I was getting caught up on my Notifications and realized I haven't posted a journal in a while.

Things have been going well. My job has been a bit overwhelming for the last few weeks. The person who covers the front desk for one of our offices quit with only a few days notice so they asked me to go up to that office, learn the specific tasks she did, and basically cover until a replacement is hired.

Upside: I've been able to streamline some of the tasks she did, so what took her hours takes me minutes.
Downside: I have to get up two hours earlier than normal to drive to this location and open up. I'm a night owl, this schedule is driving me mad and draining me.

For those who don't know, I'm on Staff for  pinefurcon, mostly in Registration and the Game Room. I had a lot of fun volunteering this year and am glad to provide more support going forward.

I also agreed to be on Staff for Anthrocon. It took me long enough to get off my lazy butt and help. :-D

I had a lot of plans for this year's Anthrocon and while I didn't get to check off everything on my ToDo list or even take that many photos (compared to prior years), I still had a lot of fun.

For the first time, I didn't go to any panels. I didn't attend  AgentElrond's reading. I missed all the therian-related panels and assorted meet-ups. I didn't even get to  SwiftFox's Astronofur party to look through his telescope.

Why? Well...I was busy. And lousy at time management.

In the Report for last year I said I kept promising to volunteer and kept putting it off, well not this year.

After arriving in Pittsburgh I go to the convention and the expected super-long line for pre-registered Attending. My brain says "Are you sure you registered as Attending and not Sponsor?" I get my phone, find the confirmation email and go "Yay". I wait a much shorter time in the Sponsor line to get my badge and small bag of nifty items. Now that I was legal, I went to fulfill a promise and drop off the item  Stele made and asked me to deliver for the Charity on his behalf. Having some free time, I went to ConOps to offer my services and was given a snazzy SUCKER VOLUNTEER ribbon, a timeslip for recording hours, and sent back to (of course) Registration to help. After that, I meandered my way through the con, intending to charge my phone and check with  NovarLynx about getting the hotel room key when a fairy godmother brought me to the ball  Estobhan,  DonDrakore and  Talu_Lupus swept me up in their journey to the fabled Primanti Bros sandwich shop where I enjoyed some spicy garlic buffalo bites...the only non-pizza food I had all weekend.

Not kidding. Three days my only meals were "two slices of pepperoni on a paper plate." To be fair, two of those were to get the DogBowlSpecial at Furryland. Fernando's finally closed, but the location was picked up by PizzaParma to continue the tradition of offering furry t-shirts and paw-shaped dogfood bowls with a snack on it. And it wasn't the only location that changed. Tonic, a bar/restaurant that was across the street from the Westin, was replaced with Condado, a taco bar/restaurant. I went there a few times to hang out with friends, but as I don't eat tacos (I'm finicky!), I just had cola.

I went back for more volunteering over the weekend, helping out in Registration and the Artist Alley. I enjoyed it a lot and got to see some of how things work from the other side, which I'm always curious about. And had some unique experiences, like talking with Grandma Kage about folding shirts and seeing an attendee actually act like a sucky customer and demand to speak with a supervisor!

I must give off customer service pheromones or have HELP DESK shining above my head. Multiple times during the weekend, random furs, who could not have seen my Volunteer ribbon, would approach me asking for directions. This happened whether I was off to the side chatting with a friend, or even just walking the streets of Pittsburgh.

I also got to spend time hanging out with some cool people like  Scriber,  Kalleo,  Trianine and  Nighteyes, most of whom I only get to see at cons.  NovarLynx,  wayonoransky,  MidnightXenesis and  staticfoxtf2, who I shared a room with (5 Stars, would room with again). And other new friends I met there, or knew online and finally got to see in person.

And hanging out with friends at some themed room parties. I got to meet some cool people and try some new things.

I do regret not getting to hang out with Kanga. We were going to get together and play some card games, but our schedules never meshed. Next year, definitely.

I enjoyed going through the big Dealer's Den, picking up some stuff and looking longingly at some items currently out of my price range. I picked up the latest Professor Odd stories from Goldeen Ogawa, and the latest Rough Housing comics from  the_gneech. I finally got a brush and some cinnamon spray to groom my matted tail. I also splurged on a sleeveless LED hoodie. Why? Cause I saw  NightEyes wearing one the night before and knew it was something new his boyfriend was selling. So I go to his table to try one on (in red of course). I'm not fully convinced. I hand a friend my phone to take a photo, put on my awesome sunglasses and flip the hood over my head. Dayam, I look like an electric monk. Fine, here's my credit card. After walking through the entire Den on Saturday I reach the end and am at  MajikCraft's table with custom plush and etched drinking glasses. I'm looking over the selection and chatting with her (she is really cool) about plush. I make an offhand comment that the stuffing in my wolf plush Oscar has shifted and he's become floopy and droopy. Majik says she does plush repair. I spontaneously generate an ! over my head like a cartoon character and dash back to the hotel to pick him up. She says it shouldn't take too long, quotes a reasonable fee. Oscar's my first wolf plush, I got him about 20 years ago at Wolf Hollow. He's my favorite and often poses for my avatar pics. For the last couple of years I'd wanted to get him restuffed, but nervous about how good the "surgery" would be. I returned the next day and her work was superb. Oscar's belly was filled out and his limbs were rigid and full. And no "scars", I still can't spot the seam she used to open him.

Overall a lot of fun.There are the usual regrets of not getting to spend more time with friends, not getting enough hugs and scritches. Of not having a more balanced diet. Balancing that was the time I did get to spend with friends, some of the weird stuff I tried, and getting to volunteer. All of which made this one of the more fun Anthrocons for me. Can't wait till next year.

I haven't seen the usual Anthrocon memes in journals lately, so I'm re-using one from...2015? Damn, it's been a while.

Where will you be staying?
Omni Hotel. The cool one that looks like it's from Prohibition era.

What day will you be getting there?
Thursday.

How are you traveling?
By car. Leaving Wednesday with  eclipsethewolf, planning to stay overnight at the least skeevy-looking motel we find en route.
Will probably stay in touch with other  Maine_Furs en route, in case of emergency or to keep abreast of traffic conditions.

Who are you rooming with?
 NovarLynx,  wayonoransky and possibly some others.

How do you want to be addressed?
RunningRed, Red, Redsie, Sir, My Lord, Squee, It's You

Gender?
Male.

Age?
Forty-something. Mentally I'm early 20s (eats candy and reads comic books)

What do you look like?
Like this, but often with the addition of a red floofy tail.

Are you taken? Are you looking for a mate?
I am not taken at this time and wouldn't mind meeting a mate, lover or FwB.

Where/how can I find you?
I'll be around the hotel, convention center or city at large. I plan to Volunteer this year so will be hanging around the Con Center more.
I do plan to attend  AgentElrond's and  nighteyes's panels.

Do you do requests?
Yes. I can't draw for shit, My singing is horrible. I can do some impressions though, and will try to make anything I can out of buckyball magnets. I will do bad puns and sarcasms on request...though no one ever does.

Do you do trades?
Yes. You throw me the idol, I throw you the whip.
I also buy lots of trades, they're a quick and easy way to read comic book storylines.

Do you do commissions?
For a reasonable fee I will grant a commission to be an officer in the RunningRed Military.

Who will you be with?
No idea. Depends on who wants to hang out with me. Also plan to do some Volunteering which will be an interesting experience.

What is your main purpose for attending?
To reinforce the protective spells surrounding an imprisoned demon in the Pittsburgh area. Also to surround myself with furries, have fun, blow money in the Dealer's Den and this year maybe check out The Steepest Street in the US!

Can I talk to you?
Yes, yes, yes!

Can I take pictures with you?
Yes!

