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Georgia is cursed.
17 years ago
General
Seriously, it is! Avoid it at all costs.
Yesterday, August 29th, my sister and I set out for the much anticipated Dragon*Con '08 in Atlanta, Georgia. A trip of approximately 125 miles, one way. Things were going well right up until I past the Georgia state line. At that very moment, the engine temperature of my car begin to climb. I stopped at the closest service station and put more water in the radiator, but by the time we reached the City of Atlanta, the temperature gauge was hovering over the red H. Although, that was but one of the many grave concerns facing us. The interstates of Atlanta are a nightmare of gnarly streets constantly splitting, converging, twisting, and flailing off in every direction. Indeed, a car on a Georgia interstate loops around more often than a calligraphy pen. We had a number of close calls on the trip there, with several cars and trucks nearly ramming into us from the rear, side, and front. And to round it all out, the directions given to reach our destination were entirely inaccurate. Fortunately, however, the hotels that housed this year's Dragon*Con are enormous and reach high into the Atlanta skyline, easily visible even to someone speeding haphazardly through a 2g turn with semi trucks baring down on them.
After exiting the interstate we began making our way through the city streets in a manner most closely resembling that of a rat in a maze. Finally reaching the convention, we find that the parking garages closest to the host hotels were sold out and so wound up parking 4 blocks away in a place that, although marked as public parking, appeared instead to be some sort of demolished structure. It was then, after getting out of the car, that the folly of our costume choice became apparent to us... As with other recent sci-fi/fantasy conventions, my sister and I have elected to dress in the uniforms of our favorite science-fiction television series, Stargate SG-1 --an olive-green military flight-suit with black tactical vest, accessorized with the standard issue MP5 and 9mm sidearm (both Airsoft, of course.) We had not even left the vicinity of the car when a man pulled up to us in a van and asked whom we worked for. After we explained that we were there for a nerd convention, he confessed that he had assumed us to be hired gunmen on our way to "off" someone. Apparently, he was in the market.
Although most passers by ignored the 7-foot tall Wookies, half-naked manga/anime chicks, and the assortment of Storm Troopers; we were subjected to a host of intense, sometimes almost furious, stares. Before reaching the hotel, we were informed by one such pedestrian that our uniforms closely resembled those of the local Police tactical drug enforcement unit, the Atlanta Red Dogs. It seems that the residents of Atlanta really like their drugs! Oddly enough, however, unlike other conventions that we have attended, where it was standard practice to have our weapons checked at the door by security, here we breezed past a number of Atlanta PD and hotel security without even a curious glance.
Upon reaching the hotel, we began the long, arduous task of registering for the event. Each Dragon*Con information desk that we went up to sent us somewhere else and we wound up circling the building nearly twice before locating the registration room in a area that appeared to be the basement. The process of actually getting registered took nearly 45 minutes and worked much like the DMV, only more disorganized. After getting our badges, my sister wanted to give her feet a rest for a few minutes and worry over the vulnerable, dilapidated location of my car urged me to go find it a better parking spot. I walked nearly 8 blocks in an unsuccessful attempt to locate where I had parked the car before returning to get my sister to help me find it. We did and thus began looking for a better place to park. There were a number of public parking lots relatively close to the convention, but all were unattended and yet still required patrons to pay $4.00-$6.00... all in change, no less. I don't know about most men, but I have no need to carry around a roll of quarters in my pocket, and therefore, I couldn't park there. Finally, I did managed to find a parking lot with an attendant, although it was more than 6 blocks away from the convention.
