BLFC 2014 report
Originally published at Ohnitsch Cartoons. You can comment here or there.
Thursday, March 27th
Still exhausted and mighty hungry, we went downstairs to the Casino area in search of a proper breakfast. "English muffin with sausage, eggs and cheese" sounded tasty, but turned out to be the most salty and greasy thing on the planet. We both felt sick after eating half of it and decided to go for healthier breakfast options again the next days. We watched some poor creatures trying their luck on the slot machines, probably sitting there since the night before already.
The entrance of the Grand Sierra Resort.
Pretty snowy mountains.
Walmart, wow.
We explored the hotel a bit and peeked into the con space for BLFC where people were busy setting up everything. Since not much was going on, we went to the Walmart across the street and stocked up on fruits, drinks and breakfast supplies for the convention. Back at the hotel, we were the first one to draw on what we assumed was meant to be a whiteboard for artists to draw on. We also ran into Mary, who already set up her Dealer's table.
Apart from her nobody we knew was at the con yet, so we decided to sit right at the hotel entrance, welcoming the masses of friends that would also attend BLFC. Our plan did not work out as planned, but at least we got some work done during the wait and eventually we met someone we know, Howee!
In the evening we mostly spent time with Jill and Mary. Did I mention that there was a Johnny Rocket's in the hallway right outside the con space? Perfect place to have dinner! We got some tasty sandwich and had an art jam with Zero and Eligecos later. There was also a nice 80s dance going on, but I didn't stay too long.
Mary, setting up her table.
50 lanes of bowling alley!
First artjam at the con!
Friday, March 28th
Since we needed some rest today, we had a slow start, got some breakfast downstairs and watched some terrible American TV on our room. We spent most of the day hanging out with friends and enjoyed looking at craziness happening in the con space. The BLFC staff decided to put around 27 big cardboard cubes into the con space, which were stacked and thrown around by suiters pretty much all day. We had a healthy salad from the convention's own snack bar for lunch and chatted with Croc a bit. In the afternoon I suited a bit as Baseball while Henrieke was busy in the Dealers Den, talking to people we know such as Mitti, Mary, Jill, Kilcodo, Floe, Likeshine, Balaa, etc. Baseball sadly lost his radical sunglasses, luckily about an hour later the honest finder returned them to lost&found, so they were reunited again. Just in case, I bought an extra pair of sunglasses for Baseball though.
Ready for some Polaroid action!
Patches and stickers my me and (mostly) Henrieke for sale at BLFC!
For dinner we went to Johnny Rocket's with Goldie, Dax, Latte and Eli. Finally we had some time at a con to hang out with Dax and Latte, two great and passionate swing dancers and overall awesome people!
Eli and Henrieke at Johnny Rocket's
There was another dance going on, not quite my taste though. I took a few Polaroids that night and spent most of the time at another big art jam! Everyone was there including Eli, Zero, Redwulf, Kristian (who doesn't draw but makes great music), Goldie, Floe, Ruby, Tweeko and Tally.
More artjam!
The dance floor.
Saturday, 29th
Had some cereals on the room, then went down to the con space.
A bat!
Jill taking care of Kiki.
Kiki decided to explore the Dealers Den a bit as well as the video game room which was filled with old consoles and even an 80s Japanese Arcade cabinet!
The arcade.
A retro Japanese arcade cabinet!
Henrieke tries her luck at the C64 version of Bubble Bobble.
Kiki advertises Henrieke's book!
Pajama fox with Kiki.
Kiki at the Lego table.
Later we dropped by Latte's coffee panel, then we got out Dog for the costume group photo. It was in another giant room of the hotel, and as soon as the photo was done, the seemingly endless parade started. About 1/3rd of the ~1500 attendees had costumes. After the parade, I took some more photos of dog and other suits, then we went back to the room.
Dog, trying to get some free stuff.
Dog at Johnny Rocket's
While Henrieke showered, I took Baseball out for a short while. We went to the dance competition in order to see Dax & Latte's dance, they did some super nice swing dancing in suit! The rest of the dance compo was also very nice, featuring a more diverse music than the usual horrible dubstep. Our stomachs didn't permit us seeing the full show though, so we went to Port of Subs and got some dinner. Since the con space was all one big room, we could still peek a bit at the dance comp though. We also put some of our patches and stickers for sale in the con store, a little store where anyone can have the con staff sell their stuff, a very nice service! Later the long-awaited dance by Croc started! Both Dog and Baseball where there when it started, and it was great. From a just a few critters, the dance floor filled up pretty quickly. Baseball went on stage to party with Croc and even the hotel staff joined on the dance floor!
Baseball and a lady from the hotel staff partying on stage!
