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FERAL IS AWESOME
16 years ago
General
I just got back from my first Feral! ever. I can only say this to all of you out there.
GO TO FERAL IF YOU EVER GET THE CHANCE. It is now officially my favourite con.
I shall recount my experience in detail now!
Saturday morning, I was picked up by my pals
lostcat461 and Tru. Drive up was about six hours long, and we arrived at the site in time to watch all the furries flood in and take over the camp. Let me say right now just how beautiful it is up there. The air is clean and clear, the lake is beautiful, just pure Canadian wilderness. I felt alive just being outside.
It rained for the first two days, and it was pretty cold. We got stuck in a cabin with no heater and a bunch of random cabin mates, but it turned out great. Excellent company in our cabin, we worked around the cold. Nice warm showers. Three solid all-you-can-eat meals per day, so long as you're up by 8 am. The food was EXCELLENT compared to what I expected, given the location and price! The camp staff were very good people, and somewhat surprisingly seemed to enjoy the furries!
Now as for the actual con (if it can be called that), there was never a dull moment. Saturday night I hung out at the campfire despite the bit of rain, had a good time getting into a nice primal groove drumming around a campfire. Afterwards, had tons of fun telling and listening to stories there until we just downright got rained out.
Sunday morning, I kicked the day off with some archery, learning the proper way to use a bow, and talking ranged-weapon hit-rating stats with fellow WoW nerds. Did some rock climbing, which was a fun exercise in denying inbred fears, but I got showed up proper by a few others there. About then I found out that poor Ryan had fallen ill, and we wound up taking the poor guy to stay in a nice warm hotel for a night so he could recover, though he wound up missing a lot of whole experience.
In the afternoon, I hung out at one of
Kyell's two writing workshops, which was a very informal, yet fun and informative deal. Except that it was cold, oh so cold, in our little hut. Trading post was fun to browse and pick from. I enjoyed (somewhat sadistically) watching poor Kyell's wrist get a good workout from all the books he signed.
Monday morning I went out Kayak'ing for the first time, and it was awesome. The lake was pretty still, and mostly empty save for a few friends, so we made our way to a small island and just stood there taking in the scenery for a while. On my way back I picked up a tennis game, another first-time for me believe it or not, and had lots of fun there. In the afternoon, I decided to go out on a limb and try to make myself some ears at
Noblewolf's workshop. They actually came out alright, though they're not attached to anything just yet.
Then there was Predator vs. Prey. One of the definite highlights. I exhausted myself chasing down prey and fleeing fire and disease as an omnivore. In the end, I survived by evolution; made myself appealing to corporate America as a hound dog in order to stay alive. :P I done got tamed.
Monday night, there was furry improv. It kicked ass. Three-headed singers, entire scenes containing only five words, and a couple of people trying to get someone to give them a wedgie without saying anything. It was beyond awesome (and totally PG-13, of course, for sure...).
Tuesday was the last full day. Attended Kyell's other (had-to-sign-up-early) short story workshop. I learned a lot, hope I gave out a lot of helpful (if kinda cruel) criticisms and comments. Capture the flag happened that afternoon, which was like... LARP military CTF. People with swords dismembering others on their way to the flag and so on. Totally cool.
Over dinner, I WON SOMETHING AWESOME. And somebody else probably deserved it juuuuust a bit more than I did, but thems is the breaks! I will confess here inside this impenetrable wall of text that I (totally platonically) love Kyell, he's just an awesome guy. Kyell, if you're reading this, I'm sorry for being a fanboy, but you're just that cool. :P
CABIN SKITS! I hear people don't usually wanna do 'em, but they were probably the most fun I had, and I was even looking forward to it! I was Charlie in Charlie the Unicorn goes to Feral!. So, yeah, you can imagine the kind of show it was. In the end, a bat that flew onto the stage won the whole competition, and I got a free beer. No complaints!
Packing up to leave was sad, but I occupied myself filling my conbook with peoples signatures and contact info (and other positively silly things). It's like the last day of high school, only people actually CARE. And then we got in the car to go home, and then I got home, and then I went on FA, and then it was now, and then I don't know what happened!
---
TL;DR VERSION!
FERAL RULES. ATTEND IF YOU WANT TO FEEL WHAT LIVING IS LIKE.
SHUN THE NONBELIEVERS
SSHUUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN-NUH.
