#Fun fact I bought the video game just because my friend said it had stickers

[stick-by-me]

IT'S TURTLE DAY!!!

[thiswasinevitableid]

for the meet ugly asks, 18 with the ot4? nsfw, if possible? thanks

Here you go! It is indeed NSFW.

18: we were just introduced at a party by our mutual friend and when my partner comes to join us, you freak out because you were just outside making out with them and you pull me aside to tell me

“Duck! Over here!” Aubrey waves him through the crowd, pointing to the lumberjack lookalike next to her, “this is the guy I was telling you about. Barclay’s an old friend of Dani's and, get this, he and Indrid know each other too. Wait, where is mr. mothman?” Aubrey cranes her neck.

“He had to work a late shift, but he says hi. Literally” He fumbles his phone, “fuck, sorry, first thing to go when I’ve been drinkin is my coordination.” He eventually triumphs, showing them the photo of Indrid, silver hair tied back and Void the Rat perched on the sleeve of his ‘Waffle House’ shirt. The sticker on the photo says “Hi!”

“Aww” Barclay’s voice is the epitome of gentle giant, “he always wanted a rat. I’m glad he got one.”

“Whelp, now that I got you two talking, I’m gonna go spend some ‘quality time’ with my girlfriend.”

“Just don't get caught makin’ out in a closet again.” Duck calls. Aubrey flips him off with a smile.

“So how did you and Indrid--oh, there you are babe. Thought you mighta snuck out to take a work call.”

“No, just had to de-escalate a shoving match on the back porch. I know you love Jake, but maybe next time we should just have him over rather than coming to the kind of party we outgrew in undergrad. I’m discovering I don’t enjoy being under the influence in this kind of cramped party anymore."

“Yeah, not really loving the noise. I lose my voice enough in the kitchen. Duck, this is my boyfriend, Joseph. Joseph, this is Duck, he’s a friend of Dani and Aubrey’s.”

Duck crunches his cup as his mind takes a violent spin an hour into the past.

He’d been out on the side deck getting some air and sipping his beer when a guy who looks like he walked in from the set of some splashy T.V show where everyone is hot joined him. His lips looked damn good whenever he sipped his beer and Duck did his best to turn on the southern charm. It was sort of working, until he complimented the guys button up; it was covered in drawings of cryptids--including mothman, Indrid’s favorite--and fit him in the way that made Duck want to rip the buttons off with his teeth. As soon as he demonstrated his enjoyment of listening to a hot guy talk about monsters, the taller man moved gradually closer, bumping shoulders and locking eyes with growing boldness. When Duck said the song booming out of the house was his go-to for putting the moves on someone, the other man asked to see his technique.

They spent the next three songs in the darkest corner of the porch, Duck’s back pressing into metal slats as his new friend wove his fingers into his hair and teased their tongues together with an experts touch.

When Duck breathlessly asked if he wanted to go somewhere more private, he murmured, “Only after we’ve had a chance to talk about some things.”

Then his phone buzzed and he was gone, leaving Duck horny and tipsy under the stars.

Back in the present, he does everything possible to keep from meeting Joseph’s eyes as he mumbles, “I, uh, I, I need some help with somethin in the kitchen? Fuck, yeah, kitchen, Barclay can you come help?”

“Sure. Be right back, babe.”

The kitchen is packed with people doing ill-advised things with drinks, so Duck keeps Barclay in the hall as he whispers, “Man, I, I’m so fuckin sorry but I gotta say somethin’. Joe and I, we, uh, we already met.”

“Makes sense, he’s been in town a year. I just got here.”

“That ain’t the kind of meetin I mean. We got a little, uh, friendly on the porch tonight.”

Barclay gives an “ah” of understanding. Then he chuckles, “thought he looked a little ruffled when he passed me earlier.”

“I’m real fuckin sorry, I didn’t know. ‘Drid and I got an, an agreement, but I shoulda checked to see if he was datin someone.”

“That would have been smart.” Joe appears at Barclay’s shoulder, “but that’s why I said we needed to talk before we did anything else.” He strokes Barclay’s beard, “you and Indrid aren’t the only ones with an open relationship of sorts.”

“Ohthankfuck.” Duck slumps against the wall.

“While I was making sure no one made a punch that could give them alcohol poisoning, you were getting hot and heavy? That’s not fair, babe.” Barclay teases.

“I’ll make it up to you, big guy. Are you safe to drive?”

“Gonna give it another half-hour, just to be safe. You need a ride home, Duck?”

“Uh, sure, that’d be great.”

Soon, he’s bundled in the back of a Subaru, Joe sitting beside him while Barclay navigates through Saturday night traffic. They luck out; the game ran long, so they’re not fighting the throng coming out of the football stadium. When they reach his apartment, Joe stops him and hands Duck his phone. Duck didn’t even feel him take it in the first place. As he waves goodnight, he spots a new number sitting in his contacts and smiles.

----------------------------------------------------------

“...the point is, it amuses me that Joseph shares my taste in me.” Indrid sips his white chocolate mocha, then yawns wide enough for Barclay to spot his tongue piercing, “apologies, I didn’t get to bed until three.”

“Jesus, man, gonna tell Duck to start knocking you out.”

“I was working on commissions.”

Barclay gives him a disbelieving look.

“....I was working on commissions until midnight. Then I spent three hours watching videos on the finer points of home entomology.”

“There it is. You can’t fool me, I remember what you were like at sleepovers.”

“It was very important to read every single Eyewitness book your parents generously bought you.” Indrid takes another sip with an imperious tilt of his head.

Barclay bumps his unoccupied hand, “It’s so fucking nice to see you again.”

Indrid looks at him over his glasses, brown eyes as beautiful as they were when he was sixteen, “Likewise. Oh!” He perks up, “do you know what this means? We can have a double-date! I’ve always wanted to try that.”

“Sure Joseph will be into it; he has a spreadsheet of optimal date locations. Bet he’ll have fun making one for double-dates.”

“That is...exceptionally geeky.”

Barclay sends a love-struck smile into his coffee cup, “Yeah, he is.”

-----------------------------------------------

Joe is more diabolical than Duck gave him credit for. And he thought he was pretty fucking cunning after he suggest seeing the local hockey team; the chilly arena gave Indrid and excuse to cuddle up to anyone who held still for too long and gave Joe plenty of opportunities to make double entendres about sticks in Duck’s ear.

But a night out at “Woofs” AKA the kind of gay bar where Duck and Barclay get hit on constantly is a whole new level of torment. Especially because Indrid hangs off Duck proudly (when he’s not teasing Barclay for the number of free drinks he’s getting) and Joseph even asks him to dance. When he peeks over the taller man’s shoulder, he sees Barclay resting his hand on Indrid’s arm while whispering something that makes him grin.

Dancing really is the most fitting thing he could be doing, because it’s what all four of them have chosen to do about this; dance around the fact that Indrid and Barclay dated, dance around the fact Joe and Duck kissed, danced around the fact that they’re more or less acting like a polycule already.

“Oh no.” Joe mutters, eyes on the door, “things are about to get loud.”

Duck’s about to point out that the club is already loud when he’s pulled out of the path of not one, but two bachelorette parties. They opt to stay, although Barclay gets hit on by someone who doesn’t believe he’s gay. Joe takes him onto the floor for a slow dance while Duck steps into the bathroom. When he comes out, his boyfriend is nowhere to be found.

“You guys seen ‘Drid?”

Joe shakes his head, all three of them already moving for the door. They find Indrid across the street on a bench, hunched over and tapping on his knees.

“‘Drid?” Duck sits gently beside him, “you get overwhelmed?”

Indrid nods.

“You wanna head home?”

Another nod. Duck suspects the overstimulation spiked without warning, which usually means…

“You need to be nonverbal for a bit?”

This time Indrid looks at him when he nods, then cringes when he sees Joe and Barclay are watching.

“Our place is closer.” Joe offers, copying Duck’s tone, “we can all bus back there so you can be somewhere quiet. Or, um, if you need it to just be you two, that’s fine too.”

Indrid holds up a finger, indicating option one. Duck helps him up and let’s him stay hidden against his shoulder while they wait for the bus.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

This used to terrify Barclay. He and Indrid would be hanging out, would be stealthily holding hands in the top row of the football stadium, and his boyfriend would shut down. Barclay, sensing distress, would try to figure out what was wrong, would start to panic when Indrid couldn’t communicate the things happening in his mind and body. They had more than one fight where his attempts to help only made Indrid more overstimulated to the point he snapped at him to fuck off (and, on one occasion, hissed at him).

They worked it out eventually, Barclay keeping a mental list of things that soothed his friend. Watching Duck do some of them, how calm and loving he was, makes something complex bloom in his chest, as vibrant and beautiful as the Dahlias Duck brought them from the garden (“weather’s been so fuckin weird things are bloomin when they shouldn’t”).

When they make it home, Duck stops in the living room and looks between Indrid and Barclay for a moment. Then he murmurs, “‘Drid, you want Barclay to keep you company for a bit?”

Indrid smiles and nods, takes Barclay’s hand and follows him to the bedroom. He lets his memories drive, keeps the light off, arranges his body so Indrid can relax against him, and pets his hair with slow, light motions. His friend hums, meaning he’s on the right track. As he strokes his head he notices the black roots peeking through the silver; it was jarring to see Indrid with pale hair when all his memories were of dark locks of it falling over his face or catching on Barclays hands.

He looks good with the silver. More like himself.

Metal pokes his chest. He takes the glasses Indrid hands him, sets them on Joseph’s stack of library books, then gives a startled, “nnfph” as his friend pulls Barclay on top of him.