At the end of the dance, the last song was 99 red balloons which was accompanied by literally 99 red balloons falling from the ceiling onto the dancing crowd. Balloon party! At the end of Croc's dance, I couldn't even lift my arms anymore, so I was pretty much done with dancing for the night. We did yet another art jam in the tabletop gaming room! I met Kaycee, a super nice guy from the SF Bay area. There are so many nice people living in that area! When we were too tired, we got some Yoghurt from the café, checked out the way-too-crowded Biggest Little Room party and went to bed at 2:30am.
Sunday, March 30th
Since Croc, Bacon and Yippee already left today and we sent most of our luggage with them, we spent the morning packing everything but Baseball and everything else essential. We booked a Megabus ticket for Monday and tried to have as little luggage as possible. We pretty much filled up Yippee's car with our luggage, then spent some more time with friends in the Dealers Den and at the Lego table. I met another artist, Kaycee and we agreed to do a trade later.
Artjam with Kaycee, Zero and others.
That's not how you play air guitar.
Eventually we got hungry and went to Roundtable Pizza with Zot, Jessica, Eli and Kaycee. We waited a whopping 45 minutes for our pizza, because the stupid waiter "couldn't find out table". Keep in mind that at time there were only 2 occupied tables in the whole restaurant, ridiculous. After that, Henrieke and me went to the arcade to use up the rest of our tokens, turns out I bought way too many as I didn't have enough energy to play lots of DDR. We ended up playing on a broken early-90s motorcycle race machine and a newer one with funky graphics. We watched the charity auction and closing ceremonies at 5pm, highlight of the auction was a BTTF-themed custom hand-painted NES by Mitti for 100$. The Looney-Tunes shirt from the early 90s that Henrieke's mom donated went for 60$. After that, we both went to the room to take a nap as the previous days had been exhausting. Back in the con space, we didn't really find anyone, except Groggy, whom we had dinner with at - once again - Johnny Rocket's.
Me, Henrieke and Groggy at Johnny Rocket's
The rest of the evening we spent mostly in the tabletop game room, sitting there with Jill and Mary. We even got to to a trade with Mary!
Our drawings for Mary
Jaggers, Jill and me checked out the dance which was continuously awful for the whole night, they did a good job trying to get people out of the con space that night. Around midnight, everyone was thrown out of the con space, so we wandered around the hotel for a bit and found out that the rest of the con had moved to the bowling alley. We met Tweeko there and Henrieke got to do a trade with her. I didn't do much except filming a bit due to lack of energy, so eventually we said bye to everyone and went to bed.
The party moved to the bowling alley.
Monday, 31st
We slept a bit longer today as our Bus went in the afternoon from Downtown Reno, just 15 minutes from the hotel. We got some breakfast and sat at Starbucks. I spent the morning ordering some fur and reserving us a car in San Jose. We only paid 180$ for a week, pretty good deal! I also saved some money as I didn't have to get an extra liability insurance, my credit card already included one. We packed all our stuff together and took a cab to Downtown around noon. There we walked around a bit, got to see the more or less famous Reno sign and had a not-very-fresh lunch from a local McDonald's.
Downtown Reno.
Things looked very 50s
Our bus came about 40 minutes too late, which was the first of many delays on our ride. Unfortunately, today a snow storm was going on in the mountains that afternoon, causing all kinds of chaos. We had a wonderful view from the second story of the bus though and I was more than happy that I wasn't driving. We had about 70 minutes delay then the driver tried to put on snow chains, around 2 more hours of standing still due to traffic accidents, another 40 minutes for putting off the snow chains and an extended stop in Sacramento, all adding up to 5 hours delay.
Nice scenery!
Lots of snow.
We arrived in San Francisco after sitting in the same Bus for 9 and a half hours, feeling sorry for Yippee who had to pick us up in the middle of the night. Since there was absolutely no access to food and drinks on the bus, we had to stop at a McDonald's to get some calories, then we pretty much fell asleep.
Conclusion
BLFC was absolutely fantastic! The reason we went was basically because so many people told us how fun the con was, and boy it was!The name couldn't be more fitting, it had everything a big convention has, but everything was close together. The whole convention was basically in one giant room and restaurants were right outside the convention space and on the floor above. This meant that we could actually find people and also didn't have to waste time with going out for food, we just walked across the hallway. Of course it helped that there was a Johnny Rocket's, one of my favorite franchises.
What also helped to make the con so convenient was the elevator situation. There were 3 different blocks of elevators, each serving a different set of floors. So despite almost 1500 attendees, I never had to wait for an elevator.
I also felt like I didn't miss out on anything at this con thanks to the fact that everything was in one space. We could artjam, have food, watch fursuiters and see what's going on at the stage at the same time!
Lots of praise for the staff too, they did an outstanding job at organizing things. It's also little things they added such as giving out free shutter shades and putting up cardboard cubes and inflatable toys in the con space that made it special. The theme of course was my favorite con theme ever and everyone did a great job with decoration and having fun with the theme.
Everyone was right about this convention and I'm sure it'll be awesome again next year!
