AC 2024 - Post III
It didn’t really hit me until looking back after the event what a packed day Friday was this year.
For breakfast, Cedric and I wanted to try a small coffee shop directly under our hotel that we’d passed every time we’d walked from the AC to AC. *bada-tish!* As with our Fancypants Popcorn experience the morning before, we encountered an establishment down to its very last cinnamon roll, which I bought out from under Cedric, not realizing they had no more. We each ordered a cup of hot chocolate - even though it was about as far from hot chocolate weather as one could possibly get - and it was good, but Cedric still wanted something food-y for breakfast, so when we finished there we headed back to Fancypants where he indulged in one of their muffins, declaring it good. Thus fortified, we headed back to our room, for it was now time to suit up!
No, not a fursuit; perish the thought. But, for the first time since its inaugural presentation in 2016, my “Zootopia” Fan Discussion panel had been scheduled for Friday, which gladdened me greatly when I’d discovered this in the Programming Schedule published online in the weeks leading up to the con. Not only would I not be obligated to present my panel against the closing of the Art Auction on Sunday, as has happened several times in the past, but AnthroCoon and I would be getting this obligation out of the way early in the weekend, allowing us to relax and enjoy AC with no expected duties hanging over our heads. And since I anticipated no easy opportunity to return to our room before our scheduled presentation, that meant I had to suit up for it before heading out for that day’s events. So there I was, shrugging into my semi-fancy long-sleeve black semi-dress shirt, festooning it with Nick and Judy and Bogo and Gideon and Clawhauser and Sparkle Tiger badges from every available collar, pocket and lapel. Thus transforming myself into my usual annual walking spectacle, we set out for the DLCC.
It’s funny, this was my nineteenth Anthrocon, and yet for the first time this year I decided to attend the regular “So This Is Your First Anthrocon” panel. I’d heard that in the past, when Uncle Kage was this panel’s customary host, it was often an entertaining affair worth attending even for seasoned con-goers. And if that was true with Kage as host, it must be doubly so with the twin threat of Alkali and Boozy Badger as presenters. And it was, filled with laughs as expected. Along with the usual tips about con behavior and safety and hygiene came an effective demonstration when Alkali asked a fursuiter in the audience to stand up in front of the room and signal to him when she could see his hands moving into her field of vision from left, right, above and below, driving home for all to see just how limited sight is from inside a fursuit head. They also discussed how hot temperatures have been measured inside said heads; I think the highest recorded was somewhere up in the 120-130 degree range, hot enough to fry a brain without frequent trips to the headless lounge. So yeah, some eye-opening info divulged at this panel, along with all the yucks.
Cedric and I had planned to duck out of this panel early so we could hit the Dealers’ Room ASAP, but Alkali and Boozy kept things so entertaining that we stayed until the end. Thus, by the time we reached Halls A, B and C the Ultrasponsors and Supersponsors had already been admitted, while a LONG line of regular attendees snaked through the DLCC concourse waiting to be let in. Took me a while to find anyone in authority to ask what we should do as a Sponsor and Supersponsor; they seemed to let Cedric right into Hall C, but instructed me to amble down to Hall B (or was it A?) where the Ultra- and Supersponsors were being let in. I didn’t find out until after I was inside that Hall C was being used simply as a staging area (as it would be the following day for the Fursuit Parade) and that while it looked as if Cedric had been let in before I was, it actually took him some time to make it through the Hall C lines into the dealers’ space proper. But eventually we found each other, so all’s well that ends well.
To say that the AC Dealers’ Room has grown massive in recent years would be an understatement. In its first year in Pittsburgh in 2006, pretty much all of the con - Dealers’ Room, Artists’ Alley and Art Show - were all contained in Hall C, with panels and performances in the Spirit of Pittsburgh Ballroom or various meeting rooms at the Westin. This year, just the Dealers’ Room and Artists’ Alley sprawled throughout Halls A and B, and that didn’t even include the Art Show, which had been moved up to Level Three. (I will say that far more seating was provided than in prior years, with chairs and tables located centrally rather than just back by the concession booths as in most past years, so that was an improvement.) And with so much to see spread out over such a large area, it’s hardly surprising that it took forever to make my first round of all the vendors.
