One who walks the road with love will never walk the road alone.

DAY SIX - Baltimore -> Durham

---

After the last night in Pennsylvania, I'd not heard from Emily. Seeing that everything she was going through to get to Durham had so many points of failure, I was a little worried. I decided not to worry too much about it - I have faith in her, and I knew she'd make it. Still, I was pretty antsy.

After realizing I had two more hours to myself than I thought I did (My flight left at 4PM, not 2PM like I thought), we all went to this place called the Backfin for "brunch." I've been to Baltimore many times, but have never sat down to have Baltimore Crab. I made up for that at brunch by having an honest to goodness Backfin Crab Cake sandwich. Oh, man, I've been missing out. :)

I got to meet Nathan's mom, but didn't dally for long (she was busy, I had to pack). When we got back, though, we had a panic - I had accidentally taken Tom's keys to his car (thye looked exactly like the keys to our rental). After leaving, I made a hard fast run to Toms to drop off his keys. He lives at the beginning of I-70, and I-70 had a sign showing all the mileage to major cities on the way, all the way to it's terminus 2,200 miles away. I got a quick shot of the sign, and never saw my camera again.

I quickly dropped my keys off with Tom and, realizing the time, gunned it to the airport. It's prolly in this kerfluffle that I lost my camera. I cleaned out the car as best I could, checked my bag for my camera (I thought I saw it, but on retrospect, I think it was the battery charger), quickly popped into the airport, met the world's slowest and most aggrivating baggage checker, and finally made it to the gate with five minutes to spare.

Only to sit in line cause the pilots for the plane hadn't arrived. D'ohh!

We left over an hour late, but the flight was uber quick, and we arrived about 6:30. I got off the plane, and them proceeded to completely and totally get lost looking for the baggage claim. After walking halfway across the terminal, and back, I did manage to make my way to the baggage claim. And for the first time since that fateful nightmare, I held Emily in my arms. And I held her for what seemed like forever and a day. And I never wanted to let go. But, since security tends to frown on such things, we got our bags, a taxi and held hands the entire trip to the hotel.

We arrived at the hotel, and saw Liz Troub sitting on a bench outside, waiting for Jessica. We said our hellos and I let her know where our room was, and wentup to unpack. Well, mostly unpack - Emily and I spent a lot of time just sharing our time together. We only had this weekend, and I wanted to make it count. We exchanged the gifts we had for each other (I gave her a Penn State nightie, and the original to the anime piece I made for her. She gave me CANADIAN CANDIES! :9

Liz came up shortly later, and we gabbed and chatted till we got a call from Sherri Belmar who was downstairs, inviting us to have a little nosh. Both Emily and I went, and were soon joined by Liz and Jessica Silverstone. Sherri gave us all Venus Ascending pins (free for the taking, by us and the convention goers), and we all talked and gabbed all night long, and were welcomed by some con officials durng the meal. I wasn't too keen on this, considerng I wasn't planning on attending, but it wasn't a long intro.

The night wore on, we were tired and turned in. And I slept next to someone for the first time in a long time, and dreamed sweet dreams.

One who walks the road with love will never walk the road alone.

DAY SIX - Baltimore -> Durham

---

After the last night in Pennsylvania, I'd not heard from Emily. Seeing that everything she was going through to get to Durham had so many points of failure, I was a little worried. I decided not to worry too much about it - I have faith in her, and I knew she'd make it. Still, I was pretty antsy.

After realizing I had two more hours to myself than I thought I did (My flight left at 4PM, not 2PM like I thought), we all went to this place called the Backfin for "brunch." I've been to Baltimore many times, but have never sat down to have Baltimore Crab. I made up for that at brunch by having an honest to goodness Backfin Crab Cake sandwich. Oh, man, I've been missing out. :)

I got to meet Nathan's mom, but didn't dally for long (she was busy, I had to pack). When we got back, though, we had a panic - I had accidentally taken Tom's keys to his car (thye looked exactly like the keys to our rental). After leaving, I made a hard fast run to Toms to drop off his keys. He lives at the beginning of I-70, and I-70 had a sign showing all the mileage to major cities on the way, all the way to it's terminus 2,200 miles away. I got a quick shot of the sign, and never saw my camera again.

