This past week has been a whirlwind so I figured it would be worth summarizing it both so that people who didn't make it could have an idea of what it was like and so that my experience can be recorded for future reference.

This year, unlike past years, Brickfair started on Wednesday. Apart from setting up MOCs, greeting other BZPower members, and attending the opening ceremonies and bingo, not much happened that day. I did pick up and build the set I won in one of the BZP anniversary raffles, and bought some things from some of the vendors as well.

On Thursday I attended Mariann Asanuma's Mini-Con panel and found out about what that was all about. Having a Mini-Con at the center of the convention is a wonderful idea and I'll have to plan better to create mini versions of my MOCs (and myself) next year. I had planned to attend Zatth's "How Lego Impacts Our Lives" panel but ended up leaving before it started due to uneasiness with some of the attendees. I hear it was good, though, and wish I had stuck around.

On Friday I attended Peter Espersen's panel about Lego Ideas and the Exo-Suit, which was okay but didn't tell us a lot that we didn't already know from posts about the project as well as the Cuusoo panel from the year before. I also managed to buy the parts to make a mini version of our Atlantis submarine MOC for the Mini-Con as well as a bunch of other useful parts. That night was the World of Lights event. We had missed most of the practice the previous night but we made up for it by purchasing a tiny blacklight which made our submarine look amazing once the lights went out.

On Saturday I went through with my plans to attend BronyCon for a day... and they didn't turn out that great. My train to Baltimore was delayed, so by the time I arrived at the convention center the Voice Actor Q & A had already started. Bummed, I proceeded to awkwardly meander around the vendor hall for a while as I waited for the two panels I wanted to attend in the afternoon. I got a small amount of merch and a ridiculous number of StreetPasses. But when I finally headed up to the site of the other two panels I had planned to attend, I found out that those two panels were only for young kids and their parents. Frustrated, I took an earlier train back to BrickFair and managed to make it to the tail end of The Lego Movie, which was a nice pick-me-up after a day gone awry. Looking back my time at BronyCon wasn't abysmal, but it wasn't worth the expense I had taken to follow through with those plans, and unless the two events are different dates next year I'll be sticking with BrickFair.

Sunday was fairly uneventful, as the public days usually are, but I had a good time regardless. I spent most of the day alternating between checking StreetPass and demonstrating the features of our submarine MOC to attendees. At 2:00 I finally managed to contribute a hat to the BZP hatpile, having missed it every other year. Right before closing I managed to pick up Benny's Spaceship for a good price from one of the vendors. After Brickfair closed I went to the BZPower fancy dinner, but the service was abysmal (with an hour-long wait, slow service, a substitution in my order that I didn't okay, and only a half-apology and subsequent rudeness from the manager) and I ended up leaving early since I didn't want my frustration to cast a shadow over everyone else's evening. My mom picked me up and took me back to the restaurant at the Holiday Inn, which is better than that Longhorn Steakhouse will probably ever be. The manager there (an amazingly friendly guy who I had met earlier that weekend) got me a free drink, appetizer and dessert, no questions asked.

All in all, it was far from a perfect weekend, but I still enjoyed myself and left with some decent loot. I hope next year's BrickFair is even better.