Kessalia writes...

OK, I'm told this is where con reports go, so here goes... Gathering 2007 only, not the camping trip that preceded it.

So Thursday we woke up in North Carolina at a very nice little motel about 5 miles west of Cherokee. We took our time heading out, and just had breakfast out of what we had with us, which was plenty. We actually spent the first part of the day in the park, looking for a couple waterfalls we had managed to miss the first time through. Finally sighed and headed back to the craziness that is Pigeon Forge, and since we'd spotted the hotel on the way down had no trouble finding it. Shan checked us in, we hauled our stuff up to the room they gave us, and whoops... It was very definitely a smoking room, and reeked accordingly. Since Shan had specifically requested a NON smoking room, we called the desk and got put on hold. For way too long a time. Finally we got fed up and just walked back down to the desk, where the putz on the counter just rolled out the old "Oh no, that IS a non smoking room (despite the lack of sign, odor, and ASHTRAYS on the tables) we have no room to move you to, sorry, go spray air freshener." As he was finishing up his little memorized rote a manager comes up behind him, hands him a paper, and says "This is where we're moving them to" and boy did the putz clam up fast. Twit. Guess SOMEone had been working while we'd been on hold after all. Ah well, we had much much less room trouble than the rest of the clan, so we can't complain too much.
Anyway, got up to the room, which was RIGHT across from the con area, which would have been more marvy if we didn't have to wait for and take the elevator that whole 10 feet... *L*
Settled in, cranked the AC up high, and went back to the desk to get directions to the airport, since we were planning to go pick Rob and Maui up at about 11 pm. Nice clerk gave us a map and directions, and we walked across the street for dinner. Finally managed to get a hold of the rest of the clan, who were riding in from Memphis with Trimm - They were running late due to flight delays of course, so we re-confirmed I'd go get the other bunch that night, no problems. I called Rob to make sure everything was still OK with his flight just after the buggers cancelled it for a 10 minute thunderstorm. As far as we knew Maui was still on time, but we had no idea when Rob was gonna get in now. Finally he gets rescheduled, to the NEXT DAY. So poor Wobby spent a crappy night at the airport, but at least it meant Shan and I could BOTH go get Maui (we were gonna leave Shan behind before because of lack of space - remember all my camping stuff was taking up the entire trunk. :P ) That worked really well, because there was construction blocking all the routes we knew of to get BACK to the motel from the airport - so we got brave and after picking Mau up without a hitch, we grabbed the atlas and map the hotel gave us and fumbled our way back to PF in the dark. Made it, though,and got to the hotel not that far behind the rest of the clan, who'd gotten stuck in the construction traffic we'd detoured around. They'd reserved a suite, but I guess there were none left, so they got thrown across the freaking street to a even more ghetto hotel owned by the same people. Sure, it was technically a suite, and I admit I never saw it, but I heard stories. And 'overcharged' doesn't start to cut it, I also heard. Still, I'll let them blog that little mess... We got back, Mau went over to visit them for a few minutes, then came back and we all slept.

Next morning, Friday! I woke up and everyone else was still asleep (or half awake and just not getting up yet, who knows) but it was rapidly approaching 9 am and I finally said screw it and got up and wandered a bit, looking for people I knew. Walked next door to the BP station and got breakfast, then ran into con staffers on the way upstairs. Asked if they needed help and got told no, not really, but I went and butted into the room anyway because I saw JG in there setting up the art area. Said hi to her, and volunteered to help with art panels, and that time got a 'yes please!' *L* Helps when people can recognize you without a nametag. :P Finally the rest of my room got up and moving and wandered over, and promptly got put to work, because that's what Arcadia does... we get drafted easy. :P I grabbed my badge in there somewhere, but we hung out until all the art we had was hung and labeled, and by that time the rest of the clan had arrived and hugs were exchanged. About noon Shan and I headed back up to the airport to get Rob, and we took a different route that was more scenic, had less construction, but was much longer. Still got there just at the right time, though, and grabbed Wobby without much trouble. Grabbed lunch on the way back, and zoomed back to PF... I was still about 15 minutes late getting to the 3pm lifedrawing session though. Life drawing was fun, I always like it because the con is the only place I can do it in anything like a formal setting. They were also cool about taking pics, so I snagged photos of some of the more complex poses, too. ^_^ The clan waited patiently while I finished that up, then those who wanted to went to opening ceremonies, which Shan and I skipped in favor of being lazy in the hotel room and eating our leftovers from lunch. After the ceremonies finally wound up, we all met up downstairs, picking up a few adoptees of course in the process, and went to dinner (Shan and I just got desserts) and then walked a couple blocks to a laser tag place. I'd never done it before, but it was fun. I assume part of the fun was the group, though. We got the whole session to ourselves, which rocked, too. I came in next to dead last for points, go me! ;P At that point it was getting late, so it was back to the hotels and bed -eventually. *L*

