I'm not going to stand here and pump you all up like a special guest preacher at the Evangelist family redneck special fun day about how great 2013 is going to be, because today is Tuesday and yesterday was Monday and that's how it is for me. Be honest now my little mufflewumps, nothing really changes as if by witchcraft and court orders against that really creepy girl we all "sorta know". (She'll get you eventually mate, and you said being a douchebag to her was just mean. Mate, I saved my own damn hide. Learn how to say no if you wanna avoid 3 years of being the one getting dicked down.)
I highly doubt I'll be going to many Expos by MCM unless I get dragged there to extract the urine, it's a headache in a monkey's vagina that I can very well do without. I may have to take this back if I have a ridiculously good cosplay I want everyone to see so that I can have one day in the year where I don't cry myself to sleep. I haven't seen much change in 2012 as I have done over the last few years. A lot of cosplayers are younger now than we've had before and we're seeing some crazy effort put in; but I'm not too sure if we're seeing that because there's just more people now and by lieu there's a fuckton of half-assed Ls and Naruto's at a Bahmitzva than I've noticed.
New conventions and small events! For me that's where it'll be this year. Gemucon, Tokonatsu, Fushicon and on the other end of the scale I'll try and get to Ayacon (No promises). Being new to an event brings back some of the magic and last Toko was my first. I had high hopes for entering the masquarade for next Toko however my girlfriend is an insanely awesome cosplayer that makes me look like I made my shit out of Animeleague flyers, banana pulp and kleenex; she's been made a Judge for the masq as she keeps winning it and now I'm either gonna have to learn how to weld or sit this one out due to potential calls of favouritism. Now, where's that arc-welder..
I've met more really interesting people by going to conventions than I ever did through expos, and I guess that's where it's at now. Expo used to be a place where you met people, now it's swelled so big it's become a microcosm of the English Society; keep to yourselves, don't talk to strangers and move along there's nothing to see here.
What I really love is the creativity of conventioning. Humans are pretty stupid meatsacks but sometimes this stupidity is an amazing source of entertainment through ingenuity. Last Amecon a friend of mine realised he paid almost £200 for a room he barely used, there's tons of places to sleep and if you can borrow a mate's shower/floorspace for luggage you're all set. I've even heard of the room rota, you get 6 people to a room, they have 1/3 of the 24hour day to sleep in the room. It's so stupid yet my OCD loves the efficiency . I don't know wether to smile or frown and it makes my face ache so hard I want to tear out my eyeballs and fill my sockets with Patron Gold. The same friend who decided to "HoboCon" wants to see if he can pitch a tent. Again my common sense wants to tell him to stop using JD Honey as the water component in his coffee, yet Tokonatsu springs to mind and I'm still drinking my HoneyJack Coffee.
Shameless plug times;
Gemucon 5th April - 7th April - Nottingham
Places are already at the 250 mark, and it's filling up. FREE CUPCAKE FOR EVERYONE GUARANTEED.
Gemu Pre-Con Party 4th April @Brass Monkey - Nottingham
If you can make it to the PreCon, we've got Happy Hour prices until 3am and single mixers/bottled beer at £3. Brass Monkey is my personal favourite bar and a classy-ass place to be but you don't need to dress up. Cosplay and stupid/in game meme T shirts encouraged.
Looking forward to news of future conventions and as always keep the news/comments/confessions of love/suggestions/ransom notes flooding in. You can get me on my email, twitter and for anyone in Yorkshire I'm three hills north past the pointy rock as the afternoon crow flies.
~Warai Otoko
Showing posts with label Tokonatsu. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tokonatsu. Show all posts
Tuesday, 1 January 2013
Saturday, 18 August 2012
Convention Review: Tokonatsu 2012 [Tents and Alcohol]
About this time two weeks ago I attended Tokonatsu which is essentially a convention where the accommodation is tents, in a field. £10 to hire a tent and free accommodation to take your own tent. This of course gets taken advantage of by those overcompensating nards who bring 18-man tents just for themselves.
I'll try to structure this as best as I can and not just ramble on like an angry lesbian in Burtons.
Accomodation:
TENTS. Fuckin' tents. You make it as comfy/rough as you want. Parking is limited but free.
Facilities:
One water pipe to service all 250 or so people on site. One. You know Dr. Rich thought they were kidding when he was told to take a cup into the shower to collect the sad dribble down the shower wall to throw over himself. Oh how we laughed.
Pack a shower cup.