Can I touch/hug/cuddle you?
Sure, but ask first, in case I'm wearing something pointy.

Can I hang out with you?
Sure. I hate going to a con and being alone.

Do you go to parties?
If invited, yes.

Do you fursuit/costume?
Partial only (my ears and tail). Don't have a full suit yet.

What/where will you be eating?
No idea. If I remember to eat.... I always hit up Fernando's for a dogfood bowl and slice of pizza. I try to visit interesting places, like Primanti, or Nick's Thai, or somewhere new and fascinating.

Can I come with you for food/fun etc?
Sure, it's more fun with friends, minions.

What is the best way to reach you?
I'm on Twitter/Telegram. If you're a friend I'm fine with sharing my ph# for texts.

Anything else?
If you want to meet up, lemme know in advance so I can look out for you.

I've uploaded the photos from the convention.
As usual, I split them among my galleries, so you can see more at
DeviantArt: PFC18 Gallery
Weasyl: PFC18 Gallery

My policies:
I respect the autonomy of my subjects. If you don't like the photo or change your mind and don't want your face/name shown, by all means let me know. I won't argue or question, I'll remove it.
And if you like a photo and want to re-post elsewhere, by all means let me know and I'll send you a copy (I also keep unedited copies). All I request is you ask first, and give me credit as photographer.

It was a fun weekend overall, but not without some minor gaffes. Nothing serious, more in the "amusing anecdote" vein.

There were a few panels I thought I'd attend as they were being done by friends of mine, but I naively assumed they'd be held on a Saturday or Sunday. So when I finally check the schedule the Monday before and see  Estobhan and  Stele's panels were Friday, when I'd normally be working. Swell.

Could I get the day off at nearly the last minute? I have one Critical Task I have to do, but maybe they can let me leave after that. My supervisor works in another office on Tuesday and Wednesday. I could send an email, but I'd rather appeal in person. So I'll get in a bit early on Thursday and ask.

Of course I'm running late. I get to the office, no lights on. Huh. Okay, maybe she's working in another office today. I clock in, check email, and my brain train comes to an abrupt halt. There's an email from my supervisor, she basically pulled a Jerry Maguire. Well. I find the person who was designated as her temporary replacement, "Hey, so I arranged to leave early tomorrow after [Critical Task]. With the changes is that still okay?" "Yeah, that's fine." Woot.

Friday morning I go in, quickly do Critical Task, go out and drive up to the DoubleTree making Whoop Whoop noises like Zoidberg. I get my badge and hang around the Registration/Charity room chatting with staff. It being a local con, most of the Staff are friends/acquaintances/assorted other people who tolerate my presence. And most of the Staff are buzzing around like aircraft trying to avoid a target lock. Everyone's walkie talkie kept going off summoning them from one problem to another. So...your typical convention.

Erin's panel went very well. She was in suit and gave a talk about her life and identifying as therian, furry, trans, etc. I set up my iPodTouch to record the audio for future reference.

Next was Stele's panel. It was a story hour, him relating weird anecdotes from his life, along with TechBurr and Haunter. It wasn't Maine-style, like Tim Sample or Bob Marley. Just telling them like he would hanging out with some friends. It was a little rough, and he did have a tendency to fidget, but I thought he did well and with some practice could be a regular storyteller, provided enough weird stuff happens to him.

With his permission, I set up my iPod to record his panel as well, and made a mistake I was kicking myself over all weekend. It's an older device and the battery isn't as powerful anymore. Despite being on for all of Erin's panel I assumed there was still enough juice for Stele's. I was wrong. And I didn't have a long enough charging cord. After the panel I plugged it in, and the app showed a saved file...with 0:00. Crap. It shut off before the end and corrupted the file. After the con was over and I had a chance to use my GoogleFu I found a solution (involving a HEX editor) and was able to fix the file, saving the audio up to the point the battery died.

The really sad part? The main reason I was calling myself an idiot all weekend? I completely forgot I had a backup battery in my backpack, for exactly these situations.

One of the reasons I wanted to attend Stele's story hour was because he reached out to me a couple of months before. "Hey, you remember that time, with that thing? I wanna use it in my panel and make sure you were okay with it" I was okay with him sharing. It was a weird situation, but once it was resolved, it was kinda funny. He didn't bring it up in his first panel, but in the second; ConDerps with  wayonoransky.

That panel had some hiccups, but was also enjoyable. Wayon and Stele both work retail, so there's no end to the stories they can tell.

Saturday I returned to the con feeling a little blah. After the last panel I was a bit bored. I hung around with nothing to do. Most of my friends were on Staff and too busy to hang out and everyone else seemed to want to be with people more interesting. This feeling hit me hard at the end of Anthrocon last year. But I head in, mostly for  Joaquin_N_Memphis's reading. He gave a good reading of stories related to some of the novels he has out.

And then it happened. I don't remember who it was, but I was chatting with a friend about how busy the Staff and Volunteers looked. The friend, who was also Staff, said they were really understaffed and always in need of help. Now, I've been going to Anthrocon on and off since 2002 and every year I tell my friends on Staff there that one of these days I should volunteer or something. They reply "Yes, you damn well should." Manana, manana.

This afternoon I figure, what the hell, got not much else to do until  blackpawwolf's fursuit photoshoot on Sunday. I walk over to the Security desk outside the ballroom and ask Gesten how one might go about volunteering for this convention, if it wasn't too lat. He pointed me toward Registration. Okay, I figure they have a form or something you fill out providing contact information, agreeing to abide by the rules of the convention, releasing PineFurCon LLC and its subsidiaries free from liability should volunteering result in death or dismemberment, that sort of thing. Maybe snag one of those nice VOLUNTEER ribbons to attach to my badge and use it to pick up ladies at the bar later on.

Nope. Registration just sends me right back to Gesten who gets on his walkie talkie offering up a victim to the Staff Gods, then points toward the GameRoom with an evil laugh.

I spent the rest of the day in the GameRoom, helping Hawk, Wayon and  Walolas, checking out controllers, helping people use the VR rigs, making sure nobody walked off with one of the huge-ass TVs.

A few attendees were playing a fascinating game called Secret Hitler. After the GameRoom closed, they adjoined to the Zoo where I got to join them in a few games. A curious and weird game. But fun.

Sunday I drove back to the Hotel, helped Radar take photos of his fursuits, then resumed volunteering. I got to employ my excellent data entry skills, honed from years of finding customer accounts when coworkers misentered information in every single field. I also won one of the raffle items, an Indiana Jones MicroMachine set. After Closing Ceremonies I stayed to help tear things down, feeling like a furry roadie and wondering if there were roadie shirts, then wondering if any Guests of Honor had riders like rock stars do, with requests like which brand of bottled water they get, and bowls of M&Ms with no green ones. Eh, what can I say, my mind loves going off on tangents.

I left the convention knowing I was going to sign up to volunteer or staff again the next year, and I was going to volunteer at Anthrocon this year.

Added a few new folders to help keep things organized.
I don't produce that much creative output so I didn't think it was necessary till now, but I was getting tired of scrolling through multiple submission pages to find something from years back.

So I added folders for art people have done of me, or for me, and some for stuff I've done.

Yesterday was a bit of a hectic day.
I woke up to find the apartment building next door was on fire and belching lots of yellow/black smoke.
And by next door I mean "the building on the other side of a six-foor alley from my bedroom window"

The building on the other side suffered some damage to the siding, my apartment building was fine, but only because, quite literally, that's how the wind blows.

After watching the fire departments from several towns work to put out the blaze, and taking several photos, I went into work (I'd already called and let them know I'd be late due to fire). Anyway, I was a little cold from no jacket and my shoes and socks were wet cause I stepped in a small river of runoff. The FD stopped me from going back into the apartment to change, and I didn't argue. I couldn't get to my bag of clothes in case of emergencies that I kept in my trunk cause a firehose was draped over my car.

