Hello! Hope you're all OK!
Overall, Anthrocon 2002 was the best con I'd ever been to! There was always
something to do the whole weekend with never a dull moment! Including
meeting several furs I had known, but never met in real life before (you know
who you are!)
Didn't have much trouble getting there this year like I did last year. The
only problem was missing the Penn Turnpike exit on I-81, but when I realized
my mistake, I had just gone by an interstate spur that went straight south to
the turnpike, so I didn't lose much time there.
Upon arrival, the first thing I did was to see about registering. They
didn't have the problems they had last year when even the pre-reg line was
nearly 2 hours long. This year, even the at the door line wasn't that long.
"If the registration staff starts to glow or smoke, get away, lie down and
cover your head" (seen on a sign above registration)
First thing after that was meeting up with Louve, Chik'ki, Fuzzytoes and A
Generic Wolf for a trip to the Philly Zoo, the first zoo in the U.S. :-) One
enclosure we all wanted to see was the African Cape Dogs. The path became an
uphill walk as we got close to the Cape Dog enclosure, to steep for Louve to
push her wheelchair up the hill, so Chik'ki was pushing her up the hill. As
some of you already know, Louve is nuts about Cape Dogs. As soon as we came
around the turn and she spotted the big "Cape Dogs" sign, she excitedly says
"puppies!" and starts frantically pushing herself :-) Was great to see her
that happy & excited :-)
After returning to the hotel from the Philly Zoo, The first place headed for
was the dealer's room. As always when I go into the dealer'sroom at cons, I
couldn't keep away from the tables selling plushies and soon added 3 to my
fursonal collection :-)
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/grywlf14.jpg
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/grywlf15.jpg
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/redwlf03.jpg
The rest of that evening and most of Saturday consisted of getting artists to
draw in the sketchbooks I had with me and the best part of any con,
socializing with friends :-)
The charity auction was a huge success, raising $13,280 for Cannine Partners
for Life, an organization that trains dogs to assist handicapped people :-)
Also, as a result of the auction going over $10,000, Anthrocon chairman Kage
got his head shaved into a mohawk at the closing ceremonies :-) Just that
fact alone had the large grand ballroom half full well before the ceremonies
even started :-) There's a decent chance that the charity auction 'll go
over $20,000 next year, because if it does, Kage's Dad 'll get his head
shaved into a mohawk, Kage 'll get a mohawk again & it'll be dyed purple,
artist Jim Groat 'll also get a purple mohawk and his goatee shaved and both
Jim & Kage 'll put on grass skirts & cocoanut shell bikini tops & dance
before the crowd at the closing ceremonies :-)
Saturday evening, the Fursuit Masquerade was entertaining as always with
several good acts :-) The ones I liked best were as follows. A catgirl in a
kimono that did a dance routine to the song "Diamonds are a Girl's best
Friend" from the movie "Moulon Rouge." Big Bad Wolf pretending to play a
guitar & sing to a (unknown) heavy metal song. An act that involved a cute,
pretty and sweet cheetah girl in a form fitting (but not skin tight) fursuit,
her headfur in a ponytail and dyued to look like it too had cheetah spots
(being a single male, I'm obviously biased on that one). Lutalo, the African
Cape Dog in a fursuit so good it cost $6,000 (wow!) whose act consisted of
holding a spear while walking around like he was stalking something while
African drums played (he did a good job of it too). Of course, Louve went
nuts for that fursuit :-)
The M.C. onstage, speaking to the audience, suddenly looking off to the side
and saying "What the heck," at which point a very well done 7 foot tall
mechwolf constume comes into view. A roach can be seen in the mouth piloting
the mech and saying something about how roaches are gonna rise up and take
over the world. The M.C. sneaks up behing the mech, "sabatoges" it and after
it gets restarted, walks off, the roach pilot saying "You haven't seen the
last of us!"
