edwards | Entries tagged with convergence

(Interlude - went shopping, took Hiro for his service and bought Ed's birthday present and the same thing for myself to review and tell him how it works; Acer Aspire One. Better than a basic Eee for similar money. It's a touch larger than the Eee, but the screen is another league).

So, to continue travels - which some pictures have been posted from already...

kest & I left the Hyatt on Monday at checkout time, leaving behind cool people and apparently missing Sushi with

hellsop, but mindful of the long drive to Homestead/Florida City, where we'd got a motel near the Everglades to go exploring from.

The drive down involved surprisingly little drama, though I did miss a toll and the traffic was backed up for a big section - we stopped at a Waffle House for breakfast/lunch and found wildlife in the trees (picture to be added), and I discovered whilst searching for pills that the conditioner had escaped in the bag of stuff on the back seat. Gah. Yes, it was about this time that my neck was recovering from the ice skating...

We found the Travelodge just fine, and unpacked, but noticed it was running late so plans to use the pool were scrapped in search of food... Yep... you guessed it... it was mostly closed. Drove up and down the strip a few times looking to see what there was, with the looming sign of "Denny's" overhead next to the parking lot... I insisted on driving a little further, and we found more, including an Applebees... "Let's see if that's open!" - but no, I drove past it. It was on the wrong side on the way back, but that is where we ended up, and in fact, the food was pretty good, way better than Denny's.

The night was disturbed slightly by what seemed to be a duck. I wondered if it was broken A/C, but in the morning, we found a tiny frog hiding on the anti-breakin plate on the door - the call of which was apparently quite ducklike! Noisy little bugger.

In the morning, we pointed the car at the Everglades; stopping en route so I could investigate the Nike outlet store for some socks and possibly cheap Nike+ trainers (all a success), and finally get some cash from the ATM. I managed, interestingly, to put the trainers on the wrong feet and not notice...

The Everglades drive in involved rain, and the horrifying realisation that we had no gas. Thankfully, in the middle of the park at Flamingo Landing, there's a gas station; we skipped some trails (and were harassed by a Vulture flying in front of the car) and went to fill up and grab soda and snacks (soda for me; Cherry Cola in the US tastes more "Cherry"). The trails were... somewhat infested with what I'm thinking from pictures and memory of what they were like would have been blackflies. We also covered ourselves in Deet, since the momentary opening of the window to pay the entrance fee resulted in a car full of said flies. Within moments, the car dashboard looked like a massacre had taken place as we flailed about like a couple of energetic spackers at the demonic insects.

In fairness to the wildlife, it wasn't the best weather. We saw lizards, we saw a couple of birds, but after a lot of walking about, seeing German Bimbos (who used the word "fotoapparat!" far too much when I was near. I can only assume they were impressed by my equipment) and suspecting said bimbos of scaring the wildlife - then we got to the last trails. These were the longest, and weren't in the Mangrove swamps so much, so we assumed (wrongly) that there would be less flying terror.

The sounds of the Everglades are impressive, and it would be nice to see some of the causes of those sounds. Or better yet, a Florida Panther. Which I didn't shut up about, having learned it existed.

Near the evening, and the end of the last trail, I wasn't whiny, but I did say something along the lines of "time to go, we'd better see something bloody impressive". Upon which, Kest finds five alligators moving around near the boardwalk (and I'd been trying to get her to come see one I'd seen in the distance), then near that, a green backed heron stalking food, then another Anhinga, and more alligators, and cardinals, and a good dramatic sunset... So yeah, Everglades, probably best camped in, seen early morning and late evening, and evacuated during the day to avoid the bugs.

I was kinda smug but concerned when we got back; Kest was absolutely slaughtered by the bloodsuckers and despite being dressed, had been bitten through her clothes - I'd considered at various points making some feeble attempt to remove the sea of flies from her back, but figured that they weren't actually biting, since I was also covered. I didn't seem to have shown any signs of biting at this stage...

...in the morning, I looked like I had pox. And it got worse as the day went on... it's only just cleared up now.

On the one hand, UGH. On the other hand, I lived, and I reckon I could be more liberal with the Deet, and more tolerant of the buzzing, and quite enjoy properly exploring an area like that. As long as I had something to block out the buzzing in my ears.

Sadly, the morning also meant dashing back up to Tampa so Kest didn't miss her flight - we took the scenic route through Cypress National Park (I didn't have "insane in the brain" in my head at all. Honest) and made it back in time, but not as good time as we'd have liked given the plan to have coffee before she left. We saw some wildlife on the road, too, including a probably sad turtle on the hard shoulder, apparently moving along but not a safe place.

And then, having managed to escape the airport and once again, get the diversion on I275 wrong, I made my way to

krysania1's house...

