UK PonyCon 2025 report, part four: Sunday, first half

Yes, 7:30 am. Having been evacuated four hours earlier. These people are amazing

Well, this was an interesting morning. That's as in "may you live in interesting times" interesting. I woke up well on time and got my stuff together. There are no Sunday buses where I live, but this was not a deal-breaker. I'd been offered a lift into Halesowen, which was nice.¹ The weather was pretty decent, a bit chilly and breezy but largely sunny, so after being dropped off I was happy enough waiting at the bus station. The X10 duly arrived, and as it was a double-decker as usual I went upstairs for a lovely view of... well, Halesowen. Look, I was in a good mood, all right?
¹ This is not a sentence you will read very often. 

I flicked over to the UK PonyCon Discord while on the bus – and that was when I realised something was up. Long story short, the HSBC bank right in Birmingham city centre had caught fire and the area had had to be evacuated at around 3 am. No significant injuries, thankfully. The snag was that right above this bank was a Premier Inn hotel. And this hotel was where a large proportion of the convention staff were staying. They'd been given shelter in New Street station next door prior to being redistributed to other hotels, but one thing they hadn't had was any real sleep.

I went to the Soloman Cutler Wetherspoons pub on the outskirts of the city centre for breakfast, as I knew it would be quiet at that time in the morning. There I had a breakfast muffin and several cups of coffee while I kept in touch with both the con and my Worcester group friends. The staff had done a truly wonderful job in rescheduling to fit in nearly everything while delaying opening from 10 am to midday to allow themselves some kind of rest and preparation. This really does deserve tremendous appreciation, so here I am tremendously appreciating it!

Matthew Boulton, James Watt and William Murdoch arguing whether to do karaoke or G3 merch shopping

Because of the delay, I was able to book into my own Premier Inn before heading to the con; fortunately it wasn't the evacuated one. Unfortunately the mess meant the check-in kiosks and main computer weren't working properly, but in the end I did get my room. As it was a Sunday night, the cheapest night of the week, I'd splashed out on a Premier Plus room, which was up on the seventh floor and had luxuries I wasn't accustomed to like a shower with halfway decent hair and body wash. Also, a couple more free mini chocolate bars! Green and Blacks this time.

Then it was off to UKPC. Everyone seemed in a good mood, and I was pleased to see a very strong feeling of appreciation towards the convention staff. The queue was again fairly long, but again it was handled efficiently and quickly. Once inside the venue, I made a point of thanking Bexi as she went past, but she rather played down her efforts, noting that she'd stayed in a different hotel and so had had some sleep. The venue staff had seemed slightly fussier about reminding everyone not to bring external food and drink in this morning, which as I said earlier they weren't always that consistent about. Ah well.

The first thing I headed for was the "Fluttershy Fan Club" panel, because the schedule rejig had meant the original clash with "Britannia Mare-ster" (of which more in a minute) had been avoided. This panel was intended to be a celebration of why Fluttershy is Best Pony. Obviously the fact of that is beyond question, but I was looking forward to basking in our mutual admiration for Flutters. Sadly, for reasons I never discovered but perhaps connected with the fire, the host didn't make it. We ended up watching Fluttershy clips for half an hour and then calling it a day. Could have been worse!

This was actually fairly relaxing. Not for the Gala animals, though...

That meant some time to spare, so I split that between chatting to friends and wandering around the stalls. It was just too busy to be comfortable, and I wasn't really in a merch-buying mood anyway, although I did make sure to stop by Imalou's table and buy an extremely amusing print of Izzy and Sprout – you can see that in the merch haul pic at the end of this series. Imalou was very nice considering the busyness, her prices were very fair, and I think all of us feel she would be extremely welcome if she ever wants to come to UK PonyCon again.

Then it really was time for Britannia Marester. That's a truly horrible pun – bravo! This has become a bit of a favourite for UKPC over the last few years. Based to an extent on the show Taskmaster, this sees a panel of contestants including the special guests set ridiculous tasks. In this case, things like choosing ten words from the FiM theme that nobody else would pick, running around collecting as many stickers as possible (Hawthorn was not a fan of this one) and designing an OC in a couple of minutes. Imalou's OC, "Fish Chips", was maybe the highlight of the whole game! Rebecca Shoichet won, but she immediately gave up her victory in favour of Amlaur. It was all a lot of fun.

