Scrabbled wildly to finish a few more things today and all for naught. Did get most of them done, but not finished (yes, there is a difference). Clocked a long ten hours today, interrupted only by trips to the bathroom for either me or the dog. Looking forward to four days of minimal mousing; my right hand is quite sore from it. I've been wearing my sewing support wrist brace all day for a couple of days, but the base of my wrist (the part where the nurse takes your pulse) hurts even when resting on a soft surface in the proper position. I finally wrapped a cloth around my wrist for more padding, which got me through the rest of the afternoon.

Once James got home, we ate supper and then made our sandwiches for the weekend. By sometime after seven, the estimated time to downtown was only thirty minutes, so we got dressed, wet down our chiller neck towels, stuck some crackers in our pocket, tucked e-readers under our arm, and, with tickets in hand, set out to register for DragonCon. We ran into the usual traffic downtown, which cleared once all the oddballl football fans got off at the exit for the Georgia Dome. :-) Found parking relatively easy at the Courtland Street Garage.

Then the easy stopped.

We got spoiled. After the marathon registration session in 2010, the one that took us almost four hours to get through (thank God for the copy of Bill Bryson's At Home!), DragonCon initiated a barcode system that worked fabulously. In 2011 and 2012 we got down there at 7:30 and were hustled through the line like recruits at boot camp; tiring but fabulous! In 2011 we were done in time to go see the Celtic band Emerald Rose play a long set.

Sigh. tonight, there was a long, long line, which I left James to get in while I nipped in the ladies' room and copped us two cups of water. Anyway, it wasn't almost four hours, but the hour and a half was bad enough; especially when there was an incredible stink every time we passed one of the drains in the sidewalk surrounding the Sheraton. I found James on the backside of the hotel on Ellis Street; the forward pace wasn't brisk, but at least it wasn't endless. Once inside, it was time for the mouse maze again—Disney World queue flashbacks! There were so many people in the ballroom that they had to have big fans in every corner.

The chill towels worked out okay; worth $10 anyway. And the cup of water I nursed held out with sips. So we came home a bit sore and warm, but it worked out. I miss the "Readers Digest condensed version," though. (It took about fifteen minutes extra just to get home because as we were checking out of the garage, the driver of the car four cars ahead of us, at the payment counter, turned out not to have any money. [eyes roll])

And Willow managed to be good for the entire time we were out. Good dog!

Labels: conventions, dogs, pets, work

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:19:00 PM

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