Shibaricon The Second Time

I remember the last Shibaricon and how overwhelmed I was by it. I thought I was much better equipped mentally for the event. I had learned about the challenge of selecting classes and attending the popular ones. I knew the hotel. I was pretty comfortable this time playing in public around other more well known rope riggers. I was feeling pretty good about Shibaricon.

I forgot about the huge number of rope people attending, didn't know that almost half of them had never attended a Shibaricon and some of them were new to rope. I spend most of my time playing in scenes where either I am the only rigger or there is one or two other riggers around. When I do attend events that has multiple riggers, they are still the minority in attendance. Shibaricon has over 600 people with experienced riggers and experienced rope bottoms from around the world and I counted over 40 suspension points in just the main play room. It is mostly rope with some other types of play mixed in.

After the first Shibaricon, I learned I needed to rethink class selection and attendance. This time I learned that I needed to rethink arranging play dates, meeting people and scheduling play time. One can't just find people by walking around and the cell phone technology is useless since one can't have any tech around that may be able to take pictures or other recordings.

Off to Chicago

My two playmates and I had planned to go to Shibaricon. We would be traveling out a day early and I had picked up one of those car top carriers for the extra gear in my small car. Alas, events transpired that prevented one of my playmates attending. It was upsetting to me and put an emotional negative into the situation. If I could have done something for her, I would have stayed back. I was worried that things would turn for the worse. I crossed my fingers and hoped.

Instead of driving extra distance to pick up my second playmate, we headed out to Chicago taking our time. Got there around diner timer, discovered Chicago was 20 degrees colder because of a storm front. I hadn't packed for this weather.

We dropped off the luggage at the front door and I went and parked the car. We are pretty familiar with the hotel now. We got settled in our room and I think we ordered room service.

The next day we took our time, enjoyed ourselves by going to the Shedd Aquarium. I couldn't find where I parked the car since the notation I wrote down was worthless and I had entered the garage from a different point. In addition, Raven who had stayed back in the warmth found out the aquarium was closing. I went up and down the basement levels of the parking garage and finally found my car and manage to find Raven in the pickup traffic craziness in front of the building.

We went back to the hotel, ate something and went off to the meet and greet.

Meet and Greet

The meet and greet was great. I bumped into many people. Made introductions between people I knew. It was a blast.

The thing was that there was two people I wanted to meet and the room was huge. I worked it, went through the full circle of the room, stayed still and so on. Even though people had name tags and the like, I still didn't connect up with those two people. There was just too many people and many were doing exactly the same thing I was doing. Oh well I tried.

When it was over, we kicked back at the bar. Chatted with more people and eventually trundled off to bed. Classes started late but we did want to be 30 or so minutes early.

Social Butterfly Me

One of the things I don't comment on but spent a considerable amount of time was socializing with people. When I am not in one of my introvert moods, I enjoy meeting people, saying hello, asking how things are going and so on.

I learn things about the world this way. I learn about the people. I make new friends and reconnect with old friends. I was constantly doing this at Shibaricon.

In a sense, flirting and socializing is one of my kinks. I love the smiles I see and the warm greetings. The hugs are good too.

First Day of Classes

I talked with Raven about the first day of classes. We had decided to attend Zamil's classes but I was over-thinking things. My learning style and thought processes don't lend themselves to learning well in class settings. I have always been envious of those that do but it isn't in the cards for me. Some trainers I have met call my style of learning kinetic. I have to be doing something like bouncy a leg up an down to internalize things or be day dreaming in some way.

Well my lovely girlfriend, Raven, turned to me and said "focus on learning one thing". I loved that advice and it settled me.

Even though the class was suppose to start at 11:30AM, we showed up as we had learned last year early. We were there 30 minutes early and in 5 to 10 minutes, the class was full. I would guess it was full 25 minutes before the class was suppose to start.

Zamil's two back to back classes were great. He was on an elevated platform so we could see him, his rope bottom., his tying and his ties. He did things too fast at time but repeated things and my classmates asked him to repeat certain parts. He dealt well with the challenge of having almost 3 different perspectives by moving his model around and redoing ties or having the people doing the ties come up close for a moment. I loved it and learned few things. I surpassed my goal of learning one thing.

Alas the second session, I didn't do any rope work but just watched. I was sick from some sort of delayed allergy and was struggling. Raven wasn't doing well either. I still learned some things.