“Like the weight” Indrid mumbles, wrapping his arms around him. The longer they lay there, the easier it is to overhear the conversation in the other room.

“I feel awful, if I’d known I’d have never recommended we go somewhere like a loud bar.”

“S’okay, Joe. ‘Drid is still a little wary of tellin people that’s something he has to consider when goin’ out; Dani and them get it, but other folks think he’s bein’ a buzzkill.

“That’s ridiculous.”

“You’re tellin me. Besides, sometimes it comes up so fast, or happens in places he ain’t anticipatin it. He’ll be okay, especially with Barclay takin’ care of him.”

A pause, then, “Do you need someone to, um, take care of you?”

“Joe-”

“It’s alright if the answer is no. But part of my plan was to get everyone in a, um, bit of a frisky mood.”

A snicker, “Frisky?”

“I was trying not to be too crude.”

“Joe, you know how I feel about you. But we gotta check with the others to be sure everythin is on the level.”

“Tell them to come in.” Indrid whispers, a smile plain in his voice.

“Uh, babe? Could you and Duck come in here a sec?”

“Everythin oka--ffft” Duck snorts a laugh, “guess he improvised not havin a weighted blanket.”

“That I did.”

Duck bursts into a grin, hurrying to settle on the bed near Indrid’s head, “Hey, sugar. How you feelin’?”

“Much better. It helps that this one is very soothing.” He toys with Barclay’s hair, sending goosebumps up his arms, “though it seems he had a slighty different reaction to our contact.”

Barclay was so distracted by the conversation that he hadn’t realized his cock was hardening along the familiar warmth of Indrid’s thigh whenever one of them shifted.

“Fuck, Indrid, I’m sorry-”

“It’s alright. In fact, it is rather relevant to what you two were discussing in the hall. Am I correct that we all wish to be in some form of polyamorous relationship with each other?”

“Yes” say two voices along with his own.

“Wonderful. I suggest we hash out details later. Right now, it seems you two have, ah, unfinished business.”

“Fuckin finallyAH” Duck cackles as Joseph knocks him backwards, kissing him frantically while yanking up his shirt. As soon as his belly is exposed Joseph begins pawing and groping from there up his sides. Indrid nudges Barclay so they can sit up, allowing the other two more room to disrobe. Or, more accurately, for Joseph to disrobe both himself and Duck, since the shorter man is having trouble moving his limbs between bursts of laughter and moaning.

Joseph crawls backwards, shoving Duck’s legs apart and groping his thighs, “I’ve wanted to get my hands on these since the party. Lord almighty did you look good in those jeans.” He kisses his way up the left thigh, moaning and mouthing at the skin. His posture puts his perfect ass in the air, which happens to be one of Barclay’s favorite views in the whole world. He unzips his pants, fights to get his cock out as Indrid begins offering commentary from beside him.

“Mmmm, were I not still rather exhausted, I’d make him do that to us both.”

Joseph raises an eyebrow, but doesn’t move his mouth from where it’s teasing Duck’s inner thigh.

“Know you would.” He reaches down to play with Joseph’s hair, “‘Drid’s got a whole fantasy where you blow him while I sit on his face.”

“Funny” Barclay’s voice is turning rough with desire,“he’s got one where he takes all three of us at once.”

Joseph’s face lacks any trace of self-consciousness, a rare thing for him, which means this whole arrangement is fucking brilliant. He simply nods, then takes Duck’s dick into his mouth.

“JEsus, fuck, Joe, ohfuckyeah.” Duck holds Joseph’s head encouragingly, “shoulda known you’d be good at this, you’re so fuckin good at everythin, fuck, fuck.”

Barclay grips his cock, trying to stroke in time with movements of Joseph’s head. Slender fingers carefully push his aside as Indrid purrs, “allow me.”

“You, you don’t have to, you said you were tired-”

“Not too tired for this” he strokes up more firmly, then brushes their lips together, “or this.”

It’s like tasting Hershey Chocolate or Marionberry Pie, transporting him back to their shitty hometown in Eastern Oregon, to summer heat on his skin and basement air in his nose as Indrid proved that yes, kissing boys was what he wanted to do.

Indrid’s certainly gotten better at it since then. Barclay likes to think he has, hopes the other man is feeling even half the things currently piling up in Barclay’s chest.

“Oh.” Indrid sighs as he pulls back, “that’s even better than I remember.”

A particularly loud moan from Joseph, underscored by Duck cursing happily, brings them back to the present.

Barclay moans as Indrid’s hand moves more deliberately.

“Do you remember the first time we did this?”

“Uh huh, c-couch, in that, fuck, that basement rec room at my house.”

“You came so fast.”

“Can’t really blame me.”

“Given the sounds he’s making, he might do the same thing now.” Joseph smiles at them from over Duck’s knee, “that’s one of the best things about you. You’re so sensitive, big guy.”

Barclay whines his name. His boyfriend winks, then dives back down to render Duck speechless.

“You really are” Indrid nips his ear, “remember when we, ah, lost it to each other?”

“Mmmhmm” he whimpers, squeezing his eyes shut as if that might make all this last longer. Joseph echoes the noise, making Duck groan.

“Just picture it, Joseph” Indrid is getting into it now, panting and pink-cheeked, “Barclay, eighteen and even shyer than he is now, in my lap, begging me to fuck him.”

‘I, I wasn’t the only one begging.” He grins.

“Of course not. I was desperate to get to it because just seeing you naked had me certain I was going to--one moment” he releases Barclay’s cock, ignoring his whimper to clamber into a position that allows him to kiss Duck as the shorter man grinds into Joseph’s mouth. He doesn’t pull back until Duck’s hips slow and Joseph is busy wiping his lips.

“I can never resist kissing you while you cum.”

“Fuck I love you.” Duck cups Indrid’s cheek. The silver haired man rubs against his palm a moment, then retreats. Duck growls at Joseph, “as for you, you got ten seconds to open your legs so I can show you a good time.”

“So thoughtful” Indrid pecks his cheek, returns to Barclay, “now, where was I…”

“Shy, AHshit, fuckingchristthat’s good.” Joseph’s legs sprawl open as Duck finger-fucks him, sitting on his side to kiss him without obstructing Barclay’s view.

“Ah yes.” He kisses Barclays neck, hand teasing the head of his cock, “you insisted on bottoming because you were so scared you might hurt me. I can still see it, you on your hands and knees, asking me to take you--those were your exact words--then whimpering when I finally got my cock in.”

“Fuck” Joseph is clearly enjoying the story; if Barclay had known he was into this, he would have made all his exes record voicemails describing their exploits.

“If memory serves I came very fast, because you were so much tighter than I expected and you, you felt so good. I used my hands to get you off-”

“Uh huh, fuck, you hadn’t pulled out yet and it was so fucking good, fuck, Indrid-”

“You made such cute noises when you came” a slow, deep kiss as heat floods him, “I wonder if you’ll do the same now.”

“Probably” is all he grunts out before he’s cumming hard enough that most of it hits Joseph’s stomach rather than Indrid’s fingers. His head lolls as his cock pulses, and beneath his own heartbeat he picks up Duck ordering Joseph to be good and cum for him. After a moment, there’s the distinct moan his boyfriend makes during his climax. It’s followed, confusingly, by weak laughter. His eyes flutter open to see Indrid licking his cum off Joseph’s chest, which happens to be ticklish.

He scoots over to join them, Joseph kissing him sleepily the instant he’s close enough.

“You sure you don’t need to cum, sugar?”

“I’m only half-hard, and I know I’m too tired to make it the rest of the way. Not that this wasn’t supremely satisfying. But you each owe me an orgasm sometime in the future.”

“All in favor of blowin ‘Drids mind tomorrow mornin’”

He and the other two raise their hands in sync. Then the four of them collapse, laughing, in each others arms.

[halorocks1214]

hmmmm prime numbers for the video game asks?

Listen, are you secretly a math teacher? I might not be taking a math class my first year at college but come on, I’m taking a break for a reason

JKJK, thanks for asking~

1. First game you played obsessively?  To make sure I answered the right questions I double checked my math with Google and turns out, one is not prime, so there’s that fun fact for the day that I always keep forgetting

2. A game that has influenced you creatively? Writing, drawing, etc.

Pbpbppbpb, I mean, the stories from my favorite games definitely helped me get into Writing and such. I loved the idea of my characters going through the situations the characters in these games did, and slowly I learned to make my own stories instead of just... taking plots from video games and changing the characters to mine lmao

Though, my main OC going through all the Pokemon games’ plots as a singular person and interconnecting all the worlds and lore? Yeah, not getting rid of that any time soon. Pry it from my cold, dead heads. I dare ya

3. Who did you play with as a kid?

Lots and lots of online friends. I get real tired of people saying, “internet friends can’t be real friends!” because for the longest time the only people I could ever talk to were through a headset

Outside of that, I do have and had IRL friends who I played with a lot (I got a few buddies who I regularly get online with that I see in real life as well), and occasionally I play with my brother

The rest of my family and I (including my brother) also have game nights. Mostly Mario Party and other Nintendo/Mario games

5. Ever use cheat codes?

I did actually, a few times for one game. I was getting tired of dying so quickly in Don’t Starve so I looked up how to spawn certain items in the chat box with codes and stuff. I think I accidentally impulse ended that run by trying to take on that spherical-cyclops-ostrich monster because I was getting cocky and... yeah 

7. Any games you have multiple copies of?

Nothing off the top of my head! With the new wave of being able to have digital libraries especially. Even as a small child I kinda saw it as a waste, so I never had more than one copy of anything 