Current Mood: ShinyThing!
Current Music: Sophia (Here I Am Club Mix) - The Crüxshadows

The Continued Adventures of EdwardS, featuring Kest The Wonder Girl, The Sex God Axel, and some other cameos.

Friday, 8th August

Food, right? Food is good. I think today featured food and goths. Possibly. Anyway, it kicked off with registration, where the laminates were handed out, goths were met, and a large shark was biting people. I had been asked to photograph people with the Shark, but this seemed to be happening in a more... analogue fashion to that originally suggested. My C14 bag contained 7 cds; five in jewel cases from Dark Orchid (Kali Yuga), Erotic (Never Sleep Again), Elan (Volumetric), Crüxshadows (Sophia EP), The Dreamside feat. Rogue (hahaha) (Open Your Eyes EP) and the fake-vinyl-effect CD single from Ghost in the Machine (Compulsive), plus Invisible Ballet CD in a paper sleeve. I wonder how many people missed that one; I did until packing!

There was hanging about, and I think today was when we went to a place with Too Many TVs for food, where I ate... a Philly Cheesesteak. Again. Yep. Love those Philly Cheesesteak subs. Afterwards I remember that we'd volunteered to take people to the fashion show, so we hung about in the lobby waiting - people better prepared than I had minivans, so we were almost redundant; however, two people crammed into the Sebring and we took them the scenic route to the Cuban Club. By which I mean, past it twice before finally stopping there. At this stage, I'm also beginning to worry about my bank card, as the amount available (having enabled USA-ATM use) did not tally with the amount I'd spent. Despite Kest's booking of the room, it seemed the hotel had pre-authorised the amount on my card. Argh. After this, we collected

hellsop and

geekers from Tampa International (Hello, my favourite airport); I toyed with the idea of trying harder to get shot of the rental and indeed, ditching the bloody satnav, but decided better the devil I know and the paperwork for changing cars was so convoluted, removing the satnav may have taken an hour or more.

At some point today I think we made the liquor run. I attempted to use a one-way street to get to the store, realised my mistake as it was pointed out, and recovered in the same way that a cat recovers after falling off the radiator after too long a stretch. I don't think anyone noticed. Much. Especially not the three-across line of cars waiting at the lights to go down that road...

Then I collapsed with jetlag, and missed the Scaryoake, fashion show etc. I became functional for the most awesome room party; hanging out with

missjanette was fun and much shit was talked about the areas where our paths had almost-but-not-quite crossed in the preceding ~~almost a decade~~ um, couple of years or so. The party was attended by many cool people, all of whom were the right degree of noisy and sociable.

At some point in the night, Kaos arrived, having somehow managed to fly to Miami instead of Tampa, lose her passport, and... well, I'm glad she had a good time when she got here, because it sounds like the travel was really quite sucky.

Saturday, 9th August

Goths on Ice. Having made whatever lack of preparations were required, we piled into the Sebring and went out somewhere to go skating. I can't skate, but I tried; I failed when the dork photographer (who had also been very reluctant to have his own picture snapped whilst snapping everyone) took a picture of me with flash and blinded me somewhat - landing delightfully elegantly on my head. This put somewhat of a restriction on my movements, so if I didn't turn to look when talking, sorry. I enjoyed it regardless, and took a lot of photos. Also, things may be in the wrong order here; I think today Kest, Una & I also had Pita at the Pita Republic where I ordered too much food and met

lil_m_moses properly and DJ SailorGloom joined us.

The vendors were visited; I bought

jenova_red a very pretty "Vortex" necklace from Tawanda, having met Caroline a couple of times so it was nice to buy from someone we'd talked to outside of vending.

At some point, having already noticed one piano, another one was spotted far back near the ballroom without a lock on it. A Kawai, it was in good tune and I played it for a while; by the time Jeff had popped over and I was suggesting we tried playing a duet/together on it (Jeff's really good with keyboards, proper prog chops and accuracy) a security guard asked us to stop. Bah. Apparently, these two beautiful Grands were there for show only; even when I sought permission, it was apologetically explained that they're not even used by musicians for performances. WTF? Why not just have some cheap-ass electric Behringer or an empty shell? What a waste :(

I decided to hang around outside waiting for the Shark Jump and testing out my camera (the lens is a tad slow), some kids were playing on BMXs and skateboard, and had attracted the attention of the security guard. As TheOneFonz and everyone else got prepared and the crowd of goths, excitable after the bathing beauty contest, built up, a different guard to the first one appears and wants people to leave, because there can't be cycling or skating. I have a quiet word with him, explaining that we're nothing to do with the four kids that had been there and if I asked them to leave, we'd like to finish what we'd done and then we'd be outta there - I asked the kids if they'd go because otherwise we'd be prevented from jumping the shark, and unlike British kids, they actually agreed and left (shame, as they were utterly harmless) and the guard thanked me and retired to a safe distance.

