It’s been a week since I returned from Anime Weekend Atlanta 16, so I figure it’s time to make the yearly post about the con.
Play-by-play begins here↓
Thursday, September 16:
I woke up a lot earlier this year than the previous years, excepting the two years I worked on Thursday, mostly because I needed to track down our air compressor to insure my tires were inflated full. Only one of them needed it, so I departed the house around 11:00 to run by Micro Center to grab yet another USB IDE enclosure (because one can never have too many) before grabbing lunch and heading to the airport. I hit the Chick-fil-A on US 78 that some of my high school classmates used to work at around noon then proceeded onwards to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport to pick up my friends who were flying in.
We arrived in Cobb around 3 and checked into the Embassy Suites Galleria Atlanta, our chosen hotel for the weekend. I set up the aircard then headed over to conspace to assist with the setup of communications. Once the majority had been done, the three of us meandered over to Cumberland Mall for dinner, then on the way back to the room, I stopped by registration and got my con bag, as I had used the Early Start service to get my badge ahead of time.
Once we had returned to our hotel room, we did the usual playing of games and chilling until the early hours of the morning. Thus ended “Day 0.”
Friday, September 17:
Running theme of this convention: my waking up earlier than required. Realized I forgot my deodorant, and one of my friends needed to pick up a new hard drive, so we meandered up to the Marietta Micro Center for him to grab that, and as we had had some connectivity issues, I picked up a cheap wireless router to throw in line. After that we were going to get lunch at Umezono Japanese Restaurant, but they were not open yet, so we hit Walgreen’s, returned to the hotel so I could apply said destinkifier, and by the time we had returned up 41 to Umezono, they were open. Their menu is the same as Sushi Yoko’s, so I had my usual gyūdon (beef bowl). After lunch, we headed into the convention. We hit the dealer’s room, and upon discovering a distinct lack of Sasuga Books, who I later found out are closed, and one or two of the vendors with import games either not having what I was hunting or having crazy high prices, we meandered back to the other part of the con. One major find was Pokémon Black and White, Japanese edition of course, on release weekend in the US. But for $70, I opted against buying either. After just milling around for a while we returned to our hotel for the nightly Manager’s Reception. Not long after that two of my other friends joined us and the usual crew was assembled. Evening was rounded out with even more gaming and proceeding to decimate my aircard’s 5GB of 3.75G by transferring a 1.4GB video from my desktop, among other things. Oops. Good thing it’s overage free!
Saturday, September 18:
Woke up early yet again. What is wrong with me. Actually sat in on a screening today, catching the tail end of Royal Space Force: The Wings of Honneamise and the movie version of Gunbuster. After this we milled around the con again and did another few walkthroughs of the dealer’s room. I picked up the box sets of Hidamari Sketch and Hidamari Sketch x365. Rounded the day out with the reception and caught dinner afterwards.
Sunday, September 19:
Up early, but with good reason this time. Sat in on MX Media’s panel then caught lunch at the mall and made one final once-over of the convention before heading back to the room to hang out until the reception. Got dinner at the hotel’s restaurant then went back to the room to play horrible horrible horrible NES games for most of the night. We did try an all-white mage game of Final Fantasy but quickly gave up.
I crashed the earliest of us but woke up ill not too long afterwards. Apparently dinner and what I had to drink didn’t agree with me at all.
Monday, September 20:
I woke up waaay early today and spent a good bit of the early morning in the bathroom. Didn’t feel well at all, so upon departing the hotel around 11, I decided to just take my friends to the airport so I could get home and get some plain food into my system. I headed back to Gwinnett and stopped in at one of the other in-town friends to drop off the extra food we had and hang out for a little while. Discussed next year’s plans then I finally returned home, fixed some plain rice, and sat in my chair and took a power nap. I was better by the next day, but I definitely will be more careful with my intake of drinks next year.
Conclusions:
1. When heat is in effect, waiting forever for an elevator or climbing lots of stairs > walking a quarter mile.
2. Drink less.
3. Get back in the Waverly if at all possible.
One funny tidbit: the escalators in the Waverly’s lobby worked all weekend. All of us were in extreme shock.
This year’s convention was underwhelming at best in terms of stuff to do at the convention proper, but as always, it was a good distraction from reality for a few days. I’m considering going ahead and preregistering for next year, but until the convention announces availability of rooms in the Waverly, I might just wait. I think I’ve got my group convinced to return to the Waverly, and I’m plotting some network tricks to try.
But hey, it’s a year away, and a lot can change between now and then, so we shall see.