11. Have you ever made new friends from playing video games?

I don’t do that much online hunting anymore where I can voice chat, so nowadays, not really anymore, but back then, with all my Halo and other Xbox obsessions? All the time. My friends list is huge for a reason, and that’s because I never shut up lmao

13. A game you’ve never played that everyone else has?

There’s probably a lot of them, tbh. I watch a lot of Youtubers to get my fix for certain games that I don’t have the time or energy to play myself

17. Ever lose a friend over a game? 

Outside of “online friends I dropped because of getting older and more mature”, not really. I’ve lost friends, but never over video games

19. Favorite handheld console?

As cliche as it is, the Switch man, holy shit. The Switch is genuinely revolutionary to the world of video games, and I don’t think I’ll ever be able to live with out it

23. The game that you’ve logged the most hours into?

Hmm, if we were to go with “in general” the Pokemon franchise definitely. But if we want concrete numbers I can think of off the top of my head, Monster Hunter World is getting dangerously close to logging in 300+ hours, and following that (not very closely, mind you) would be something like Breath of the Wild or New Horizons

Listen, my friend begged me to get MHW to play with him and if there’s anything I’m grateful from him for, it would be his insistence that I get this game. It’s baller

29. What is your gaming set up?

This post is going to be twice as long because I saw the opportunity for pictures and I apologize for nothing

Computer is very basic. I don’t use my gigantic monitor for games though, because every monitor I’ve ever tried lags the hell out of my frames and I just can’t deal with that :/

Switch and Xbox! The two main consoles I play... pretty much the only ones. I had a PS3 briefly for Persona 5, but other than that, *jazz hands*

BUT THE BEST THING: I recently asked my dad to make me these controller-holding hooks for the headboard of my bed and they are the BEST THINGS EVER I love my dad

Bouns: the back of my Switch since I’m a sticker slut

31. Does the 3DS and/or Virtual Boy hurt your eyes or give you headaches?

Any screen device is bound to give me headaches from time to time. Whether it’s from staring at the brightness for too long, or because my dumbass was laying/sitting in a position that was bad for my back/neck, I will probably never know

37. Have you played E.T. for the Atari 2600? Do you think that’s the worst game ever, or do you have another nomination?

Never touched it, and while I can’t give a personal opinion on how garbage it is or isn’t, I do like the jokes that come from it :D

41. A genre that you just can’t get into?

Uh, you know what? I can’t really come up with anything. A long time ago I might have said “long, story-heavy games that take forever to complete” since I mainly watched those on Youtube, but now that I’ve played games like Persona 5 and Breath of the Wild and absolutely adored them, I don’t think I have a leg to stand on

I think I’m willing to give anything a try, but if I play it and it gets boring, then it was probably mostly because I didn’t like the story or because I couldn’t get behind the controls :P

43. Ever play games when you really should have been concentrating on something else?

Yes, all the damn time. Homework in high school that I need to work on? Latest chapter of that fic I’m supposed to be writing? Nah, gotta find all the fossils on my island before I forget to do it later, cause we all know what’s really important here

47. Do you like competitive games?

Man, my Overwatch phase consisted heavily of the competitive aspect of the game, even if the competitive side was toxic as crap. Halo online is and was the shit, always had fun with a variety of the games they came up with. SMASH, SMASH WITH MY TWO BUDDIES I MENTIONED BEFORE IS SO MUCH GODDAMN FUN YOU DON’T EVEN KNOW-

So TLDR, I do like the competitive aspect of video games a whole lot, even if the competitive stuff I mainly do nowadays is just me and my friends fighting each other in Smash at midnight lmao

53. What’s your opinion on DLC these days?

It depends on the pricing and what comes with the DLC. Each DLC is it’s separate thing, and you can really only judge them based on each individual game and what they are worth. Was the game mainly complete when you bought it? Does the DLC have actual worthwhile additions to the game itself? ETC ETC

I could make an entire essay out of this, but I’m kinda tired, and the best way to sum up my feelings is “DLCs aren’t inherently good or bad, and it sucks that certain unnamed companies have given them a dirty reputation”

59. Do you play any cell phone games?

Again with the used to. Huge mobile game phase for awhile (Clash of Clans, PUBG rip-offs, etc) but not anymore. I do have mindless, ad-riddled games if I’m bored, but even those are collecting dust at this point

61. Do you trade in your games or keep them forever?

Off the top of my head I cannot think of any time I have ever traded in a game, so I guess it looks like I keep them until they die or break lol

67. Do you have a happy gaming-related childhood memory you want to share?

Man, I have a bunch. Video games were and still are a huge comfort thing for me, so to just share one would be blasphemy. Let’s just say, video games have always brought be joy and happiness during times when nothing else could :)

Ask the gamer more video game questions

[crowwingedangel]

My vacation, Part 2: Colossalcon!

This is for everyone who keeps asking me how my time going home/at the convention was. Actually, I’m not very good with talking about my emotional reactions and things on the spot… I’m a writer. I do much better writing it out. So that’s what I’m doing now! If you’re one of those people who wanted to know, or are just curious, feel free to look under the cut!

Below is my experience at the convention! It’s long and will have photos, so check it out! 

Wednesday 

So I got to Kalahari around 5 and parked my car. It was still pretty early, so there was plenty of parking around. I went to check in, only to learn that my room was fairly close to where I parked my car! SCORE!  

I then spent some time making trips to the room with my stuff... I brought a bunch of food, since I knew con food is really expensive, and the room itself was a lot... and I had a VIP pass, so this con was costly enough already. Heh... Luckily though, I got all of my stuff in just before the rain showed up!

My friend I was sharing the room with wasn’t going to arrive until Thursday afternoon, so I had this night to myself. I went and registered for the con and got my pass, then I proceeded to walk around... get the layout of the land, as it where. Alas, my phone was pretty full, so I didn’t take lots of pictures of everything I saw... In fact, I only took a few the whole weekend. But a lot of people took photos, so check out the colossalcon tag if you want an idea of what I saw!  I wandered around for a while before heading back to the room and deciding to spend the night chilling... I took a nice bath in the giant tub, then spent the evening making a semi-update for Crimson Wings. That mutant class update? Yeah, I made it during this down time. Eventually I went to bed, knowing I’d have a long day following. 

Thursday 

The con officially began! I took my time waking up in the morning, and decided to explore for a while, waiting for my friend to arrive. I didn’t wear any cosplay that morning, wanting to save it for when she got there, and wanting to look at everything for a while as myself before I changed...

So I went! Not knowing what to do other then look around, I guessed. But luckily, I came across the usual “I need friends” signs that happen at cons. So, seeing as I was alone, I decided, “why not?” I approached, and made some new friends and we all hugged sexy Jesus (yes you just read that). You may have figured out by now that I don’t really like using people’s names on the Internet so... I’ll just say that the two girls had the same name and the guy’s name was my middle name! There, now some of you may know one of their names...

We hung out for a while and met up several times throughout the con! I’m very socially awkward at making friends, so I’m kind of proud that I managed it... But two of them were dressed as two of my favorite twins when I first saw them, so that helped! We went to the game room and played things for a while, mostly team music games. One of them was like a master at them, but we did pretty good as a team! 

Eventually went to the craft fair and saw all the cool stuff people had made and were selling. Eventually my friend arrived and we had to split up, but like I said, I kept in contact with these guys after!  

So I met up with my friend, the one who basically functions as my editor for my writing... Did you know my writing has an editor? Well, now you do. I helped get her stuff to the room, and while she got settled, I changed into my Edward Elric cosplay. I don’t have any pictures of this cosplay, but a bunch of people took photos of me, so if one turns up, I’ll put it here!  We wandered about and I showed her around. And we finally started buying stuff. I got an Non-binary and an Ace-ace patch. I don’t know what I’m going to put them on, but I liked them! I also got one of those ironed-bead sprite Mad Dummy and a small fox pattern pouch... But then of course I finally found the plushies in the dealer room. And there... was a chubby lucario. I made him mine. ...Well, he was always mine, wasn’t he?! He’s actually under my arm right now as I type this! He’s some comfy! Oh, I can take a photo of him right now, can’t I?

Here he is! My fat boi! So chubby and cute, I love him! 

Eventually my friend and I made it back to our room and chilled for the rest of the evening, eating snacks and reading webcomics. I’m pretty good and getting my friends into more webcomics, I think... I had her catch up on a pretty long one that night while we listened to the sounds of party around us.

Friday

Friday, oh boy what I day. It was certainly fun and interesting! So, I (and my grandma, she did the sewing part) worked very hard on a cosplay of RGB from The Property of Hate by @modmad. 

I think it turned out very well, and you can see more pictures in my post here. But, being summer and all, it was very hot and the head was pretty much and oven. I could only wear it for bursts of 20 minutes to half an hour at a time before I’d need to go back to the room and rest. I still think it looked cool though, and some people recognized who I was so mission accomplished I guess! But also... @modmad, is his vision really as limited from that screen as I could see? Because there is no peripheral vision at all, someone get him a seeing-eye hero!  

I wandered about the convention a lot that day sans the head so that I could... be alive, haha. But I bought myself some manga and ordered a commission that I will probably fill you all in more on later once it is made! ;3 (It’s Crimson Wings related.) It’s by the same artist I bought some buttons from a few years back... And I bought more buttons, of course! I needed my snoot-snoot seal!