GO TO FERAL IF YOU EVER GET THE CHANCE. It is now officially my favourite con.
I shall recount my experience in detail now!
Saturday morning, I was picked up by my pals
lostcat461 and Tru. Drive up was about six hours long, and we arrived at the site in time to watch all the furries flood in and take over the camp. Let me say right now just how beautiful it is up there. The air is clean and clear, the lake is beautiful, just pure Canadian wilderness. I felt alive just being outside.It rained for the first two days, and it was pretty cold. We got stuck in a cabin with no heater and a bunch of random cabin mates, but it turned out great. Excellent company in our cabin, we worked around the cold. Nice warm showers. Three solid all-you-can-eat meals per day, so long as you're up by 8 am. The food was EXCELLENT compared to what I expected, given the location and price! The camp staff were very good people, and somewhat surprisingly seemed to enjoy the furries!
Now as for the actual con (if it can be called that), there was never a dull moment. Saturday night I hung out at the campfire despite the bit of rain, had a good time getting into a nice primal groove drumming around a campfire. Afterwards, had tons of fun telling and listening to stories there until we just downright got rained out.
Sunday morning, I kicked the day off with some archery, learning the proper way to use a bow, and talking ranged-weapon hit-rating stats with fellow WoW nerds. Did some rock climbing, which was a fun exercise in denying inbred fears, but I got showed up proper by a few others there. About then I found out that poor Ryan had fallen ill, and we wound up taking the poor guy to stay in a nice warm hotel for a night so he could recover, though he wound up missing a lot of whole experience.
In the afternoon, I hung out at one of
Kyell's two writing workshops, which was a very informal, yet fun and informative deal. Except that it was cold, oh so cold, in our little hut. Trading post was fun to browse and pick from. I enjoyed (somewhat sadistically) watching poor Kyell's wrist get a good workout from all the books he signed.Monday morning I went out Kayak'ing for the first time, and it was awesome. The lake was pretty still, and mostly empty save for a few friends, so we made our way to a small island and just stood there taking in the scenery for a while. On my way back I picked up a tennis game, another first-time for me believe it or not, and had lots of fun there. In the afternoon, I decided to go out on a limb and try to make myself some ears at
Noblewolf's workshop. They actually came out alright, though they're not attached to anything just yet.Then there was Predator vs. Prey. One of the definite highlights. I exhausted myself chasing down prey and fleeing fire and disease as an omnivore. In the end, I survived by evolution; made myself appealing to corporate America as a hound dog in order to stay alive. :P I done got tamed.
Monday night, there was furry improv. It kicked ass. Three-headed singers, entire scenes containing only five words, and a couple of people trying to get someone to give them a wedgie without saying anything. It was beyond awesome (and totally PG-13, of course, for sure...).
Tuesday was the last full day. Attended Kyell's other (had-to-sign-up-early) short story workshop. I learned a lot, hope I gave out a lot of helpful (if kinda cruel) criticisms and comments. Capture the flag happened that afternoon, which was like... LARP military CTF. People with swords dismembering others on their way to the flag and so on. Totally cool.
Over dinner, I WON SOMETHING AWESOME. And somebody else probably deserved it juuuuust a bit more than I did, but thems is the breaks! I will confess here inside this impenetrable wall of text that I (totally platonically) love Kyell, he's just an awesome guy. Kyell, if you're reading this, I'm sorry for being a fanboy, but you're just that cool. :P
CABIN SKITS! I hear people don't usually wanna do 'em, but they were probably the most fun I had, and I was even looking forward to it! I was Charlie in Charlie the Unicorn goes to Feral!. So, yeah, you can imagine the kind of show it was. In the end, a bat that flew onto the stage won the whole competition, and I got a free beer. No complaints!
Packing up to leave was sad, but I occupied myself filling my conbook with peoples signatures and contact info (and other positively silly things). It's like the last day of high school, only people actually CARE. And then we got in the car to go home, and then I got home, and then I went on FA, and then it was now, and then I don't know what happened!
---
TL;DR VERSION!
FERAL RULES. ATTEND IF YOU WANT TO FEEL WHAT LIVING IS LIKE.
SHUN THE NONBELIEVERS
SSHUUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN-NUH.
This was about as good as it gets, man. :P
(<-rock climbs and kayaks, though less this year than he should)
Thanks again for giving that out at all, by the way! Free stuff is awesome!