Saturday at Gally always feels most hectic, though not in a frenetic way. The stress, at least for me, tends to come from the fact that there’s always awesomeness available than it’s ever possible for a single person to partake in (though I’ll admit I’ve seen a few folks with time turners…). On the up side, programming never begins first thing in the morning. For some attendees, that means they have time recover a little from the previous night’s hangover; for me, it means time to blog.

So after getting my Day One recap finished and posted, I had plenty of time to laze about our hotel room and get dressed in my cosplay for the day before my first event. That happened to be the second of my two panels. Just as my first one, “Ninth Symphony” (a review of Series Nine) proved to be a fascinating discussion with lots of input from both the panelists and audience members.

From there, I headed straight to the Verity! meetup where they were giving away Verity! tumblers, candy, and ribbons (each Verity had her own color). Someone even brought a cake to share (including the inscription “Because cake should be a business expense”). Everyone, fans and podcasters alike, was lovely, and I was sad to duck out early.

However, because I am still at the stage in my fandom where I like to collect autographs and have the occasional photo, my scheduled demanded that I spend some time in the following hours standing in lines to acquire these goodies. Because it is the way of these things, the photos were running a little late. I ended up missing a panel I’d wanted to see, but the need to roll with scheduling changes is part of con life.

I did make it to the “Life and Death in the Moffat Era” panel. One of the things I love about Gally is the consistently high quality of the panel discussions, and this was no exceptions. Having had similar discussions with friends before, many of the points were familiar, but from time to time someone would bring up an idea or perspective I’d not encountered before. Even when people in the room disagreed, though—and this is something I see consistently at Gally (at least in panels)—everyone remained respectful and friendly.

I really wanted to go to the Peter Davison/Colin Baker panel at 3pm, but because I was doing a steampunk Osgood cosplay, I had already committed to getting a photo with Ingrid Oliver (who plays Osgood). My photo op was smack in middle of “The Two Doctors” panel, so I didn’t even try to go to the first few minutes.

That turned out to be an issue for the rest of my planned schedule, because the following panel with Ingrid and Michelle Gomez proved more popular than I had anticipated (and I knew lots of folks would want in). I’m not sure if it got handled differently than big panels in previous years, or if the way it was run was a result of the fire alarm getting pulled by a three-year-old in middle of Peter and Colin’s panel (which I understand led to a fair amount of grumpiness when people filed back into Program A and didn’t get the same seats they’d had when they left), but I had to get in line to try to get into Program A for Ingrid and Michelle’s panel.

Unfortunately, I hadn’t arrived soon enough. The line stopped moving as I got near the front, and I heard the guests being introduced and brought on stage. I asked the con ops volunteer next to me whether or not they were letting anyone else in and was told, “Not yet.” Since they were effectively waiting for people to leave Program A before letting more in, I decided to bail; no one was going to be leaving that panel, and there was no reason for me to stand in a hallway for nothing for an hour.

Eventually I remembered there was another panel during that time slot I’d considered seeing. I only got in for the last fifteen minutes or so, but “Being a Scientist Sci-Fi Fan” was another great panel discussion. I wish I’d managed to see more of it; it was right up my alley.

After another bit of down time in my room, I went to “How to Start a Doctor Who Fan Club (And Survive the Politics).” Some of my friends were interested in the subject matter, so I went to be with them and support another friend who was on the panel. Since the topic wasn’t of particular interest to me personally, I didn’t find it as engaging as the other panels I’ve seen here, but there was plenty of lively discussion involving both panel and audience, so I count it as a success.

Dinner on Saturday nights is again something of a trick due to timing and the mass of other con-goers trying to eat at the same time. My friends and I managed a tasty, inexpensive pizza on the patio of a nearby restaurant, though, and made it back in plenty of time to get into the back of Program A for the Masquerade.

As usual, the costumes at the Masquerade ranged from super cute kids to brave first attempts to true master work. The forty entries were great fun to watch. All of my favorites got recognized in one way or another at the end of the night, and my personal favorite even won Best of Show: a brilliant master level entry called “Eldrad Lives!”

Most years, I’d say that the halftime game show “Just a Minute” was the highlight of the evening, but this year I got tired of the particular antics very rapidly. The “joke” of Ian McNeice interrupting everyone for spurious reasons ceased to be funny to me after about the fifth time (all within the first Minute of the game). The highlight, therefore, was Masquerade winner Valerie Anderson (I believe I have the name right, but might be mistaken).

Her Eldrad was not only a brilliant costume, but was personally meaningful. She took the mike after being crowned Best in Show and shared that “This has been my dream since 1976.” The Hand of Fear was the first Doctor Who she ever saw, Eldrad the first monster. It was beautiful to see something that was clearly so important to her be rewarded—and rightly so. It was a great way to cap off my day.

And now I’m off to start the third and final day of Gallifrey One 2016. See you on the flip side.