Finally, the best masquerade act was one where a male rabbit in the act
secretly arranged with the M.C. and sound crew for the music to suddenly cut
off about 30 seconds into the act. The M.C. came out on stage asking what
was wrong. The sound crew says "bad C.D." The M.C. pretends to be upset,
saying "We went throught his before. We told you to make sure that C.D. was
good" among other things, gives the rabbit a microphone and orders him to
apologize to the audience for wasting their time. He does so, says "While
I've got this microphone anyway,..." and says some really sweet things about
his otter girlfriend who was also in the act, ending with "She's made my life
complete in such a way, I can't imagine living my life without her." You can
probably guess what he said to her next :-)
Following the fursuit masquerade, the ballroom floor was cleared and for the
next hour, an *excellent* 6 piece progressive rock ensemble from Philly
called "Chromelodeon" took the stage :-) From their website at
chromelodeon.com, "To truly know the sound of Chromelodeon, it is better to
experience it for yourself. . . but put into words, they are an unlikely
smear directly between minimalist orchestral music and hard rock. Utilizing
an electric violin, a vocoder, and even the sound of an accordion - not as a
novelty but as natural, recurring instrumentation - it is not likely that
their style would be confused with that of another group anywhere"
You can hear Chromelodeon at
http://artists.mp3s.com/artists/321/chromelodeon.html
where there are 3 mp3's available to listen to online or download :-) I am
downloading all 3 of 'em, e-mailing the band's webmaster & contact addys
asking about buying their CD's and e-mailing AC Programming Director Susan
Deer requesting that they be brought back again next year! I wanna hear
more!
Following Chromelodeon, for the second night in a row, the grand ballroom was
transformed onto a dance hall. Even if you don't dance, it was a show just
to stand in there and watch! The lighting and sound was fantastic! "You
might have noted the absolutely stunning and remarkable light and sound work
that we had in here. Did you all think that those dances kicked (censored)
or what?" (Kage at the closing ceremonies)
Most of Sunday also consisted of getting artists to draw in the sketchbooks I
had with me and the best part of any con, socializing with friends :-) Of
course, I went to the closing ceremonies and videotaped Kage getting his hair
shaved into a mohawk :-) "I did *not* consent to the dye! You people had to
get to $15,000 and you blew it!" (Kage when Susan pulled out a box of purplr
hair dye) "Are you going on tour with Mayhem?" (wiseguy during the time for
suggestions)
It was also said at the closing ceremonies that there were nearly 1,700 in
attendence! That means that for the 2nd year in a row, Anthrocon broke it's
own record for the largest furry con ever! It's even larger than many of the
major sci-fi cons!
After the closing ceremonies, Louve, Chik'ki, A Generic Wolf and I went up to
Louve & Chik'ki's room, talked for awhile. Then I said goodbye to everyone,
went to meet another fur I had to talk to that evening, then got ready for
bed to get a good sleep for the (uneventful) drive home. Upon arriving back
in my hometown, I stopped to get my paycheck, still wearing the wolf ears and
tail I wore all during the con, getting amused reactions from co-workers,
especially one manager who couldn't stop laughing :-) "Oh, gosh! Look at
James!" (the just mentioned manager)
As some of you know, last year I took several photos, but neatly all of them
turned out too dark to be kept even though I used an "indoor" (lousy cheap
Kodak one time use 35mm) camera. This year, I carried a digital camera. I
took a total of 41 photos that could be kept :-) To see them, go to
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/Photos.htm
and click on the "Anthrocon 2002" link near the top.
