One Of Us

Over the weekend I was in London attending Uncon with Dave and Adam.

Uncon is a convention that’s put on by Fortean Times. It’s a two day event featuring all kinds of lectures on a vast array of subjects, none of which could be called mainstream.

I got to meet Jon Ronson and he signed my copy of The Psychopath Test which was so cool. He would be signing books after his lecture but I saw him out side the venue and pounced on him. Okay not literally but I did make sure he didn’t get away. He even commented on my politically incorrect pen saying how nice it was. I’m not sure which was better, getting his autograph or him liking my pen.

Anyway, during one of the lectures I wasn’t interested in I wandered out to where the vendors section was. I picked up my free Uncon T-Shirt (which I may actually fit into one of these days!). I noticed Hunt Emerson (he draws the cartoon in Fortean Times) was there and he was selling caricatures for £5. I couldn’t resist! He was lovely to chat to and just an all around nice guy. I love the drawing he’s done of me, it will be framed as soon as I can find a frame for it.

The one thing that struck me about the whole weekend was that I didn’t feel out of place or weird the whole weekend it. It was easy to just be me, to be able to discuss things that interested me with complete strangers. I enjoyed the debate that some lectures created, and there were jokes that only this specific group of people would get. I’m still surprised how mainstream we all look, apart from the few odd-balls, you’d never guess any of us would attend something like this.

Maybe it’s me who thinks that, maybe I feel like an odd-ball because I read it. I do think that it shows how many people enjoy stuff like Uncon and that it’s not as weird as others think it is.

Regardless, I had a great weekend, met some new people and got to spend time with two of my favorite people.

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