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Forza Puppy!
Oct. 20th, 2014 10:10 amDue to the weather and general lethargy, I was very undecided whether to suit at the Leeds Meet on Saturday. In the end, I'm glad I did as I had a fantastic time and Arcais was on hand to take loads and loads of picky-wicks as I'm an attention seeking puppy.
The Fursuit walk was a bit weird though as we seemed to piss off a load of people with our antics. The ticket staff at Ladyboys of Bangkok loved us but the management didn't, telling us in curt terms to get off the steps as "we are trying to ruin a business here". An erudite point had there actually been any customers - in fact we were attracting people TO the show as people wanted to interact with the fuzzies. The same was the case outside the Desperados van, which had been set up outside of the library and was distributing free small bottles of their new mixed in lime flavour. We got some free samples and indeed in on the act but we were told we weren't allowed to take any pictures outside of the van as it would "affect our brand image". To be fair the chappie was polite about it and generally good natured but did make me self-conscious that perhaps our walks do annoy a few people and that has never been the intention. The problem is though, with performance and characterisation, you assume a different identity and it is difficult to know when to stop, particularly when the world around you is somewhat isolated.
This is not to say that we annoyed everyone we met. The lady with the beautiful pink acoustic guitar loved me and even let me have a play while we also bumped into some Swedish students who wanted to swap some broccoli for something more valuable. They were quite nice and in the end Arc gave them her £1 cat ears, getting to keep the holy broccoli in return. I hope she makes a soup out of it or something.
It was also Taneli's birthday and Arc had got him a chocolate cake which she hid behind the bar until an appropriate break in the proceedings when everyone could sing Happy Birthday to him. She then distributed said cake to around half of the attendees - it was most delicious. Sadly, the bar had a very poor choice of red wine - with just one half-finished bottle available - while the new pitchers had still not arrived so they weren't available either. This was a shame but I guess couldn't be helped, and it's hard to complain when the venue does so much for us. I also liked the horsey theme in the lights on the back wall.
After the meal we opted to go to Almost Famous again, which I keep calling Absolutely Famous for some reason. I did observe that if you don't like chili then there's not much there for you while I opted for the paired down winning fries such is the volume of food you get otherwise. It was the first time in three occasions that I managed to finish the food and all the staff were very interested in the dog suit, which I stored behind the welcoming stand out of the way. After this, we went to the Black Prince, a new pub where Flares used to be, which is just a standard affair with few ales and very little else. The domed roof is impressive, although it does need a clean to bring out the golden gilding, while we also enjoyed the highlights of Sunderland's 8-0 dicking at the hands of Southampton. Tonks wasn't too happy about the football but as Taneli, Skavi, Wolfie and Xolani we weren't too bothered, this is what we did, as well as some general chatting until I left around 10pm as I had work the following day. As it turned out, the others left some 15 minutes later meaning I might as well have stayed.
Sadly, while we were waiting for Skavi and Xolani to join us on City Square we saw an unsavoury incident with a skinhead muscled meathead who was tiring to impress his drongo mates. There was an accordion player adding to the ambience of the square and this guy went up to him and on four occasions aggressively asked him "where are you from?" Upon soliciting a response on the fourth time, we said "why don't you fuck off back there, then". He then laughed and strutted off but it made me incredibly angry, so much so that I nearly went after him. In the end, we gave the accordion man lots of money as his playing had been pleasant while we were waiting. It's sad though that this city has some of these aggressive morons.
Despite this, in the end it was a great meet, with Saber finding his hoodie and house key which he had lost in the venue bookending a great afternoon. We'll be doing it all again for the Northernfurs meet this Saturday, where we will have some new furry themed shots on the menu as well as furry artwork on the TV screens (please get your submissions in by Wednesday if you are interested in exhibiting). We have a few other things planned too, really looking forward to it.
The Fursuit walk was a bit weird though as we seemed to piss off a load of people with our antics. The ticket staff at Ladyboys of Bangkok loved us but the management didn't, telling us in curt terms to get off the steps as "we are trying to ruin a business here". An erudite point had there actually been any customers - in fact we were attracting people TO the show as people wanted to interact with the fuzzies. The same was the case outside the Desperados van, which had been set up outside of the library and was distributing free small bottles of their new mixed in lime flavour. We got some free samples and indeed in on the act but we were told we weren't allowed to take any pictures outside of the van as it would "affect our brand image". To be fair the chappie was polite about it and generally good natured but did make me self-conscious that perhaps our walks do annoy a few people and that has never been the intention. The problem is though, with performance and characterisation, you assume a different identity and it is difficult to know when to stop, particularly when the world around you is somewhat isolated.
This is not to say that we annoyed everyone we met. The lady with the beautiful pink acoustic guitar loved me and even let me have a play while we also bumped into some Swedish students who wanted to swap some broccoli for something more valuable. They were quite nice and in the end Arc gave them her £1 cat ears, getting to keep the holy broccoli in return. I hope she makes a soup out of it or something.
It was also Taneli's birthday and Arc had got him a chocolate cake which she hid behind the bar until an appropriate break in the proceedings when everyone could sing Happy Birthday to him. She then distributed said cake to around half of the attendees - it was most delicious. Sadly, the bar had a very poor choice of red wine - with just one half-finished bottle available - while the new pitchers had still not arrived so they weren't available either. This was a shame but I guess couldn't be helped, and it's hard to complain when the venue does so much for us. I also liked the horsey theme in the lights on the back wall.
After the meal we opted to go to Almost Famous again, which I keep calling Absolutely Famous for some reason. I did observe that if you don't like chili then there's not much there for you while I opted for the paired down winning fries such is the volume of food you get otherwise. It was the first time in three occasions that I managed to finish the food and all the staff were very interested in the dog suit, which I stored behind the welcoming stand out of the way. After this, we went to the Black Prince, a new pub where Flares used to be, which is just a standard affair with few ales and very little else. The domed roof is impressive, although it does need a clean to bring out the golden gilding, while we also enjoyed the highlights of Sunderland's 8-0 dicking at the hands of Southampton. Tonks wasn't too happy about the football but as Taneli, Skavi, Wolfie and Xolani we weren't too bothered, this is what we did, as well as some general chatting until I left around 10pm as I had work the following day. As it turned out, the others left some 15 minutes later meaning I might as well have stayed.
Sadly, while we were waiting for Skavi and Xolani to join us on City Square we saw an unsavoury incident with a skinhead muscled meathead who was tiring to impress his drongo mates. There was an accordion player adding to the ambience of the square and this guy went up to him and on four occasions aggressively asked him "where are you from?" Upon soliciting a response on the fourth time, we said "why don't you fuck off back there, then". He then laughed and strutted off but it made me incredibly angry, so much so that I nearly went after him. In the end, we gave the accordion man lots of money as his playing had been pleasant while we were waiting. It's sad though that this city has some of these aggressive morons.
Despite this, in the end it was a great meet, with Saber finding his hoodie and house key which he had lost in the venue bookending a great afternoon. We'll be doing it all again for the Northernfurs meet this Saturday, where we will have some new furry themed shots on the menu as well as furry artwork on the TV screens (please get your submissions in by Wednesday if you are interested in exhibiting). We have a few other things planned too, really looking forward to it.