So I spent the workday barefoot and smelling like I attended an out of control BBQ. And musing on the What Ifs?

I hadn't slept well the night before and opted to skip the gym. Turned out to be a moot decision. The power company cut the power to the area (to protect the power mains that ran by the burning building) and this included my gym.

So I return home, power still not back on, but the fire is out and they're in the process of knocking the building down cause it was a lost cause. I went into my apartment to put on a fresh shirt and fresh socks before heading around to get some more photos and vids of excavators knocking down the remains of the building.

I'd lived in this apartment for two years with my (platonic) friend Ben ( Joaquin_N_Memphis) and the view out of my bedroom window was a covered up window with small holes (venting for a dryer or air conditioner I assumed). And now it's gone.

Watching the excavators...it looked like two predators/scavengers tearing at a large corpse for meat. Noticing a parallel between what used to be a living home with furniture, personal possessions and memories being turned into debris, and a living deer or mammoth being turned into chunks of food. Not saying this in a negative way, I am a wolf after all. Just musing on the impermanence of things.

The power came back on, along with the hallways fire alarms. Part of knocking the building down was to expose hidden sections that were still burning. They did that, and hit them with water, which released a lot more billowing acrid plumes of smoke. Enough to trigger our smoke alarms. The FD came in to reset them, twice.

From what I read in the news, and this isn't 100% confirmed, of the 24 people who lived there, only one person didn't get out, an 89yr old man. Don't know if they determined the cause of the fire yet, but I have a vested interest in finding out.

The whole area smelled like smoke and it was pervasive enough in the apartment and my clothes that my nose really couldn't distinguish how bad it was in each room. We decided to wait on airing the place out until the outside improved a bit.

The street the building was on (our building is on an intersection) was blocked the whole day and night with a fire truck continuing to hose the site down with water and monitoring it for signs of more burning.

I get up this morning, having slept better than I expected, to find the FD advising us to move our cars from the adjacent lot, they were going to bring in a tower truck to continue hosing off the parts of the debris that were still smoldering.

I posted some pics to my Twitter yesterday. I took more last night, along with some short video clips. I haven't decided exactly what I'd do with them, maybe edit together and put on youtube or something.

Physically, me, my roommate and my possessions are fine, apart from a lingering odor of soot.
Mentally I'm just a little tired but otherwise okay. The fire was contained enough that there wasn't a sense of emergency, of an urgency to flee.

I do plan on buying a fire-proof safe to keep important documents and backups of my computer hard drive, it never hurts to plan ahead.

Just an FYI that I will be down in Mass visiting family for the holidays from Friday through Tuesday in case anyone wanted to hang out or see a movie.

I put this off for too long.
When I attend a con or meet and take a lot of photos, I spend weeks agonizing over them, trying to decide which few to upload. I don't want to flood my galleries and will pick ones based on quality of the pic and interesting subject matter. But I worry that I took photos of other people who won't get to see them.

I'd seen  awolfgod uploads his photos to a cloud and thought that might provide a solution. My FA/DA/Weasyl galleries would show select photos to represent my time at the event and a separate hosting site for people to look through to see if they're in any and maybe have a copy.

So my policy for flickr will be pretty much the same as my galleries.
1)I respect the wishes of the subjects in my photos. If you don't like how you look in the photo or don't want your face shown. If you've sold the fursuit or are gender transitioning and don't want open reminders of the past. Whatever the reason. Just ask and I'll erase you from the pic, or add credits/links, no problem.

2)I'm happy to share. If you're in a photo and want to put it in your gallery or twitter, I'm happy to oblige. I can provide the original file and edit/trim as needed. I'd prefer people don't just copy from the gallery, partly because I would like to know where the photos end up. My only requirement is being properly credited as the photographer.

My flickr is Here.
My AC2017 album is Here.

Been a rather drained month.
Between concrud and shitty sleep I've had like zero mental energy to handle furry-related stuff.
I have been feeling better the last few days, and get some work related stuff rearranged so I could get caught up on the submissions and comments and journals here.

Still need to decide what to do with photos. I'm not happy with Photobucket's recent douchiness.

Another summer and another year that I was fortunate enough to attend Anthrocon, despite many worries about being able to go. First, I spent nearly all of 2016 unemployed and money was getting tight. Then, when I did get employment, wasn't 100% sure I'd be able to take the time off.

I consider myself blessed by the Goddess that I was hired by a company that is pretty decent to work for, and cool enough to let me take a week off only a few months after joining them.

The roomshare was arranged months in advance.  Staggard reserved a room in the Omni and looked for roommates. Knowing she'd need help bringing heavy supplies to the Dealer's Table, her candidates must be the strongest furs she knew. Wanting roommates who'd be good company, they would also have to be charming and witty. And wanting to protect her feminine innocence and purity, only the most rainbow-flaming queers would make the cut.

But...everyone on that list already had plans so she settled for  Blackpawwolf,  novarlynx,  eclipsethewolf and myself.

For the rideshare I took Eclipse in my car. On a long drive it's nice to have a companion to help pass the time and keep the driver occupied with idle chatter. In this Eclipse succeeded. He is affable and I recommend him to any lonely long-haul truckers.

I forgot that my GPS has a weird definition of "fastest" and sent us through New York City traffic and New Jersey. Not places I'd normally visit; and with good reason, the first time we stopped, Eclipse noticed I was missing a hubcap. In my defense, on prior trips to AC it was usually with someone who didn't mind driving the whole way, or one time where we had to detour to JFK to pick up someone. Lesson hammered home, make note of the route before leaving.

We stayed overnight in a Super 8, checking in with the others via Telegram. Tag, who's from a part of Maine so far north that she can borrow a cup of sugar from Mrs Claus, said "Sleep is for the weak" and just drove all night.

We made it safely to Pittsburgh and any rumors that we saw drug dealers with a duffel bag full of coke at a truck stop on the I-76 and were weaving in and out of traffic to evade them until they rear-ended a Dodge Ram with a Trump bumper sticker are completely untrue and unconfirmable.

My experience at the convention was full of highs and lows. There is stuff I wish had happened differently, jerks I wish I'd avoided, but also experiences that will bring a smile to my face when I remember them.

I was looking forward to Radar's fursuit photoshoot and even brought some of  Joaquin_N_Memphis's novelty inflatables, but the whole thing got cancelled at the last minute.

I was also looking forward to  nighteyes' Readings in Terrible Fiction panel. It was scheduled for Friday night and I forgot about it until Saturday afternoon. THEN on Sunday I ran into Night in the Dealer's Den, apologized for missing it and he said the panel was moved from Friday to Saturday. This was after the schedule book was printed but it was on the website. I uttered some choice profanities that briefly turned me into RunningBlue. I mentioned that the LED lanyard I got from his boyfriend the prior year was kinda short, he said they got longer ones in, and even though I don't have a fursuit or go to raves, convinced me to buy one. I think he's secretly Jessie Custer. Since the lanyard cost $30 I got a free LED fidget spinner. Ooh, shiny.

One panel I did not miss was  AgentElrond's reading. She's a remarkable woman and her books are fun reads. She also wears some cool outfits when I see her at the cons. Her reading this year was set in the Odd-verse and was about uplifted rats. I bought more of her Odd and Driving Arcana books, to find out she had omnibuses with bonus stories. Sigh, can't afford them this year, but something to budget for in 2018.

