What a nice three day weekend spent up in Knoxville, TN. Here are some of the highlights:

Took  VitaminR up to the con with me. I had previously taken him up to his first con at FWA and he seemed to like that a lot so I thought it would be cool to get in with him at FangCon. He had his first fursuit too, which was pretty awesome, and I was happy to see him debut it.

Met  KwiPie who stepped in to be our roommate when everyone else fell through. She was a lot of fun to have around and was glad to have been able to help her have this experience too.

Finally got to meet  Keefur who had been trying to coax me into coming to this since last year! lol, he's an awesome gentleman to talk to and I'm glad I was able to get to know him better. He definitely knows his stuff re: the fandom.

Also free beer, and not just from the  frozenoasis. Keefer had a few keggers brought in from local breweries. Frozen Oasis' party was great too, and I love what they did with the blacklight. The slushy mix seemed to be endless.

Niic the singing dog was...bad. Baaaad. It turns out my initial assessment of his music was correct: He is great at singing in that rapid fire vocal style reminiscent of hip-hop or rap. His song "Paws To The Wall" is done entirely in this style and is really and truly excellent. But when he tries to sing outside of his range, which he does often and which many of his new songs call for, he chokes. It sounds like really bad karaoke. He's supposed to be a really big deal up north too, and getting him down here was supposed to be a big draw for southern furries. I guess the furs up there just have lower standards.

The other acts were pretty boss though. Rhubarb the bear wandered around the con playing music and Husky In Denial not only ran a ton of promotions for the release of his album "Kung Fu", he also played a score of material both new and old incredibly well with just an "acoustic" guitar and a few effect pedals.  ADDF also rocked out the show with a loose, off-the-cuff feeling set performance that included a broad range of covers (Hendrix to Disturbed) as well as some original material from their EP, of which I was able to get a signed copy at the charity auction. They were totes badass.

Epic rounds of Cards Against Humanity with my friend  skarskitsune and his lady  Nikada. They had a ton of hilarious card sets and expansions, including epic custom cards that really made the game unpredictable and fun. It was great getting to actually spend some time with them, especially since I only barely ran into them at Anthrocon the year that I went.

Speaking of which, this was a very small con. A very small con. We had some 300 something people show up, which broke the previous record of 200. It is only the con's third year though, so some of it was expected, but when I got there I was a little afraid that there wouldn't be much to do over the weekend. I was wrong though; it being such a small con actually made it easier to meet people and socialize with them. You ended up running into the same folks over and over and could always be involved in whatever was going on at the time; it was really great! I think if I can I will try to work it so that I make one large con and one small one each year.

It was great. I relished being able to host a room instead of being a guest for a change. I remember in my early FWA days when I used to get a room by myself and get frustrated at not meeting anyone...things seem so different now.

Watching Graye at FangCon made me consider perhaps volunteering at FWA. I am getting older and more experienced at the whole con thing, so the time will soon come anyways, I feel. It's a way I can give back to the community since I'm not an artist or anything, lol. Something to think about...

Good times. I had fun meeting everyone there and would definitely consider returning another year.