I quickly dropped my keys off with Tom and, realizing the time, gunned it to the airport. It's prolly in this kerfluffle that I lost my camera. I cleaned out the car as best I could, checked my bag for my camera (I thought I saw it, but on retrospect, I think it was the battery charger), quickly popped into the airport, met the world's slowest and most aggrivating baggage checker, and finally made it to the gate with five minutes to spare.

Only to sit in line cause the pilots for the plane hadn't arrived. D'ohh!

We left over an hour late, but the flight was uber quick, and we arrived about 6:30. I got off the plane, and them proceeded to completely and totally get lost looking for the baggage claim. After walking halfway across the terminal, and back, I did manage to make my way to the baggage claim. And for the first time since that fateful nightmare, I held Emily in my arms. And I held her for what seemed like forever and a day. And I never wanted to let go. But, since security tends to frown on such things, we got our bags, a taxi and held hands the entire trip to the hotel.

We arrived at the hotel, and saw Liz Troub sitting on a bench outside, waiting for Jessica. We said our hellos and I let her know where our room was, and wentup to unpack. Well, mostly unpack - Emily and I spent a lot of time just sharing our time together. We only had this weekend, and I wanted to make it count. We exchanged the gifts we had for each other (I gave her a Penn State nightie, and the original to the anime piece I made for her. She gave me CANADIAN CANDIES! :9

Liz came up shortly later, and we gabbed and chatted till we got a call from Sherri Belmar who was downstairs, inviting us to have a little nosh. Both Emily and I went, and were soon joined by Liz and Jessica Silverstone. Sherri gave us all Venus Ascending pins (free for the taking, by us and the convention goers), and we all talked and gabbed all night long, and were welcomed by some con officials durng the meal. I wasn't too keen on this, considerng I wasn't planning on attending, but it wasn't a long intro.

The night wore on, we were tired and turned in. And I slept next to someone for the first time in a long time, and dreamed sweet dreams.

You will find as you look back upon your life that the moments when you have truly lived are the mom

DAY SEVEN - Durham

---

I woke up rather gently and spent some time just enjoying Emily's company. I had no plans for the weekend, except maybe to see a movie sometime in the weekend, and go to the webcomics dinner that evening. We both got dressed and decided to eat something light because we had the dinner coming up that evening. Emily had already walked around the area (she woke up before me) and found a McDonalds. Not exactly something LOCAL, but it would work for the time being.

We worked our way down to the lobby of the hotel, where the con was starting up. I suddenly had the strange idea to try and crash the party a bit. They knew Jenn Dolari had quit, but not Jenn Reallastname. And maybe even Emily had her badge still waiting for her as well. No sooner were we in line for a day pass than we were completely surrounded by the main Convention Runners. At first I thought "Oh, shit, they're on to me" but it turned out that they wanted to let me know that I was welcomed at the con, and gave Emily and me guest badges. We were guests again.

Huh, wha?! :D

Anyways, we moved onto McDonalds for some quick food and really bad service. The woman kept forgetting our lunch, forgetting our order, and forgetting how much she charged me. I did manage to introduce Emily to southern Sweet Tea. I sometimes forget that Canadian culture isn't American, it's English. So Iced Tea is rare to begin with, but SWEET Iced Tea is very rare (it's rare even in parts of the US that arent' the deep south, I know of only two places locally in Austin that serve sweet tea).

After a few quick talks with the Con President and an Con Runners, bygones were made bygones, and I "absorbed" half of Sherri's fullsized table. I even considered running a few quick prints to sell, but after realizing that the con was not going to be as attended as last year, I just decided to chill with the trans webcomic artists. Before the Big dinner, we stepped back to our room, along side Mike Moon, a good friend from last year's con. He gave me some Japanese Star Trek books as an early birthday present - Most cool! Thank you, Mike!

The webcomics dinner was Kurama's, the same place the entire staff ran off to last year when we were searching for Chinese food. We are very well, and I gained a taste for Crab Egg Sushi. A good time was had by all, and I did a quck toast to the webcomics folks and Sherri. On heading back, we did the Meet the Guests function, and that was the first sign that something at this con was seriously wrong. Last year, the Meet the Guests function was HUGE. And was more than just guests and staff, but a LOT of attendies. This time, no attendies. In fact, the con was very sparse, but last year, Friday was sparse, too.