On the topic of rats, one fellow I did not see enough of was  Scriber. He's an artist and a fan of rodents, and one of those I only ever see at Anthrocon. We hung out a bit on Sunday and unfortunately our paths didn't cross again that weekend. I'll have to recommend Goldeen's story to him, I think he'd dig it.

I'd always wanted to help out at Anthrocon, be a part of the process and not just a participant. Two friends of mine,  TRIANINE and  kalleo are staff and every year for almost a decade now I've promised that I'd volunteer. But I suffer from Chronic NeverGotAroundToIt and LazyAssitis. So when Tag asked if I'd be her Dealer's Assistant Minion, I was thrilled. Some of you may scoff. "I go to a convention to have fun, not work," you say. I'd reply that I did have fun. Sure after waiting in the Pre-registration line to get a badge I had to wait a long time in a second line to have it swapped for one that said Dealer on it, but I am a naturally helpful person and enjoyed assisting Tag at her table. I am also curious. I like to peek behind the scenes and see how things are put together, and I did learn a lot of things I never knew before about how the Dealer's Den is organized. And there were some perks, like having a safe place to keep swag as I made trips around the Den spending way, way more money than I should have. As to whether having a Dealer's badge helps one get laid...eh, a gentleman doesn't [REDACTED] and tell.

I was worried that I might have been a little annoying, always checking in with Tag to see if she needed anything. I'm sure many people wouldn't care, but I considered it a sign of trust and responsibility. I chalk it up to a Yankee Work Ethic, same attitude when I was head cashier or agent assist. I was going to show I earned it.

I did spend quite a bit of time in the Den and it was cool meeting so many creators. I had to stop by and say hi to  the_gneech, after archive-binging his Suburban Jungle and Rough Housing webcomics, I promised him I'd buy the dead-tree versions (does anyone even use that term any more?). And he was nice enough to sign everything for me. The Gneech is a cool guy who's been in the fandom a long time. I still have two of the old-style Suburban Jungle books he signed for me back at Anthrocon 2003! Between him and Goldeen, a decent chunk of my purchases are books I can log on Goodreads. Which makes me wonder if I can log the adult comics on there as well.

I also visited  bigblued's table to get some more vinyl stickers for my iphone to go with the ones on my ipad and ipod touch, and some for the HP laptop I got a while back. I showed one of the ladies there the paw print sticker on the back of my ipod. She remarked on how old it was, they didn't even have the template anymore. She explained that while the pad and toes were basic circles and ovals, what was important was the proportions and relative distances between them, and with my consent took a photo of my ipod for reference. They have an awesome selection and help show that a lot of dealers who sell at Anthrocon aren't just "artists" but also craftspeople. Something rare in an over-commercialized brand-conscious world.

There were some people I'd known online that I wanted to meet in person, unfortunately a lot of them turned out to be jerks. Most of the people I did bump into were cool.

I ran into  Negger and his friends on the first day, looking for a store to get a SIM card. My brain hadn't yet brought up my mental map of Pittsburgh from longterm storage so I flailed a little trying to recall how I got there with  Deejaydragon the year before. To my regret, I forgot the registration packets included local maps. In hindsight I'm going to recommend to the staff there could be a small guide for international visitors. Not just on SIM cards, but weird US customs like tipping.

I joined a CAH game with people from an online chat I was a member of, and one of them recognized me from last year when we played Cards in the Westin lobby until like...6am.He's a pretty cool guy and good artist. The next night he joined me and a few others in a game of Exploding Kittens where I got to try out the Imploding Kittens expansion pack. Pandora, another MaineFur joined us. She proved to be a formidable adversary with a hitherto unknown streak of evil. For those who are familiar with the game, she defused an Exploding card. Rules say you can shuffle it back anywhere in the deck. She calmly put the Exploding Kitten back on the top of the deck, knowing it was my turn next and that I had no Defuse cards. I commended her on a well played move and said I'd name it after her.

My furry getup consists of a hat with fuzzy ears and a huge-ass tail. Next to full-body or partial fursuits I'm pretty much invisible, but I forget that away from those fellows I'm likely to stick out. I'm walking from the Omni towards the convention, passing a van parked on the side while the father rearranges stuff in the back. He stopped me to ask some questions about the furry fandom. I answered as best I could and like to think I represented my fandom well (the way his son was holding his phone I think he was taking video of me, but I'm not sure and it didn't occur to me to ask). There's a panel called "Furry and the Media" for how to interact with reporters, but I think our fandom could use a more general one for helping people interact with non-furs in general. A bit of prep so you're not standing there going "umm...err" to general questions.

One of my favorite panels is also the most random. You never know how it will go from year to year. I'm not talking about Alkali's Whose Lion panel, but  SwiftFox's AstronoFur Star Party. Every year he brings his telescope to the roof of the DLCC to show us the sky. Whether we see planets and stars or a closeup of the stadium across the river depends on the capriciousness of the weather. This year the weather gods were kind. We got excellent views of a gibbous moon, Jupiter and several of his moons, and Saturn and his rings. I probably spend more time at this "panel" than at any other activity at Anthrocon. I was up on the roof for hours, taking turns looking through the scope, chatting with others and seeing the reactions of people who were seeing these sights for the first time. It sometimes feels that science is in a losing battle against ignorance and indifference. That people who came to Pittsburgh for furry fun and socializing took some time to come up and get wowed at celestial sights...gave me a bit of hope for the future. There was one gentleman there, after looking through the scope called to his two daughters sitting on a bench to take a look. The girls were wearing ears and tails and oohed and aahed at seeing the Moon and Jupiter. I don't know if the man was a furry himself, but it was clear he was encouraging his kids' interest in furry and science.

Last year Swift brought a solar telescope, one with filters designed to let you look safely at the sun. Unfortunately, every time I went up, the sun was behind clouds. This year I had better luck and got a great view. And new to this year, a fellow named  Jorric brought a huge telescope, one that sits on the ground. He wheeled it over on a hotel luggage cart. Its larger size meant we were able to see more distant or faint objects. He showed us the Ring Nebula, about 2300ly away. It looked like a fuzzy spot, but that was the first time I saw something outside our solar system.

A lot of the good feelings I had through the con evaporated Sunday night. For reasons I'd rather not put in a public blog, I spent the night pissed off and in a bit of a funk. A part of my mind was saying "Fuck this. People suck. Furries suck. Leave now and don't come back." Another part of my mind was saying "This is just a small flood of negative emotions. You know the con is great. You have friends who care about you. Don't let a tiny bad experience taint a larger good experience." One of the advantages of being a werewolf is I have experience with being pissed off, controlling it, and the consequences when I do or don't exercise that control. In a way I was overriding a mental shift into a creature of spite.

We've all seen an otherwise good time tainted because someone had a drama moment over a minor thing. It sucks, it's stupid, and I wasn't going to do that to others. So while a part of me wanted to go on Twitter and Telegram and whine like humans do, my inner wolf guided me away from the con and other furries, along the Riverwalk in a direction I hadn't gone before, to restore my mellow. I saw a rabbit scurry through the brush, took photos of the Moon and planets above the convention center and looked to distract myself with curiosity about what else was around the con area that I'd never explored before.

I did make some carefully edited posts, and got a reply from an old friend who invited me to come by his hotel room to talk.  AutumnFox is an old friend, a therian I'd known online for many years, but we rarely interacted in person. I think the last time I visited him was not long after I moved to Maine and was the same visit where I first played Sly Cooper and GTA 3 on his PS2. We'd drifted apart and despite seeing his fursuit self in passing at cons, hadn't really reconnected.

Well, I was feeling my mellow returning, enough that I felt ready to interact with others, and made my way to his hotel. We talked for a bit, he helped me regain my mellow and we made plans to stay in touch better after the con.