Lunchtime! I decided to pop over to the Dragon again – and wonder of wonders, Britain's Got Talent had finally finished and so I could actually move. I wasn't that hungry so I confined myself to a soft drink and some chips. I'd been expecting to eat alone, but Roku joined me for a while which was very pleasant. This recce had been valuable, as it meant the Dragon was now a more viable choice for our Worcester group Sunday evening meal than the Briar Rose, which was apparently going to be full of Aston Villa fans...

Britannia Marester. A very boring photo of a very entertaining panel

Next time: Bingo!

UK PonyCon 2025 report, part three: Saturday, second half

Imalou (left) and Rebecca Shoichet (centre) answer the questions

Once I'd finished Languages of Equestria, it was time for the unmissable Special Guest Q&A and Script Reading. As usual, the latter was short but amusing, with Rebecca Shoichet demonstrating why she's a professional VA and most of us aren't. The question session was almost perfectly timed, with just a couple of minutes remaining after the last person had asked their queries. I don't remember anything earth-shattering in Rebecca or Imalou's answers, though the latter had some fun details about getting a certain red pony (Sprout) approved by Hasbro.

The freebies table had some fun little things by now, so I made sure to leave more stuff myself as I picked up a Sunny Pez dispenser. Because why not? Also some of the Chinese Kayou trading cards that have recently started appearing all over the place. These were mostly donated by James, whose attempts to practically throw packs of them at people became somewhat amusing by the final Monday morning! I didn't want any more UKPC merch, so that wasn't a factor. Also, by now I'd got the water dispenser in the breakout room to work properly: for some reason it took forever to start actually dispensing.

There wasn't a great deal that appealed to me in the early evening, which was a mild shame but not something I was too fussed about. I still have no idea why boba tea is supposed to be so fascinating, so I skipped Bexi's panel with that name, and while I was mildly attracted by the idea of a G4 fan-made videos panel, I wasn't attracted enough to prioritise it over some more stalls shopping. I ended up buying... well, not much this time. As you'll see when I eventually reach the merch haul pic, it was a case of slim pickings, something which is no reflection on the vendors.

This photo entirely fails to capture the lively, upmarket atmosphere. And no, I didn't win on the Monopoly

Getting evening food on a Saturday night is always a fraught endeavour. The Wetherspoons pub in the station was packed solid and had bouncers on the door by six o'clock. This is not what my local small-town pubs are like! I had to tell them we were looking for food, and they let us in. We then came out again sharpish as there wasn't a table to be had for love nor money. Nor mayonnaise (bing bong). The Dragon was still out as Britain's Got Talent was on to day 753 or something.

So a few of us ended up in the McDonald's on the New Street ramp. I think it was Bridle, Oily, Mike, Hawthorn and me; apologies if I've missed someone! It was nice to be able to talk to Mike properly for the first time since he'd made it, but other than the friends chat and the inevitable Big Mac I wasn't that keen on the place. It was incredibly busy and we only got a table by basically shoving large bags of ponies on the shelf and trying with varying success to repel non-convention people.

After a while it was back to the venue! UKPC had a second music event this time, the Forest Fest. This turned out to be an almost complete non-event for me because of timing. There was some kind of delay and it took ages before any music began. When it did, DJ Ben Love started with a wub that almost knocked me off my feet and went on from there. I stayed outside looking at a map of part of the Alps that someone had left in the bar area. No, I don't know why either. Maybe it was a clue, though to what I couldn't say.

Props to the bar for having cider. Unprops for having crisps at £2.50

And now, the bit that really mattered: Archer's Pub Quiz! This is a hilarious event run by one of the very few (maybe the only one) to have attended every single UK PonyCon. She asks 40 questions across all gens, split into four rounds of fiendishness such as colour-reversed symbols/cutie marks, and the team that answers Derpy correctly the most wins. In our case, we managed to include "Batman" as an answer in tribute to the absent Alli, but still somehow messed up an obvious "Night Glider" answer by putting "Night Light". Still, our team ("Kylie Minogue Tesco Edition") ended up joint third, our usual position. I took zero photos here. Go me.

