Good and bad things to talk about today. Namely my recent adventures at
Furry Weekend Atlanta and the Marly situation. I will be updating the Marly journal after this one so go here for details if you haven't read them already:
CAT CANCER FUNDRAISER (3/7 update)
Before I start, anytime I say "we" I mean myself and
StupidShepherd (just for clarification).
So let's get the bad news out of the way first so we can end with something good. Today we went to take Marly to the vet for her consultation with the surgeon. Turns out we had the option to actually have the amputation surgery
today. We were in a bit of a shock since we did not expect that. While we weren't emotionally ready for it, we decided it was a blessing in disguise and decided to go through with it. We knew if we rescheduled it that Pyro would be on an emotional edge waiting for the day to come, like a horrible impending countdown. And Marly despises the vets so one less trip the better.
Despite the shock of it all, we did it and it's done. She went into surgery around 2:30 today and got done around 4:00? The amputation was a success and Marly was already apparently awake (and grumpy). Now we just have to wait for her to recoup at the vet for a couple days. Wednesday is a good estimate for when we will get her home.
The best news about this is that she is now completely
cancer-free.In regards to the bill... we took out money from savings to pay the $2,600 deposit and will pull out more for the rest. We will continue with our Marm Fund to make it up since that money is rather important until Pyro can get a job. Just so we are transparent in letting people know what's going on with all that. We
have the money
technically it's just that we kinda also
don't have the money since we have to pay it back (our parents are helping). It's a weird situation but I hope that at least makes sense!
The bill for proofWe set up a GoFundMe which hasn't gotten much traction but I figure I would link it anyway. We've been much more successful with commissions and generous donations on here. But at least we have options!
www.gofundme.com/marlyfund Once again I want to thank EVERYONE who has donated or purchased things! We can never thank you enough and I really wanna do something special for everyone when I get free time!
And now happy news. FWA!
I was going into it not knowing what to expect. I have a strange relationship with the furry fandom. I love them. I hate them. I think they're cringy. I think they're awesome. It's just very complex, and always has been since I've been in this fandom since 2004, whether in-denial or not (does everyone go through a "GAIS IM NOT A FURRY IM
ANTHRO!" phase?). And while I still don't like to label myself furry, I can still say I'm in the fandom, and after this convention I think any doubts I may have had are long gone. FWA was amaaaaazing.
The hotel was super swanky and awesome and the staff were fabulous, patient, and many even curious about the con. They kept asking us "What's your costume?" and we were like "We don't have one" and they seemed disappointed aha. FWA staff did an amazing job as well. The theme this year was "Game On" and they definitely pulled the theme into all the decorations and whatnot. And things were way more organized than I imagined. They definitely know what they're doing!
As always, the fursuits were amazing. I took pics of a lot of my favorites. I always had conflicts on fursuits. I adore them aesthetically but often thought they were really cringy when people acted "cutesy" in them. But when you're in a setting among a bunch of folks who are into that sorta thing, it's not even remotely cringy at all. It's fun and adorable and I was totally down with it! And the fursuit dance competition was frikkin raaaad. I can't get over it still. Videos online really don't capture the audio very well, guess it's just something you have to be in there for to really get into. But I'll link my favorite dances below! As far as if I ever wanna suit... well, time will tell on that.
[link][link][link] (A fellow SCAD student I think?)[link]The Artist Alley is where we spent most of our time, between 10:00-3:00 Saturday and Sunday. While we didn't make bank, we DID make a hefty amount! We learned our mistakes this time and what to do differently the next. My biggest issue was mostly that I need to try out colored things (watercolor maybe?) and I need more examples. I keep forgetting I don't draw a lot of common animals that people could envision their characters in. So next year I'll go in with a better binder of samples. I was really pleased with a lot of the feedback I got from folks, though, on what they enjoyed about my work! It was very very flattering! I would really like to do something with my comic next year too to promote it.
Best of all was the general atmosphere of the place. Everyone was so incredibly friendly. I've been to a handful of conventions before, mostly local, though one was fairly big, and it PALED in comparison to how kind everyone was here. It's like you could be friends with everyone. I met and spoke with so many amazing people while sitting in the alley or running into the elevators. I definitely have some folks I need to track down on FA after this just from the wonderful conversations I held with them.
And!! Awesome of all!! I got to meet the fabulous
! Which is LITERALLY AMAZING because we have known each other through deviantART for the 10 years I've been on here! We grew up through our cringy teen years on here so it was really cool to get to meet in person! I really wish we could have talked longer! With hope we can meet again in the future and make more awesome memories! I also told him super secret things I want to do for the future. Maybe. If I can round up the courage. We will see... B)
And to the others I met in person, including the person who said they've followed my comic since the beginning (your name escapes me but you know who you are!!) it was amazing meeting you too!! I really wish I could have talked more as well at the time! If you ever go again PLEASE definitely find me because you were so nice and your support of my dumb comic makes me wanna cry
To anyone who talked with me, I'm sorry if I rambled on and on or was awkward at all! I do that thing where I continuously talk or say dumb shit to prevent pauses in conversations. And I get distracted by others talking. I can't talk with more than one at a time OH LAWD. So thank you for putting up with my awkwardness and ignore if I said stupid things!
Honestly, the only real negatives I had about the con were fairly small. Some people were a little too cringy for my taste, namely when they were drunk. I guess drunk people are only fun when you're also drunk? I dunno, man, I don't find it funny. Then we were both rather unprepared for how things would work time-wise. We never got to see any panels we wanted to see, we kept forgetting to eat and when we remembered it was so late that the food court was closed so we had to just eat the snacks we brought (we ate at Hard Rock the first night but we wanted to be cheap the other two days so we declined going to restaurants), and just essentially did not organize right at all. We will hopefully improve upon that next time. And lastly, the worst thing was uh... well. People thought it would be a good idea to "start a howl". At midnight. And 2 am. Guys, please, don't do that. People need to sleep. Not everyone is into all-nighters and THERE WERE NON-FURRIES AT THE HOTEL TOO. People like that give the fandom a terrible name and that's what gets conventions cancelled when the hotels can't stand it anymore. Apparently the elevators kept breaking too, though why I don't know. I guess excessively using them? I mean, I imagine they would get worn out when there was a con over
over four thousand people going up and down frequently.
All in all I had a great time. We ended up calculating everything up, and counting the profits the two of us made in the alley and pre-order badges Pyro did prior to the con, we not only made back ALL the money we spent for the FWA fund BUT ALSO we made a little bit of profit! All of which went straight into the Marm Fund! Obviously this made us feel a good deal less guilty about going in the first place.
I am so, so happy I got to go. It was a huge stress relief from this year and was just an amazing experience. I am absolutely addicted now and, if it hasn't been clear already, I'm already planning for next year. Thank you, FWA, for being an awesome furry con
Keep praying for Marly if you can, I'll keep everyone updated. And as always, thank you for the endless support
~*~Filly B.~*~