It was now technically Monday, the epilogue of the con so I returned to our room for some sleep before the long drive home. Tag left hella early, like a ninja. Eclipse and I prepacked the car on Sunday so we were out the door shortly after waking up. Having learned my lesson, we discussed optimal routes back to Maine and I made a list of the highways so we'd know what numbers to look for. It worked pretty well, we didn't get lost or sidetracked by a schizophrenic piece of navigational software. We stopped for lunch at Perkins, one of those simple family restaurants with an uncomplicated menu and a selection of baked goods for sale at the front register for taking home. The rest of the ride home was uncomplicated by trouble, drama, or having to explain what furry porn is to a New York State Trooper. Or how she can set up her own FurAffinity account. I don't need to say hi to Ofc Stevens.

I got Eclipse back to his house, then returned home to say hi to Ben and decompress after a long drive. My office was closed the next day for the 4th so I spent some time sorting my swag and laundry before having to deal with work again, or a small case of con crud that gave me a nagging sore throat and cough for two weeks which delayed this post and my sorting through photos to upload.

I posted last month that the job was going well. I'm doing productive work, getting feedback, no one's asked for my supervisor and I've not been asked to upsell anything.

The only stresses were neurotic fears that the shoe might drop and the contract with the agency would be ended for no reason. Like what happened last fall with another assignment.

Now that worry is over.

As of last week all the hurdles were cleared and I was handed standard and non-standard employment paperwork to sign to become officially, their IT Guy. The W4s, the I9s, a sexual harassment policy (as in, don't do it), a policy for using company computers and internet access...
Hahahahaha. *breathes in* Hahahahahaha.

I still haven't funny finished with my staffing agency yet. My supervisor thought I was making $17/hr, but the agency was paying me $15.5. I'm willing to chalk it up to human error and misunderstanding, but I will see about getting back pay.

I would like to see if there's any way I can change my hours to maybe start a little later in the day. Mornings suck. :P

I'm looking through the backlog of submissions and journal entries and comments, trying to keep up with my social media accounts. Oh hey,  estobhan plays the piano.

The job is going well and I've been assured by my supervisor that they do want to hire me on once they finalize things with my staffing agency.

I'm still looking to find the balance between being productive and taking some short breaks to check FA, or Weasyl, or Twitter. And have the mental energy to do so. If I reply to a journal, or comment on art, I feel the artist/writer deserves my full brain power and not just a simple "nice pic, derp" comment.

I've also been working on pre-ref sheets, getting ideas down on my characters color schemes, persona, etc. It is something I've procrastinated on for too long. And I promised  nashida that I'd commission a ref sheet from her, and I intend to fulfill that promise...soon. Ish.

By the end of the day I have been tired. Not sleepy tired, but drained. And sometimes with a slight headache. I'm not sure if it's the office...a lack of ventilation, sitting next to a huge-ass copier/printer, mold in the rugs. Or my caffeine consumption - all the iced tea I drink. Similar stuff happened when I worked Plum and I attributed that to stress and caffeine crashes. I'll see if switching drinks in the afternoon helps. Or drinking diet coke which has less caffeiene.

It's been a rough couple of months, money-wise, since my last temp job ended abruptly last September.
But things improved. In early January, one of the staffing agencies had a data entry job starting in a few weeks, with the possibility of continuing further. Interestingly enough, this agency was the first one I signed up with after leaving Plum, and this was the first lead they had for me that panned out...a year later.

The job was some basic data entry, QA stuff for a mental health clinic to make sure the clinicians were caught up on paperwork. The pay is good, the location is one I know well as it was down the road from my first apartment in Maine. Literally, right down the hill.

There was a learning curve to figure out the software and enough of the paperwork to give accurate info but the staff is super cool. The other temp who started with me didn't last long, after a week he bailed (whether for a better job, or he just didn't like this one, we never knew), but it worked out for me.

The supervisor asked if I'd continue the assignment as their "tech guy". Part of it would involve creating templates for forms and reports in the software as well as basic troubleshooting for their computers. I was initially hesitant, not sure if my technical skills were up to par, but as it turned out their requirements were more "computer savvy" than "sysadmin". That I am capable of doing a factory reset on a laptop, connect it to the wifi, set up admin and user accounts, clean off the bloatware and install company required software, means I'm more than qualified.

The work so far has been great, the staff are awesome. There's no metrics and no customer interaction. And with the "promotion" came a nice raise, so I am finally able to dig myself out of the financial hole I was in. And be able to add more cool stuff to my resume.

So back in October, a fur on here posted a Journal entry called Hillary Clinton paid people to incite violence at rallies. I wont, at this time, name that fur. The journal contained a link to a video that purportedly claimed what was stated in the subject line. The video was from Project Veritas Action. I did some checking and pointed out to this fur that PVA was a project of James O'Keefe, who had zero journalistic credibility after it was proven his ACORN videos were fake. This fur still claimed Democrats were evil and Republicans were good. He claimed his views were the only logical ones based on fact. After attempting to discuss the issue with him he stated that while he knew Trump had a horrible track record as a person, all he cared about was the idea Trump wouldn't take away his guns. He was certain that a Clinton victory would mean erasure of the 2nd Amendment.

Ah, makes sense. This fur was an NRA cultist who only cared about his assault rifles.

Now, recently I came across this article proving O'Keefe was a liar whose video was 100% fraudulent. I was going to bring this up in the Journal thread, along with this article about a local conservative who kept screeching that gun regulations were evil, who was killed in a beautifully ironic way when he was stupid, careless and sloppy with a loaded weapon. And to my surprise, the original Journal was deleted. No commentary, no acknowledgement he was duped and tried passing along lies like a bad headcold.

Again, not a surprise. I post this journal for multiple reasons. First, I don't want what this fur did to be forgotten. Conservatives love trying to rewrite their pasts and their sins and lies, but the rest of us remember and won't let it be forgotten.

Second, so you know why I might look with disdain upon you if you have an NRA icon on your FA page, Twitter, or otherwise indicate you are a member of that cult. Because it's saying you have no problem being a member of an organization with a long history of lies and manipulation and are incapable of thinking for yourself. And that you condone mass murder. Also massive amounts of selfishness. I have yet to meet someone who proudly claims membership in that organization who was willing to put his little boy fantasies secondary to the safety and security of other people.

Thirdly, so you know why I might look with disdain upon you if you say you voted for TerroristTrump, are Conservative, or otherwise support the GOP. Because it's saying you have no problem with people who routinely lie, refuse to accept responsibility for the problems they cause, and will regularly screw over other people to serve their selfish interests. I have yet to find anyone who claimed to be a Conservative who was able to think rationally, accept alternate viewpoints, or think of others. And this includes former coworkers and family.

Now, I still Watch this fur, because I don't throw away friendships based on disagreeing with their views. But in the past, when I have challenged someone who lets the NRA do their thinking for them, they end up unfollowing me from everything. Like Bluepawz who, despite everything I did for him at Anthrocon 2015, valued me less than his paranoia about Democrats revoking access to guns.

After 14.5 years I've decided it's time to cancel my livejournal account. The decision was partly that very few people I know use it. At this point it's just some Bronies and Ursula Vernon. The main reason, as I learned via  sdwolf is that the Russian company that owns LJ moved everything to servers in their own country. So they are no longer under any U.S. privacy/protection laws (not that such things have stopped our own NSA) and firmly in the hands with a highly unethical leader who led a hacking effort to screw over the US election in favor of his buddy Trump.

While it is unlikely they would use information from my lowly blog for any nefarious purposes, it was enough for me to say "fuck it, I'm outta here."

I will spend the next several days making a backup of my entries. A slow process as I don't want to save them in XML and being near broke I can't afford BlogBooker's rates to copy multiple years.

