Furs! Furcon!

Yea, I have no idea either.

Are these those people that dress up like animals and have sex with each other, or children, or donkeys, or whatever?

Wow. I am just back from Further Confusion - a furry convention that is held each year in San Jose. I'd never been to a "con" before and had very little idea of what to expect. I'm not a typical con attendee either - many people there consider themselves members of "furry fandom" - sort of like science fiction/fantasy fans, but with a furry bent. Some of them go to lots of cons, and they have their own lingo etc.

I didn't come from there. I just wanted to be a pony, then I started being a monster, and though I'd heard of furries it hadn't occurred to me that I was doing a similar thing. Eventually a light went off, and I realized that I *AM* a furry... of sorts, at least.

So Davor and I went up on Fryday and got back Sunday night. We're tired from lack of sleep, bad hotel food, and being on our feet so much, but so inspired to take our monster costumes further!

Some hilights and memorable moments (in no particular order):

Seeing the Furs wandering about in their cool fursuits.

Getting cookies (hot ones with hella melty chocolate) from the front desk when we picked up our room keys. Yummmm.

Being *warm* for three whole days. Unlike the hotel, my house is freezing cold.

Sharing a room with an experienced FurCon friend (who was the person who first told me about this subculture).

The Best monster costume I have EVER seen!!! Best costume I've seen in probably years - the Blob by Mr Dinosaur of Castro Valley. My kind of monster!

Wearing our monster heads and going "RAA!!" at people.

RAAing the front desk until they gave us more cookies!!! Oh, the power of the RAA!! Heh heh.

Attending an Evil Genius cocktail party with many posters on the walls featuring various evil geniuses labeled "Evil Genius of the Month". The Evil Geniuses were sipping champagne and offering it to their guests. Mmm, champagne! (The next day we discovered their diabolical plan had succeeded: we were quite hungover. D'oh!)

Spinning in the best party room on the party room floor (Furtribe!) - in my monster costume.

Figuring out the "No BDSM Gear" rule was basically bullshit. There were people with collars and cuffs, those chest harnesses and all sorts of things. I imagine a straitjacket or a zippered hood might give them pause, but seriously, I saw all manner of kinky stuff being worn. I even saw a kitty cat leading her owner around on a leash, in the hotel restaurant. I'm guessing that this policy has been around for a while and has gradually gotten stretched, but they haven't rewritten it. Glad I brought my tack anyway!

Finding out how people make their heads - amazing.

Seeing a fursuit with incredible animated ears, and getting to see the wearer demonstrate how they are controlled.

Many very smart people sharing their knowledge and encouraging us beginners.

Being made to feel very welcome by the hotel people. They clearly really enjoyed having us there.

Dancing with people in various stages of costuming - from street clothes with a tail, to gestural costumes like our monsters, up to the full-on fursuits.

Seeing creativity expressed in so many ways, all around.

Learning how to interact with fursuiters (and a little of what it's like inside.)

Being caught scrumping in the weight room but not getting booted from the hotel or the con. (They said it was closed - but our cardkey opened the door - and we didn't make a mess!)

Convincing Davor that we should sneak quietly out the *other* door instead of walking past the guard and giving them the opportunity to scold us. Heh heh heh.

Wandering around as a zebra-pony with pink mane and tail on Saturday night (until my shoe broke, then it sucked.)

Meeting Mr Dinosaur and having him say the monster heads were "amazing" and "great!" I'd love to do what he does - creating characters and costumes and taking them to various events. His stuff was so cool, I'd have loved to see more of it. And it seemed more wearable and easier to design and create than the classic fur suit with big head style. Some of those folks have computer fans in their heads to help cool them. He doesn't do that because the noise is distracting and it makes it harder to interact with people. I loved his style and can't wait to see more.

Hanging out with Jovino! What fun that was, and a rather rare treat.

Getting to see a 20 year old fursuit - older than many of the attendees!

Immediately after seeing the 20 year old fursuit, being peppered with questions by some very young attendees ("Did you really dye your hair that color or is it fake?" etc) and just saying "Raa!!" to everything since I didn't feel like answering these questions for the millionth time, and then having them act like they were scared of the monster. Raa!!

Eating in the hotel restaurant - only because of its location in the middle of everything. A great spot to bump into friends, see the furs going by and just enjoy the view.

Laughing my head off in the restaurant first at Jovino's funny story about the guy making a face in line at the DMV for an hour so he could have an ID with him making a weird face - SO funny - and then, when my sandwich came without the sprouts the menu said it should have and I asked if they could bring me some, receiving a bowl of *SAUERKRAUT* instead! At first I had no idea what it could be, and when I finally figured it out I laughed so hard I'm surprised I didn't hurt myself. Oh. My. God... SAUERKRAUT. This was easily the most unintentionally surreal moment I've had the pleasure to experience in some time.