In the evening, I had my VIP autograph session... I had brought something for most of them (at least the ones I had stuff for, unfortunately I didn’t own anything to bring for the two ladies :C). I knew I was going to be meeting Steve Blum, so I switched into my Terriermon outfit I had made with my grandma. At the session, I met up with the trio of friends from the other day (I had met up with them earlier that day too, but only for a few minutes). We talking in the lines and such while we waited! I got to meet a few awesome people, including Chris Patton, who I caved and bought a Greed poster to have him sign... I love Greed, you guys... I also met Vic Mignogna and had him sign my FMA Brotherhood DVD set, and met Steve Blum and had him sign my Digimon Tamers DVD (he also kept talking in Guilmon’s voice and I was losing it.) My friends also had Vic do the coffee scene from Ouran which you can see on one of their instagrams here! I also got photos with Vic and Steve because I am weak.

Awesomeness.

Then later that night my editor friend and I went to the Kalahari pool for the after hours time we had! We went nearing midnight, and did stuff like the wave pool, the hot tub, and the lazy river for a while. We were about to leave when I ran into the friend trio again, so we went back into the wave pool for a while before finally heading back to the room. It was like 3 in the morning and I had an early Nintendo photoshoot I wanted to get to!

Saturday

Saturday I cosplayed as Pit the whole day. Nintendo had an early photoshoot that day (well, early considering how late we were up that night and how it’d take a while to get dressed. We’re still waiting for all the photos to come out from it, but it’s page is here. And one photo is out at least with me and the other awesome Pit in it! 

It was a lot of fun, and all the smash brothers poses and things were a blast and I hope more photos show up soon! Like we beat up Sandbag and there was the smash ball and-... lots of playing around, I hope they turn up. Unfortunately the Zelda shoot was at the same time, so no Zelda or Link for us... what’s up with that? 

Anyway, after that my friend and I hung out in the room for a while, needing to relax after being up so early... I showed her some youtube videos and made her laugh so hard she fell off the bed. Good times! Then we headed back to the con and did more shopping around, smaller things like charms and stickers now, and went to some panels. I said good bye to my new trio of friends who were leaving that afternoon, and hopefully they are doing well! 

By the evening I had to go to the room a while because I wasn’t feeling great... I actually bought some actual food at the con because the food we had was basically running out and I needed something to settle my stomach. But when we grabbed food we headed to the Masquerade (The skit / cosplay contest) and watched that! I still chuckle that Tony Stark was the host. It was a lot of fun, and the skits were fun, including some really good singers and a Nurse Joy who wanted to become a trainer (that one had some very clever props, just saying). And those cosplays were amazing. Much appreciation. The halftime show was hilarious, our side’s champion two girls beating the other side’s two men at a blind-folded donut eating contest-... It’s a long story, and this is long enough as it is, haha.  

After it was over, my friend and I headed back to the room and ended the night watching some youtube.  

Sunday 

Alas, the con was basically over. I wore my Terriermon cosplay that day since it’s the simplest and isn’t hot. We had to check out by ten, and my friend had to leave at ten, so we basically got up in the morning, packed my car, and parted ways as she was picked up. I stayed a little longer to check out the flee market. I found some good stuff and spend more money (of course! More pokemon plush for me! ...And some really old digimon toys. Nice.) Once I felt I had checked everything out and had basically spent the last of the cash I had brought with me, I headed back out to my car to start my drive to my parent’s house...   I arrived, and then had dinner with my family, including my aunt and uncle at a restaurant, then turned in for the night, having to catch an early flight back down here in the morning... 

AND that was the con, everyone! It was a lot of fun and I tried to sort out as much as I could here! I hope that helped answer the basic question of how it was! If you have any more specific questions, feel free to ask! 

[shalliedragon]

Fur Squared 2018: Convention Report

All right. I think it's official now. Fur Squared is now my favorite furry convention. Their attention to detail, the sheer generosity of the attendees, the utter insanity of the events, the fact that it's just the right size, the fact that 40% of the attendees either sponsored or super-sponsored... all of those things make Fur Squared unlike any other convention I've been to. It is rare that I attend a convention that is pretty much non-stop happiness and excitement from beginning to end.

I say this despite the fact that the weekend was more or less one big blur of awesomeness. There weren't a whole ton of standout moments, because it was all consistently fun and enjoyable. But I will try to recount what I remember (might be easier now that it's over).

Thursday

Got everything packed into my car before work, and left work early to head on the road. It's a long drive from home to Brookfield, so I had to put the pedal down and just go. On the road I listened to the Dragget Show and Feral Attraction podcasts (sidenote: FA's "keeping yourself secure on the internet" episode was extremely disappointing, but that's a topic for another day).

I got to the con around 10:15 and checked into my room. I met my dear friend (and roommate) Jake (AKA Cobbs) in the lobby of the Sheraton. After exchanging pleasantries, he helped me carry my stuff in, and then we went over to MST3K (stylized to MiST3Ke on the schedule). Registration had closed, so I didn't have my con badge yet, but the person at the door thankfully let us in just by showing our state ID's.

The panelists were Alkali, Pandez, Xander, Draggor, Dixie Lioness, and Furry Bobs (I believe). The movie in question was... some kind of bad fantasy adventure thing, I don't remember the title, but it was bad. The panelists had to drink when a weapon was drawn, when there was a typo in the subtitles, when there was "(dramatic music)" playing, or the secret rule: anytime the panelists ended a sentence with a vowel. I didn't stick around to the end, as I was exhausted (so did Jake), but I think the panelists ended up winning.

We made our way back to the room, where we ran into our 3rd roommate, Gotherine Foxx (Gothy for short), who was putting the finishing touches (read: a pack of googly eyes) on a very large and ornately-drawn painting for the charity auction. She subsequently left with her friends, and then Jake and I went to bed.

Friday

I. Slept. Like. GARBAGE.

It took me a very long time to finally fall asleep the night before, and I don't quite know why. I think I got like 3-4 hours of sleep. It was BAD.

Thankfully, Fur Squared made it up to me with FREE BREAKFAST. This is one of my favorite features of Fur Squared. Every day of the con, they give all of the attendees vouchers for the breakfast buffet, so that everyone always gets at least one of the two meals needed for the 6-2-1 rule. I ate my fill, assuming that I wouldn't really be eating lunch that day. Jake and I sat with my friends Angel and Gabi, and we also ran into my friends Linn and Xeila.

After breakfast, I meandered around the con space with Jake, and went to get registered. Two things of note. First, they were giving out ribbons to the sponsors/super-sponsors that had character classes on them: archmage, drunken master, divine oracle, and ... one other one that I don't remember (I think it was Bard or something like that). I chose Archmage. Second, they had little stickers that you can put on your badge for your preferred pronouns. This made me REALLY happy; I always love it when cons try to be trans-inclusive.

Then we did some people-watching. There were a lot of familiar faces, and the excitement was palpable (both from the attendees, and from the many happy dogs that the charity had brought with them). I managed to snag a picture of Axikor as they walked past (it was actually the only picture I took the entire con, foolish me). Finally, it was time for opening ceremonies. It was filmed, so I won't go into detail, but long-story-short: the GOH's were Furry Bobs and Cypher (sp?), the artist of honor was Golden Druid, the con theme was "Lizards and Labyrinths 2nd Edition, Revenge of the Top Hat", the Kalerati and the Church of Adam started a charity donation war to see which one was the best, and people were silly. Good times.

Also, throughout this time, my 4th roommate, Dezzi, was nowhere to be found.

After the con was open, I made a beeline for my room and got right into my fursuit. I traveled around the con space some, posed for a few pictures, gave a few hugs, and got some professional photos taken at the photoshoot area in the headless lounge (I was due for some new photos). They had a whole collection of fantasy-themed props there, which made for some fun photos. I did a couple photos: one where I had a veil and some potions and looked like an alchemist, and one where I had a fistful of gemstones. The photos should be processed in the next few weeks.

I ran into my friend Alex while I was there; he was wearing his Azriel Dreemur fursuit (he's the one with the big Save button you see gallivanting around the cons). We chatted for a bit, and he went on his way.

I also had a goal for the weekend. Earlier in the year, I had bought a pack of "sprouts", these little clip-on plastic plants that you can affix to yourself as decoration. I was inspired by a former MFF roommate, Sven, who was giving them out to people. I wanted to continue the tradition, so that I could help #SproutTheLove on my own. I had a collection of 5 that I was going to give out by the time the weekend was over (I had already given my other 2 to my roommates).

After getting my photo taken, I sauntered downstairs to the video gaming room. They had rockband set up, so I immediately sat down at the drum kit and started getting a song set up. A couple other furries saw me banging on the drums and went "I have to get in on this." There were 3 of us playing "Somebody Told Me" by The Killers. And it was a cluster. We could barely hear the music, the instruments were all out of sync, and I was extremely rusty (and in fursuit). But it was fun, and it seemed like it made people smile, so it was worth it.

I said my goodbyes (I think we ended up attracting a small crowd), and made my way back to my room to cool off and clean up. I got a quick bite to eat at the con suite (which was decorated with candles, goblets, crystals, and even a little keg), and then made my way over to the Otherworld Stories panel. Alkali and a bunch of his Nero (LARP) friends told stories of their various experiences in LARPing, and hilarity ensued. It was a surprisingly popular event, and the individuals involved sounded pretty amazing. They also had a slideshow of old photos from Alkali's LARP days. I really wish they had Nero out where I live, because it sounded like a hell of a lot of fun.

After that I stayed put for convention horror stories. It's pretty standard for that kind of panel: old con chairs and con staffers talk about ridiculous terrible things that happened during their tenures, and hilarity ensued. I had heard many of them before, but it was still fun. It was filmed.

I got a quick bite to eat (#BeerCheeseSoup) between panels, and then went back for the 3-Headed Monster. As per usual, Alkali, Pandez, and Xander each did 15-20 minute comedy sets back to back. Xander got somewhat political, but also much darker than usual. Good balance of new and old material. Alkali ... was Alkali, and Pandez sang a song or two. It was filmed, as usual, and it is consistently one of my favorite events, so if you haven't seen it yet... see it. Seriously.