After that I shall delete the account and...decide what to do next. I don't know if I'd do another "here's stuff that happened to me today" blog, but at  Joaquin_N_Memphis's suggestion I may open a WordPress to put the random thoughts I get that are too big for Twitter.

I do apologize for the delay in getting these photos up. I could blame the temp job I started in late July but the truth is I suffer from procrastination and low energy.

I hope you enjoy these photos. I know I'm not the best photographer so welcome any feedback, suggestions or criticism, especially my decision to take several photos in sepia or black and white, in fitting with this year's Anthrocon theme of The Roaring Twenties (as it's AC's 20th anniversary).

More photos on Weasyl and DeviantArt.

So the mini golf went well.
I was totally surprised at how many people showed up. Likely cause I didn't think to set up a RSVP system.
It was a very hot and sunny day.
 Stele and  kalleo showed up with a cooler full of ice and Gatorade.
There were almost 20 people, but only 15 who had the time to play. We split up into four groups, two for each course, then switching, so we didn't block things for other players. I went with  awolfgod,  novarlynx and  stele. Behind us were  gizmo_nine and his friend. I was glad Gizmo came down cause I rarely see him anymore.

I'm not sure how the other teams did, but we had fun. We didn't take it too seriously and laughed when our balls went in the water, or bushes, took silly photos.

For the second course, Novar, Spangler and others suited up (mostly in partials due to the heat) to golf and get photos.

The numbers dwindled and after both courses we were down to 10. Spangler had wanted to suit around the tourist area, the amusement park and cheap stores, but group consensus was to find a sitdown restaurant. We settled on Portland Pie in Scarborough. We also had some lovely Zootopia sheet cake Spangler brought.

There was a slight medical emergency that evening, but it got resolved.

Hope to have more OOB meets in the future.

Sunday, the last day of the con (mostly). I told myself I'd do a lap of the Dealer's Den, see if there was anything worth spending my dwindling money on. For me it's kind of a tiered system, ranging from stuff I have to buy down to indulgences and stuff that is nice but I didn't think I'd really use. As always happens, my plans derailed by running into someone I knew, this time  kalleo in her Tobi fursuit. I told her I promised  NightEyes I'd visit his boyfriend's table and we went off to find it. I found a table that looked right, asked if he knew NightEyes and of course he asked which one (as there are a few with it). I said Coffee and ding, it was him. I looked over his jewelry while Spangler's attention was drawn to LED lanyards, particularly a green one the same as Tobi's hair/bandana. I picked out one for myself, in red of course, and a lovely pendant featuring the therian symbol with a wolf over it. Spangler wanted to get out of Tobi and get him dried but, of course, got distracted. This time by  blackpawwolf who bought a set of  TaniDaReal's mood badges. Spangler saw them and immediately wanted some. I thought this odd as I'd been wearing a set myself all weekend! Harumph. We found the table and Spangler mulled over which species, and what extra badges to get. I put up with this for two reasons. Spangler is my friend and a cool person to hang with. And second, she said she'd let me borrow Tobi to suit around in. Squee. We got to her hotel room where she gave Tobi a quick sanitize, and lent me the head, tail, bandana and four paws. The torso she deemed too sweaty to wear. I'd gotten to try on a fursuit head once or twice before but never had the chance to go suiting as it were.

It was a little cumbersome. The paws were very large so I had to learn to walk with a wide gait. The paws had four fingers and I had some trouble figuring which of my fingers went with which of his. The head fit okay, but I was never certain I had it on correctly. I found myself often lifting up the muzzle to get fresh air to my mouth. The eyes were very hard to see out of (I knew this already, in fact, I got to wear Tobi's head for a few minutes at a bowling meet). When walking I'd move my head from side to side to increase my peripheral vision to look for obstacles like people, feet, service dogs, stairs. I wouldn't have minded a handler but none of my friends were free. I made my way around the Westin lobby, then over to the DLCC. I got several pictures taken with friends, a few people asking to pose with them for selfies and interacted with others. I was my usual goofball self, but now I had the excuse of "being a fursuiter!" Actually, the first thing I did, at Spangler's suggestion, was get a Fursuiter badge. 14 years since I first attended Anthrocon and I finally have a fursuit badge I didn't have to loot from a corpse. Whee!

Wearing Tobi I poked my head back in the Dealer's Den and came across  Negger, in his  Franko suit, hanging out at the SofaWolf table. Of course I had to get my picture taken with him. I took a small breather (literally) and looked over his comic. Some of the style reminded me of Franco-Belgian comics I'd seen and we chatted about his inspiration. So of course I had to buy a copy, and he signed it with a lovely illustration on the inside cover. After the Closing Ceremonies I was done suiting and went to return Tobi. Spangler said I could just leave it with ConOps, but they were hesitant to take it for various reasons. I left word with a mutual friend and went to my hotel room to store him until I could contact Spangler, or barring that, prepare to take him back to Maine. I borrowed Tobi in good faith and I damn well was going to get him back to her in the same condition. Fortunately, she did contact me and I was able to return him safe and sound. And now with more of a desire to have a suit of my own. Someday. When I can afford one.

Monday.
Got up rather early, by my standards, along with my roommates. We got ourselves showered and dressed.  achievingMoses went down to greet  BluedergDSCH, and snag a u-boat for us. We load up, say goodbye to  Wanny and head off....to tour Pittsburgh. Moses had spent some time here in college and wanted to show us some of the neighborhoods he knew, including one that almost had me choking on my soda when he said it, "Little Caucasia." We headed east and arrived at JFK with plenty of time for  Deejaydragon to catch his flight, despite Moses' GPS sending us on a tour of Chinatown. The ride back to New England was for the most part uneventful and we parted ways at my parents. I enjoyed some cold pizza and an episode of Preacher before pushing on to return home. Another summer, another Anthrocon done.

I had a great time and I'm very glad I went. I got to say hi and hug people I see so very rarely and meet some new people I had only known online or were brand new to me. I got to bounce around in a fursuit and got to help out some friends. I think next year I'll see about volunteering. It's about time I did so. As always it was a learning experience and I made notes of what I'd do differently the next con.

Another awesome day. I idled away the noontime by finishing the Survey, then joined  Wanny to watch the Fursuit parade. I didn't bother taking video this year, opting to just snap the occasional photos. Right after this was my second commitment,  blackpawwolf's fursuit photo shoot. I felt honored that he was trusting me with such an important promotion for his business. He was up on the DLCC roof with several owners of his wares. I had a blast taking the photos, trying to use lessons I learned from others, getting the suiters interesting poses and just hoping everything looked good at the end of it. Radar and I had also hoped to have a  MaineFurs shoot, but only  daKotawolf12 came. With  kalleo having to leave that left Radar and Kota to pose. And in retrospect, I should have set the timer and gotten in some photos myself. Heh. Hopefully next year we'll have a bigger turnout.

After this, Radar and I suddenly came over all peckish, but desired something more than non-existent cheese. Last year I joined some friends at a lovely Thai place but had to leave early due to commitments. I was determined to visit them again and make up for it. I'm not normally a Thai kind of person, but when I visit Anthrocon I want to try new and different thing. So we ventured to Nicky's, home of tailed statues and unique bathroom sinks. I couldn't for the life of me remember what I ordered last year. This time I started with an appetizer of spicy wings, basil flavored, I think. I heard Thai places can have very spicy food, but also heard the food they serve white people has the spiciness ratcheted down a bit. I felt that jumping right to the hottest setting is dumb and you should get to know a restaurant and their levels of hot. I believe I ordered somewhere around 5-7 (out of 10, with the menu promising a fabled 20). And also, sometimes you want to enjoy the taste more than the sensation of your mouth feeling like the Ark of the Covenant was opened in it. The wings were good. For an entree I tried their Yellow Curry with Duck. I don't get to eat duck that often and Yellow had fewer of the ickier vegetables (ie, any vegetable not tomato). I was served two copper chalices from the end of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. One was filled with this kinda brown soup with stuff floating in it, the other with white rice. Umm....how do I eat this? I flagged down our waiter and admitted my ignorance. Apparently, you're supposed to put some rice on a plate, then pour the curry over it. Interesting! I tried some of it this way, but really don't like soggy rice. So I ate the rice plain and ate the duck bits from the bowl. An interesting and educational experience.