I reckon the crowd of goths gathering behind us had some bearing on his willingness to acquiesce ;)

The evening was spent trying to be sociable in the ballroom and listening to bands, with the goth disco (the DJs were awesome, the music sometimes hilarious, the lighting comedically bad) in the City Centre part of the hotel being a touch quiet but having the great benefit of having and outdoors exit (I had to modify the door to make it stay open; another reason I hate travelling without multi-tools as it needed some allen bolts undoing to repair it correctly - the inside of the fire door-style handle had been broken). Drinks were bought, and conversations had, and it was all good; the room party later was a touch more chaotic as people showed up pre-partied from the other events, and eventually

noralise managed (I think this was when it happened) Audra entirely by accident and in a hilarious fashion; their douchebaggery was confirmed however, as the party was closed down due to a noise complaint. Close.The.Damn.Door.People.

Sleep, not helped by having a very unco-operative neck, and then...

Sunday, 10th August

Sleep. Oh, so MUCH sleep. Missed a lot of stuff, then went to help Kest who was volunteering at the merchandise stall; the hotel helpfully provided a bowl of oatmeal and a smoothie, one of the few "Oh, thankyou!" moments of the hotel's performance. If some weird bloke was slightly rude or weird at you, that was me; I was also flashing the back of the badges in an attempt to attract goths with the power of Shiny. We sold a couple of things; signed photos of ~~TheOneBob~~ TheOneFonz were arranged inside the Shark's mouth artfully and sales doubled. There was chilling, and swimming, and bumping into people whilst running about -

timly_grae asked if I would photograph The Passing Hour's performance and set decoration later, so a determined trip to the Convention Centre was made - naturally, this meant we were early. And had forgotten to eat. After Timly's band were on, we went in search of food, acquired it after an unreasoable wait, and then headed back to the hotel - I forget what for (possibly to unload my camera, that had become downright irritating). Also, my bank balance was Seriously Out Of Whack by this stage. We met Kat and Sartori outside the hotel, and all went back to the Convention centre to catch people as they left. This became a rather excellent session of hanging out in the lobby berating Timly for failing as a rockstar (even though the band's performance was great, he failed to understand the "Groupie" bit of it. Typical) and chatting to more people, and attempting to get through the remaining booze (I failed to have any tequila, I stole glasses from the bar so we could all finish off the Baileys, and I think we acquired more booze than we started with).

Kaos had to leave early due to the need to get to Miami, which was a shame.

Sleep. And then Monday, which would bring farewells, packing, and driving to the Everglades...

Current Mood: full
Current Location: Sutton Coldfield
Current Music: Cheese Skeleton - Elan

Made it back eventually; I've been sleeping fairly solidly and then I'm off up to Hawick on a high-speed blast around Scotland on Monday; Hawick to collect post and grab some stuff I forgot like missing paperwork and missing remote for my office fan (though it's cold here now), Galashiels to drop off the kids' presents from America, Edinburgh for the same for

ailsak, then Glasgow to drop off stuff for Siani etc.

Anyway. the Mac is now ripping CDs and I've downloaded a new version of SeaMonkey for newsgroups and XJournal to do some more comprehensive updates to LJ. Starting with this slightly more sensible C14 Update. I'd taken more days than most people, since

kest & I planned to go off on a mini roadtrip (eventually decided upon as being to the Everglades), and flew in to America on Tuesday, setting off nice and early from Birmingham BHX on Continental flight 026.

Tuesday, 5th August

jenova_red dropped me off after lots of packing dilemmas and deciding to leave the Sigma 300-800 monster lens in favour of a 120-400mm OS and 2x convertor, and I eventually got onto a 757 (horrid, cramped plane) after a mild panic over not having an address for the day I landed in the USA.

The flight was uneventful, immigration in Newark International was nerve-wracking but done, and the internal flight was only marred by the woman beside me throwing her stuff on me when getting into her chair. Arrival in Tampa was downright pleasant - the car was sorted quickly, baggage sensible, and of course no immigration so I felt quite comfortable. I collected my first car, a white Sebring, from the rental people, adjusted for LHD, and set off.