After that, we had the LGBT panel...supposedly (it was also the first time I saw and met up with Jade Gordon). Many of the guest badges had the event listed on it, for Friday Night, but there was no mention of it in the program book, or the large room scehdules. Ten minutes before the panel, #9 asked one of the con runners what was going on, and they quickly wrote on the schedule about the LGBT panel...but the damage was already done. Two people who were not guests showed up, the same tireless two people who showed up at nearly every webcomic con (Hi, y'all! Hope you had a fun time). Sherri chimed in as an excellent moderator...but in the end it was mostly the webcomic artists chatting with themselves.

In fact, that was one of the major issues with the con this year. The lack of attendance and lack of a good schedule. Even the website STILL says "TBA" for most of our events. I hate to say it, but Erin and Kittyhawk (and to a lesser extent, I) are major draws...the fact they left, they took most of the reason for people to go. And for those who went, no one knew what was going on for the most part. Not a schedule to be found anywhere, and even the gust badges with their schedules on them had conflicting information.

However, after all that, we went back to our rooms, and snuggled up for a good night's sleep....

You will find as you look back upon your life that the moments when you have truly lived are the mom

DAY SEVEN - Durham

---

I woke up rather gently and spent some time just enjoying Emily's company. I had no plans for the weekend, except maybe to see a movie sometime in the weekend, and go to the webcomics dinner that evening. We both got dressed and decided to eat something light because we had the dinner coming up that evening. Emily had already walked around the area (she woke up before me) and found a McDonalds. Not exactly something LOCAL, but it would work for the time being.

We worked our way down to the lobby of the hotel, where the con was starting up. I suddenly had the strange idea to try and crash the party a bit. They knew Jenn Dolari had quit, but not Jenn Reallastname. And maybe even Emily had her badge still waiting for her as well. No sooner were we in line for a day pass than we were completely surrounded by the main Convention Runners. At first I thought "Oh, shit, they're on to me" but it turned out that they wanted to let me know that I was welcomed at the con, and gave Emily and me guest badges. We were guests again.

Huh, wha?! :D

Anyways, we moved onto McDonalds for some quick food and really bad service. The woman kept forgetting our lunch, forgetting our order, and forgetting how much she charged me. I did manage to introduce Emily to southern Sweet Tea. I sometimes forget that Canadian culture isn't American, it's English. So Iced Tea is rare to begin with, but SWEET Iced Tea is very rare (it's rare even in parts of the US that arent' the deep south, I know of only two places locally in Austin that serve sweet tea).

After a few quick talks with the Con President and an Con Runners, bygones were made bygones, and I "absorbed" half of Sherri's fullsized table. I even considered running a few quick prints to sell, but after realizing that the con was not going to be as attended as last year, I just decided to chill with the trans webcomic artists. Before the Big dinner, we stepped back to our room, along side Mike Moon, a good friend from last year's con. He gave me some Japanese Star Trek books as an early birthday present - Most cool! Thank you, Mike!

The webcomics dinner was Kurama's, the same place the entire staff ran off to last year when we were searching for Chinese food. We are very well, and I gained a taste for Crab Egg Sushi. A good time was had by all, and I did a quck toast to the webcomics folks and Sherri. On heading back, we did the Meet the Guests function, and that was the first sign that something at this con was seriously wrong. Last year, the Meet the Guests function was HUGE. And was more than just guests and staff, but a LOT of attendies. This time, no attendies. In fact, the con was very sparse, but last year, Friday was sparse, too.

After that, we had the LGBT panel...supposedly (it was also the first time I saw and met up with Jade Gordon). Many of the guest badges had the event listed on it, for Friday Night, but there was no mention of it in the program book, or the large room scehdules. Ten minutes before the panel, #9 asked one of the con runners what was going on, and they quickly wrote on the schedule about the LGBT panel...but the damage was already done. Two people who were not guests showed up, the same tireless two people who showed up at nearly every webcomic con (Hi, y'all! Hope you had a fun time). Sherri chimed in as an excellent moderator...but in the end it was mostly the webcomic artists chatting with themselves.

In fact, that was one of the major issues with the con this year. The lack of attendance and lack of a good schedule. Even the website STILL says "TBA" for most of our events. I hate to say it, but Erin and Kittyhawk (and to a lesser extent, I) are major draws...the fact they left, they took most of the reason for people to go. And for those who went, no one knew what was going on for the most part. Not a schedule to be found anywhere, and even the gust badges with their schedules on them had conflicting information.

However, after all that, we went back to our rooms, and snuggled up for a good night's sleep....