The next panel I attended was Swiftfox's Astronofur panel. And it was moved from the DLCC roof to the Riverwalk down below. I wondered what happened, was there a problem? Nope, Swift explained, it was his idea. There's a little too much bounce on the roof of the convention center when people walk on it and this is bad when you're trying to look at distant objects through a telescope. Unfortunately, this does limit your field of view. The point was kinda moot because, again, it was mostly overcast that evening. The best he could show us was Jupiter, and if you looked real hard, some Jovian moons. As before, those of us who attended hung around, took turns looking through the scope, asking Swift some astronomical type questions. And I guess to make up for it,  Sunnydancer and Moondancer came by and said hi.

Midnight rolled around so I went to  NightEyes's Readings in Terrible Fiction panel. It's a variant of the Eye of Argon readings scifi cons used to hold, but Night and Ocean Tigrox have chosen a furry novel, one that is truly, truly bad. Curiously enough, they used the same book from last year, and we picked up where we'd left off (and intending next year to continue where we left off this time). With the original variant, a player would read until they laughed too much, but due to the large number of people at the panel it was decided to limit readers to 2minutes during the first hour, then 1minute during the second. And there were some great readers. Several readers did impersonations, reading in the voice of Orson Welles, Schwarzenegger, Christopher Walken, and Kermit. One creative fellow read like Flash the DMV sloth from Zootopia, with Ocean reading ahead a la Officer Hopps. 2am rolled around and Dorsai kicked us out of the convention center. I eventually wound up in the lobby and chatted with some people there, including a fellow curious about therianthropy and some from a Telegram group I was in. We soon started a game of Cards Against Humanity, joined by some others loitering around the lobby who enjoyed a good game of being a horrible person. And we found it very hard to stop. We played down there till about 6am.

Friday was a pretty busy day for me. Around noon I escorted  deejaydragon to a nearby AT&T store to get a SIM card for his phone. The clerk knew we were attending Anthrocon and we chatted about it for a bit. On the way back I found some new art, the Strawberry Way mural. It was a rather random looking colorful mural painted on the alley for several blocks. I love exploring Pittsburgh and finding random art. It's like locating Easter Eggs or Hidden Objects in video games. Ever since I first saw Bobo's Escape From Death I've admired Pittsburgh's open enthusiasm for non-traditional street art. Hell, it's no wonder the city embraces Anthrocon. I'm sure to them furries are just another artistic expression that comes by each year to hang out for a few days. Back at the con I ran into  The-Kitsune-Cavalier and some friends. We went to Fernandos where I spent $15 for two slices of pepperoni pizza, chips, soda and a dog food bowl. The latter is why it was worth it. I now have four of them. And yay, they used the paw-shape for the bowl again. Jessica had her lovely parasol with her, but the patch job from ANE was wearing off. While I learned from Steele and brought my Leatherman, I lacked tape. We discussed whether it was worth it to replace or repair. I offered to take it home with me, give it a proper fixing and somehow get back to her in Mass to return it. Alas, I forgot to take it before we parted and didn't see her again the rest of the convention. Depending on how the summer goes I might be able to meet up with her again. Maybe at Furpocalypse.

The time had finally come. What I had been waiting for since AnthroNewEngland.  AgentElrond's reading. I got to the room, found a seat up front and was checking over my camera when this strange woman rushed over, greeting me and offering condolences on my job loss. I wasn't sure she was even talking to me (how often have you seen someone at a con raise their hand and say hi, only to realize they were greeting the person behind you) when I realized it was Rondie. O. M. G. The last time I saw this woman she looked like Whoville's accountant. Now she looked like a Warrior Princess. Gone was the vest and tie. In their place a very tight purplish shirt with a spirally motif. A heavily pleated kilt, belt and ass-kicking boots. Instead of a fuzzy purple pointed cap she wore a thick tiara that looked like it gave a +5 racial bonus to Elves. She didn't like someone waiting for an NPC to give her a quest, not someone about to read from a book she wrote. The only thing missing was a double-headed axe, one side notched for ogres, the other side for orcs. She later told me the other outfit was her winter outfit, this was her summer look. Well hell, I'd love to see what she looks like in the autumn. Yeah, I'll admit I was starting to crush a bit.

So anyway. I was here not just to support a great author whose ANE reading was so much fun (the voices she gave to each of the characters were AweSome) but also record it for posterity. I got out my iPodTouch, which I mostly use as a portable music player because it has a lot more memory than my phone and iPad combined. I asked Rondie if she'd like me to videotape the reading as well. An enthusiastic Yes. I set up my Nikon which would record video as long as there was space on the memory card and sat down with my Canon, a better camera for still photos but, for some reason, would only shoot three minutes worth of video at a time.

Rondie read some passages from her upcoming Professor Odd book, due to be released this summer. I thought it went very well and the story sounds like it's going to be another great read. After the panel I tagged along as she and a small retinue returned to the Dealer's Den. I bought the last Odd book, both Driving Arcana volumes (set in the same world as the story she read at ANE), and chatted with another panel attendee who, fitting in with the theme was dressed in an elegant pinstripe suit and hat. We discussed photography tips and I helped encourage him to pick up some Odd books.

I intended, at this point, to return immediately to my room and copy the video and audio files to my laptop because I prepare for the worst. So of course I get distracted and delayed by fursuiters and friends. I encountered  Wanny and DeeJay with  Negger (Yes. He knows what that sounds like in the U.S.) fursuiting as  Franko, the main character from the comic he drew (and was selling through SofaWolf). Of course I had to take some photos.

Eventually I returned to my room to discover two horrible truths. First, Apple really hates its customers. Unlike photos, you can't simply copy Voice Memos to Windows. And I didn't have iTunes on my laptop. The only other output option was attach to email but the iPod was wifi only (and I'd later find out there were filesize restrictions and 1hr of audio was too big). OK, make sure nothing happens to the iPod. Now for the video.

Where's my Nikon. Search bookpack. Search bookpack again.

Shit.

SHIT.

Shit, shit, shit. I LOST THE CAMERA? OK, it wasn't the camera I was worried about. It was a hand-me down and I still had my Canon (hell, I could have taken pictures with my ipad if I needed to). It was the video of the panel. That was irreplaceable. OMG, if I lost that. Rondie was so happy I recorded it. If I lost it, it would be such a disappointment. Still I had hope. I've lost stuff at Anthrocon before and recovered them (a few years before I lost a wrist wallet filled with $200 in cash and found it at the Artist Alley bag check, phew). First step, make my way in a panic to Con Ops. Then if need be, scour the hell out of the Dealer's Den. Lucky for me Fate protects fools, little children, and ships named Enterprise. ConOps Lost and Found had a black Nikon! How many pixels, they asked, to confirm it was mine. Err...umm. Wait, I took photos during the panel with my Canon. "There will be a video featuring a woman from this pic." Satisfied, they gave me the camera. I confirmed the video was still there, teleported by sheer force of will back to my laptop and copied the video file twice. And so like happens to a lot of us, what could have been a tragedy ended up being just an amusing anecdote. The Gods, however kind, do require some sacrifice. While they returned my cooler and camera, later in the con I lost my pair of really cool goggle-like sunglasses. You know what? They can have them with my thanks. I also learned some lessons. First, I need something on my camera to identify them as mine (like keeping a unique photo on the memory card, or carve my initials in the camera). Second, when taking pics/video of something important, immediately swap out the memory card and keep it somewhere safe on my person.