First up - and where I eventually met up with Cedric - was Roz Gibson’s table, which took me some time to find. Roz had brought along a gorgeous full-color banner to hang from the front of her table, and it really spruced up her seller’s space and helped draw the eye to her wares - long overdue. The reason she was our top priority this year was because Dave Hopkins had done a vanity printing of his “Friday the 13th” comic and, since it could not be offered for sale due to copyright issues, he’d granted Roz ten copies to give away free to the first ten customers who bought two of her publications and/or $20 worth of merchandise and asked for Dave’s comic as a bonus. We need not have rushed, because I saw copies still on display well into Saturday, but even so I was happy to have that under my belt in the opening minutes of my purchasing forays. (I bought Volumes Three and Four of the “Griffin Ranger” series to meet my financial obligation; Cedric had run low on cash funds by that time, and since Roz’s friend Calicougar was minding the table on our first stop, he had to return when Roz was actually available to make sure she could accept credit cards, so I’m not sure what his qualifying purchases were.) Roz also had packs of her playing cards for sale, which I would later learn sold out, as well as her usual fine and extensive selection of Choco-Eggs, which are always popular and draw a lot of customers to her space.
I also hit up Bill Holbrook at his table during my first round, and ended up buying not one, not two, not three but FOUR of his “Kevin and Kell” books. Not sure how that happened, since I’d sworn to myself that books were one thing I’d go very light on this year since books are heavy and I’d need to get everything back home with me on the train. I walked away from his table asking myself, “Wait, what am I doing?!” Well, at least he signed them all for me, wonderful guy that he is - and now I’ve got the next four volumes in sequence after the two big omnibuses I’d picked up in previous years.
The only other things I picked up on this preliminary foray were a couple of originals from Cadmium Tea and one from Rukis, although the Rukis one may actually have come later since her table was mobbed on my first pass. I wanted to keep things light (oops! too late for that!) since I knew I’d probably have no opportunity to make it back to the hotel before that afternoon’s Big Event.
And that Big Event was rapidly approaching now, meaning I had roughly an hour to grab myself some sustenance first. Not wanting to leave the DLCC to seek out a restaurant, and in the mood for more than just a quick and overpriced hot dog from the concession booths, for the first time ever I hit up the Anthronoms offerings out on the main concourse, standing in line and eventually settling for the Asian chicken dish, served in a handy cardboard carton with plastic forks available! Taking my carton and Pepsi with me to a nearby table, I shared my meal in the presence of some other attendees engaged in enthusiastic conversation about - well, whatever they were talking about. I honestly forget what it was. But one suiter amongst them spoke with a very pronounced Australia accent, clearly audible even through his head, and I complimented him on it (as if he had any control over the way he naturally spoke, but there it is). Finishing my noms, I took my purchases and my folder and my remaining Pepsi and myself over to Room 333 to make my own volunteer contribution to this year’s scheduled proceedings.
Unfortunately, Room 333 was nowhere to be found.
I went to where I THOUGHT it should be, walking down past the 300’s and 310’s and 320’s, and quickly realized the hallway ran out before the 330’s came anywhere within sight. Perplexed, I actually started musing aloud where 333 could be - and it’s lucky for me that I did so, because a staffer just happened to be nearby to overhear, and instructed me that Room 333 was back where I’d just come from, on the main concourse overlooking the Allegheny River. Had I even been aware that there were meeting rooms in that part of the DLCC? If not, I certainly was now, and off I was to hopefully be in time for my own panel.
I arrived with minutes to spare, “Zootopia” badges flapping against my shirt, to find AnthroCoon already seated at the front table, fiddling with his laptop and other AV apparatus, and a fair number of attendees filling the chairs. I’d expected a large turnout this year due to the advance interest expressed in the online Programming Schedule, and while we never got anywhere near the 173 listed there (which was a good thing, since I’m not sure our room could have accommodated even a hundred) it was still the best turnout in years, bigger I would estimate than even last year’s, when we had one of the fourth-floor theaters for our presentation. But a room’s a room, and an audience is an audience, and I’ll take whatever we can get!
