Arisia

[fbhjr]

My wife agreed to do some demos for the Higgins museum at the Arisia Science Fiction convention this weekend. It is a show we used to do all the time. But, since I quit doing Higgins demos more than 5 years ago, I hadn’t been in a while.

On the way in we saw a rainbow and hoped it was a good luck sign.


Apparently reflection rainbows are good luck signs. This one was a refraction rainbow.

The show was in a part of Boston that has changed a lot since I grew up just outside the city line. So, we got off the new turnpike exit and drove around a while trying to figure out which hotel we were after.

It turned out to be the one next to the place with the big roof.


As you’d expect of a big hotel that caters to conventions and such, they only have 200 parking spaces.
Wait, did that make sense?
Not to me...

Still I managed to find a place across the street and was probably better off for it.

After all, the 200 spaces they have go for $40 to get in for any amount of time. I paid $2.50 in quarters to the meter across the street....

My wife was only there to practice today.


I tried to keep people from walking through the practice. This wasn’t bad when they were just waving their arms. But, more of a worry when they picked up the swords.


Despite palusbuteo and my attempts to block people two different mothers towing their children behind them pushed past me to walk through the sword fight.

Two!
Morons.

When they were done practicing, there was a little hat on one of the chairs we had used to try and stop people.

This fit the theme of rainbows and creatures associated with them. But, not having found the end of the rainbow, the gold and luck were not ours.

We still had a few minutes of the 2 hours left on the meter when we headed out of the city.
Sadly, as mentioned above, all my instincts for getting to the highway are based on the city 30-40 years ago.
So, we drove around and around a bit. But, found the turnpike again and went home.

When I got home I found messages from my boss and the folks in Switzerland saying they didn’t like the drawing I had sent them yesterday and I needed to fix it before Monday morning, Swiss time.
So, I headed into work and spent a couple hours there.

Next time, I need to find the right kind of rainbow...

Comments

[palusbuteo.livejournal.com]

That sucks having to go into work. I really hope they like your new drawings.

That whole Fort Point area with the new Convention center and all - Yeah it is totally confusing and extrordinarily difficult to navigate and has hardly any access from the highway.

Friday evening when i went in after work (4PM) to set up my art in the art show, from the entrance of the Exit 24 A-B-C Clusterfuck, to the Hotel itself, took me an hour. I knew I was heading into stupid 93 south traffic, but trying to get past South Station was stupid beyond belief. But I kept my temper in check and managed to get there and all set up. The drive home was me and 3 other cars vs. 5PM and 5,000,000 cars.

I also was 'lucky' to get a garage parking spot all 3 days I was there. But, I also knew I was going to be biting it big time price-wise for the "convenience". $85 total for about 10 hours' worth of time at the Con. Fortunately I sold almost everything I had for sale at the art show, the cost of said art show is pretty low, and I also got a free weekend pass and ate free food the whole time, so I about broke even.

I vehemently agree with you that allegedly 400 spaces (or 200 as you've said) for a 16 story hotel next to a gigantic convention center, is laughably pathetic. Especially for a destination like that. I'm always amazed at the Worcester-Like blindness/arrogance that Boston had when it re-built/re-developed that area. All of that money and time invested into it, with poor access from all of the highways, inadequate parking, and even a 20 minute walk from South Station. It's stupid but not surprising either.