After getting back inside the hotel, all the stress and over exertion from walking for so long, under a blazing hot summer sun and wearing a heavy, full-body military flight-suit, finally caught up with me and I began to feel very ill. I will forgo the gory details of said heat-stroke and skip ahead to the point in which I realized how bad off I was and began seeking medical attention. I made my way to one of the convention information booths and requested the location on the convention's emergency medical personnel, but the ladies there were absolutely no help and just bewilderingly thumbed through their books and muttered a prolonged "Uhmmmm...." while I stood their struggling to remain conscious. Fortunately for me, a very kind and heroic fellow con-goer by the name of Jessi "JAC" Conlier, who had some medical training and at that moment happened to be on his way over to compliment me on my costume, quickly came to my aid and rounded up the EMTs. They weren't of as much help as I thought they were going to be -merely checking my vitals and then informing me that I was not going to die but was suffering from severe heat-exhaustion (which I was already painfully aware of.) My new friend stayed with me until I could get someplace cool and out of the way to rest and recuperate before we parted ways. But, more than an hour later, I was still feeling like shit. So my sister (who herself was suffering from the same condition, only to a lesser degree) and I decided to call it quits and head homeward -despite the fact that we had not gotten to enjoy even one minute of the convention and didn't get to see a single celebrity guest.
By the time we made it back to my car, we were both very ill --in every sense of the word. I tried desperately to make it back on to I-20 West-bound, but thanks to poorly labeled off-ramps and a couple of extremely rude and malicious drivers, we instead ended up on I-75 North-bound. Still, I probably could have found my way back onto the interstate I needed to be on had my car's earlier engine troubles not come back to haunt us. With the temperature gauge now well past the red H and steam beginning to pour out from under the hood, we pulled off on some strange, dark exit and attempted to fix the problem. But I was unable to get the radiator to hold water and was forced to undergo the greatest humiliation imaginable --calling our parents to come rescue us.
Sick and upset, my sister and I tried our best to get comfortable and wait the two hours it would take for our parents to reach us. An hour into that wait, on the western edge of the state, our parents had just crossed the accursed Georgia state line when their transmission started to give out. They were then forced to pull over and make repairs before continuing on Atlanta to find us. Ultimately, we were unable to fix my car that night and had to leave it behind. Me and my father had to get up this morning and make the long trip back to Atlanta to retrieve it. A task that took all day to complete. And thus ended the shittiest day I've had in a long time.
But, I've learned my lesson! Georgia will henceforth be avoided like the plague! I hate that I didn't get to experience Dragon*Con. I'm sure it would have been great fun, had fate not conspired against us on that day.
Yesterday, August 29th, my sister and I set out for the much anticipated Dragon*Con '08 in Atlanta, Georgia. A trip of approximately 125 miles, one way. Things were going well right up until I past the Georgia state line. At that very moment, the engine temperature of my car begin to climb. I stopped at the closest service station and put more water in the radiator, but by the time we reached the City of Atlanta, the temperature gauge was hovering over the red H. Although, that was but one of the many grave concerns facing us. The interstates of Atlanta are a nightmare of gnarly streets constantly splitting, converging, twisting, and flailing off in every direction. Indeed, a car on a Georgia interstate loops around more often than a calligraphy pen. We had a number of close calls on the trip there, with several cars and trucks nearly ramming into us from the rear, side, and front. And to round it all out, the directions given to reach our destination were entirely inaccurate. Fortunately, however, the hotels that housed this year's Dragon*Con are enormous and reach high into the Atlanta skyline, easily visible even to someone speeding haphazardly through a 2g turn with semi trucks baring down on them.
After exiting the interstate we began making our way through the city streets in a manner most closely resembling that of a rat in a maze. Finally reaching the convention, we find that the parking garages closest to the host hotels were sold out and so wound up parking 4 blocks away in a place that, although marked as public parking, appeared instead to be some sort of demolished structure. It was then, after getting out of the car, that the folly of our costume choice became apparent to us... As with other recent sci-fi/fantasy conventions, my sister and I have elected to dress in the uniforms of our favorite science-fiction television series, Stargate SG-1 --an olive-green military flight-suit with black tactical vest, accessorized with the standard issue MP5 and 9mm sidearm (both Airsoft, of course.) We had not even left the vicinity of the car when a man pulled up to us in a van and asked whom we worked for. After we explained that we were there for a nerd convention, he confessed that he had assumed us to be hired gunmen on our way to "off" someone. Apparently, he was in the market.
