kalpurna

MJ 2007!! It finally happened! It was EVERYTHING I expected it would be and MORE! ♥

I was the YOUNGEST CON-GOER OF ALL, which was both kind of fun and kind of worrisome, in that I was a bit worried about people writing me off for my age – which all in all they didn't seem to do. I do have this sinking feeling, though, that everyone who met me at the con remembers me as the very young girl with the very-low-cut shirts. Which... is fair. When picking out a shirt to wear to the NightGames Lounge a month or so ago, my thought process pretty much consisted of, "Hey, fangirls like boobs, right? They will like this top! And no one I've shown it to has been too weird about it, so it must not look that slutty, right?" UHM. WRONG. Friday night, I walk up to the bar with mrsronweasley. aneli8 and mayatawi turn around. Their gazes drop to my chest. Both, in unison: "WOW."

Guys, it was a lot sluttier than I thought it was. And, well, so was the shirt I wore on Saturday.

All con long, I was greeted by comments like, "Hey, here they – um, you – are!" and "I thought your breasts said some smart things in the panel today!" and, from helleboredoll, after I changed into a different shirt: "Awww, you put them away!" SIGH. I certainly did not have had the biggest boobs there, but I think I had the most surface area open to the public view? And wow, fangirls are way, way less subtle about checking out your rack than boys are. \o/ It was pretty awesome, and I felt either embarrassed or kind of sexass all con, depending on my level of shame at any given moment, which was generally inversely proportionate to my alcohol consumption.

And then I put a temporary tattoo of a cactus with the caption "Stuck on you" on my boob.

MADE OF CLASS.

Over the course of the weekend, I met more interesting, smart, wonderful fangirls than I knew what to do with, and I'm tearing my hair out right now over how many people I absolutely have to friend. My flist is already pretty unwieldy, and I hate cutting it down, so it just seems to expand and expand and oh, there goes my homework. Mostly, I'm amazed with how lovely everyone was, physically and personally, and how down-to-earth, how awkward and flirtatious and shy and outspoken and real everyone was. Online, people take up different amounts of space in my mind, based on how long I've been fangirling their writing and how often I talk to them; but in person, everyone is just... people! Women! Not very intimidating at all, in the end. I think as time goes on, I'll find that this whole experience will have left trails through my brain, just slightly reshaping the way I feel about fandom. It's a fresh perspective, and one I'm very much enjoying.

You know, I don't really have anything intellectual to report, though. Which is interesting, because usually I can wring meta from a stone. And yet... no! This was mostly a social experience for me, not an intellectual one. I went to fascinating panels and talked to very smart people, and I basically came out of the experience with nothing very much to say, which is all right, I think.

Friday night, after the Night Games Lounge (so much booze! SO many cookies!), we got to see the fantastic vid show of mrsronweasley (plagued by minor technical difficulties, but it came through!) featuring premieres of an Entourage vid by astolat and a PAUL GROSS vid by strangecobwebs and a truly hilarious showing of an older Sentinel vid by joandarck. When Out Here played, shoemaster and I grabbed on to each other and flailed quietly, as I glanced over my shoulder to find brooklinegirl having much the same reaction. After that, I went up to the charming technathene's room, where there were tasty gourmet homemade treats! And a full-on bar in the bathroom! A tip for anyone planning to attend a con where you don't know many people: bring a very nice gay man to cook delicious food, and have a full-on bar in the bathroom. You will make friends.

The next night, I watched Hard Core Logo with _unhurt, lipsum, entropical87, joandarck, c_regalis, and far too many other people to count. The reason I mention those particular five is that at one point I was actively clutching all of them at once to keep from bursting. The sounds we made during the knifelicking scene were inhuman. It was actually sort of amazing. brooklinegirl and mrsronweasley burst in from the hall to ask what was going on, and we kind of moaned a little bit. And then we played it again.

In addition to those mentioned, I had the privilege of meeting giddygeek, calathea, pearl_o, qe2, airinshaw, katrin, the_familiar, shihadchick, izzybeth, celli, china_shop, cmshaw, ifreet, lamardeuse, slodwick, slidellra, strangecobwebs, each of whom I could write an entire post about, not to mention my lovely bedmate nos4a2no9, and probably about a thousand more I've forgotten to mention. I drank truly ridiculous amounts of boxed wine, and talked about cock. I wore a pin that said "It's Go Time!" with an arrow pointing down. I went to my VERY! FIRST! CON! And I had a MARVELOUS time.