After that was QUIPFUR. This is Draggor's homebrew version of the popular video game Quiplash. Serathin was the MC (he basically just read off the answers and stuff) and the main panelists were Xander, Furry Bobs, and Huscoon. Unlike standard Quiplash (in addition to having furry-related questions), Quipfur was played where Draggor chose which two people played in a given round. He usually pitted one of the panelists against a random audience member. It was pretty hilarious, and I highly recommend it if you like fun events that you can participate in.

It was at that time that I noticed that Draggor still wasn't wearing his trademark skin-tight bodysuits. He was in a costume (broad-brimmed fantasy hat with feather, and tights), but he wasn't wearing a mask or anything. Indeed, throughout the entire convention, he only donned a bodysuit once: the fursuit parade (where he wore his Robbie Sinclair suit). Other than that, he was just his normal human self. He never said why he wasn't wearing them (to my knowledge), so I don't know what the reason was for the change of pace. I can only speculate: either a) he just wanted to change things up and do something different, or b) he was getting tired of being known as "the bulge" and wanted to be recognized for more than just his suits and his package. Maybe I'll ask him sometime...

After Quipfur, I went over to "Fox's Songs To Get Murdered By". Fox Amoore (accompanied by Flop the bass bunny) basically just played a bunch of random songs, and had Pandez, Alkali, and Boozy Badger sing along. It was definitely fun, and very silly. I think it was filmed (I hope so, because my memory for it was kind of weak).

Of note: this was one of the first panels I recall that made mention of the phrase "cripple fight." This phrase was to become a recurrent meme throughout the con.

Jake and I quickly went over to the restaurant and got some more food (I had a salad, and Jake had a salad with a brat sandwich, and also had the cocktail I got earlier that night, a variant of a sidecar). We often spent our time talking about things in the fandom and various hobbies. Jake's a soft-spoken guy, who often just responds with a "nice" or "I like that" when I tell stories. I worry that I am boring or annoying to him, but since he chooses to keep hanging out with me, I'm assuming my worries are unfounded.

After dinner part 2, we went to Whose Lion Is It Anyway (audience participation version). I've become more fond of the audience Whose Lion in recent years; people have gotten better at it, and the quality of the jokes has really increased. Further, I am SO HAPPY that Alkali specifically told people "please avoid insult humor and racist jokes" and encouraged people to get creative. That had been a problem in previous years; people had often used Whose Lion as an excuse to say terrible things to each other, in an attempt to be funny. But since they specifically quashed that this time, people actually tried different things beyond the typical "hey baby wanna do sex?" chestnut. It was great. Indeed, some some of the jokes were FANTASTIC.

Also more cripple fight. And Culver's. Culver's is apparently a thing now.

After that, we went to the bizarrely-titled "Boozy's Drunken Naptime." I honestly went into it expecting to see Boozy doing dramatic readings of children's stories or something. Instead, it was him, Huscoon, Fox Amoore, Nbowa, and Dixie Lioness just BS'ing for an hour. Weird, but still funny and interesting.

This seems to be a common theme for a lot of panels: get X people, put them on a stage, and have them tell funny stories and BS with each other, with pretty much no structure beyond that. There were at least 4 panels at Fur Squared that followed this format. It's a format I haven't really seen outside of furry conventions, and I am curious about how it came to be, and why it works so well. More research to come.

After that was the last panel of the night: Iron Alcoholic. It is competitive mixology. During each round, the competitors had to create a cocktail that met certain criteria (i.e. "must contain vodka, must be a shot"). They had a time limit to do this (2-3 minutes), and then audience members were the taste-testers for the event. Each round had a winner, based on how the audience felt. Me and Jake only stayed for 2 rounds, because the event started after midnight, and we were both exhausted. But it was pretty awesome. It was definitely filmed (thank you Silvergatomon, seriously he is a saint).

Saturday

I got up at around 8 in the morning, so that I could go to Xander's Saturday Morning Cartoons panel. I had been looking forward to this panel all year; it was a ton of fun last time. It's a great way to just relax and unwind on a Saturday morning. As usual, Xander created a "playlist" of various clips from cartoons and TV shows, and we just kind of sat and watched. It was funny, though some clips were better than others. Most of them were D&D or animal themed to an extent. Unlike last year, they didn't have cereal and milk, which was a bit disappointing. Still, a good time.

Immediately following was CHAIRity D&D. This was probably one of the best panels at the con. It was a one-shot D&D adventure, played by Alkali, Draggor, Dusty Montale, and John AKA Beardo The Magnificent, with Faelan as the DM. They were playing a variant of 5th edition, with some additional house rules to streamline things (each player had a deck of cards with spells on them). And it was BRILLIANT. The campaign was really smooth and fluid. Faelan was an EXPERT DM; he deftly made things up off the cuff, without batting an eye or checking a rulebook. All the players got really into their characters. And as usual, they were hilarious. To top it all off, the audience could donate money to the charity to both increase the difficulty of the adventure AND grant boons to the players if they so desired.

It was probably one of the best run, most entertaining D&D sessions I have ever witnessed. And it sounds like they'll be doing it again next year, so yeeeeeeee!

After the adventure, I booked it back to my room to quickly get into fursuit for the parade. While I was in the staging area, I ran into Xander (in suit) and gave him my usual hug. I also ran into my friend Angel, who was wearing her brand new wolf partial suit. It was super cute, especially because she had a big plush cookie in her mouth. After the group photo, the parade began. I was right behind Red Beagle (I think that's his name?) and I felt really bad, because I kept bumping into him as I walked. My vision isn't very good in-suit, so I had a hard time looking at the audience AND seeing where I was going. I'm going to make an effort to be aware of that going forward. Mustn't have been fun for Mr. Beagle (considering my head is made of resin and probably made for unpleasant noseboops).

On a lighter note, I do distinctly recall hearing people shout "Shallie!" as I rounded one of the corners (I think it was Leafy Greens?). This really made my day, as I rarely get recognized by name in the parade. I made an effort to get a lot of mugging and posing in, trying to do more than just wave. I think they like it when I act "fabulous", so I'm going to try and ham it up more next time.

After the parade, I rushed back to my room to get cleaned up before running back to attend Charity Whose Lion. Again, one of my favorite events. And again, more cripple fight (IIRC Boozy ended up swatting Propzilla with his cane). I highly recommend this panel; these folks are all experts at improv comedy. If you haven't seen it, watch the video when it comes out.

Following that, I went over to the dealer's room to take a look around, and collect my super-sponsor swag. This year's con swag: a Fur Squared beer mug, a t-shirt, a branded dice bag, a complete set of D&D dice, and a branded stemless wine glass for the super sponsors. As usual, sponsors got a copy of the poster, and super sponsors got to be IN the poster. I was pretty blown away by my picture: they knew somehow that I was a spellcaster, so they made me a sorceress (in a pretty dress no less). It was awesome.

After wandering around some more and snagging a bite to eat (while signing the super-sponsor poster for the charity auction and giving two sprouts away to some strangers), I went over to @FurSquared. This was a gameshow of some stripe, hosted by Iggy, where each round, people were given prompts, and were asked to come up with clever responses. For example, one of them was "what kind of fictional crossover have you always dreamed of?" The responses were pretty good, but I remember the game being a bit more... lively the previous year. Still, fun times.

Following that, I went over to another bizarrely named panel: "Monkey Knife Fights." Following a similar formula as Drunken Naptime, they put Alkali and Boozy up on a stage and had them BS for an hour. As you might imagine, it was hysterical. But that wasn't the cool part. That came after the panel.

Immediately following the event, Alkali revealed that a hypnotist had come to the convention, and was in the audience with us. I think some people donated to the charity to convince Alkali to undergo hypnosis at the hands of this gentleman. I thought "Oh this'll be funny, we'll watch Alkali do stupid things". But what actually happened was even better. The gentleman, who was named Mark, was a professional hypno-therapist, and he spoke all about how hypnosis can be used to help treat psychological disorders and mental illness. He also explained how hypnosis worked, in an effort to allay Alkali of his fears (he was visibly nervous at first).

Eventually, the ferret calmed down, and Mark began his hypnosis regimen. He told Alkali to imagine that a helium balloon was tied to his wrist, and that it was slowly filling up with gas. As it filled, Alkali was told to imagine that his arm was getting lighter as the pull of the balloon got stronger. Eventually, Alkali's arm PHYSICALLY ROSE OFF HIS LEG, and he literally could not make himself put it down. Then, Mark cut the balloon's "string", and Alkali went to sleep. Mark told Alkali to envision that one of his friends had snuck in the room and put googly eyes on Boozy's eyes (Boozy had been sitting there silently the whole time), and to think about how funny that would be.

At the end, Mark told Alkali that he wouldn't remember any of this, but that he would feel very refreshed and happy, and that he would see Boozy's "googly eyes" upon his waking. Mark commanded Alkali to wake up, and Alkali had the biggest, most placid grin I had ever seen on his face. He looked so peaceful, so content, so relaxed...

And then he turned and saw Boozy and LOST IT!

Alkali honestly believed that there were googly eyes on Boozy's face. He was all like "You look like Dr. Doom from Roger Rabbit!" and he laughed so hard that he nearly fell out of his chair. After he had calmed down, Mark asked how Alkali had felt. Alkali responded that he felt "the best I've felt all day."

I really hope that was filmed, because that was an incredible experience.

Moving on, I went to the super-sponsor dinner. More accurately, I stood in line for the super-sponsor dinner. Apparently there were so many super-sponsors that they had to bring in people in stages. I was toward the end of the line. Alkali was really apologetic, and said he would try to smooth things out for next year. But it honestly didn't matter. They had enough food for everyone.

