The Con: Mewcon or Manga and Exsotic Worlds Convention
The Place: Red Lion Inn Vancover WA
The Time 31 Dec to 2 Jan 2010
Mew con is an Anime, SF and Fantasy convention in Vancover WA. The convention is small and what I consider a relax-a-con. Relax a con is a term a friend came up to describe small convention that doesn’t have much in the way of organized events, so much of the time is spent with friends or lounging around.
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The Con: Orycon31 the Science Fiction Convention
The Dates 27-29 November 2009
The Place : Double Tree Hotel, Portland Oregon.
This is my third Orycon Science Fiction convention I attended. My adventure or misadventure started around January attempt to volunteer for staff. Volunteer days ended due to lack of communications and direction by the volunteering and PR departments of Orycon to the point I became discouraged and decided it better to focus on other conventions. With Thursday freed up, I decide to go visit my mother in Tacoma for Thanksgiving dinner. Next day I woke up had breakfast dove back to Portland and the Hotel, I got in around 2:00pm and picked up my badge.
I already registered and will be attending Orycon, The Science Fiction convention over the Thanksgiving weekend in Portland Oregon. I need to apologize for not pressing for furry events at Orycon. My recent stint of unemployment during Spring and Summer had me wondering will I still me living in Oregon in November less going to Orycon. I have we can perhaps do a meal or a meet and greet.
I will not be volunteering at Orycon as I said in my earlier. Instead I want to give attention to the furry community and Rainfurrest. If they ask for a few hours, I will give it to them. My decision is probably 60% not knowing how to volunteer at Orycon, 20% the Orycon staff culture which tends to be a closed tight nit group and 20% bad experiences include the flap about trying to get promotional martial to take with me to Rainfurrest. There seem to be no place for an old fur. This begs question was there a problem with me or because I am a furry. If the later, I hope not, perhaps we need to question how much support we can expect from Oregon Science Fiction Conventions concerning bringing furry convention to Portland. I think it is prudent some of us to talk to furries who sponsored events at Orycon 29 and earlier about their experiences first.
On a brighter topic thanks to Woyro I tuned into Anthropomorphic Dreams Blog and downloaded s reading of anthropomorphic fiction to listen to at work. I found The Thing in the Toyshop interesting. Nice Furry fiction grounded in Fury’s Science Fiction Roots. I need to get away for political podcast for a while.
It looks like Foxmas is being put on hold until they find a new venue’ hopefully the scrap heap or somewhere in Las Vegas. I guess I should had spoken out earlier but after years of preaching about sins during my fundamentalist days, I realize spouting about sins only waste energy, doesn’t change things, and is not the Gospel. So, when Frozen Oasis revealed about their new mini con Foxmas I was happy until realize it was going to be an 18+ event. Even more discomfiting was the warning on the web site not NSFW. A bad omen especially when we are trying to clean up the image of the fandom.
Frozen Oasis is a gray area in the fandom. Most furry cons want very (officially) little to do with them. Frankly, it better they go away. The fandom doesn’t need the potential for more bad media. A +18 party is not what we need.
My convention plans has changed and not for the best. I guess this is the best; my new job is just making ends meet and I am not sure I could raise the extra funds to attend.
I am not confident that All Fur Fun will survive. History in on my side; remember canceled conventions like Conifur Northwest 2006 and FurFest Northwest. All Fur Fun is a nice relax-a-con but seem to be on shaky ground for one reason or another. In addition, Spokane is out of the way and does not have much in resources to hold a convention
The Convention: Rainfurrest
The Place: Seattle SeaTac Marriott.
This is my third Rainfurrest. First, here are the numbers. We had around 905 attendees up from 599 in 2008 and 157 to 159 in the fursuit parade up from 89.
Friday morning was a blur. I woke up on time; Soon the morning became a flurry of sending orders, receiving my check and cashing it, and getting a tank of gas. I did not leave Portland until 11:30. By this time, it clear I was going to miss opening ceremony. Got to the hotel around 2:50pm just in time to jump into Gesture Drawing workshop and. The next panel on clothing I skipped out when the panelist could not get equipment; this was the second year in a row a panel was delayed due to no equipment.
Latter, I checked in to the hotel and moved into my room. I also picked up a bag for the plushie costume contest. Originally, I was going to use a Dear Daniel plush but I decided to use because the minimum height was ten inches. The plushie masquerade works like this. On Friday, each contestant picks up a mystery bag. The contestant can only use the items in the bag and must create a costume by the Variety Show on Saturday night. I got Blue cloth and lace plus a few buttons. Latter I had dinner at Claim Jumpers (over price Applebee’s). I sat through a Ranting 2 performance. Not that I liked all his jokes, but I had to experience him once and participated in the art jam.
Kumoricon Con Report
The Con: Kumoricon
The Place: Hilton Portland and Executive Tower
Kumoricon is the anime convention held in Portland over the Labor Day weekend. It has become a Labor Day tradition. Kumoricon beats a trip to Sprit Mountain to donate to the Native American welfare fund. (at the slots or Blackjack table).
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