Not much to say about the panel itself that hasn’t been said before; for the first time we’d been allotted only an hour for our presentation, but since there was nothing else scheduled for that room until 5:00, we ran over by about 15 minutes with a bunch of last-minute questions and comments. Having AnthroCoon as my cohost always helps to fill up the time with his AV offerings, and this year he showed us the very first “Zootopia” commercial along with a parody video “Buy Everything,” which led me to conclude there might actually have been more “Zootopia” merch than I’d realized. It was a good give-and-take between us and the audience about pretty much every aspect of the film, and we crammed a lot into our hour-plus. Afterwards, I continued speaking out on the concourse with an older fan who had a lot to say about both the film and the fandom. Then, with the strains of music from the “Christian Furs” panel filtering out into the hallway, we parted ways (Cedric was nowhere to be seen by this time). I forget whether I went back to the Dealers’ Room or simply returned to the hotel by that point, figuring I’d bought everything I needed to buy for that day and was getting tired of carrying it all around with me.
I didn’t need any dinner after the late lunch I’d picked up on the concourse, so I chilled in the hotel for a bit until it was time to head out for the evening’s highly-anticipated double feature: Alkai and Boozy Badger, followed by Uncle Kage’s Story Hour! And this year, for some reason, these prime events were scheduled not in the Spirit of Pittsburgh Ballroom but instead in the Allegheny Room at the Westin. Interesting choice. Now the Allegheny is quite large, but not nearly as large as the SoP. Despite this, there seemed to be adequate seating for everyone who wanted to attend (or maybe most of the latecomers peeked in, saw how packed it was, and wandered off elsewhere?), and all three performers played to a packed house, especially Kage. Best of all, the acoustics were SO much better than last year when Kage did his Story Hour in Hall C of the DLCC, when we had to strain to make out what he was saying, so big improvement there. Lots of laughs in both sets, way too many to recount here, but let’s just say that when Kage compared himself to a samurai sword that must draw blood before it can be sheathed again, and then paused to drop the bomb that the sword had already come out three times so far this year without the first full day of the con even being behind us, it drew quite a stunned reaction from the audience.
MY first full day of the con certainly wasn’t over yet, because with those two spotlight performances behind me, it was time to toddle over to the Art Show and wait for the opening of the Artist and Dealers’ Reception. I arrived quite early, but since there was a convenient handrail to lean against and I am a born leaner, I chose my spot and staked myself out there, content to lean the time away while I people-watched and furry-watched. The third-level concourse was still a bustling place at that hour, even with the closing of the Dealers’ Room, so I had lots of activity to peer at. Cedric joined me for a time, as did another young gentleman who engaged us in conversation for a while. Eventually he and Cedric wandered off, and then a proper line started to form for the Reception, so I removed myself from my favored leaning post and took my place on line before it got too long (and it did get long before we were all let in).
The organizers did their usual fine job on the food spread, with fruit and vegetable platters, a large bread and cheese board, and of course gourmet cookies for dessert, along with the beverage bins. Not wanting to eat too much, I filled my plate once from the vegetable trays, followed that up with a few samplings from the fruit fare (drizzled with thick fresh honey - messy but tasty!) and capped it off with a large sugar cookie and a brownie wedge. Then it was time to peruse the works on offer, cookie plate and beverage in hand.
So how was the new layout and location of the Art Show? My initial reservations melted away as I went from room to room, finding impressive pieces right from the start. The new linear layout of the Show might have seemed unwieldy at first blush, but then again, the old configurations in the main halls always presented challenges of their own, so it was six of one or half a dozen of the other. On the whole, I might deem it an improvement; at the very least, I certainly had no problem with it, once I got used to the newness of it. The views from the concourse were certainly better, and we even had a live jazz band (with one or two players in suit!) to serenade us while we munched and browsed. And with so much fine artistry to take in, the Art Show is always transportive no matter where it’s held!
I probably lingered there until nearly 10:30 or so, then headed back to the hotel in time to catch the late news and yet another report on AC. Then it was time for bed, and then … Saturday!