BronyCon 2019 Reflections Part 2: Friday · 1:42am Oct 29th, 2019
Friday
When I woke up on Friday, I got a notification from Discord saying that a friend of mine was asking everybody in the server we shared if anyone wanted to go out for breakfast. I said yes and after getting confused as to where this place actually was, I finally found it. Peter’s Pour House was the name of the place. It was a pub that happened to serve breakfast. I got a bagel with butter on it. I tried my best to talk with the others at the table. I think I did okay, but I wish I was better at making conversation. After breakfast, everyone went their separate ways. I went back to the convention center to attend my first panel of the day, “Cosplay & Design 101.” A lot of good advice in this panel on things like costumes, makeup, props, etc.
My strategy for attending panels at BC2019 was to focus on the panels on the 300 level since Mane Event’s Hall panels had some of the worst lines and were more likely to be put up on YouTube than the panels in the other rooms. Every room had bad and confusing lines, but Mane Event's Hall seemed to be the worst. Last year, the earliest you had to be was maybe 15-30 minutes or so. This year, you had to be at least an hour or so early just to get a chance at having a seat. While I do wish I had seen some of the Mane Event’s Hall panels, I do not regret going to the panels that I did get to see. Another part of my strategy was trying to find a time when Pastel Pastures didn’t have any events going on so I could go to Quills and Sofas. They were in separate rooms last year, but this year they had to share a room and if Pastel Pastures had a panel going on the whole room might be occupied. I tried every day of the con to see if I could get into Quills and Sofas, but every time I walked by that room, Pastel Pastures had a panel going on or people were lining up early for the next Pastel Pastures panel. I tried to see if Quills and Sofas had the typewriters again this year. It looks like they didn’t, but I’m not sure.
I had lunch at Jimmy John’s once again, ordering my usual thing. I ended up taking my sandwich with me to my room because there wasn’t anywhere to sit. After I finished eating, I decided to check out the vendor hall. As I was walking along the Hilton skywalk, I heard somebody talking to the guy behind me. Turns out the guy behind me was Silver Quill. I was too nervous to say anything to him though. When I arrived at the vendor hall, I couldn’t decide on what to buy, so I just looked around. I didn’t go to the Vendor Hall on Thursday because the line was too long. I saw Dr. Wolf hanging out by Lightning Bliss’ booth talking to somebody. I was too shy to say anything to him so I kept on walking.
After I left the vendor hall, I waited in line for the “Thanks M.A. Larson” panel, but after twenty minutes of standing in an unmoving line in a part of the Hilton skywalk that had no AC and feeling hot and sweating, I decided to give up and go to another panel instead. If I had brought a bottle of water with me, I probably could’ve stood in line longer. The panel I ended up seeing was “The History of BronyPalooza.” It was an interesting panel, hearing about things like the “no jumping” rule from 2013 and how EFNW managed to set off the Richter scale at a local university because of the con goers jumping around during that convention’s concert.
I went to Diamond Tavern at the Hilton after that. Food was pretty good. Had the chicken tender and fries with a soda combo, which was a special for the con. After that, I went to Silver Quill’s panel, “After the Fact Live: Feeling Pinkie Keen.” It was fun seeing him live. He discussed the stages in which we handle ideas different from our own and how Twilight’s behavior in the episode reflects these stages.
After that I returned to my room. I had hoped to hang out with friends that night, but things didn’t work out, so I ended up going to bed. In hindsight, I should have gone to Quills and Sofas that night. The last panel of that night at Pastel Pastures ended at 8:30, which was a lot earlier than the other nights of the con. Oh well.
