It’s Wednesday already? I suppose I should write up our fantastic weekend before it completely goes out of my head. Furry Connection North was a great convention – we had a wonderful time!

Thursday
After work, takaza and I met up with roho and genet for dinner at Gurnee Mills before going to see This American Life Live. The show we saw will be broadcast this coming weekend, and they will be sending it out to theaters again on May 7th. I highly recommend the show! Mike Birbiglia’s story was great, and Dan Savage’s story made us cry. All in all, it was a lot of fun, and I’m glad we saw it.

After the show we said our goodbyes and drove down to the teeming metropolis of Mishawaka, Indiana. We spent the night at a Hyatt Place, which was quite comfortable (and free!).

Friday
After a fitful night’s sleep, I woke up at 7 AM. I surfed the net for a bit, then went to shower. We hit the road a little after 9 AM. We arrived in Ann Arbor right around noon and headed directly to Zingerman’s Deli for lunch. Dan had an excellent turkey sandwich. May sandwich was amazing, the JJ’s Special: Zingerman’s pastrami, Switzerland Swiss cheese & oven-roasted onions on grilled Jewish rye bread. No condiments – they weren’t necessary. So. Good. On our way back to our car we came across Durham’s Tracklements, a teeny-tiny shop where they smoke all kinds of fish and meats on-site (quote after we left: “I smell delicious!”). We picked up some “Marrakesh” beef jerky, which had a spicy, Middle-Eastern flavored rub. Very tasty! I’d recommend AA locals to check this place out!

From there we headed over to Sheraton Detroit Novi. After unloading and getting a tour of the function space from scs_11, we wandered for a bit and chatted with friends. We were invited to an early dinner in the hotel restaurant with girtygrin, nikvulper, giza, and omnibahumut. The meal was quite tasty and the company was great. Much shop was talked, and I was even more impressed with the care and hard work that Gir and his staff had put into the preparations for the convention.

Our first security shift was from 6 PM to 9:30 PM. Yes, we were actually working during the convention, but since we weren’t in charge of anything it was much more laid back. While Dan checked badges and ID’s at the sponsor lounge, I was down the hall from him at the door to the video game room, getting serenaded by the folks playing Rock Band very loudly. Ow. Fortunately, r_bear and daveqat were kind enough to hang around and chat during my shift. Our discussion turned to a certain flirtatious canine, and I was moved to poke fordshepherd via text message about what a flirt he is. This led RB and Dave to text Ford as well, and much amusement was had.

Dan and I wound down the evening with a nice chat with linnaeus in our suite before we headed off to bed.

Saturday
I woke up far too early and decided to shower and face the world. I picked up coffee and scone at a nearbyBiggby’s Crushing Hand Coffee, and enjoyed the beautiful morning sun while chatting with Ford on the phone. He gave me a mission: Get as many people as possible to text him during the convention. A challenge! It’s a good thing that he has unlimited text messages, because I’m willing to bet he received several hundred of them over the course of the weekend. The winning stroke, though, was when Dan had his mother text Ford in addition to everyone else 🙂

Dan and I had a quiet but enjoyable lunch at Chili’s, then our second security shift from 1 PM until 4 PM that afternoon, doing badge checking in the main function space, then providing traffic guidance during the fursuit parade. Afterwards we hung out in the hotel bar and joked around with the bartender, a real firecracker (Laura, I think her name was?). I was vastly amused when Giza provided her with a tail to wear during her shift – she knew how to play to her audience for the maximum tips!

Soon, it was time for dinner. The pre-planned group of 12 become 16 then became 20: me, takaza, giza, linnaeus, daveqat, jimcyl, perro, wolphy, calapurr, justincheetah, street22, r_bear, graywolf769, quasiskunk, aragornwolf, tango, wolffit, dexcat, and Dexgirl. (I think I may have missed someone – if so, my apologies!). With all of the text messages flying back and forth, Ford was with us in spirit, as well.

We drove the half-hour back to Ann Arbor to Zingerman’s Roadhouse and had an awesome, raucous dinner. My pulled pork BBQ was only OK (the mustard BBQ sauce was somewhat lacking), but the cheese trays, the side dishes, and the desserts were all top-notch. I was vastly amused to find out after the fact that the friendly fellow who was filling our water glasses (and who remembered us from the prior year) turned out to be one of the owners of the Zingerman’s empire. That makes them all the more awesome, in my book.

We got back to hotel just in time for the party we had scheduled at 9:30 PM. It was a crazy evening! We had a slew of people, and I was glad to be able to chat a bit more with Nik and eddiddiums. Dan had a great time mixing drinks. We introduced Midori to his mixing lineup, which begat a new drink, “Green”, which I believe contained Midori, Laird’s Applejack, pineapple juice, coconut rum, and Mountain Dew Throwback. It was scary-good. I’m amazed we didn’t have any noise complaints, but somehow we kept things to a low roar. We shut down the party a little before midnight.

Sunday
Dan and I were up at 5:30 AM for our 6 AM – 8 AM security shift. As expected the convention was pretty dead, though we saw some stragglers hanging around (and had to roust one sleeper in the hallway). We spent most of the time hanging out in Operations, talking with Sgt. Steve, Rene, and Tango. After our shift was over, we got breakfast at the hotel restaurant with Tango, then Dan went back to bed. I spent the morning hanging out in Operations and chatting with Tango and RB about Midwest FurFest-related stuff.

A little after 11, I went upstairs and woke Dan up. We packed up the room, checked out, and drove home. The trip was uneventful, but for a few traffic slowdowns. Once home, we spent the balance of the evening relaxing and winding down.

All in all, it was a really enjoyable weekend, and a great convention. We had fun hanging out with the Dorsai Irregulars and helping out with security. I want to give a huge shoutout to Gir and his staff: Eddie, Ed, Nik, Kit, Deyna, Jazzy, Omni, Oddy, Stevie, Basil, and many others who I didn’t have the good fortunate to meet. I know you were a little shorthanded this year, but if I hadn’t known that ahead of time I never would have guessed. You should all rest up and relax – you did a fantastic job, and really have created a convention to be proud of!