Friday, September 14, 2007 The most thorough By Jerome Pohl LA Correspondent Former Opinion editor Chris Hvizdak was supposed to write an arti cle for my magazine, Thalia, about a convention he went to last sum mer. Since he never got around to writing it, my consummate journal istic professionalism forced my hand into buying a day pass for the 2007 Anthrocon (in laymen's terms, the furry convention). If you don't know what furries are Google it; you can never have enough regrets in life The furries are people, mostly men, who dress up as ani mals and have conventions to meet like-minded people, preferably men, and when the day is done and the hotel room door is closed these men do what animals do, or what men dressed as animals would do. I won't scar you with visuals, but suffice it to say that in fur suit lingo SPH stands for Strategically Placed Holes... Yes, they needed an abbrevia tion. While my friends went undercover as plushies, I donned my pith helmet (it's made of real pith) and full safari regalia and went on furry safari. Well, when we arrived there were a few people here and there with fur suits, nothing mascots hadn't desensitized us to. Then an elevator door opened and the furry-con hit us like an 8-foot tall wolf in leather bondage gear, because that's exactly what we saw! From then on, the day was a blur of family friendly fetish fun. Mid day it happened. The fur suit parade. They came at us one by one, single file. Cats, dogs, bears, a fox in Halo armor, a horse slathered in American flags, a raptor with a guitar'? Jerry Pohl Somewhere during the parade it hit me, where I was, and who they were... and I was afraid. You don't understand, they weren't just dressed as animals, they wanted to BE those animals. You don't know man, you weren't there, you weren't in the s%!#, knee deep in sot see ing your best friend get scritched by a wolf in a garish pimp suit. Many people that day succumbed to what can only be described as the purple people eater. He stood 7 feet high, with eyes like saucers, and a mouth he could fit your head into, and he did! But since the guy in the suit isn't 7 feet tall, at mouth level he's basically rubbing his forehead on you. Not all furries are furry. The whale for example had "The only thing worse than beating a dead horse is sitting on one." —Christopher LaFuria HUMOR vacation from reality I have ever taken a latex whale suit. But water wouldn't stay on him, so instead he's cov ered in some type of lube. So after you hugged him thy this time in the day we realized resisting only made it worse) you'd he all slimy. There were also two guys with raccoon puppets on their hands. And the puppets were talking to each other. 1 don't think you understand. The guys weren't talking to each other with the puppets. The puppets were talking to each other and the guys were not part of this equation. They're looking at each other's puppets, not at each other, and they're not talking about stuff using the puppets, the puppets are talking ahout has an unfortunate encounter with the Purple puppet stuff. to each other. What type of meadows they prefer to frol ic in. The day culminated in the furry masquerade. which was their skit show. It included music videos, live comedy. a man in a shark cos tume, and a different kind of whale singing as Jessica Rabbit. I belie \ c her measurements were 36-240-360. At some point during this I curl into a ball and the floor. Also the raptor with a guitar was there. per forming his trademark furry parody folk songs. Chris already knew who he was, Sonic Blue (look him up if you like funny songs). He's "Hey, Sweetcheeks - Christopher LaFuria let Pow/LA People Eater coNTRIBt TED !liar° famous among the furies, so Chris took me and our friend Dave up to Blue's hotel room to buy a CD. Blue walked us up to his room. Past the door, a long narrow hallway opens into the bedroom. where we discovered, on one of the beds, waiting for Blue to return, two precocious gentlemen. Now they weren't naked, but nudity was clearly forthcoming. While Blue is sell ing Chris a CD and signing some 8X 10 glossies for us. the door opened. and in walked three more big hairy fur suiters. Now the party really begins. The shirts come off, the bondage gear comes out, they put Hentai on the TV, one guy puts on a tutu. and they launch into sonic epic scritching. which is furry for foreplay. So now I have to he in don't-get-raped-by-six-dudes mode, which is an important mode to he in. After procuring our Sonic Blue memorabilia, we squeezed past the frisky furries (now shirt less and furry in a different way) in the long narrow hallway and escaped with just enough sanity for one last item of busi- The worst of the night surely behind us, we went to the con bulletin board. The bulletin hoard at the furry convention is a magical place. Many of them already know each other from the Internet. so they post notes on which they have written: Screen name, real name. phone number. room number, and what sexual activities they're interested in performing while wearing their fur suit. While we had our hearts set on hardcore polar hear on anteater action, we ended up a lovely little soiree called the Matta Rata Tea Party. Here we met Dragonwolf and Angelkitty. rare and elusive girl furries. It was kinda like Sonic Blue's party, only the fat hairy dudes were replaced with tall silky chicks, and one blue haired lesbian midget with a crew cut and a pronounced stutter. Wow was she ever popular. at Anthrocon That night I realized something: the lorries are superior to us mere humans, ironically because they do not deny that they are animals. They have to dress up as creatures to do so, but they have the ability to put their name and number on a bulletin hoard and have lots of sex, which means they'll he spawning our future generations more prolifi cally than the rest of us. After the inevitable wars are fought, man and furry may some day live in peace with one another. Dr. Schlaumph's "Tips for the Ladies" #42 If yom have writin, on the bxls. ofy y,,qu r smeatpara4 ML inevitably read it... Twice Something Punny (A pun is like a good steak. A rare medium well done.) BAR-B-QUE" "Stop Ahead." The Behrend Beacon Mike Sharkell'HE BEHREND BEACON Mike Sharkey/THE BEHREND BEACON ICiO.l~~
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