Of course, I got lots of sketches too :-) A total of 36 sketches of
Foxonian's Cassie the Rock Vixen and of my own Vixina, who is also the
fiddler in Csssie's progressive metal band :-) To see the sketches, please
continue farther down :-)
ARTWORK-VIXINA
All 24 pix of Vixina obtained at Anthrocon were based on her new look as seen
in the model pic by Patrick Little at
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/patrick_little_01.jpg
The URL's to view them directly are below. The name of the artist that did
each one is in the filename at the end of each URL. All except one were
random, each artist being told "Anything G to PG-13 of this character" (as
the story goes, Vixina won't pose topless, botomless, nude or in sexual
situations, all that even if nothing's showing)
The one that wasn't random was the pic by HollyAnn. It's a full color
comission picturing Vixina in t-shirt & overalls as an adorably cute 8 year
olf frog catchin' tomboy :-)
URL's to Vixina sketches. URL's that end with "(framed)"mean I thought that
pic good enough that I framed it & hung it on my wall :-)
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/babs_bunny_01.jpg
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/dan_luz_01.jpg
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/david_cantero_01.jpg (framed)
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/diana_kellogg_01.jpg
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/emilie_pellenz_01.jpg
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/eric_huelin_01.jpg
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/heather_wasneuski_01.jpg (framed)
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/hollyann_01.jpg (framed)
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/jim_groat_01.jpg
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/louie_01.jpg
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/lunarwolf_01.jpg
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/megan_giles_01.jpg (framed)
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/mehndix_01.jpg (framed)
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/michelle_latta_01.jpg
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/oakpaw_01.jpg (framed)
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/orlando_j_sierra_01.jpg
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/phallon_01.jpg
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/rae_naomi_turner_01.jpg
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/saibin_01.jpg (framed)
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/sai_kennedy_01.jpg (framed)
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/shawntae_howard_01.jpg (framed)
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/stephen_locke_01.jpg
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/steve_gallacci_01.jpg
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/steve_martin_01.jpg
All pix and stories of Vixina as well as artist website link/e-mail (where
available) can be seen at
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/Vixina07.htm
ARTWORK-CASSIE THE ROCK VIXEN
All 12 pix of obtained at Anthrocon were based on her familiar look that her
fans know and love. The URL's to view them directly are below. The name of
the artist that did each one is in the filename at the end of each URL. Like
Vixina, as the story goes, Cassie won't pose topless, botomless, nude or in
sexual situations, all that even if nothing's showing.
The one that wasn't random was the pic by HollyAnn. It's a full color
comission picturing Vixina in t-shirt & overalls as an adorably cute 8 year
olf frog catchin' tomboy :-)
URL's to Cassie sketches.
http://members.aol.com/cassierockvixen4/alan_mackey_01.jpg
http://members.aol.com/cassierockvixen4/candy_lewin_01.jpg
http://members.aol.com/cassierockvixen8/david_cantero_03.jpg
http://members.aol.com/cassierockvixen8/diana_kellogg_02.jpg
http://members.aol.com/cassierockvixen8/emilie_pellenz_01.jpg
http://members.aol.com/cassierockvixen8/flinthoof_01.jpg
http://members.aol.com/cassierockvixen4/jessk_01.jpg
http://members.aol.com/cassierockvixen8/joe_rosales_01.jpg
http://members.aol.com/cassierockvixen8/louie_01.jpg
http://members.aol.com/cassierockvixen8/mark_b_langille_01.jpg
http://members.aol.com/cassierockvixen8/steve_gallacci_01.jpg
http://members.aol.com/cassierockvixen8/vicky_wyman_01.jpg
All pix and stories of Cassie as well as artist website link/e-mail (where
available) can be seen at
http://members.aol.com/rufinoform/Cassie.htm
Take care! Hope to hear from you soon! Goodbye!
Cloudchaser Shaconage, a chocolate & peanut butter lovin' Red Wolf furry
Louve RSD Awareness Page-In Honor of Louve
http://cloudchaser.esmartweb.com/louversd.htm
Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy (RSD), a devestating and extremely painful
nervous system disorder that 1,000's of people including my sister Louve must
live with every day. Louve is in the final stage of full body RSD a.k.a.
Dysautonomia, incurable and fatal after prolonged severe suffering than can
last for years
http://www.ninds.nih.gov/health_and_medical/disorders/dysauto_doc.htm
Received on Wed Jul 17 2002 - 15:50:22 CDT
