After a few final preparations, much housecleaning, and three loads of laundry, I departed from my apartment shortly after 1PM on Thursday. With some difficulty, Baragon, luggage, the mosasaur, me, and my sister were crammed into Mom's late-model Prius, minus a few things that were discovered missing before departure from the county.

Departure was at 3:30 PM. We carefully navigated the Cleveland Convention Cordon, only to find that I had forgotten my contact lenses. Cosplaying blindly did not appeal to me, so we lost an hour to go back and recover things. Rachel drove the first leg to Sandusky on the Ohio Turnpike, then we swapped places and headed over the state border into northern Indiana.

Northern Indiana. Home of sketchy toll plazas. My sister drove another leg of the trip. Dinner was a mostly-edible Burger King chicken salad and cup of coffee. I took over about halfway through Indiana and drove the rest of the distance to...

Chicago. City of Light! City of Traffic! If only the express lanes weren't closed at night, life would have been so much easier.

We finally blundered into the hotel room near O'Hare at 11:25 PM. As I write this, I feel the energy of the coffee departing from my veins. Tomorrow...we go to G-Fest. Who knows what convention adventures and wacky hijinks lie ahead...