"What's new with you?" says the Blog posting button. Well let me tell you.

It all started with helping out with Love Me Newgrounds 2 (which just came out today!) and becoming friends with @CaptainStevie, who wanted to go to this meet but it ended up not workin' out for him. If it weren't for him I don't think I'd ever have considered going to this. For an unforgettable experience, I have to thank him deeply, and in another timeline, there's a selfie of the two of us at the meet in this blog post.

EDIT: THIS HAPPENED NEXT MEETUP

SO!

Let's recap this thing.

The day before the meet rolls around. Reassuringly, I'm not the only one who's nervous. @Tamag0 and I doodle what we think we're gonna look like the whole time.

Tamago and I would end up not seeing each other as they came after the meet, and in my head I confused multiple people for them, LOL

EDIT: THIS WAS ALSO RECTIFIED THE NEXT MEETUP

In the blink of an eye, though, the meetup was then upon us. We were all OFF TO PHILLY.

...Even though TooManyGames wasn't technically in Philly but yunno, it feels GOOD to say "Newgrounds Philly meetup".

THE MEETUP

My NG account turned 8 years old on the day of the meetup, and it was time to celebrate!

I get there and go to get my badge, and the woman behind the table looked at my shirt and was like "Well I know what you're here to see!". The con opens, and I scope the layout and run into a few people I wasn't expecting to see in the process!

First was Vinny Vinesauce who had come in prior to his meet and greet table. I was able to have a quick exchange with him which was really cool! He had asked about the NG meet and I answered questions about it, and told where it was goin' on, and he said he was interested in it and talked to / wanted to talk to Tom about it and such. He ended up popping his head over and I had no idea until today! Super chill guy!

Oh and then for all that psyching myself up to see NG people, I didn't factor in the possibility of running into old homeschooler friends! We were all very surprised to see each other and chatted for a bit as we ran into each other here and there.

I would later recognize some NG folk from the con opening with all of us in the arcade area, but 20 minutes before the meet I walk past the stage entrance and see my first Newgrounder - @YendorNG watchin' for people. And we Spiderman Pointing meme'd.

The swag table, complete with @PKettles print. Other people's free stuff that was brought soon accumulated as well. @Shal jumpscare in the upper-right!

Can't have a meetup without a NG flag!

My place in the guestbook!

Newgrounds real???

It became very apparent very quickly how special this was gonna be after that. Photos, signings, swag exchanging...It wasn't even 3:00 yet! @CorTat-G and the Newgrounds Podcast team (@Droid, @heyopc and @Shal) took the stage, said thank yous to everyone, and started an impromptu live NGP episode, talkin' about the chicken cheesesteak from the food court heyopc was eating. The stage reeked of chicken cheesesteak afterwards.

Here's @BrandyBuizel being carried off-stage to applause.

A little bit into the panel format, @TomFulp walked in and on-stage, who wasn't sure if the bustling commotion from a far off stage was the meetup or not (it was). The panel went back to meetup mode shortly after that and I got to say hi and chat to Tom for a bit here and there!

I also had a very in-depth chat with @Luis and got a sticker from @SrPelo, whom I complemented on all the pins he was wearing and recognized a few.

Kinda going out of order in terms of the order of events at this point - @Taka was givin' out doodles of people and I received one! He also brought the McDonalds ad poster that people signed. @Squidly brought a plushie of their character Chompy which we all signed too!

I also got an awesome handmade NG bracelet from @vividlance, and I'm happy for whoever got the one that read "NEMGROUNDS".

@emizip went to the meet in an ENA cosplay!

I had tried to do a mini sketchbook thing but quickly into the meet I realized that wasn't gonna work out very well, but I did get doodles from @emizip and @BrandyBuizel, as well as a signature from @Hibachi before abandoning it. Thank you three!

@milkypossum and @MKMaffo (awesome stickers!) walked by me at one point, and I didn't realize until today that the person with the @MindChamber logo on their outfit...just actually might've been MindChamber? :P

At some point talking to Taka and his friends I look down and see that an event sticker had managed to stick itself to the bottom of my shoe. Someone had to have unpeeled the back of it, and left it on the ground sticky side up! Very odd. I stuck it to my shirt, and then to my lil' sketchbook along with my name tag.

There's so much I'm going to be leaving out here, people I talked to, swag I acquired, photos and video I took, but it really was a JAM-PACKED HOUR that went by just like that! After that hour exhaustion seriously set in though, socializing at that point was like...*fart noise*

I felt bad 'cuz there were some NG folk still around after and I was just like, gone, haha. But I did get to high-five @jack later.

The Funkin' Crew were late to the meetup and I didn't get to meet any of them sadly. :c

Also, for beefing the timing of the StreetPass event at the con (it was today and not yesterday), I managed to StreetPass 10 people! Wowza!

And yeah...aside from checkin' out the con afterwards, that's pretty much the gist of it!

So what were my main takeaways?

• That was one of the coolest things I've EVER done
• Cons are NOT SENSORY-FRIENDLY at all. I was both in my element as far as the content of the con goes..and NOT in my element at the same time, as far as sensory and social stuff goes. Weird!
• I can be socially awkward! I really hope the interactions I had with you all were pleasant!

Thank you to all the event organizers and everyone who came and made this meetup what it was! This kinda thing isn't really my thing at all, so I'm happy to have had the experience now! Did I mention this was my FIRST EVER CON??

My legs and feet still hurt.

BACK TO WORK ON RANDY LEARNS HISTORY!

ONE HOUR LONG POINT N' CLICK ADVENTURE!

FULLY VOICE ACTED LIKE LOVE ME NG 2!

BE ON THE LOOKOUT!

-XOXO Dungeon <3