Saturday!! We all slept too late but I hauled my butt out of bed for the 10 am lifedrawing. They were really the only con things I did, so I'm glad I did that much, at least. *L* The poor across the street people finally managed to get a room in the con hotel, another suite, which was much nicer but still too expensive in my opinion. *L* Hung out there a bit and goofed off a lot, (pic is DE, Arno, and Maui) of course. There was not much going on that we really needed to go until the MGT3K at 8, so some of us went swimming and Mau and DE wandered off shopping or something, I think. We ended up driving to TGIFridays for dinner that night, which was nice - I usually don't get to see much of the people who stay in the other clan room, so getting to hang with Trimm, Beedoo! and Arno for the evening was awesome. ^_^ I didn't do the radio play as usual (I still have -never- sat through one of those. Some year, I guess) but a lot of the clan wanted to go to the MGT3K, and the rest of us went swimming again. Well, Rob came and played with his camera and let us pick on him, and DE couldn't swim because of her bum knee, but the rest of us swam. Well, ok, all 5 of us. But still. After that there was much confusion and trying to find Arno and the others, which was finally given up on and sleep happened. Eventually. :P

SUNDAY! I... have no idea what happened Sunday? Oh! Wait, yeah, we went to breakfast at the pancake place next door, and then split up again. DE had to leave to head back to work Monday, most of the clan went for mini golf and Shan and I went up to the outlet mall because I was looking for things for my nephew's birthday. I didn't get a darn thing for my nephew and ended up only getting some hand soap for myself. But it's nice soap, darnit. ;P Met up with the rest of the group and did a lap of go-cart racing, before we headed back to the hotel and picked up the cars and went to Golden Corral for our non-banquet clan dinner. *L* Got back and headed to the Masquerade! Most of my pics are semi-random Masquerade pics, so I'm not gonna detail them here again, sorry. pic folder is here again if you missed it the first time.
Hung out after wards, got in the conga line, and then went over to take the traditional clan pic. Two weird things happened, first people kept jumping into the pic with us who we barely or didn't know at all, and second, people we didn't or barely knew kept taking our pictures once we finally got posed. It was like we were famous or something? *L* But I was the bitch and kicked everyone else out (except for the guy with the kick ass costume, I wasn't complaining about him) and got the pic - Arcadia Clan Gathering Pic 2007! and my thanks to whoever shot the pic for me. It's a decent photo of everyone except me. *L* Back row is Arno, Trimm, me, Robert, and the gargoyle, Delphine is in the middle, then Beedoo!, Maui, and JG are in the front. DE had already left. After that we noticed the room we were in had handy tables, so we got into a weird card game Beed had brought until JG came back in and told us about the problems with water leaking in the dealers/art room. So the clan pitched in and went to help take down the art show in a hurry, and we were just finishing that up along with the staff when the whole CON showed up and started helping us move the dealers' stuff to improvised high ground. I was very impressed with how we all worked together, and seeing who ended up in charge and who was actually getting obeyed and who was doing what was interesting. *L* Still, that little exercise seemed to pretty much kill the dance ( it's funny, the one time I've been there that we were isolated enough that we could have stayed more than a few minutes, and everyone left - maybe it's habit at this point? ;P ) so we went back to our card games. I finally left when I noticed that the noise in the room was making me literally cringe every time someone said something, and the game was such that everyone was yelling and being loud, that was part of the fun - but I couldn't take it anymore and had to beg off and head to bed before my head exploded. o.O Since I knew we were heading out first thing in the morning, I did manage to get re-packed most of the way, and then went back to donate some of the food we had left from camping but didn't want to haul home over to the card players... But finally I got a shower and some sleep and the headache went away.

MONDAY! Basically just got up, found the clan, and said goodbyes. We had set ourselves a strict goal of 10 am departure, based on how long a drive we had, and we made it almost on the nose. It was the LONGEST damn drive through Kentucky ever, I swear it was all downhill once we got to Ohio, but still it seemed like such a damn long drive. *L* But we had the Arcadia CD to keep us company and we finally got home about 7:30. After which we promptly crashed, since Delfy had to be at work way too freaking early the next morning.

THE END! Yes, I'm planning on going to Chicago, though I didn't have the money to pre-reg yet.