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Thursday I was stuck at work fairly late, so the folks driving down left long before I got home.
I’m given to understand that things were slow from the start with half the folks not ready when expected. Then, they lost almost 3 hours in NYC traffic.
That’s one of the issues with drivers with less experience at the long distance travel; less flexibility. If you’ve driven the roads around the area, you might (only might) be able to think of some way around the traffic. If you’re going off instructions, you’ve got to go with what you have or you won’t know how to get back on course.
I’m told they went through the Frank Sinatra “best of” CD 3 times in that traffic jam and not once did the other cars sing along with “New York, New York”.
Sad.

Those of us flying set out at 3:45 for the airport. Traffic was light and we got there with no problems.

We parked in the main garage and spent a lot of time in their swirly up ramp.

As always, huge lines at security, but even that early in the morning they have a lot of folks and we got through it quickly.
My wife had made cookies. Maybe you can’t bring drinks through security anymore, but cookies are fine.

The flight to Huston was 100% full so they offered to check in our carry on for free. We let them. Our seat in the plane was in the very back, so I got to see our bags being put on the plane and knew we would have costuming.

There was some smell on the plane that made us all feel sick. We think it was the cleaner used in the bathrooms. Whatever it was, it was nasty.

The airport was busy enough that they were using multiple runways to get the planes up in the air. That means you’ve got to taxi across a runway with a plane coming down to land on it.

Glad they had the timing right.

We took off right over the city and I was happy to see where our usual harbor cruise leaves from pass below us. Somehow to me that sort of linked the trips and I hummed some shanties for a bit. (Coincidently one that Lance tried to sing without that much luck on Sunday…)

As we flew along the shadow of the plane had a rainbow around it.

I don’t know if that is lucky or not, but it was cool.

There were a lot of clouds.

But, the central part of the country was clear.

And, we got to Huston without problem.

It’s been 36 ½ years since I was at the Huston airport. It’s not like I remember it. Now the terminals are separate and have a shuttle train that runs between them. It’s much bigger than I remember in general.

But, we had a nice lunch and then checked in on the car to see where it was.

Then, we tried to fly to Gulfport, MS.
I say tried because our plane wasn’t there. No one seemed sure where it was. All they knew is that it had reported a mechanical problem and was going to try and go back and have it fixed, then come get us.
It did arrive, almost an hour late. Of all the flights we took this weekend, it was the only one that wasn’t 100% full. Maybe the other folks worried about that mechanical problem…

It did eventually get there and we boarded and took off.
I have no desire to start a debate about the whole legal thing down south about when life begins. I was not in favor of that amendment and am glad it didn’t pass.
But, flying over the place where my parents honeymooned, 9 months before I was born, did make me think about where my life began.

There are some interesting islands in the Gulf. But, I’m not sure I’d want to live there.

The plane flew without problem for us and actually made up some speed. So, we only landed 45 minutes late.

I was happy to get off the little plane.

The Gulf Port Airport is the site of the Waffle House that led to the term “Waffle Housing” for some extreme use of the plumbing.

We got the rental car and drove the hour over to Mobile.

For those of you in my D&D campaign of decades ago, I’ve found Mosspoint.

We managed to get to the faire site just in time for the theoretical meeting that the contract says we have to attend.

I was surprised we were the first ones there as it was a few hours after the car normally arrives. But, the traffic in NYC caused a chain reaction of hitting more traffic in other cities, so they didn’t get in until 6 or so.
We did go over the set up with the faire organizer, were given our spot for the tent, and worked out some of the changes to the pirate melee with the pirate crew.
Just as we were finishing up on site, the car from home and the car with

pallid_regina and Jack Salt arrived. Sadly car 2 had not been able to pick up the extra performer they had hoped for, but we still had one more than contractual minimum, so it was fine.

Rooms were checked into, pizza was ordered and eaten (I had chicken fingers) and folks went off to get some sleep before the show started the next morning.