ICC diary

[karohemd]

In short, it was the best ICC of the three I've been to, both OOC and IC. Cool people, good organisation, great roleplay and much much fun with lovely people.

Tuesday
Alarm clock went off at 7:00, got up, made breakfast, got ready, checked and rechecked luggage and tickets, tidied a bit.
Taxi arrived and took me to the station. The bloody cruiser was 10 minutes late but as the train to Gatwick was late as well, so I made it in time.
Called dannyuk to check where he was and it turns out that he's going tomorrow, Wednesday, not today. I just wish for once people would get their dates right... Now I need to find a room at the hotel on my own. It's only the beginning of the week, shouldn't be too difficult. Still, a hassle I don't need.
Costums wasn't a problem at all this year. Well, davywavy wasn't with me ;oP
Sitting in the gate lounge waiting to board, scheduled departure is in an hour.
Flight took off with 15 mins delay, nothing special but made good time and got to St. Louis before the scheduled arrival time.
There were very few people, the plane might have been a quarter full and I had a double seat at the window on my own. There were even a couple of empty window seats. Very good leg room for me so for taller people it should be OK. The two meals were mediocre at best (a chunk of salmon with rice and the other was a microwave deep pan pizzette) but the flight attendants were more friendly this time but still not pretty.
No individual video screens in the backrest in front of you but a couple of monitors in the middle row. Watched Johnny English which was quite bad. Rowan Atkinson should stick to Black Adder. Basic didn't appeal to me so I read instead (The Gates of Winter by Mark Anthony).
All in all, the flight was rather painless, only 8 hours 45 mins or so.

Immigration/Customs in St. Louis wasn't bad, either. Just a long wait for my luggage and the strange rechecking after customs, even if the final destination was St. Louis. Rather long walk to Baggage Claim/exits with only one short horizontal escalator (or whatever those things are called).
Found the right exit and caught a shuttle to the Hilton. Got a room but sadly not the one I had reseved for Wednesday so I'll have to move tomorrow.

Switched on alarm radio and found Classic Rock station (Molly Hatchet, Metallica, Guns'n'Roses, Aerosmith, Led Zeppelin and Bad Company so far) immediately. That's what I like about the US, you can find your favourite music immediately if it's reasonably mainstream.

Had a lovely dinner (a seared Tilapia with lots of garlic, pasta and griddled courgettes plus a glass of White Zinfandel), watched a bit of TV but felt too tired so had a bath instead.

Wednesday
Had a reasonably quiet night considering that I can't sleep properly the first night I'm somewhere, anyway, and got rid of most of the jetlag. Had breakfast and then ran into John and Chris of the Irish Cam and got to know three blokes from New Brunswick (Canada) who drove 30 hours to get here...
Hotel screwed up the reservation somehow and when I tried to change rooms, the double queen wasn't available anymore. Oh well...

Absolutely beautiful and warm weather, no clouds in sight, so went into "town", walked around downtown a bit, short trip to the river to take pictures of the arch in case the weather is bad tomorrow.
Back at the hotel at five. More Cammies there as was to be expected. The UK contingent or at least part of it should get here in the next hour or so. Plan to have dinner and then see if people are up for a trip downtown clubbing or something. Hm, a casino might also be an idea...

As I went downstairs, davywavy, dannyuk and Anna had shown up, so we chatted and things. Ran into Wolf as well who had very short hair (later found out he had donated his long hair to charity). We decided to go onto a food/booze run. Wolf used his real world transport influences to get one of the Hilton airport shuttle drivers to drive us to a shopping area, so we stacked up on snacks and booze (think the same numbers as in the UK but in dollars).
Got back and more people arrived (e.g saintammie), charleseb (in disguise with even longer hair and a baseball cap) and others.
Decided to have a drink with davywavy in the bar and who sat there in a corner? whethergal and mergryphon, so we joined them and had a nice chat while I had dinner. Manage to persuade Dave to buy a round of Macallan and nice it was, too.
By the time I had lost the inclination to go clubbing so I just hung out with people and distributed chocolate and pixiecrack among the crowd.
Bed now so I'm fit when Nicki shows up early in the morning.

Thursday
Got up at about 8:30, went downstairs to have breakfast to be joined by sollunastella and Gordon and later davywavy. Chatted a bit and then went upstairs to run into nikkita422's arms. Gave Matthew a Kinder egg which he was really chuffed with, especially as it was a really cool toy (a sort of winged boat). Went downstairs to sign in but were told that it wouldn't start before noon for prereged people so we had to wait for a bit. OOC reg was quick and easy, just no Photo Team badge. :o( Had to wait another two hours for IC check-in to start but better to get everything sorted today than having to do it later. This obviously also shortened our available time so we decided to leave a trip to St. Louis for tomorrow. Instead we played air hockey and watched Matthew swim and crash one of the game machines. And it bloody ate our money. :o(
Finally met georgechance and later luckychance in person, which was good.
kyrthira showed up as well and was very happy about the wine, the chocolate and the Kinder egg. ;o) Apparently, Kinder eggs are illegal to be sold in this country (choking hazard). I think I need to bring a case next year...
The lobby and check-in areas are absolutely swarming with people. Unfortunately, there's no clear separation between the main hotel and the conference bits like last year so the few normal guests left are a bit perturbed by the masses of mostly young people talking about strange things. ;o)
The photo team meeting was a bit short and only consisted of Robert and me...
No gaming for me so I wandered back and forth between the Sabbat game and the C/A soft roleplay. Got some good shots of characters and things.
The Commonwealth Party hosted by Neil, the Canadian NC, was very cramped but OK. Chatted to some new people and others who I knew from last year and spread pixiecrack, chocolate and Amarula around.