And what a banquet it was. They had a buffet with chicken and mushrooms, roast beef, roasted vegetables, dinner rolls, salad, beer cheese soup, potatoes, cookies, brownies, and Sprecher Root Beer on tap. It was pretty delicious, especially considering how hungry I was. I sat at the table, eating with my fellow super-sponsors, thinking to myself "I'm doing this every year!" And frankly, I think I will. All the cool swag, getting to be in the poster, AND a free catered meal? Considering a Fur Squared supersponsorship is $100 less than one at MFF or AC, I think that's a pretty solid bargain.

Also, there was a proposal at the dinner. It was pretty sweet. I think Alkali cried.

After that was the DRAGGET SHOW! Super fun, like always. The panel was Xander and Alkali, Boozy, Draggor, and Pandez. I forget what all they talked about, but it was recorded, so eh. I do remember Xander mentioning the video I made for them. Context: I had been working on a remix of the JAPAN SONG for the past several weeks (go to YouTube and look up "dragget show japan song" if you want to see the original, or my remix), with my goal being to get it done before Fur Squared. I was successful. I also wanted to get Xander's attention about it (he tends to not check his phone often), so I asked him about it on his Patreon. He mentioned it, and said that he had actually retweeted the song. So yeah, that was cool.

Of note: the Dragget Show was a charity panel, so people were passing around the hat. But towards the end, there were two huge donations. One person donated $666.66. And (IIRC) Tobe donated $1,000. Alkali cried. Combined with the other money, the show raised over $2000, which made it the most generous event at the convention other than the charity auction. It was amazing. And as usual, the show ended with a charity story. It was the story of what REALLY happened on Draggor's birthday, when they all got insanely high. I won't go into detail, though; you need to attend the panel to hear the charity stories. >:D

Following that, I went over to the Foxes and Peppers after dark show. It was pretty funny, like usual. Pepper's guitar string broke mid-set, so he had to fix it WHILE performing. They auctioned off the last printing of one of Fox's CD's. And they performed "Lighthouse", in memory of the kids who were shot during the school shooting in Florida recently. Pepper put it best: "I want to forget the reason I wrote this song, but there keep being more and more reasons to perform it."

The show ran a little long, so I ended up being late to Libation Appreciation. For those who don't know, this event is all about sharing knowledge about alcohol. They talked about various different types of booze, how they like to enjoy them, and various recommendations for brands to try (apparently Nika distillery is good for Japanese whiskey). It was pretty informative. Then Fox and Pepper crashed the panel, and Pepper (who was drunk) started playing around with the giant Jenga set in the corner of the room. Still, good times. They kicked us out at 1AM and I went to bed.

Sunday

Got up at around 9 for breakfast (someone ended up taking our spots, so we had to talk to the wait staff and get new vouchers), and then Jake and I went over to main events for Keep Talking And Nobody Explodes. For those who don't know the video game: one person has a bomb in front of them, with a bunch of puzzles on it. The other person/team has a bomb manual, with instructions on how to solve the puzzles. However, neither can see each other's screens, so they have to talk and work together to defuse the bomb. It's a pretty fun, but stressful, game.

And they took it further at Fur Squared. Firr and Zen Fox were running the panel. They had one audience member at the bomb, and a team of other audience members with paper copies of the manual. While the bomb was being defused, Firr and Zen would do everything in their power to be distracting. They would scream and shout, sing, dance and stomp around, blare annoying music, and more. They even set up crazy "house rules" to make it even harder. One of the "experts" had to speak in a Russian accent. Another time, only one of them was allowed to speak. Another time, the audience had to use their phones to use the manual.

And then it was my turn. I got to be the defuser once (I lost), and it was hilarious. Firr and Zen were yelling and making the stage shake, and they were moving my microphone around. Another time, I was one of the experts, which was shortly after they had taken all of the paper manuals and threw the pages all over the place. We gathered up the papers as best we could, and were ready to start.

And then Harvard walked up to the bomb chair. Harvard is a silent fursuiter. We had to play "Keep Talking" with someone who didn't talk. To make matters worse, Firr and Zen decided to play "helping hands" with us, where they came up behind us and put their arms under ours, pretending to be "our arms." I distinctly remember receiving a nipple tweak from Firr. At any rate, we lost, even on the easiest difficulty. Harvard had the foresight to hilariously dive from her chair just as the bomb was about to explode. "She was the only one who thought to do that," said Firr.

Our next "victim" was Razzy, another fursuiter. Thankfully Razzy could talk. We still had a hard time deciphering what he was saying for some of the puzzles. This wasn't made easier by the fact that Zen Fox decided to lie down on top of all of the bomb manuals. I had to physically roll him out of the way (I thankfully didn't push him off the table). But we won!

For the last bomb, I think it was Zen in the hot seat, and Firr reading the manual. They misread one of the puzzles, but I think they ended up winning? I don't remember. Regardless, Firr does a really good job with the Keep Talking panel, so you should check it out next time you go to Fur Squared.

Following that event, Jake and I went down to the "Coming and GOHing" panel. SemJay, Zen Fox, Pandez, and Firr regaled us with stories about being the previous guests of honor at Fur Squared. They answered questions and shared their thoughts about unexpected things about being a GOH, what their proudest accomplishments were, and how they messed with Alkali's head. SemJay even took off her pants for charity (she was wearing underwear, don't worry).

This panel bled into the following panel, Firr's "Go Forth And Suck." It was a pep-talk panel, where Firr (and the other former GOH's) encouraged people to just go out there and try whatever they wanted to do. If you have an idea, just do it, and don't be ashamed of sucking. We all sucked at one point. And sucking is how you get good. It was because they all took risks and did stupid things, some of which just blew up in their faces, that they ended up where they are now. Pandez's story was particularly poignant; one of his first solo comedy sets was to a crowd of 12 people in a room made for 500. But he kept going, and he learned a lesson from his experience (tailor the room to the size of the event, and do smaller sets).

I was reminded of my panel at the previous year's Fur Squared. The one that only had 3 attendees. As of writing this, I never attempted to try again after that dismal failure (even though someone thanked me for my time). So, next con I go to, I am going to submit multiple panel ideas and see which ones I get. I will do my best, and I will have fun doing it, no matter what happens.

Sidenote: because one panel ended up bleeding into the other, the panelists decided to combine the two and call it "Coming and GOHing and Sucking." We laughed at that for a good 30 seconds.

After the panel, I went with Jake back to the room and we said our goodbyes. He unfortunately had a plane to catch. But I was happy to have been able to share so much of the con with him, whether it was sitting together at panels, or having in-depth conversations during meals. He told me he remembered fondly the time at AC when we just sat and talked for hours at the end of the con. I hope that we can do something like that again sometime.

Then I went to the charity auction. As usual, it was fun times. Lots of great stuff up for auction. I unfortunately didn't win anything. But honestly, it wasn't even about that. The Fur Squared charity auction is one of the highlights of the con, because people really get into it. Cheering, jokes, huge bids; the atmosphere was electric! There were items that went for over $1000 apiece. My roommate, Dezzi, actually ended up buying the creative rights to the Kalerati AND the Church of Adam at the auction. Alkali bought the signed super-sponsor poster, as a way to say Thank You for all the hard work done by Axikor and their team. A mask made by one of Alkali's Nero friends went for $1500. It was incredible.

Oh, and someone bought a collection of Victoria's Secret perfume and then sprayed it all over Alkali, Firr, and Pandez.

Charity auctions, the bar has been set by Fur Squared. Both in terms of money raised, and in terms of the experience.

After the auction, I quickly went back to my room to get into fursuit. I decided that this was going to be a tradition: I would always do "This Is How You Kill A Con" and closing ceremonies in-suit. So I did.

I met up with my friends Linn and Xeila at the panel, and had some snuggles (I know Linn had previously asked for fursuit snuggles, so I was making good on my promise). I gave Linn one of my sprouts. But the real fun was the panel itself. For those who haven't been: "This Is How You Kill A Con" is basically just a time-filler while the board of directors meets to go over the events of the con. As a result, they give Firr free reign to do pretty much whatever he wants. And he took full advantage of that.

Him and Zen (and I think Furry Bobs was there for a bit) just kind of did whatever for an hour and a half. We had a mini charity auction. Several things ended up being up for bid. First, a small sketch done by an artist in the audience at "Coming and GOHing and Sucking". Next, a small piece of string. I think there was something else (I hope they filmed the panel).

And then Huscoon showed up. The conversation turned to Culver's, again. Turns out, the Fur Squared Twitter account only follows one other account: Culver's. This gave Firr an idea. He would put up for auction the ability to send a single tweet from the Fur Squared Twitter account AND the ability to have the account follow any one other account (no unfollows). I think the winner tweeted out that he wanted to be the GOH for next year.

They also managed to convince Huscoon to auction off the ability for someone to post a tweet on HIS account. Yes, you read correctly. The famously conservative, controversy-starting Huscoon. The one for whom #BlameHuscoon was created. Turns out, Dixie was the one who won that tweet. I think she posted "I give my undying love to my sweetheart, Pepper Coyote" or something like that. Good times.

In the middle of the shenanigans, I made my way up to the front of the room and gave my last two sprouts to Firr and Zen. Firr clipped his to his hat (where it stayed for the rest of the con), and Zen clipped his to his beard. I was happy.

Finally (after ending the panel with a round of "Bohemian Rhapsody"), it was time for closing ceremonies. They began with a big Happy Birthday song for Draggor, and he was blown away. He was grinning from ear to ear, and he turned beet red from embarrassment. Turns out he's as big a sweetheart as Alkali is. The staff also brought up a present for him: a hoodie featuring the logo for Dragon's Milk beer.