I had to go at that point, and I was sorry to miss the Cartoon Riff with the Titanic cartoon featuring rapping dogs. There were probably other cartoons involved, but that one matters in cinematic history. I was less fussed about the late-night unofficial panel with Ember, basically roasting every pony. I'm told it was fun and I'm almost certainly in a minority of one on this, but if you're going to make a point of having a fully family-friendly convention, which UKPC does, an "unofficial, wink wink" 18+ event in the middle of the night just so the host can swear a lot seems kind of missing that point. I'd have had no problems had it been a fully casual thing in a pub somewhere.

Anyway, I was in a good mood regardless. As the con was so close to home this year I had decided I'd be going, well, home for Saturday night, thus saving about a trillion bits on hotel costs. For some bizarre reason the train was perfectly on time and had no yelling football fans; I was rather disconcerted. I was even more disconcerted not to have people shouting below my window until 4 am, although as I have a garden that would have been rather concerning. I had a bite and a drink, flicked through the Worcester Shires Discord, and ended up sleeping reasonably well. Early start tomorrow!

DJ Ben Love spins the decks, or whatever these people do

Next time: The morning burn

Ponyfic Roundup 559: More Thousand Words IV Contest entries

Read it Later story count: 90 (-1)

Words read this week: 5,000

Back to Logan Being Hopeless: It would take much too long to explain the details this week, so I won't even try. Think about millipedes or something, I don't know. Fortunately I shall be having a break from Ponyfic Roundup next week, as noted at the bottom. When I come back, I intend to gradually start increasing word count again! For today, though, it's still the lowest it can realistically be for five fics:

Bittersweet Memories by Shaslan
Always Has Been by Bandy
No Bones About It by Pascoite
Dinner and a Show by TheDriderPony
Aurora by Flashgen

★: 0 | ★★: 0 | ★★★: 4 | ★★★★: 1 | ★★★★★: 0
Note: I use a skewed rating system. A fic I enjoy an average amount scores two stars.

UK PonyCon 2025 report, part two: Saturday, first half

My hotel room view was concrete, so have Birmingham Council House (which I did walk past) instead

It's been too long owing to that WiFi outage, but I'm back with the next part of my UK PonyCon 2025 report. I was delighted to get a good night's sleep at my hotel – I think I chose pretty well – and because of not having to travel into Birmingham from elsewhere I was able to have Saturday breakfast at the Travelodge for once. The usual buffet stuff, but I ate a lot as lunch is always a problem at cons, so we're talking bacon, scrambled eggs, sausages, tomatoes, hash browns, yoghurt, cereal, several glasses of fruit juice... you get the idea. Then it was time to check out as I wouldn't be returning to this hotel. All smooth.

It was a very windy day, but fortunately Storm Amy's worst effects were elsewhere, and it was at least bright so a reasonable experience to walk into central Birmingham. I know a few people were in the Briar Rose (same pub as last night) for breakfast, though memory for specific identities is already hazy, so even though I wasn't eating I joined them there for a bit. By now of course I had my con badge around my neck – I only really take it off for bed and showers during the weekend – so the excitement levels were building nicely.

Off to New Street station, but not to catch a train: walking through it was just the easiest way to get to the venue, which was a few minutes' walk out the back. I made it at just before 9:30, I think, and the queue was already substantial, although it became even more so not long afterwards. I remember seeing a few people go by – Ace, Zen, Trixxy, Charles, a few others I can't recall. The building overhang by the comic shop would have protected us a bit from any rain, but there wasn't any, yay. Pretty much on time (10:00) we filed in!

The crowded Opening Ceremony. Britannia and Bexi on stage

The bag checks from venue staff on entering were an unknown, but they were very professionally handled all weekend, even if the level of strictness over outside food and drink did seem to vary from person to person. I had a little more to carry than usual owing to not being able to leave stuff in my hotel, but it all fitted in one bag. There was a very basic cloakroom (basically just a coat rail and a space underneath for bags) which was unattended; I was willing to leave my old jacket there but not my bag.

It was nice to catch up with some friends before things started, including Ghost Mike who I hadn't seen until this morning owing to all those plane delays. Chatting away with sometimes long-absent friends before a con is one of my favourite things, so that was great. I also made sure to have a quick chat with JowyB – it might have been then, it might have been slightly later – who is a great guy and a great artist. I bought one of his lucky dip sketches for a fiver and came away with a 2014 one featuring both Chrysalis and Flufflepuff. Very happy!