Seeing geeky people. I mean REALLY geeky people. Since getting out of 'net consulting I haven't spent nearly as much time in the company of the truly geeky. I have a bit of a geek fetish, but some of these folks were WAY too much for me. The geek level in the head construction panel was amazing... and I didn't even make it to the biotech panel!

Avoiding being escorted out of Con Ops by the furry goons. (I'm not saying who that did happen to!)

Walking on plastic in the hallways of the party room floor... which seemed like overkill. I don't think anything got spilled out there. It wasn't that wild. But when you saw the plastic, you thought it could be.

Seeing Raavor get attacked by a big Land Shark! Yikes!!! It bit his head right off!!!

Taking the elevator and having Furs get on in their cool suits! On the last day I was there, Davor and I (wearing our Monster outfits) got into an elevator containing a chick wearing little bat wings with jeans and a tshirt and two completely suited Furs. On the next floor someone got on with ankle bells and a bellydance-esque outfit (pantaloons and a cropped vest). On the next floor, two more Furs got on, and then we stopped on the party floor and picked up yet another Fur - so we had 5 Furs, 2 Monsters, a bellydancer and the relatively underdressed batwing girl. It was fun dodging all the tails, let me tell you! This made me realize that I was really going to miss being there when I got home. However I could not have taken much more hotel food.

Telling people (who'd never been to Burning Man) about Monster-oke and watching it break their brains.

Spinning in the Cool Down Lounge (an official con party!) on Sunday night.

Spreading Pony Propaganda: while we were setting up on Sunday, a man who was there with his grade school age daughter told me he'd come for the gaming but as soon as he saw the place he had to go get her, knowing she'd love it because she's really into animals. I said that when I was a little girl I used to love pretending to be a horse and I ran everywhere like a horse does. She got a HUGE smile, her dad said "sound familiar, sweetie?" and she said "yes!" So I went on to say that I'd stopped doing it and then I found out that grownups did it too, and so now I do it again, and I'm a monster too (I had the monster on). She just grinned at me, and I said "yeah, it's really fun!" It felt really good to *encourage* her, since all I ever got for it when I was a kid was grief.

Registering for next year! They're doing MLK weekend so this time we'll be able to stay through Monday instead of missing the last day.

All that was only the past three days. And I've left stuff out, like Critterlympics (must be seen to be believed!) I spent so much time smiling and laughing, and so did Davor. It was great to have a break and live in a different world for those three days.

I know this was long, and I suppose I could have stuck some of it behind a cut tag. I didn't, because I don't think it's going to hurt anyone (and it's interesting, at least it is to me anyway) but if I were to get feedback requesting otherwise I'd be happy to do it next time. Otherwise, here 'tiz.

I'll post a link to my photos once I get them up on MonkeyView.

I'm feeling: Furry! Where's the icon for THAT, I ask you? It would be SO CUTE!

I'm hearing: Bring Your Sweet Loving Back - Lemuria

Ahahaha...

WTF

And yes, the bdsm policy is so wierd.

Its like I was told by the people photographing my fursuit that the 5-point bondage gear was inappropriate and i shoudl remove it if i didnt want constaff on my case. (I was the tye dye leopard in bondage leading the conga line at the fursuit dance). I wasnt sure at first and took it off but then I put it on anyway and nothing was said. I think its a matter of certain people dont think its bad and so they just say that to enforce the rule and make it out to be more strict than it is.

What on earth is going on?

there was an mtv special on this "Scene" that aired a few years ago.its basically a bunch of nerds that dress up as furry animals and fuck each other thru holes in the costumes.

the fat guy dressed as the blue tigger playing with his cell phone had me rofling. classic.

Animorphs

Yea, I have no idea either.

 

This made me laugh out loud.

Where are the NIPPLES?

there was an mtv special on this "Scene" that aired a few years ago.its basically a bunch of nerds that dress up as furry animals and fuck each other thru holes in the costumes.

 

 

the fat guy dressed as the blue tigger playing with his cell phone had me rofling. classic.

I saw that show.

you hit the nail on the head

its strange to me

Fucking FURRIES

who thinks this shit up?

CERTAINLY ONE OF THE MOST TERRIFYING SIDES OF HUMANITY

ANYWAY, HERE ARE SOME CODES FOR LEMMINGS:

lol lemmings was fuckin hard when I was 8 with that like windows 95 sheet. anways furries are fuckin weird except for --

-- this rules... except if you fall over.

Usually I'm all "To each their own" and shit, but fuck this. This is just too weird

And while we're on the subject of weird sex fetishes, I've got something I've often pondered. In the beastiality "community" or whatever the fuck they would say, do you think it matters if you fuck a guy or girl animal? Like, are there fag beasties that get beat up and made fun of by straight ones? Or is an animal just an animal, regardless of sex?

this is pretty much the shit..

.lame.

hahahaha

i wanted to quote almost every picture

thats awesome

I dress up as a whale, it gets me mad pussy.