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| Near Derby bus station – three hours to UKPC time! |
I slept fairly well on Friday night, probably just about getting in the requisite six hours. I still woke fairly early, but that did allow me time for a reasonably leisurely shower. I'd decided to get the Red Arrow express bus into Nottingham rather than the train, since it meant slightly less walking and slightly less expense. I had no problems getting to the bus station in enough time to get an inexpensive bottle of Highland Spring. I was a little disappointed to find that the bus was, well, a bus rather than the usual coach, but the journey itself was uneventful.
I was in Nottingham by a little after eight o'clock, which meant time for breakfast. I'd decided to use the one city centre Wetherspoons I'd never visited, the Lloyds No 1 Bar. Usually these (unlike other Spoons) have music playing, but that wasn't the case today. I'd expected to be eating alone but Cozy (no, not that Cozy) offered to join me for a bit, which was very nice of them. I had my usual fry-up, though with only water to drink rather than coffee. Then, off to the venue! On hoof, since the weather was good enough that taking the tram seemed unnecessary.
Despite pre-registration, I was still keen to be reasonably near the front of the queue, since attendance was going to be large enough that processing would still take a while if you were near the back. All tickets had sold out for the first time since 2018, and capacity had been increased see then. QueueCon¹ is generally quite an enjoyable experience if it's not wet, and on this occasion Luna (not that Luna either) produced a deck of MLP cards and we had a few rounds of Chase the Ace while waiting for ten. I saw a few other people I knew, but not many.
¹ Don't you give me that "LineCon" malarkey; I'm not American! :P
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| Bexi and Britannia – costume by Snow Gryphon Suits. |
At last it was time! The priority folks, such as Silver/Gold Sponsors and those granted early entry for accessibility reasons, moved through fast and then it was our turn! We were a bit surprised that those who hadn't pre-regged went in first, but on reflection it made sense as they'd take longer to process. At any rate, things worked out, and once I was through the bag check (carried out with customary smoothness by the venue staff) I was inside... and home!
Plenty of people were already gathering in front of the Mane Stage for the opening ceremony. UKPC has a very informal singalong at this point, but not many attendees participate, which is a bit of a shame. I didn't care; I was belting out the My Little Pony Tales theme with some gusto! I did pop off briefly to reacquaint myself with the venue layout and to have a quick scout of the large stalls section. In the event, all I bought was the official UKPC T-shirt and mug; I wouldn't have time to shop again until Sunday!
This year, UK PonyCon was celebrating its 20th birthday. It had become the longest running My Little Pony convention in the world, and this year's theme was appropriately "We're Making History". Committee member Moomin had worked wonders by procuring a big screen for the stage; although Bexi found it a bit unnerving to see herself in multiple, it was definitely a fine addition. We settled down for the usual welcome waffling before things began in earnest.
Except that this year, there was something extra... unbeknownst to all but one of the con committee, a group had been working for months on a very special animation, which I've embedded here. Long-standing friend and Worcester Shires stalwart Patrick Rowberry, who directed the piece, told me it had been a nightmare keeping quiet for so many months! It was lovely that something like 20 conventions agreed to their mascots being included, and Bexi was overcome and in tears.
It was going to be hard to follow such an opening act, but there was a whole con weekend ahead of us! With the busiest UKPC schedule I can remember, I had to make a few tough choices. After briefly looking in on Dr Pony's history of G1 panel, I plumped for "MLP Fan Animation: Behind the Scenes". It turned out that this nondescript title had also been chosen to throw people off the scent, since it was a look the making of the opening ceremony animation! Very interesting, and nicely judged to be understandable to non-animation people like me without being overly simplistic.
I'd enjoyed myself a lot, but another hard decision awaited. I had to take only the briefest glimpse of the Cosplay Contest as Hawthorn had persuaded me that "G1 is Genius Actually" was the place to be. This was presented by Jack Getschman, the brains behind Scootertrix, both the G4 abridged series and the more recent G1 shorts. Jack clearly truly likes G1, and that affection made his lampooning of it all the more entertaining.¹ We even got a sneak preview of the latest G1 piece, containing "Meegan" getting seriously fed up with the ponies always running to her for help. :D
¹ There was even an exclusive "Gen1us" ribbon, available only to those of us who attended the panel.
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| Sage advice from the Scootertrix panel. |
Things really didn't let up for the daytime portion of Saturday, and a few minutes later it was time for "A Zen Guide to Rail". This was a bit different from previous years, with the aviation aspect removed for a completely railway focus, and plane and cake pone Ace now largely in a technical support role to Zen. A nice and relaxed panel with a genial host, though in the Q&A I did sneak in a question that started out seriously but ended with "...would anyone like any toast?" I absolutely, totally and utterly blame Dodj for putting me up to this, but I regret nothing!
Next time: Saturday part two, featuring chips, cakes and cheese.
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