I won't go into too much detail, as this panel was filmed. I'll just go over the highlights. Kataze had his traditional power point presentation, going over the numbers at the convention. This time he had graphs, and they were HILARIOUS. Final head count: 1101. Total sponsors and super-sponsors: 485. That's right. 45% of the convention chose to upgrade their badges. By contrast, I think AC had a similar number of upgraded badges, but had 7,500 attendees.

Someone brought in a whole cart full of Culver's custard. I didn't get any (as I was in suit) but they had enough for... a lot of people.

And then the waterworks. Alkali read off the totals for the charitable donations from each of the sources. And as he read, his became more and more misty-eyed. But it didn't stop there. I think there were at least 4 or 5 instances of people coming up and going "wait Alkali, I have more money." Including my roommate Gothy donating a LITERAL BRA AND PANTIES MADE OF MONEY, that was worth $69 on the dot. As usual, Firr went around and rounded things up.

The final charity total was $21,000. They beat their previous year's total by about $6,000. Which, as of this post, puts Fur Squared at #3 in the ranking of most generous furry conventions in the world (total donated divided by attendance).

To top it all off, Cy, one of the guests of honor, said that when she sells her house, she would donate 10% of the value of the house to the charity, which was estimated to be a donation of about $12,000.

Lastly, they announced stuff for next year. Vegas themed. Title: The Mouse Always Wins. I do hope that means that Miko is going to do something ridiculous.

They also announced the guests of honor. They doubled up on the artists of honor (I don't remember their names), but they also had a new "Gamemaster of honor" title, which they awarded to Iggy! I was ecstatic, cuz I had roomed with him the previous year, and consider him my friend. I was jumping up and down and clapping like mad. I think Iggy was pretty surprised.

After closing ceremonies wrapped up, Linn went back to my room with me, and I gave her the Christmas present that I had been meaning to get to her for the past 2 months: a board game called Pitch Deck (look it up, it's fantastic). She was so happy, because she's a huge board game nerd, and she immediately recognized the game when I pulled it out. We sat and talked for a while, catching up and talking about future convention plans. After a while, I told that I had to get cleaned up (I was still in my bodysuit), so we parted ways.

After cleaning up, I went over to the hotel restaurant for dinner. This was where things took a bit of a dip. I got to the restaurant, and sat down. I waited for the waitress to come bring me a menu, but she never did. I went over to the bar and sat down, looking over at the bartenders. They never acknowledged me. I sat there for a solid 15 minutes, and was never even noticed. It was stupid. Upset, I decided to give up and head over to the Adventure Time marathon. Thankfully they had pizza there, so I was able to eat my fill without having to spend money.

I discovered that night that I don't like Adventure Time. While it has some funny jokes, it's too full of existential dark humor and body horror for me to enjoy it. Plus, there were like 5 people watching the show. So instead, I decided to take a look around and see what people were doing.

It was then that I discovered the "dead dog karaoke" happening. Firr, being a DJ, had set up a karaoke machine in the main events room. People could give him a card with their requests on it, and he would call you up when it was your turn. It started out kind of slow, but as the night went on, it became increasingly more fun. And there were some AMAZING singers. Citrine Husky in particular did an incredible cover of "Don't Stop Believin'".

People were really getting into it. I ran into Gabi and Angel again, and we hung out for a bit before they ran off onto the dance floor. There were a surprising number of folks dancing. Then Zen Fox showed up and things got a bit more rowdy.

Highlights: closing ceremonies had a big confetti cannon, so people were having confetti fights. A lady in a big white fursuit, with padded digi legs, sat down on Zen in the middle of the floor. She then proceeded to poke Zen with a big "phallic" balloon. At another point, someone had a cardboard cutout of Jesus, and they were dancing around with it. Someone did Andrew W.K.'s "Party Hard" and Firr was backing it up unenthusiastically. One guy serenaded Gothy with R. Kelly's "Bump n' Grind." They did the Time Warp.

And I sang "Your Song" by Elton John. I was kind of afraid of the high notes, so I started out singing the song and octave lower than the original. This ended up sounding bad, so I switched over to the original register and just did my best. Turns out I was able to hit most of the high notes after all. I distinctly remember doing a silly dance during one of the breaks. Firr came up next to me and sang along. And I held out the last word longer than I expected (I looked at my "watch" in an effort to be funny).

I'm not saying all that to brag. I'm trying to remember what happened, because I don't think it was filmed. See, the main reason I write these journals is so that I can re-read them later down the road, and have a solid recollection of the events of the con. My memory isn't that good, and most cons become a blur after a while, so I try to capture everything as best I can.

Anyway, the night ended with another rendition of "Bohemian Rhapsody", which concluded right before the hotel staff kicked us out of the room. Apparently there were business travelers, and we needed to be quiet after midnight. I think they said they'd put the karaoke in another room next year so that it would be less disruptive.

Exhausted, I wandered back to the room with Gothy. We chatted briefly about furry stuff before heading to bed.

Monday

Got up at a reasonable hour and got breakfast with Gothy. We ran into Dezzi at the restaurant. We chatted for a bit, about his newfound "power" as the new owner of a cult and a religion. He's apparently planning on handing over the reigns at next year's charity auction if someone can match his bid.

After our breakfasts, we went back to the room and got packed. Gothy had the foresight to request a luggage cart, which made things WAY easier getting out. However, in her haste to get home, she forgot her slippers, so I had to run them out to her before she left (made it).

I packed my things, and with a little finagling, I was able to get all my stuff out to the car in one trip. After checking out, gassing up, and getting a coke, I put the pedal down and drove home, listening to #Hashtag and The Dragget Show on the way.

Overall

I love Fur Squared. It is a magical, unique, wonderful convention, a true diamond in the rough. Every year, they have new surprises. Every year, new memes, new jokes, new stories, new insanity. They keep donating more and more money, and creating bigger and grander schemes and shenanigans. Every con is special, but Fur Squared is... different. Its craziness, its generosity, its attention to detail, its loving and close-knit atmosphere, its relationship with its hotel and charity... many cons have some of these things, but it is the confluence of all of them that makes Fur Squared worthy of being called my favorite convention.

You should go.

[aoimori]

03.21.2017 MERRY, sukekiyo & Metronome 3 Band Event “Okunnahareya” @ Shinjuku ReNY [PART 1/3]

PART ONE FEAT. PRE SHOW & METRONOME

PART TWO FEAT. SUKEKIYO

PART THREE FEAT. MERRY (+ VIDEO)

Are You Ready For This

This was the last of the three「三月に咲く��鈍共による錆びたハサミと戒厳令の雨あられ三輪車の花園にて、許しておくんなはれや」shows. The title roughly means “Blooming in March in stupidity, a hail of rusted scissors and martial law at the tricycle flower garden, please forgive me”. Okunnahareya (please) for short. The event was organized by Merry. 

I went to the Tokyo show where the lineup was MERRY, SUKEKIYO, AND METRONOME. A++++

GOODS LIFE

I lined up for goods really early but the knife still sold out and I’m still sad about it! I also didn’t win the Nero dakimakura even though I bought a ton of stickers. And I didn’t get the two stickers I wanted. BUT IT’S OKAY. The shirt is definitely one of my favorite tour shirts ever. I got two Merry trading cards this time and only got ONE Tetsu (I always get lots of him in webpon/trading cards… I think it’s my fate) and a Gara!! My first Gara trading card!

Detail of the sukemerry tshirt with Kyo’s drawings of sukekiyo and Merry!

Waiting in the venue... what is this sick bg music?

The show was at Shinjuku ReNY which is kind of shaped like a circle inside. A big marquee wraps around the venue and the name of that night’s band/tour revolves around the room. For this particular show, the marquee showed each band’s name in different colors, and then the event name in red… it took so long for the entire event name to make it all the way around the venue lol

There was also some really interesting music playing before the show/between bands. There was some I couldn’t place, but there was a lot from the avant garde band Guernica (whose vocalist you may know... Jun Togawa!!)

I remember hearing these two songs:  電力組曲 and クラウド９

The atmosphere that these songs created was pretty incredible. Everything about this event was strangely beautiful so this dramatic, retro, kind of cabaret feeling and strong and slightly unsettling vocals fit perfectly. The whole thing really felt like an extremely strange carnival, like Gara said. Honestly listening to Guernica I can definitely see why Gara, or Kyo, or both of them would have wanted these songs to play.

IT BEGINS WITH... METRONOME!?

(t-site)

We were waiting for the first act (in the previous two shows sukekiyo had gone first). There was a heavy red curtain blocking our view of the stage. A staff member was yelling instructions and then SUDDENLY this loud electronica starts playing and the curtain slowly rises. Looks like metronome is first!?

I listened to metronome a little over 10 years ago so I was slightly familiar with them but I didn’t know many songs. This performance immediately made me a fan. It was just so incredibly FUN.

You could tell who was there for which band. People would rearrange themselves between sets. In some cases you could see a few people dancing around while others nearby were just nodding their heads.

I didn’t know anything other than the fact that I SUDDENLY LOVE METRONOME so I was copying furi from everyone around me and jumping around and just experiencing JOY.

Sanskrit was PROBABLY my favorite. It’s a song I like anyway, but the furi is NEXT LEVEL. There was a girl next to me that was obviously a big metronome fan so I was stealing her furi moves. During the chorus of this song you wave your hands up and down and then actually physically spin your whole body in a circle. It was SO FUNNNNN. No one else in my direct vicinity was doing it so it was mostly me and my new friend spinning around together. I can’t even explain the JOY I felt dancing and spinning while other people looked on smiling. We talked some after their set because I had so much fun I wanted to talk about it and she was happy that they had a new fan!!