The opening ceremony happened in much the same way that these things nearly always do, by thanking everyone for coming, introducing the special guests Rebecca Shoichet and Imalou, having a little bit of minor physical comedy from the fursuiter playing UKPC mascot Britannia, etc etc. It was very cramped, though: we were right up against the venue's capacity, with quite a few of us having to stand around the edges of the room. This went all the more so as some of the stalls were squeezed in at the back owing to the lack of a sufficiently large single space for all vendors to be together.

"Have you seen this mare? Reward: B10 or one cherry"

Then it was train time! Zenfox who presented ably, with technical assistance but still no cake from Ace, shifted from the recent setup of simply helping people travel safely on our railways to the far more challenging task of trying to explain Equestrian railways. Given my own attempt to do that in ponyfic with On the Wrong Track a few years ago, I was all ears. And it was tremendous fun. I have issues with the use of a crying Scootaloo image on the shaky grounds that it was the best picture of a particular station. And I have Issues with the portrayal of Fluttershy as a train hijacker and all-round criminal mare. But yeah, I loved this panel.

There wasn't that much I wanted to do for the next hour or so, and so I wandered around, exploring the "Collectors' Cove" for toy-focused stalls on the ground floor, making a quick visit to put a lanyard on the freebies table and pick up some other small thing, and generally get my bearings in the venue. I can't actually remember what I did for lunch, though I have a feeling it might have been another trip to the Briar Rose with just Patrick. Either way, that big breakfast meant I didn't eat very much.

Back to the venue to see the last moments of the cosplay contest, which has never been on my must-see list but which I normally experience a bit more than that of. Since we were in Birmingham, Luna (my friend, not the Princess) and some cronies had dressed up in Peaky Blinders-style attire (as the Pinkie Blinders, of course) and arrived in a stretch Hummer, of all things. I didn't see it, but he told me about it. That car was a bit less Brummie, though! They ended up deservedly winning the prize for Best Group Cosplay, though we didn't know that until later on.

"Pony Romance Languages" – eg Apple Bloom speakin' in Fancy

Finally for this part of the report was an unusual little panel from ImmyChan: The Languages of Equestria. I was very keen to attend her panel, as this has been a minor interest of mine since the days I created Frithaes! An Introduction to Colloquial Lapine for the Watership Down fandom over 20 years ago. I thought it might just be Hawthorn and me, but in the event the small room was packed. Immy gave a good account of herself, and even though the panel was short I found it intriguing: the North Germanic nature of Breezie-speak, for example, and a decent stab at explaining how a Latin word like "draconequus" exists in Equestria in the first place.

Next time: Getting Batman wrong... 

Ponyfic Roundup 558: Thousand Words Contest IV Gold Medallists

Read it Later story count: 91 (nc)

Words read this week: 5,000

I am late this week not because of Logan being hopeless, which I'm sure you will agree makes a refreshing change! It's because I've only relatively recently got WiFi service back after a major outage caused by someone digging through a cable or whatever the cool kids do these days. I wasn't entirely without internet thanks to phone data, but I wasn't keen to repeat my experience of trying to write PR on a phone. This is, by the way, also the reason for the pause in UK PonyCon reports. They'll be back! Anyway, here's today's slate:

Rinse Cycle by HearthsEve
The Middlemare's Market by hawthornbunny
Dollhouse by pneu
Butterfly Stains by Kintsugi Sunset
The Development of a Lexicon of Epithets for a Diarchal Equestria by gloamish

★: 0 | ★★: 0 | ★★★: 2 | ★★★★: 2 | ★★★★★: 1
Note: I use a skewed rating system. A fic I enjoy an average amount scores two stars.

Sounds of 2016, nos. 5 to 1!

Here we go, then: we've finally reached the very top of the Equestrian Trot 100 chart for 2016! It's really rather thrilling stuff, isn't it? Okay, maybe it isn't, but you get the idea. Sometimes there's something to be said for rambling on in this intro paragraph, but this time let's get moving/

Rule 1: Still available in the same or (1b) similar form direct from the/an original artist.
Rule 2: Available from a third party, with reason to believe the artist is fine with this.
Rule 3: So famous that it would be plain silly to leave it out.
Rule 4: Being unlisted is not, on its own, grounds for exclusion. 

We're into the top ten now, so Rule 3 applies across the board. Here goes!

5: Michelle Creber, Black Gryph0n & Baasik – Getting Stronger
4: Delta Brony – The Spectacle (remix)
3: µThunder – Say Goodbye to the Holiday (remix)
2: ponyphonic ft. Kristen Calvin – The Moon Rises
1: Aurelleah – Luna's Future (remix)

All right, for the very last time for 2016, off we go!