Friday
Nicki looks so innocent when she's sleeping...
After a lateish breakfast, Nicki, Matthew and me headed into St Louis for our sightseeing trip. I managed to get an absolutely wonderful shot of the arch from the side.
First we took a cruise on a riverboat which was quite interesting and also very nice because the weather was perfect (warm, cool breeze). Then we went up inside the arch in little escape pod like contraptions. The view from the 600+ feet high structure was breathtaking.
Back we went via Union Station to have early dinner at a seafood place (Lambert's?). I had a wonderful clam chowder.
Then quick drop off of photos and getting changed for C/A.
Realized again that BvR is not a good character to take somewhere where he knows very few people. I need a socialising secondary...
Took some great pics, though
The Hospitality Suite is well stocked with Mountain Dew, rar.
Pirates of the Carribbean party was small but good, yarr.

Saturday
Woke up, no Nicki. Had breakfast, still no Nicki until about 11:30. She had fallen asleep in a random room ;o)
Started Changeling without Sarah just milling around meeting people. Then Sarah turned up and we went to the Casino together as things at the arch were getting scary. We both lost horribly at poker so decided to play Black Jack instead (with some chips some kind Red Branch Knight had given us). Were warned by the RBKs that trouble might be afoot so we left. Were recruited by the RBKs as support to go on a mission which we did. Joined up with a cool Satyr called Seth who obviously liked us a lot and used a bit of Oakenshield on both us and our clothing. The attack was a bit scary but we didn't get involved and then watched the end via Tattletale. Let's just say Mike Bramnik went out with a bang. ;o)

As I was having dinner later, Steph told me that apparently Mike Tinney had been at the ling game and really enjoyed it and was much impressed with the roleplay and the costumes.

Changed again to do some C/A, starting with the Toreador Salon which got scary very quickly. I only say Antediluvian....
Wandered around a bit and was asked by a random person if I was that language expert. Hm, people already know BvR, that's scary. Might have one or two business contacts as well.

Skipped Conclave, changed and got ready for Succubus Club.

Succubus Club turned out to be absolutely smashing. Free booze (shame I don't drink when I dance) provided by WW, Activision and someone else (Hm, this WW takeover is making more and more sense). Justin Achilli played a fantastic set of EBM/Electro/Industrial (over 3 hours at least) and the other a mix of funky and party stuff. kyrthira turned up very late and then dragged me out to share the bottle of wine I had bought which made a pleasant close to a fantastic day. Good thing that the clock went back by an hour so I managed to sleep a couple of hours.

Sunday
Got up, showered, had breakfast and went to the Fan Club Meeting and the Closing Ceremonies.
Blablabla but Changeling will survive YoF and there might be a Boggan book some time in the future.
Two UK people got awards: Marc Torley a Stirling Award (an actual silver plated computer mouse) and Dave Keyes the International Member of the Year.
Then the saying and hugging good-bye started.
Helped Nicki and Matthew get their stuff to their car and sent them off to Georgia. Mmmmm, Nickihugs. :o)
Packed my suitcase with just the bits left I need tonight and tomorrow morning.
Had dinner with aglokulo and dannyuk (a nice juicy steak this time), got changed and made my way to Dead Dog.

Dead Dog was pretty dead, far more so than last year. The DJ (also VST C/A of St. Louis) said he was only allowed to play soft music in the first few hours, which might have people kept away as quite a few preferred to sit in the lounge. Shame, really.
Distributed the rest of my pixie sticks among the tables and chatted to people. Then one of the tables started playing Lunch Money and I joined in which made the wait for the Vaulderita more fun.
Finally the hotel bar people pushed off and we broke out our stuff. We had various whiskeys, vodkas, butterscotch and chocolate malt schnaps, gin, sour mixer, red Aftershock courtesy of me, Creme de Menthe and probably some things I can't remember.
The participating group wasn't very big, either, maybe 15 people max so the bowl went around a couple of times. This one tasted more lemony than the one last year, still not bad, maybe a bit more potent, though.
We also had more Virgins this year than Veterans which is unusual.
Some more dancing later (Merrick rocked the dancefloor ;o), the party finally died. Helped pack up a bit and joined others in the lounge who were playing team Lunch Money. Chatted some more and then headed off to bed. Was in bed at about 3 and didnt' wake up until the alarm went off at 9.

Monday
Got up feeling crap with a slight headache (something in the Vaulderita must have been bad), showered, had big breakfast with lots of juice, finished packing and headed down. Mooched around a bit, updated LJ on the computer and chatted a bit on IRC.
Good to hear that Nicki and crew got home safe and sound.
Took the shuttle to the airport at 2, and didn't have to wait very long to security check. They were very thorough, though. I had to take off my trainers and they systematically went through my bag. No complaints, though.
Again, the gate I needed was at the very end of the concourse and there were no walkways except for a short bit. Good thing I always check my big luggage.