like there was last time, though some furs still tried to stir up such a reaction for a few times. Really this just tells me that maybe furs are coming back to their senses and knocking this shit off finally.

One of the notes that was mentioned at Closing Ceremony just doesn't sit well with me, and that was the con announcing how many free doses of "NARCAN" were handed out during the con.
I'm sorry...no. You don't brag about a statistic of how many furs wanted "NARCAN" as a means of staying safe during the event, what the fuck are we doing?!

So its really abundantly clear that the whole purpose and point of Las Vegas Fur Con isn't the con itself.
You register for a fur con at a resort park, but during the day its like you're supposed to outside of the con and do Vegas things, and then come back and do drugs and room parties and do dances into the night.
Sure doesn't seem like there's fuck all else to do at this event.

*

I did have high hopes to finally meet up with my longtime friend  theDARKWOLF TheDARKWOLF who I'd lost touch with for easily twelve or thirteen years at this point when he left California to go to other states east. A bit of time ago I got a message on FA that he'd moved back and was staying in Las Vegas now!
Thrilled I did reach out to say I'd be going to Las Vegas Fur Con and it'd be an ideal place to meet up, but...well, it never happened.

Darkwolf seemed to have other obligations come up and so he never showed up, and he doesn't keep an active presence on FA to answer notes in a timely fashion, and though he says he has a Discord he won't ever give me his name to keep in touch that way.

I honestly don't know if Las Vegas Fur Con is worth a return trip, despite it being close. Maybe if there's actual panels and Dealers present to keep my interest and to keep my sketchbooks in rotation I'd consider it, but really it just seems like a party con first, with a furry con on the side, and I need it to be the other way around.

--Mozdoc