UK PonyCon 2025 report, part one: Friday

My key to Equestria...

Here we go at last with my report of UK PonyCon 2025! To save you all waiting in suspense, I'll say right away that it was an extremely enjoyable convention. Not everything ran entirely according to plan, but that's cons for you. My small grumbles here and there should not take away from the fact that, given the unavoidable issues of a venue smaller (though more expensive to hire) than last year's, pretty much everyone did a sterling job to say the least.

So then, here we are on the Friday! It was nice not to have to start early in the morning for TrainCon. Indeed, I was almost in danger of being too early into Birmingham! There were no rail strikes this year, so it was a simple process. Sadly I didn't notice any other Pony folk I knew at Birmingham New Street station at first, and so I went to the Pret on the concourse for a cheap filter coffee. Nothing of great interest happened, bar Oilyvalves giving me a wave from outside as he passed by on the way to his hotel.

Surprisingly, I got to the KitKats before Pinkie did

I'd bought an early check-in add-on (though that's gone from £10 to £15 fairly recently, grumble) and so I set off to Newhall Street to find my Travelodge around midday. I'd selected it carefully as it was just far enough out of the city centre that I hoped it wouldn't be too loud on a Friday night, but still easy walking distance. I'd booked the very slightly upgraded Standard Room Plus, which meant being on the top floor (big plus), a coffee pod machine (shrug) and for whatever reason, a couple of complimentary KitKats. Not complaining!

Then it was off to town for the usual Worcester Shires pre-con meal, which was moved from the Dragon to the Briar Rose at the last minute because Britain's Got Talent was on at the Hippodrome meaning there would have been about 73 people for every table in the Dragon. This was the usual very pleasant experience, marred only by Ghost Mike's plane woes (which he's talked about himself) meaning he wasn't able to arrive until late evening. We did, however, discover the secret of the Briar Rose's mayonnaise cupboard.¹ Even if the staff themselves were later defeated by it...
¹ What it sounds like. A big wall panel behind which were shelves and shelves of mayonnaise.

The essence of UK PonyCon, really. The gens, not the rain

Pre-registration for UK PonyCon was in the venue itself, only a few minutes' walk away, so most of us made use of the opportunity as it didn't take long at all. My Bronze Sponsor badge was very nice, with Britannia on one edge and Sunny on the other, in honour of special guest Imalou. Lanyard in place, it was back to the pub for a bit. This year, for the first time at UKPC, there was going to be a Friday evening music event as part of the convention itself, and that's why our meal was in the afternoon rather than in the evening as it had been in the past.

The venue opened properly an hour before the "Jungle Jam" concert began at 6 pm, so we wandered over. Only the music hall and an outer hall with a bar were open, but that was fine. The bar sold at least some drinks at a non-absurd price, which was a plus. First up was Bexi with her now legendary cheesefest. As with last year, they're a tad too modern for me, and sorry Bexi but the "Cha Cha Slide" still isn't very interesting, but "5, 6, 7, 8" "Reach" (yay S Club 7!) and the Macarena are hard to avoid smiling at. She wasn't ridiculously loud, so this set made a good introduction.

Acid Applejack at the Jungle Jam

Next up was Acid Applejack, a Dutch EDM (and similar) musician. Not quite as much my cup of tea, but I still enjoyed his set. Actually, he seemed to have a good time at the con; I found myself standing next to his chair at a Mane Stage event later in the weekend. The third act was StormBlaze, who although probably best known as an artist gave a storming (ha) set. Some of the tunes were horse-related rather than strictly Pony, but it worked – and even if she was nervous about singing "My Past is Not Today" with Rebecca Shoichet in earshot, I think she nailed it.

I don't dance as everypony who knows me knows, but I got about as close as I'm ever going to get during some of these tunes! Still, after that things started to move more to the loud'n'hard kind of music and much as I respect Blackened Blue's ability, he's just a bit too much for me. So I retreated to my hotel room, finding the light rain annoying but it was very agreeable not to have to spend 45 minutes on a bus first! I'd really enjoyed the music – more than I'd expected to, if I'm honest – so I was in a very good mood for the following day. I even got a good night's sleep!

Next time: UK PonyCon hits the buffers, in a very entertaining way