The provided satnav, a Garmin Nuvi, was so utterly shit that I ended up spectacularly lost, hungry and with an incoming storm. In desperation I made it look for the nearest food place, a Wendys about 17 miles out of Tampa (yah. I was that lost by this point, having just followed a sign for "food off 275"), and in the thunderstorm with forked lightening, the dearth of motels and lack of visibility made the Sebring's misaligned steering and knackered brakes ever more obtrusive. In frustration, the address of the Regency Hyatt in Tampa was punched in, and I made it, soaked and stressed and a day before I had a booking. For once, the valet left the car alone and I tried to get the room booking adjusted -

kest having put our names on the bookings, this should be sensible; nope. They just had hers. Managing to call, this was all sorted, though far from straightforward.

Gave the Valet the keys, took my bags upto our first room, and collapsed after a shower.

Wednesday, 6th August

Woke up and got breakfast in the hotel; $12 for buffet. Not SO bad, though the food was distinctly average, not even as acceptable (or good, being fair to them) as the Hilton's I've been thrown into for conferences lately. Then set off to collect Kest from the airport; her flight got in around 10:15 so I went early to try and change my Sebring. No Mustangs available, so I got another Sebring - at least this one worked. The flight was a little delayed, but not as delayed as Kest's bag - which didn't show up at all. After finding the appropriate desk, enquiries were made, and it transpired the bag would arrive on the next flight in. Since the airline offered to forward it to the hotel, we headed back to get organised, then went in search of food having arranged a fridge for the room. At this stage, we're on the 9th floor, and the elevators are already beginning to break - the hotel being shared with a Bodybuilder's Convention would prove to be the ultimate downfall for the elevator system.

When we went out for food, Kest mastered the satnav whilst I attempted to figure out the frustrating one-way system in Tampa, 'aided' by the Sebring's wonderful rear visibility. Unfortunately every source of food was either invisible or closed (or had stopped serving food) - eventually we went up 275 to Dale Mabry and found a Denny's (and everything else, but the Denny's was chosen as we knew it would be open). Tomorrow would bring people and work, so we headed back.

Thursday, 7th August

With the Convergence crew in town, Kest had volunteered to help out, so we went and saw what we could do that would be useful. I ended up punching holes in laminates, meeting Andrew (aka The Exiled 2.0 from alt.gothic) and a few others (names omitted to protect the guilty, or because I can't be sure I know how to spell them). Batty also punched holes.

missjanette arrived and there was chaos with the room, including the hotel managing to dump all the food in our fridge when we requested that it was moved, and repeated attempts to add Kaos to the reservation failing

noralise arrived when the rooms were vaguely organised. We were moved to the 13th floor in order to obtain the two rooms we'd asked for; something that would later make me dizzy. Drinks at the Tiki Hut were supposed to be attended, but it was somewhat closed, so a trek to Channelside and Wet Willies was partaken of; frozen Monkeyshine cocktail is very nice, but jetlag was beginning to hit already so I'm a touch out of it by this stage.

In the next installment; someone's head is damaged, and a sea creature meets a sad end!

Current Mood: Sleepadjusted
Current Location: Sutton Coldfield
Current Music: Entrance - The Passing Hour

So, I wrote a huge update whilst at the airport where I found free WiFi; first the gateway failed to let me post, then when I sorted that the really, really long update was disposed of and the quick update rejected for being in the wrong character set.

Basically, got into Tampa, no problems. Baggage was delayed but not lost, I got the car (white Sebring), and set off to find somewhere to stay. No real luck, hampered by roadworks and an unaware satnav. I got woefully lost AND the Sebring's brakes and steering were really shagged despite it only having done 9,800 miles. Ugh.

Made it to the Convergence hotel in the most incredible (by UK standards) storm with amazing lightning strikes, torrential rain. The lack of sleep, headlights everywhere and so forth made me just glad to be there.

Slept, rooms are nice, facilities nice, good breakfast, etc. Internet is NOT FREE unless it's in the business centre. Got the car back from the valet (having carefully checked what I should tip), drove to get

kest with enough time to beforehand change the damn car for something not broken, and that all went great; found free WiFi in airport but hadn't brought my laptop. Bought some things for people and a multi-purpose charger for my phone, called the bank to allow my card to work in ATMs - got Kest, got new car. Grey Sebring this time, and it drives better. Figured out the bizarre roadworks on I-275, swore at drivers not letting me out, but got to the hotel without too much drama (Kest's bag is delayed though).

David is helping with a viewing of the house, so YEAY to that, he tried to call and the call was very choppy. I may try setting up a Skype-type account thing.

Looking forward to people arriving now I'm slightly more in control of things and not relying on air travel, immigration and stuff not to screw things up (actually that bit wasn't vastly different to how it used to be, just slower and busier), missing people who aren't here; expect pictures and more stuff soon as I get the WiFi to behave and so forth!

Also. Boeing 757. VERY cramped indeed. But apparently very efficient and fast.

Home on 16th, 7am!