Food:
You get free breakfast lunch and dinner, but trust me when I say it's quite spartan. For a 5'4 girl of 8-9stone, this is fine. But there was the stock up at tescos and the liquid diet I'll get to later. For someone like me there were the emergency McDonalds runs, and Toko actually provide a tesco run service and Dominoes Pizza so it's not like they don't give two flying shits about you. However they will not spoon feed you so it's up to your own sad ass to get up and make use of the available services.
Conventioning (Meat n' Tatties of the gig)
Toko being in a really nice campsite (no shit it's really fucking nice!) has a few outdoor events that any other convention can't do, such as Frisbee/battleroyale/extremestalk/waterfights etc etc and they're all unique to Toko. However the rest being the DDR tent, the Anime tent, and the drink yourself silly in your own or someone else's tent. No real parties as such, there's one but it's a campsite what do you expect?
Yes, you know it, you've been waiting for it and some of you mufflewumps actually skipped ahead to this; Alcohol. Toko does not have a bar, the entire event is a bar. We took a fair amount of booze and decided to take it easy what with consistently being in the dehydrating outside. Powerade saved our lives, coincidentally did you know if you mix red powerade with vodka you get StealthJuice? Tastes like sweet fuck all yet gets you smashed harder than physics in my mind.
Overall Toko is exactly what it claims to be and delivers on everything it says it will. There's no hidden extras, no gimmicks and no complications. If you love roughing it, being outside and getting into it like Ray Mears doing Carmel Dansen, then Toko is highly recommended. Though I can guarantee you less than 10% of anyone who does cushy conventions, you know they kind, they have running water and beds and solid roofs; will not enjoy Toko.
What the 'Otoko says:
FUCK ME THE WEEBS. Weebin' here, weebin' there, weebin' errywhere. That aside, we met some really nice folks, and that again is down to Toko being incredibly down to Earth. You can meet someone and have a nice talk with them, hunker down and dismiss 9/10ths of the superficiality/crapola you'd get from most people at any other con.
Pack suncream, hygienic wipes, alcohol, deo and always get up early for breakfast. Any questions since I probably missed out a metric fuckton of shenanigans feel free to leave a comment and I'll reply.
~Warai Otoko
I'll try to structure this as best as I can and not just ramble on like an angry lesbian in Burtons.
Accomodation:
TENTS. Fuckin' tents. You make it as comfy/rough as you want. Parking is limited but free.
Facilities:
One water pipe to service all 250 or so people on site. One. You know Dr. Rich thought they were kidding when he was told to take a cup into the shower to collect the sad dribble down the shower wall to throw over himself. Oh how we laughed.
Pack a shower cup.
Food:
You get free breakfast lunch and dinner, but trust me when I say it's quite spartan. For a 5'4 girl of 8-9stone, this is fine. But there was the stock up at tescos and the liquid diet I'll get to later. For someone like me there were the emergency McDonalds runs, and Toko actually provide a tesco run service and Dominoes Pizza so it's not like they don't give two flying shits about you. However they will not spoon feed you so it's up to your own sad ass to get up and make use of the available services.
Conventioning (Meat n' Tatties of the gig)
Toko being in a really nice campsite (no shit it's really fucking nice!) has a few outdoor events that any other convention can't do, such as Frisbee/battleroyale/extremestalk/waterfights etc etc and they're all unique to Toko. However the rest being the DDR tent, the Anime tent, and the drink yourself silly in your own or someone else's tent. No real parties as such, there's one but it's a campsite what do you expect?
Yes, you know it, you've been waiting for it and some of you mufflewumps actually skipped ahead to this; Alcohol. Toko does not have a bar, the entire event is a bar. We took a fair amount of booze and decided to take it easy what with consistently being in the dehydrating outside. Powerade saved our lives, coincidentally did you know if you mix red powerade with vodka you get StealthJuice? Tastes like sweet fuck all yet gets you smashed harder than physics in my mind.
Overall Toko is exactly what it claims to be and delivers on everything it says it will. There's no hidden extras, no gimmicks and no complications. If you love roughing it, being outside and getting into it like Ray Mears doing Carmel Dansen, then Toko is highly recommended. Though I can guarantee you less than 10% of anyone who does cushy conventions, you know they kind, they have running water and beds and solid roofs; will not enjoy Toko.
What the 'Otoko says:
FUCK ME THE WEEBS. Weebin' here, weebin' there, weebin' errywhere. That aside, we met some really nice folks, and that again is down to Toko being incredibly down to Earth. You can meet someone and have a nice talk with them, hunker down and dismiss 9/10ths of the superficiality/crapola you'd get from most people at any other con.
Pack suncream, hygienic wipes, alcohol, deo and always get up early for breakfast. Any questions since I probably missed out a metric fuckton of shenanigans feel free to leave a comment and I'll reply.
~Warai Otoko
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