Theme: Furry University
Location: Westin Peachtree Plaza
Since Henrieke did something to her elbow prior to the trip, our first stop today was a doctor, which naturally meant filling out lots of paperwork. The doctor did suggest that it might be a dislocation and wanted us to go to an emergency room, but since that would mean tons of paperwork, spending half a day there and paying a 4-digit amount which would probably reached my credit card limit, we decided to just see of the arm sling, muscle relaxers and painkillers would help for now. We picked up our medications and other stuff for the con at Walgreens and then had lunch with Chris, Kanu and Scott at Fresh2Order, pretty tasty and absolutely amazing wild mushroom soup! It took a while to get to the (massive) convention hotel due to rush hour traffic, but we made it eventually. The hotel the convention was at was the Westin Atlanta, the tallest hotel in the U.S.! After waiting a bit in the Lobby for Nicole, our roommate, we got to our room in the 5th floor which granted us a wonderful view over Atlanta and far beyond the city borders. The first event of the con was the opening ceremony where we already met Louve, Booboo, Foxjump, Clawed and Sapphire. Louve was the guest of honor, so we sat there and watched her sitting on stage in all her glory, silently cheering for her. Right afterwards, there was the GoH meet and greet panel where Louve answered questions mostly about horses. We all then went to Metro Diner, a restaurant we've already visited in 2011, except this time with horrible karaoke in the background! We enjoyed the dinner a lot though, drawing a bit while trying not to fall asleep due to jetlag.
Had breakfast at Starbucks, a way less fancy experience than in Austria. Then went to the Dealers Den to say hi to everyone we knew, mostly annoying Louve and Booboo, also meeting Stigmata who is a real artist. Henrieke's book was on sale at the con, giving us the first chance to see it in real life!
Apart from the Dealers Den we also went to the Artist Alley and pretty much spent most of the day there.
For lunch we went to the Peachtree Center Mall and got some tasty chicken. After wandering around a bit at the con, I got Baseball out for a short while.
At 6:30 Henrieke went to a crowdfunding panel, I went to Chorca's room in the meanwhile and hung out a bit with the people up there. Also I got a tiny Domino's "Pan Pizza" which they sold directly in the hotel. It looked adorable, but tasted terrible and made me wonder how on earth one could mess up Pizza. It pretty much tasted like someone accidentally dropped the whole thing in a barrel of oil. After the panel we tried to have an art jam in the Artist Alley, sadly much less big than at FWA 2011 but still very fun. Louve made an amazing drawing for me despite having to be somewhere else and we also met Bloodshot23, an absolutely amazing artist who I instantly did an art trade with! It's always fun meeting new people! Also Zahzu - who might be an even bigger Lemur nerd than Henrieke - was there, making awesome art. Eventually I went to the dance floor and danced a bit with Shannon. Sadly Henrieke felt bad because of her elbow problems so we went to bed shortly after that.
Good news: Henrieke's elbow popped back in, no trip to the doctor necessary! We got up at 10:00 again, once again went to Starbucks and got out both Baseball and Kiki for the group photo.
After that we watched the Parade with Louve, Booboo and Stigmata. After that, Henrieke sat at the Sofawolf table to sign copies of her book. In the meanwhile I went to the food court in the Peachtree Center to get some lunch that we ate back at the Sofawolf table. We went to watch some of the charity auction to see if the patches Henrieke donated sold. After some strolling around in the art show and the Artists Alley, I got a coffee in the lobby and we ran across Bloodshot23 and Designosaur and went up to the observation deck, granting us an amazing view over Atlanta.
We brought Kiki back to the room, got some food and drinks at CVS, then got Dog out. We met Brian and took him to our room as we would all go to meet at the Steakhouse with Chilly anyway. It was nice meeting Chilly finally as she was one of the first artists I met online! We had a nice time and good food st the steakhouse, said good-bye and went back to the hotel.
Henrieke and Nicole were sitting in the Artist Alley, but since I didn't feel like drawing too much eventually I got Baseball out at 2:00, ran into Kanu and Chorca and partied until 3:30.
I got up at 12 and met Henrieke and Louve who were busy drawing cats in the charity room. Henrieke was up for a while already since she attended Louve's live drawing panel.
We went to the Artist Alley after that and got some lunch at Dunkin Donuts with Louve. Back in the hotel, we ate our unhealthy American food and I drew my part of the trade with Mehndi. We went to Stigmata's "Try Harder" Panel and after that wandered around between Dealers Den and Artist Alley. Henrieke, I and Zahzu sat there for a while and I got a Domino's personal pizza. I don't know how they did it, but they managed to mess up a pepperoni pizza. I will eat a pepperoni pizza in any form, thin crust to deep dish, but this was just a sponge made of dough that was completely soaked in fat, with some gross cheese and pepperoni on top. I felt sick after eating it.
I went to CVS to get some edible food for Henrieke as all other stores were closed at that time. After they threw us out of the Artist Alley, we went to Louve's room where a photo shoot was happening. Since Kookie and Sapphire felt like suiting, I lent them Baseball and Dog and we all went downstairs a bit, where not too much was happening. The rest of the evening we spent on Louve's room with Booboo, Sapphire, Foxjump, Clawed, Mehndi and others. Doing fun things like watching Red Dawn and Monsters Inc., eating German candy, taking creepy photos of Clawed and making fun of everything. Foxjump also took some nice photos of Baseball and Dog! We had lots of fun that night and went to bed at 2:30.
We got up at 10, packed our stuff and dumped it in Chris' room. We ran into a couple of people leaving and said bye to them, including FoxB and Kookie. We had one last breakfast at Starbucks, spent some more time in Chris' room and then left the hotel along with some nice con-memories!
Back at Kanu's house, we spontaneously decided to go see the new Muppets movie at a cinema that also served food, radical! We all enjoyed the movie too, both Henrieke and me liked it even better than the previous Muppets movie. In the evening we just relaxed and watched some Space Dandy.
For lunch today we met up with Kanu at Willy's Mexican grill, then we went to Fry's Electronics since Chris told me about how amazing that store is because they sell single electronic components and all kinds of geeky stuff. We also went to the Northpoint Mall to check out the Lego store and the Disney store.
In the evening there was another party, had a nice time and people also didn't leave too late, giving us enough time to sleep.