Relieved, I returned to the DLCC to meet up with Wan and Negger, still wearing Franko, going to  Senkolke's 2nd Annual International Fur Photoshoot. As with last year, it was mostly South American furs (but some Mexican furs did show up). I'm not sure if attendees from the rest of the world didn't bring their fursuits or didn't know about it, but I hope interest will grow and future shoots will show more representation from other parts of the globe.

I spent the end of the night in the Zoo with  Scriber, an adorable artist, and  blackpawwolf chatting about assorted things.

Another summer, another Anthrocon. And I almost bailed on it this year. Mostly cause of money. With no job and wanting to earmark my small income from Unemployment and Temp jobs to important expenses like rent and food, could I really justify the cost? For the last few years I have been trying to keep track of my convention spending and looking over the numbers I decided to risk it. My major expenditure being the Dealer's Den, I'd just minimize spending there. The other factor that almost derailed things was a pain in my side. See, the weekend before Anthrocon I managed to trip and fall hard on a gravel parking lot. I got a scraped knee and some scrapes on my palm from trying to stop my fall, minor, minor minor. But I also fell on my left side and that hurt. A lot. And it didn't stop hurting that night. It felt like Mike Tyson went to town on me. It hurt to sit, to stand, to lie down. I managed to get myself to bed and lie on my right side, getting some rest that night. Fortunately, the pain abated over the next few days. I figure I just bruised something inside. Eventually the pain was barely noticeable.

Despite these potential roadblocks, I had more reasons to not skip. I promised a few people I'd come and offer some assistance with things. Now, I'm not so egotistical to think that my presence was critical, I just like being helpful and feel I contributed. It was also a good way to improve my photography skills. And hell, like Applejack, I have a compulsion to honor my word no matter what.

Wednesday evening I take a leisurely drive to Massachusetts, not in any rush and enjoying the scenery. Haha. I lie. I cursed every slowpoke in the left lane and ignored the scenery. I'm from that state, driving in a rush is in my blood. I stayed at my parents overnight and was up and ready when  AchievingMoses arrived. Shepherd was hella prompt. He introduced me to his friend  BluedergDSCH, an amiable dragon with the tousled hair of a musician. We made a small detour for the obligatory stop at DD. Hindus pray to Ganesha before the start of a journey, New Englanders stop at Dunkin Donuts. Moses asked why I wasn't wearing my kimono shirt. I retorted that it was a bowling shirt, dammit, and was in my backpack. I was waiting until my hair dried to put it on (I never use a hair dryer). Kimono shirt, indeed. Just because it's long and has a Chinese dragon motif. The never of some...dammit. He's got a point, and the name kinda suits it. Fine. Thanks to Moses, it's now a kimono shirt.

We journey to New York City to pick up another dragon,  deejaydragon, at JFK. There was a small delay waiting for his flight. I know this will be hard for some to believe, as I'm part coyote, but I did behave myself in the airport and didn't make any jokes or pranks that would get me kicked out. I know when to be a good boy. Also, the pain in my side was acting up so I was feeling more snarling wolf. We get the dragon's stuffed stowed and I ask Moses and Shost if he looks like Bruce Vilanch, but neither of them knew who he was. We headed west to Pittsburgh, whiling away the time with light conversation in person and on Telegram and some app games. Games that drain the hell out of an ipad. Next year I should bring a book.

We make it to Pittsburgh with no complication, attributable to Moses' familiarity with the city. We unload our stuff at the Westin and into  Wanny's room. I manage to forget my snack cooler on the stone wall out front. A precursor of things to come. Fortunately, it was still there when I went back down, also an indication of my luck. It's too late at this point to register so we head down to the lobby to mingle. I take some photos of fursuiters, say hi to people I know and strangers I've just met. I got to meet some people from a Telegram group I was in, playing Cards Against Humanity in the temporary Zoo. It took some effort to find them because the directions they gave were poor. This was a recurring and aggravating problem, trying to meet up with people and getting vague as shit directions. Don't tell me you're wearing a black shirt and sitting on a ledge by the Riverwalk when it's dark and there's dozens of people there. Not helpful.

I will be attending Anthrocon this year, despite my lack of job prospects. I have enough space on my credit cards to carry me through some dry spells.

I don't think I'll post a meme though. Basically I'll be rooming with  wanny,  deejaydragon and  AchievingMoses. I'll be driving down with Moses and a friend of his. The current plan is to, again, detour to NYC to get Deejay, then pick Wan up at the Pittsburgh airport.

I have some small commitments, I promised  AgentElrond I'd help record one of her readings, to take photos of MaineFur fursuiters, and there might be some panels I want to attend, like Bad Readings and Whose Lion. But apart from that I'd be free and happy to hang out with people.

There are some people I never get to see outside of cons (like  scriber,  Trianine,  Wanny) so I would like to hang out with them when I can, but I'm always open to meeting people I've only known online. For me AC is about the social aspect. So if you want to meet me, hang out, get some dinner, whatever, let me know. I'm very easy to spot.

If you want my cell#, Note me, or connect with me on Telegram since I will check that for PMs and AC-specific groups.

I don't drink or smoke, but I'm 420-friendly and don't care if others drink. I hope to have some room parties and CaH fun, and being single would not mind some more intimate meetings.

I've been doing well at the gym lately. Since Ben and I moved, I had trouble finding a good gym. My old gym is too far away and their branch in Old Orchard Beach wasn't very good.

I tried a gym in Saco that was a bit high-priced, but their treadmills weren't good and the operating hours too short. i was having trouble even getting 2 miles on the damn things (and I found that the calibration on them was crap)

Then I found XL, just down the road. 24/7 and while it is smaller and has less equipment than my prior gyms, it does have what I use. And the treadmills have been able to give me a good run. I hope to make up for lost time this summer.

And shit, I should try and get outside more often. I'd love to get a local meet at the minigolf in OOB next month, just need to decide on a day.

And Ben and I may soon have a houseguest. A friend from up north wants to crash at our place while he looks for work in the area. Our landlord is cool with it so he should be coming in a few weeks. I'll give more info when things are more confirmed.

I haven't posted anything about my life in a while. I normally save such blogging for my LiveJournal.

I got a few one day assignments at the beginning of May. One was covering an Admin Asst at Catholic Charities while she was at a conference and the second was supposed to help cover an Admin Assist at a University who was on leave, helping get caught up on a backlog of invoices and related work. That only lasted two days because their HR found out temps can't help them with anything involving credit card info, due to privacy laws or somesuch.

I signed up with a few more staffing agencies, a few I dealt with last time I temped. One quickly got me a decent data entry gig for a medically-related office in Portland. The hours are early, and the pay isn't great, but it's better than nothing. They're migrating to different software and need medical information copied from the old system to the new. I did work like this before with Maine Medical.

I'm very glad for this assignment as my Unemp $ is going to run out in a few weeks, so the more I can push that back, the better.

The assignment is short-term, once the project is done, that's it (although like with MaineMed, they might keep me around a little bit to help on other minor things, as long as the project has the $ for it). I told them I need Anthrocon off, and related travel days, though it is likely the job would end before then anyway.

It has been hard changing my sleep schedule so as to wake up at 6:30, I havent gotten a decent night's sleep all week. So I've been more braindead after work and not up for getting onto chat. So today is my getting caught up on messages day.