For every exciting and feel-good thing that happens in your life, there are the icky and disappointing bits. It seems that my kiva.org loan I mentioned in a previous post to Jenan in Lebanon may have some problems. As of today, her repayment status says delinquent. I didn’t notice this when I last checked on Monday. I’m hoping that Jenan turns this around because I was very much hoping to reinvest that loan money to another woman in the Middle East. These women, as a group, are in a special place in my heart.

There were also some not-so-pleasant moments during this vacation… I’ll keep this brief.

Part Three

LineCon

The first was the line at BlizzCon… to get in. Some people had reported that the line was long to pick up the registration badges, but we proud guildies of the Spirits of the Elements did not experience that. As stated in my previous post, we got our badges and goodies without fuss… in under thirty minutes I think (and that included the walk).

The next morning was a different issue. We saw lots of interesting costumes in line, some of which I posted in yesterday’s blog entry. It was important to have things to look at during this time of intense waiting. This next picture below gives a decent representation of the line; you can see how people are moving in one direction and another as the line folds and wraps around.

Human (warrior?)… and I have no idea what the girl with the huge tracks of land behind him is supposed to be… photo by FlyingFitz

I could have sworn at one point that I saw a hint of ni@@le on that woman. It turned out to be a shadow, but seriously… why wear an outfit where this could become a point of debate? Seriously. I mean seriously… they are practically trying to pop out on their own.

I just don’t get it. I really don’t.

Anyway… I digress. If I remember right, we got in line around 9:00~ish AM. The doors to the convention center opened at 10:00 AM (I think). The opening ceremonies were at either 12:00 or 12:30 PM. We figured that we had plenty of time.

We didn’t.

The line went from the convention center and wrapped a couple of times around this park (seen behind the girl with the explosive breasts) then down the street a few blocks at which point it went back and forth about fifteen times in a parking lot then wound its way back to the convention following somewhat of the same path that it took before.

It took us quite a while. We missed the opening ceremonies.

The day before, I had slathered myself in sunscreen. I knew that we would be outdoors and standing around in lines while we were in Disneyland… who wants to burn. Unfortunately, I made no such precautions the first day of BlizzCon… I honestly figured that we would be inside all day. My mistake. I take no comfort my my dark hair; I have the red-headed ginger gene within me and therefore I burn easily.

HusbandMike was quite put out and upset. He felt that if the doors opened at 10:30 and the opening ceremonies were at 12:00 then the convention staff should have been prepared to process the twenty to thirty thousand gamers during that time. A valid point, but perhaps not quite realistic since BlizzCon is staff by the inexperienced (with conventions that is) staff of Blizzard. Sigh… C’est la vie.

Food

Second, I’m so glad that we brought plenty of snacks and drinks with us. Kudos to HusbandMike for the foresight to buy carmel popcorn at Downtown Disney and Cheese-its at Target. The vending machines only took exact change, it was like $3 or $4 for a soda, and they were pretty much sold out each time you went to them. The lines at the concession stands wrapped around corners.

The food that I did see people eating didn’t look too appetizing either. I am not a fan of gross convention food. Fortunately, we walked back to the hotel for our lunch. I had a delicious club sandwich accompanied by crispy fries. Yum.

Seating

Finally… finding seats, especially in Hall D (the main hall), was rather difficult. Everywhere you looked people were saving seats. Later in the evening, the chairs we found didn’t get us very close to the stage for viewing the costume competition, and we pretty much watched the event on the big screens projected throughout the area.

I didn’t mind too much. I actually think that I got a better close up view on the big screens, and I still occasionally looked at the stage. Plus, I was happy to be sitting down.

अब पछ्ताए होत क्‍या जब चिड़िया चुग गई खेत ।
Why repent now, when the bird has already eaten the crop?
There is no use repenting after time of action passes.
~ Hindi Proverb
English equivalent: no use crying over spilled milk