I know I was sporadic with journals previously, but holy crap I didn't think I'd take 3 and a half years to update...

Not a whole lot to say at the mo, nor a whole lot of new art uploaded in that time (just haven't got the finances to pay a fair price for commissions - sooooon!), but I do log in on here daily so like... maybe I can try to actually get involved more and stuff?

Also planning to overhaul Scirus a little at some point, but let's not get carried away here. Baby ratty steps!

Confuzzled 2016 is, sadly, over now. This was my first ever furry con, and it was an absolute blast ♥♥♥ I'm already looking forward to going back next year!

I got to hang out with old friends, met some wonderful new people, and was blown away by the quality of the stuff on offer in the dealer's den! I had a great (albeit manic) time in there too, helping neonpossum and pyropaws with sales on their tables - their work was in great demand, which came as no surprise to me~ (It's not difficult to sell stuff when you're a big fan of it!)

I traded my horrendous scribble-art for some wonderful art with other people too, which was a hell of an experience for me. I'll try to scan and upload them in the near future~

It's back to reality now (possible 16hr work day tomorrow, whooo!), but I'm looking forward to more furry conventions and furmeets further down the line ^^

All the cool kids are doing it, and if nothing else I'm willing to jog swiftly along 20ft behind the bandwagon...

Where are you staying?
On-site! I've been given a randomly-chosen roomie though, so I'm a little anxious about that 8D;

What day are you getting there?
27th~(I'm too poor for the extra day ;; )

Who will you be with?
neonpossum, pyropaws, bunnybrambles and justsmith will be the main ones, though I'm hoping to see a bunch of the brumfurs there and a load of other lovelies too ♥

Do you do free art or trades?
My artist level is "stick figures" but if you reeeeeeally wanna trade for that then feel free!

Do you do commissions/badges?
See above~

Do you have prints/CDs?
And again~

Do you have art in the art show?
ONCE MORE WITH FEELING!

What suit(s) will you have?
No suits yet~

Can I dance with you?
I'd use the term "dance" loosely, but you're welcome to join in with whatever it is that I do!

What is your gender?
Fluid, but male-leaning

How old are you?
30 (aka "I'm 18 but I have 12 years' experience at it")

How tall are you?
In the 5'8" ballpark? Maybe a bit under

Are you mated? in a relationship?
My current romantic status is best described as "post-apocalyptic-wasteland-esque" if we're honest

Can I touch you?
Maybe? Some days I'm cool with it, other days I'm flighty and anxious, so ask first!

Can I talk to you?
Again, sometimes flighty and anxious, but I love meeting new people, so feel free to try! (Ask about my pets, you'll have me for an hour or so :P)

Can I hug you?
Once again, it's all about consent~

Can I take photos of you/with you?
Trashy selfies 5eva ♥

Can I buy you lots of drinks?
Well, if you insist...

Do you drink Alcohol/Smoke?
Never smoked in my life (I don't preach at people who do, though), but casual drinking is good uwu

Can I give you lots of money?
If you really want to? I have literally nothing to offer in return though

Can I hug or snuggle with you?
Didn't we already do this one? I think we already did this one...

Can we hang out?
I'm attending for the social side, so hell yes!

Are you nice?
My heart may be blackened, shrivelled and bitter, but it still holds a surprising amount of love for a lot of people. I pass for pleasant at minimum~

Where will you be most of the time during the con?
Probably scurrying around everywhere - events, dealer's den (I'm an assistant!), parties, lounge, taking photos and so on.

Other cons you may go to?
Hopefully Amecon? Other than that, I really wanna get to more Brumfurs meets! (Might plan other cons later, but it's loose and free for now)

Who are you rooming with?
I have been randomly assigned Tufty Indigo - adventure may or may not await!

Attending any events?
Opening and closing, probably the "I'm new here" type events, definitely want to do any that involve meeting animals, aiming for photography and suit-making ones too...

How can I find you at the con?
Look out for rat-related t-shirts and decidedly uncoordinated dancing~ (I'll hopefully have a camera on me too, so watch out for someone shyly asking for pics!)

So I'm definitely gonna be at Cfz this year, and it's gonna be MY FIRST EVER FURRY CON, WHOOO!

Dead excited for it; I'll hopefully have my camera along, I'm gonna be an assistant in the dealer's den for my two flatmates, and I'm planning to hit up the newbie events among others.

Any of my followers gonna be there? Would be nice to get a chance to say hi and stuff!

Putting a quick signal-boost out for someone who's been incredibly unfairly shafted by a screaming dickbag of a landlord (my wording, not theirs) - if you could take a moment to go and check out their journal about it and possibly help out, it'd be greatly appreciated ♥ It's rare that I'll signal-boost, but they're one of the nicest people I've met in this fandom, and no-one deserves to be treated the way they've been.

They've also just opened for commissions, and they're frankly a fantastic artist, so please go and check that out too! ♥♥♥

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(Also, apologies for the radio silence lately; things have been busy and I've been tired - hopefully things will pick up again soon!)

New day, new year, new list of shit to get done. I normally come into a year with a "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss" mentality, but I'm genuinely hoping this year's gonna be a bit different. There's just a certain vibe in the air.

2015 was tough for a lot of reasons, there's no two ways about that. A lot of that is gonna carry over into this year too. If I squint good and hard, though, I can see it maybe improving in the near-ish future. So let's work toward that.

I properly settled into a new circle of friends last year, and it's great to be with you guys ♥ I do miss the old circle too - I love you guys, and I'm always up for hanging out again! - but we just seem to be in the same place at the same time a lot less. Maybe we can fix that this year?