I skipped the last class session. I was still feeling ill. Raven went off to Midori's "Speed Negotiation" class. She came bouncing back to the hotel room and explained what she learned. I picked up a few things but continued to hide in the hotel room for a while.

First Play Night

We caught the end of the opening ceremonies after eating and went off and played.

This time around I was pretty aware of how to wait for a suspension rig after last Shibaricon, playing in numerous play spaces and the like. What I wasn't prepared for was the number of new to scene people who didn't understand how things worked.

Twice I was standing and waiting for equipment to use, looking around and seeing no one waiting. When the scene ended, someone would come over and say they were waiting. One was doing in a scene in the corner and another one was way off. Next year, I will push back on this silliness since the new people disappeared early.

In total, I think I was bumped off on the first night 5 times. It didn't happen the next set of nights.

Eventually we played and we had some fun. I wanted to play with the energy high but it died down quickly. I called it a night thinking about classes in the morning.
Of course, I was pretty excited when I went to bed and didn't sleep well. It happens.

Second Day of Classes

I skipped several sessions on Saturday. I attended Hedwig's "Sensing Rope" which was cool research type class. There was some academic aspects I wasn't comfortable with but the format was good. The good part is about the personal connection she experienced with rope. It aligned with mine but I think it is a small part of the rope world or at least my little part of the world.

I adored Midori's "Pink Japan Continued" class. She is an amazing presenter, very entertaining and insightful. The slide show about Japan S&M world, societal status and other informational tidbits was wonderful. It made me smile many times. My thanks to her for doing this class.

We went off to diner at some point and came back to Graydancer's Cabaret. A friend tweeted they had a killer headache and needed Alieve. I thought I had some in my bag but didn't. We found some and got it to her and then watched the show. It was great and funny. There is so much fun talent.

I think the best for me was the part done by Leon Monkeyfetish and Cherries Jubalee. They did this hot scene and he cut the rope! I know how expensive and personal hemp rope is. I knew mentally he was probably using some rope on the way out but still it made me crazy in a good way to see him intentionally cut the rope.

Saturday Play Night

Raven wasn't feeling good so I tucked her into the hotel room. We had been pretty smart about getting extra supplies including bath salts, wine, snacks and so on and had ordered room service one night giving us wine glasses.

I went off and found the woman we had agreed to a playdate with. She is wonderful, sexy and helpful rope bottom. We did some play but the hip harness wasn't working so I redid it and we played some more. The new version didn't fair much better but we were having fun.

At some point I realized that a playspace (DM) monitor was sitting in a chair next to my suspension. My first thought was that I was going to get interrupted like I have had happened in many play spaces. My second thought was he was just hanging out in a spot out of the way watching things. When the scene was done, he commented with a smile on his face "You two have played before?", I cracked a smile saying "Uh huh". All was good.

I went around looking for others to play with be my luck in running into them was horrible. After a while, I called it quits.

Sunday Bad Class Start

I went to two classes on Sunday.

The first one was unpleasant to say the least. The presenter started off saying the subject was wide ranging. Yep, I can understand that. He attempted to engage the class but his style was muddled. It happens. He may be having an off day or the class dynamics may not be good.

At some point, I tried to provide an answer. In a sense, he pounced on me for more details and I struggled with how to answer but then cut me off. I kept quiet after that. Later on another who didn't consider english their primary language but was pretty good started trying to communicate. He effectively rushed the person and shut them down.

The class was a bust. I am grateful for Shibaricon organizers asking for class reviews. I filled out my form and will probably steer away from this presenter in the future.

Sunday Remainder

The next class I attended was wonderful. I wish I had that class the previous year. I still learned things from it. Raven reminds me of that class when we play now. It makes me smile.

I would have gone to another class but I was tired and needed to recharge.

We ended up going out to diner to a steak house and had a wonderful time. The food was expensive but the company was fantastic. We got back late, I changed and went down to the play space.

I hung out for a while. I wasn't in the mood to do my normal look for someone to tie up routine and I didn't find anyone I knew to tie up. I watched some rope work and called it quit for night.

Last Day

We skipped the classes that day. Went to the closing ceremonies which were wonderful, fun and broke closure to the intense and draining weekend. After that we hung out in the hotel bar, connected up with people and slowly said goodbyes. I never like the good bye part.

It was good to see old friends and to make new ones. I didn't want to see them go but it happens. We hung around for a while and then went up to hide in the hotel room to be ready to leave early in the morning.