{"id":111,"date":"2013-08-22T15:56:07","date_gmt":"2013-08-22T03:56:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hoarde.net\/craigblog\/?p=111"},"modified":"2026-08-15T20:45:15","modified_gmt":"2026-08-15T19:45:15","slug":"day-ten-homeward-bound","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hoarde.net\/craigblog\/?p=111","title":{"rendered":"Day Ten – Homeward Bound"},"content":{"rendered":"

It is just short of 6am, and I have used the language of awful cowboy movies to name myself Craig Sleeps-Like-Crap<\/em>.
\nThat<\/em> was a bad night.
\nOn the positive side, maybe it’ll make sleeping on the SFO-AKL leg easier?<\/p>\n

I’ve had a fantastic time this Gen Con.
\nOnce again, the people I’ve met have been friendly, and I don’t think I can point to any interaction and say that that<\/strong> person was being deliberately rude, or offensive, or bringing the whole scene down, man.<\/p>\n

The closest I can think of is someone who was very loud, kind of excited, and didn’t really listen to anything happening around him because he was stuck on broadcast mode the whole time. Even he was just a little irritating, and the calm & wry chuckling when he left gave a real sense of camaraderie.
\nOr something.<\/p>\n

Turns out that there were some unexplained consequences to the message Blinkinlight from a few days ago.
\nThe total of room charges, tax, & misc. stuff had gone over what had been approved\/reserved on my NZ credit card. I asked them whether they’d like me to wander down with said credit card to re-authorise at a higher amount, but they said it wasn’t necessary.
\nThe reason it wasn’t necessary is because their system automatically charged the card, which is not<\/strong> what I wanted, because I’d get hammered with currency exchange fees.
\nThey reversed the charge, and I paid with the US debit card; Next time I’ll ask them to reserve a larger amount.<\/p>\n

Checked out just in time to catch the shuttle bus to the airport, wildly early of course, and checking in was a lot simpler than last time.
\nThen again, last time I had an extra bag, tried to use the kiosk for the wrong airline, and then got a non-functional kiosk at the right<\/em> airline, so the bar wasn’t exactly high.<\/p>\n

I saw a sign at the check-in counter at IND which was simultaneously promising & annoying; Direct flights between Indianapolis and Los Angeles will be starting on (or near) August the 27th.<\/em><\/p>\n

Security was likewise pretty easy, with very few people going through the system, so it all flowed fairly smoothly. Even the guy who opted out of the scanner got dealt with in about the same timeframe as I did.<\/p>\n

I took the precaution, just before sealing my suitcase, of photographing the two items in the package from The Family Lewis which seemed the most likely to cause concern at NZ Biosecurity, in the hope that it’ll speed up the process.<\/em>
\n\"20130821-105732.jpg\"<\/a>\"20130821-105748.jpg\"<\/a>
\nFrankly, I think there’s nothing of concern, given the cooked nature of both items; Whatever Biosecurity risk those seeds possessed, it went away somewhere in the roasting & salting process<\/em><\/p>\n

Indianapolis International, in addition to looking like a mall with check-in desks, has free wi-fi; You have to watch a short advertisement, and you get 45 minutes or so of The Internets.
\nChicago lacks this; Their version wants you to download & install an app, and, well, … that ain’t happening. NoSir.<\/p>\n

The Indy-Chicago flight went well, I think. Not many passengers, so the guy on the aisle moved to a couple of empties, and I had two seats to myself for the less-than-an-hour flight.
\nI fell asleep during landing.
\nNot sure how I manage to keep doing that.<\/p>\n

I’ve had lunch in the form of an ordinary ‘Chicago Style’ pizza. Not bad<\/strong>, as such, but I’ve had better.
\nOnce.
\nIn Chicago.<\/p>\n

There is a little over an hour until boarding might start for the Chicago to San Francisco leg, and the airport is kind of cluttered with people. It’s not packed<\/em>, there are plenty of empty seats at the gates, there are just people all over the place.
\nKind of like the dealer hall crowds at Gen Con, but without some of the basic good-will & attempts to make things easier on other people.
\nRolling backpack behaviour is about the same though; I saw someone go sprawling in Indianapolis airport, and it was only a fast-acting member of the ground crew catching her that stopped a nasty impact with the floor.<\/p>\n

I finished Redshirts<\/em> yesterday, so I bought myself a copy of The Hunger Games<\/em>, and I’m now most of the way through it. Then again, I’m also most of the way to San Francisco, so I guess that worked out OK.<\/p>\n

San Francisco got … Interesting.
\nWhat I’d thought was Terminal 1 on my schedule was actually Terminal I, as in ‘international’. The person at T1 sent me to TI, but to the United counter; Air NZ was in the next row.
\nSecurity was mercifully short & calm though, which beats the hell out of my previous SFO experience.<\/p>\n

Turns out that SFO wifi works, eventually, if you hit it enough. Also, while it threatens to make you watch advertising, it doesn’t actually DO it.<\/p>\n

I have dubbed my seat neighbour “Captain Fidget”, because for the love of God will you stop adjusting the nest of blankets, pillows, bags and other crap you’ve wrapped yourself in!?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Watched The Croods<\/em> again, and also GI Joe: The One With Bruce Willis<\/em>.
\nI don’t think I got a decent chunk of sleep, but I did get a number of naps in.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It is just short of 6am, and I have used the language of awful cowboy movies to name myself Craig Sleeps-Like-Crap. That was a bad night. On the positive side, maybe it’ll make sleeping on the SFO-AKL leg easier? I’ve had a fantastic time this Gen Con. Once again, the people I’ve met have been […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-111","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gencon2013"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3O6N9-1N","jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hoarde.net\/craigblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hoarde.net\/craigblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hoarde.net\/craigblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hoarde.net\/craigblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hoarde.net\/craigblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=111"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/hoarde.net\/craigblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":123,"href":"https:\/\/hoarde.net\/craigblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111\/revisions\/123"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hoarde.net\/craigblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=111"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hoarde.net\/craigblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=111"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hoarde.net\/craigblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=111"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}