Gimmicks also stands out as being REALLY fun because of the intense contrast between the intense parts and the upbeat verses (which then seem creepy in comparison). And also sekai wa minna boku no teki!! Sharaku does these robot moves back and forth along with the song between verses and when you move your hands in time with it it feels like you’re controlling him lol

Also their bassist Riu is ADORABLE? He knocked over his mic stand at one point and just smiled in embarrassment and picked it up and then knocked the mic off LOL. Do your best child.

QUALITY METRONOME MCS

Their MCs are SO CUTE AND FUNNY. Things I remember:

Sharaku likes it when fans who look dressed up/cute scream for him death voice style (versus the expected high pitched calling). So he referred to himself in that voice from then on. 

Before Matsuri the drummer played a festival beat?? And we all clapped along?? And then Fukusuke started doing an MC in that kind of old festival Japanese voice?? I was so confused but I loved it.

During that MC Fukusuke talked about being invited to the event. He said sukekiyo and Merry are so dark and metronome is the only bright band. But it’s okay because their roots are dark! Riu looks cute and happy but he’s actually got a black heart!! (Riu raised both his arms up and posed) He said something similar about Sharaku and himself and they all posed.  Sharaku’s pose wasn’t quite as impressive so he just kinda fell down to the ground and sat there LOL. We were laughing constantly throughout metronome’s MCs.

Sharaku said they had a show around Valentine’s Day so he decided to drive instead of taking the train because he expected to have lots of gifts. He said singers are ALWAYS the most popular member right? They HAVE TO BE, right? But he ended up only getting a small bag’s worth, so afterwards he just dejectedly said well… I could have just taken the train…

He also showed us the furi before each song yayyy

There was some talk about old VK bands versus new ones? People were just constantly laughing. I wish I understood lol

FINAL IMPRESSION & SETLIST???

WHAT A FUN AND STRANGE AND UNIQUE BAND I THINK I LOVE THEM!

1. 解離性同一人物　 2.世界はみんな僕の敵　 3.ギミックス　 4.アリガト　 5.強くてNEW GAME 6.コンピュータ　 7.MATSURI 8. ΦD-SANSKRIT 9.絶望さん

[oldnintendonerd]

Introducing my NES Collection

This was the first video game console I owned. It was bought for me by my parents, as most NES systems were for us thirty somethings. The box and all of that is unfortunately long gone. Currently, this dude is not working. It gets the flashing red light of death on every cart I put in, even after cleaning the cart with alcohol/windex and a cotton swab.

 I did clean all of the pins inside the unit just as a quick try at fixing it, but I think it needs a thorough cleaning and some pin bending. This one is not in the greatest of shape, it does have some yellowing, and I’m not entirely thrilled with its condition. But it is sentimental, as it is the one I have had since day one, when the infatuation began.

A friend had one first, of course, since that is how most of us got into almost anything, “a friend was doing it”. I was hooked the second I ran Mario to the right and stomped my first Goomba.

The NES was released on October 18th, 1985. I don’t think my friend had one immediately, it was probably not until 1986 that I was introduced to it. I did not get one until probably a year or so later as a Christmas present. Possibly even over a year, I do remember there was quite a bit of asking that had to be done. So it could have been Christmas of 1986 or even as late as Christmas of 1987 before I actually got my own NES. From then on I got a game for Christmas or my birthday, or both, almost every year.

Over time I accumulated quite a few games, even having not bought an NES game since the 90′s I still have over 40 games in my collection. Almost all accumulated when I was a kid or teenager. After I hit my 20′s I don’t think I bought another NES game at all. Here they are as it stands right now:

As you can see, it’s nothing to sneeze at, I have a lot of really good games including Battletoads, Blaster Master, both Zelda games, the Mario trilogy, Super C, Metroid, a couple Mega Mans, and of course, the classic Tetris. But, there are obvious holes in this collection, where is the rest of the Mega Man series? Either of the Double Dragons? Any of the Ninja Gaidens? How can I be missing any of these? Well, I was just a kid when I was actively collecting games for this system, and at the end of the 90′s, Nintendo had released the SNES and the N64 in that time, so there were other platforms on the table. Both of which I was also buying for during this time, and they were more expensive. Id go buy one new N64 game with my budget instead of picking up 3 or 4 used NES games.

Thats what makes this blog so much fun though. Even as a kid I would still hit yard sales, I remember very vividly haggling a guy down from $10 to $8 on Jackal, and paying for it with my own money. Probably in the neighborhood of 1988 or 1989. Great buy that game. Hours of fun.

I also managed to get an Intellivision and an Atari 2600, with about 10 games for each at a yard sale only a few houses down from where we lived. I was probably 12 or 13 years old and picked up the entire lot for $5. Both systems worked, and my brother and I played for hours with Triple Action, Astrosmash and Breakout. While the NES was in the living room like “Uh... hello!? Hellooooo!?”. This was probably 1992 or 1993, and the Atari 2600 was released in 1977. So those games, at the time I purchased them, were not even as old as the games and systems I am looking for now. 15 years? The GameCube is about 16 years old at this point. Mind blowing.

I look forward to doing a lot more of that here.

Another great buy was NES Open Tournament Golf. This was released a month after the SNES. We bought a copy brand new, I think it was a christmas present that very year. I did not have a SNES yet. Little did I know how much time I would spend with my dad playing that game. To this day it holds a place in both of our hearts. In fact just a couple weeks ago we sat down and played on the Wii virtual console about a half dozen rounds together. It’s something we try to do almost every time we get together, even if its only for a half an hour. Great memories.

Wait, why is there a sticker on it if you bought it new you ask? I’ll tell you. Somewhere in the mid 90′s my dad and I had a bit of a marathon when we discovered that it saves your money. We wanted to get to $1,000,000. A few times we got interrupted in playing and just left the console on to come back to, rather than saving play and turning it off. Well, we ended up leaving it on for over a week straight, something had gotten placed in front of the power LED so it was not noticed. I think we went on vacation or something. It was on a purple screen when we came back to it. It would then not boot, but other games worked. We figured we cooked the cartridge. So, we purchased another copy used, and as you can see it was rather expensive. Even used and a good few years after it was released. I am guessing this may be somewhere around 1994 or 1995. The 689 sticker was probably an inventory sticker or something from the place we got it, there’s no decimal point. There is a price on the back.

Even today with the high prices some of these games are fetching, $21.00 is expensive for NES Open. eBay seems to have it going around $10 shipped. Which makes it around a $7 or $8 game, tops. Bummer.

We discovered later that the original copy did still work, so when I moved out, dad kept one, and so did I. Clearly, I’ve got the used one. Come to think of it he still has quite a few of my old games. Hmmmmmm... might have to ask him about that stuff. See what he still has.

I still wish I had spent a little bit more money on the NES games as they were “going out of style” in the mid to late 90′s. You could find anything at Electronics Boutique, just bins and bins of used NES games, most under $5! Some for even a dollar or two. But you pass them up because the label doesn’t catch your eye and there is no internet to tell you what is good like today.

So now I am filling in the gaps of the collection more than two decades out of date. It just so happens that it is right when everyone else had the same idea. Story of my life. Here I am thinking I’m being original, dusting off 10 to 30+ year old video games, and I’m at least 2 years too late to the party. YouTube channels that are four plus years old about game hunting, the older videos getting absolute steals on stuff you would probably hardly have a chance to find today, let alone get for $1. Stacks of GameCube games for $1 each, GameCube systems with games and multiple controllers for $10. GameCube controllers alone are $15+ these days. SNES lots with a system, controllers and like 15 games for $20. Incredible deals.

Now the pickings are slimmer, one of the YouTube channels I follow posted a recent video where a woman would NOT part out a Genesis system and some games that went with it. It had to be sold as the package and she had it priced at $65 or something. She said something along the lines of “I looked it up online, that’s what they go for”.

Little rant here. This is the problem with game hunting now, and may be an issue as I try to rebuild my collection. Lots of people know what eBay is, check their stuff and for whatever reason, want that price. It may be a lack of understanding on how eBay works, most likely they’ve never sold on eBay before. They don’t realize that the Genesis on eBay is very clean and is listed “Tested and working”, with a 30 day return policy, and all of this plays on the price. You are not on eBay, you are selling this out of a box on the floor of your garage at a yard sale, you are not paying eBay fees to list, you are not paying PayPal fees to get payment, you are not shipping anything, and if this doesn’t work when I get home I can’t bring it back to you. $65 on eBay does not mean $65 at a yard sale. See where it says Free Shipping in the listing? Of course not, you just see the price number. The seller on eBay MIGHT walk away from the $65 sale with $40 - $45 or so after all fees and shipping are finished. A $40 bill for the same lot MIGHT get some attention at the same yard sale. I mean, people can charge whatever they want, I can’t tell people what to ask for their stuff, it is their stuff. But if you were really trying to sell it, it would be priced accordingly. $65 for a Genesis and a few games will still be sitting in that box when the yard sale is over. $25 or $30 for the same Genesis and games, now you have my attention.

Ok, rant over. It wasn’t so little. Sorry.

Despite all of the above rant, I am convinced there are still some good deals to be had out there. I like to think there are still some people willing to sell stuff at true yard sale prices, just to be rid of it, like the purpose of a yard sale. This is a tall order, but it can be done, and I’m going to try. It will all be laid out here for you to read about.

Next post - The SNES Collection, and maybe less ranting. Maybe.

No pickups yet, total stays at $83.09

2017.04.18