Wiscon 37 - Travel Edition

I started my day of travel with a 15 minute walk across the street to the hotel, with all my luggage. (76$ to pick me up at my house, 33$ to pick me up at the hotel. :P )Though I packed light! Fortunately the shuttle was early and I was early, so we left 10 minutes before we were scheduled to. I was very sweaty by that point, because muggy and damp and uphill and luggage.

We hadn't gone more than 10 minutes when we hit bumper-to-bumper traffic. Like, dude! I was expecting that once we got within spitting distance of Boston, not 10 minutes from my house! I hadn't been worried about making my flight until then. When we were still not moving much after 20 minutes, well.. it ended up not quite as peaceful a shuttle ride as it could've been.

At some point the traffic magically cleared. Seriously. There was no reason for it. Just.. poof, we're moving again. Of course we did hit more later on and etc and yay carpool lane. It was a bit after 9 when we got there. I'd been hoping for sooner, but it was okay.

Got my boarding pass lickedy-split, then went to security. Got my bag checked because there was no one to remind me I had stuck a partial bottle of soda in there, whoops. But they didn't blink twice at my ID that's lacking in an expiration date.

Southwest, yadda yadda, I was C16 if that means anything to people. Basically means I was one of the last people to board, so lucky me got a middle seat. But it was over the wing, which I prefer. Got Cheese Nips, honey-roasted peanuts, and a cup of icy Sprite. (I prefer the airlines that give you a whole can.) Normally I don't like Cheese Nips, especially more than.. two. But they were like the best Cheese Nips ever. Altitude will do that to you. Or being awake far too early in the morning.

Midway. Once you leave their restaurant hub and the security checkpoint, there ain't much. So it was a boring wait for the bus. It was a double-decker! I didn't brave the top deck though. They had 2 fours of seats (I've been reading The Killing Moon) with tables and cupholders, so I picked one of those.

You can't really write on said table. You can really type on said table. You can eat on it if you don't mind things sliding. The table shakes more than if I had the computer in my lap shaking with me. It would've had my motion sick before long. And it was just plain annoying. I couldn't stand it. So mostly I read, watched the scenery, spaced out.

An hour and a half after we left Midway, we passed O'Hare. o.O It felt like little to no progress. (We had stopped at Union Station.) So, very long bus ride.

Note for next year!! Leave from Manchester to mitigate the traffic issue. Arrive at Madison if it all reasonable, or Milwaukee if not. Or O'Hare third choice, though Southwest doesn't fly there. Also, move WisCon to Chicago to save us all some trouble. :)

Shuttle from hotel arrived pretty quick. I was afraid they'd all be busy going to the airport and back.

I am checked in. I even have my con badge. The governor's club lounge appetizer that's vegetarian is a chili cheese.. trumpet? And I'm not into spicy. I'm going to have to go scrounge up some real food before I end up in there again for dessert. :)

Did not make it in time for John Scalzi. Might have made it for the GoH readings if I'd hurried, but I didn't want to hurry. Okay. You're all caught up now!