Although most passers by ignored the 7-foot tall Wookies, half-naked manga/anime chicks, and the assortment of Storm Troopers; we were subjected to a host of intense, sometimes almost furious, stares. Before reaching the hotel, we were informed by one such pedestrian that our uniforms closely resembled those of the local Police tactical drug enforcement unit, the Atlanta Red Dogs. It seems that the residents of Atlanta really like their drugs! Oddly enough, however, unlike other conventions that we have attended, where it was standard practice to have our weapons checked at the door by security, here we breezed past a number of Atlanta PD and hotel security without even a curious glance.
Upon reaching the hotel, we began the long, arduous task of registering for the event. Each Dragon*Con information desk that we went up to sent us somewhere else and we wound up circling the building nearly twice before locating the registration room in a area that appeared to be the basement. The process of actually getting registered took nearly 45 minutes and worked much like the DMV, only more disorganized. After getting our badges, my sister wanted to give her feet a rest for a few minutes and worry over the vulnerable, dilapidated location of my car urged me to go find it a better parking spot. I walked nearly 8 blocks in an unsuccessful attempt to locate where I had parked the car before returning to get my sister to help me find it. We did and thus began looking for a better place to park. There were a number of public parking lots relatively close to the convention, but all were unattended and yet still required patrons to pay $4.00-$6.00... all in change, no less. I don't know about most men, but I have no need to carry around a roll of quarters in my pocket, and therefore, I couldn't park there. Finally, I did managed to find a parking lot with an attendant, although it was more than 6 blocks away from the convention.
After getting back inside the hotel, all the stress and over exertion from walking for so long, under a blazing hot summer sun and wearing a heavy, full-body military flight-suit, finally caught up with me and I began to feel very ill. I will forgo the gory details of said heat-stroke and skip ahead to the point in which I realized how bad off I was and began seeking medical attention. I made my way to one of the convention information booths and requested the location on the convention's emergency medical personnel, but the ladies there were absolutely no help and just bewilderingly thumbed through their books and muttered a prolonged "Uhmmmm...." while I stood their struggling to remain conscious. Fortunately for me, a very kind and heroic fellow con-goer by the name of Jessi "JAC" Conlier, who had some medical training and at that moment happened to be on his way over to compliment me on my costume, quickly came to my aid and rounded up the EMTs. They weren't of as much help as I thought they were going to be -merely checking my vitals and then informing me that I was not going to die but was suffering from severe heat-exhaustion (which I was already painfully aware of.) My new friend stayed with me until I could get someplace cool and out of the way to rest and recuperate before we parted ways. But, more than an hour later, I was still feeling like shit. So my sister (who herself was suffering from the same condition, only to a lesser degree) and I decided to call it quits and head homeward -despite the fact that we had not gotten to enjoy even one minute of the convention and didn't get to see a single celebrity guest.
By the time we made it back to my car, we were both very ill --in every sense of the word. I tried desperately to make it back on to I-20 West-bound, but thanks to poorly labeled off-ramps and a couple of extremely rude and malicious drivers, we instead ended up on I-75 North-bound. Still, I probably could have found my way back onto the interstate I needed to be on had my car's earlier engine troubles not come back to haunt us. With the temperature gauge now well past the red H and steam beginning to pour out from under the hood, we pulled off on some strange, dark exit and attempted to fix the problem. But I was unable to get the radiator to hold water and was forced to undergo the greatest humiliation imaginable --calling our parents to come rescue us.
Sick and upset, my sister and I tried our best to get comfortable and wait the two hours it would take for our parents to reach us. An hour into that wait, on the western edge of the state, our parents had just crossed the accursed Georgia state line when their transmission started to give out. They were then forced to pull over and make repairs before continuing on Atlanta to find us. Ultimately, we were unable to fix my car that night and had to leave it behind. Me and my father had to get up this morning and make the long trip back to Atlanta to retrieve it. A task that took all day to complete. And thus ended the shittiest day I've had in a long time.
But, I've learned my lesson! Georgia will henceforth be avoided like the plague! I hate that I didn't get to experience Dragon*Con. I'm sure it would have been great fun, had fate not conspired against us on that day.
that city shpuld pull an atlantis and vanish for a thousand years.
On the contrary, my sexy saurian, you're my kind of evil.
Indeed, it is a shame that we could not meet there, but as it turned out, I was in no shape to match claws with you that day. Indeed, we must make it another night.
This place is a shithole.