Not making any resolutions as such, as always. I've got my eye on a couple of targets though (maybe a new hobby, maybe resurrect old ones, maybe volunteer with St John's Ambulance), so we'll see how things go~

Hope 2016's a good year for everyone!

Spent today at the Birmingham Furmeet, and had a really good time!

Was lovely meeting so many furs, and I must have taken about 100 photos - hopefully a few will be good enough to upload here later!

Hopefully I can be a bit more confident and actually talk to more people at the next one, but I'll take what I can for now =w=

Been another long period of relative inactivity on here for me - life's been not far short of chaotic lately, though a bit of peace is finally on the horizon.

Work's been ridiculous, with a few 50-60hr weeks in a row - they're necessary, but exhausting, and much as the payslip is nice, I'll be glad to see the end of them. We're closing out an 8-month project, and we've done well so far - the extra hours are making sure we don't fall at the final hurdles!

Things have also been a little mixed on the home front - I make no secret of how much I love my pet rats, and we've had a torrid time of things with them recently. Over the space of five days, three of them passed away from various causes, and it's no exaggeration when I say that all of us in the flat were heartbroken over each individual one.

Tobio, our 18 month-old boy, had a zymbals gland tumour, which - in a nutshell - is an inoperable facial tumour that very quickly leads to poor quality of life. You can find more information here (that page is fine, but the pages it links to contain graphic images), but the short version is that it very quickly tends to result in needing to euthanise the rat - in Tobio's case, it was two weeks from detection to being put to sleep, which is no time at all.

Shortly after that, our tiny 8 month-old girl Kido developed rapid-onset pneumonia, and in the space of 39hrs went from pinging happily around the cage to death. We got her to the vet's within the first 12hrs and gave her a steroid injection and antibiotics, but she was just too small to fight it off. There was nothing more that could be done, so while it was just her time to go... 8 months just shouldn't be any pet's time.

In between those two, my special old lady Rin also passed away. She was much older - approaching 3yrs - but despite being blind and having weak back legs, she was still stomping around and rampaging about the living room like she hadn't a care in the world. We often joked that she might die tomorrow, in a year, or never, but it really did feel like that - she was a little warrior, tough as old boots and seemingly believing herself to be immortal, but she was the sweetest old lady you could ask for. So when she suddenly had a stroke, followed by a seizure that finished her off... I still don't think her passing has quite settled in. Hers has definitely hit me the hardest of the three - she's one of those special pets you never forget.

(I also have to give a shout out to  neonpossum for all the hard work he put in to nursing Kido during her illness, literally waking up every two hours check on/feed/water her. He was an absolute saint, and I only wish the outcome had been what his efforts deserved...)

There have been some positives, though. As any rat owner can tell you, rats need to be kept in social groups, and we found ourselves left with two boys in one cage and two girls in another, and with the risk of a rat being left on their own if anyone else passed suddenly, we set out to urgently find some newbies. We therefore now have two new boys (Badger and Casper) and two new girls (Freya and Astrid) living with us, and they're absolute sweethearts. They'll never replace those we've lost, but they're bright and beautiful sparks in their own right, and are in the process of settling in with their new cagemates now. As things progress, I'll be sure to put up pictures of them!

I'll put up some pictures of those we've lost in memoriam soon, as well as a commission I took out recently, and hopefully I'll get back into some semblance of normal activity on here soon~

Hope all my followers are doing well in their lives! ♥ (And if you made it this far, congratulations!)

This was just gonna be a short journal entry to say something to the effect of "Wooooooow, I've been inactive on here lately, I'll get back into things soon!" and kinda leave it at that. And that wouldn't be wrong; I have been much less active with submissions, getting commissions and leaving comments/faves on art, due in no small part to ridiculous time and effort and stress being spent on work leaving me in a kind of "Ehhhhhh" fuzz of an evening. Hopefully, that's done with for now, so hopefully I'll get back to fawning over all the gorgeous stuff you guys post ♥

But this post takes on a second reason tonight! I HAVE REGISTERED FOR CONFUZZLED 2016 I AM SO EXCITED YOU GUYS THIS'LL BE MY FIRST FURRY CON!!!

I need to get my camera out and start getting used to doing photoshoots again and stuff; I hear furries like getting shots of their suits or something?

Who else am I likely to see there? :3

Just letting everyone know that I'm off to Kitacon this weekend, so I probably won't see your glorious art and lovely notes until I get back Monday evening-ish - take care my lovelies, and I'll see you then!

For those of you who don't like the new ads, here is a nice guide for how to get rid of them (with or without blocking other ads), and here is a petition to have them removed permanently.

Just a quick fyi~

I'm new to FA, and to the furry culture generally, so I figured I'd say hi and introduce myself a bit here~

Hi!

Offline, my name is Baz, I live in the Midlands in the UK, and I'm pansexual and male-leaning genderfluid. I work in an office near Birmingham, and while my official job title is "Office Administrator," in practice my role involves everything from admin to project management to IT support to CAD work to PA to the Office Manager. In short, I'm perpetually busy! I also have a 1:1 BSc in AI and Robotics, which was a lot of work but a lot of fun~

I keep pet rats, I'm a cosplayer (hopefully a future fursuiter!), I enjoy playing Go (badly), I'm a pretty good cook, I have an amateur interest in gemstones and I love learning about sciences and history. Travelling to new places also rates among my favourite things ever!

My fursona is called Scirus ("Shirrus"), he's a rat with 'squirrel' colouration (silver-blue fur with a white belly and face), he loves mechatronic stuff and is a big fan of meat dishes. He's still very new, so I'm learning more about him as I go along!

Since you're here, how about you guys? Or your fursonas? Who are you, how are you, what do you do? <3