So this is going to be a jumble... but here goes nothing.

Wednesday at around 4pm  bt-armistice and I headed out on the first leg of the journey to Chicago. Our first stop was an overnight stay at  ~SoulWolf~ and  Gryphan's house. This was the third time in 2 weeks that we were there, which is quite surreal given they live around 3 hours from here.

We arrived in rush hour traffic which is always fun and had a quick dinner before bed. We had to get up super early so that we could make the 9 hour drive and arrive at a livable time. At 3:30am we were up and by 4:30 we were on the road.

BT took the first little part of the trip from Toronto to Sarnia. We stopped for gas there and I took the rest of the journey. The border crossing was really quick and smooth with a very short delay. It was the first time I have gone across the border at that crossing so it was quite nice. The rest of the road was a bit of a blur though to be honest. The only real things I remember was that a lot of deer still don't understand the concept of a highway and that in America, alcohol and food are cheap and plenty. Seriously we bought a bottle of Fireball whiskey for $17.99 which would have cost us $45 in Canada. You guys don't know how well you have it there.

I also noticed that the Canadian and American idea of a "Small" french fry or "Small" anything really is very different from ours. DAMN

We arrived at the convention at around 1pm local time and we hit the ground running. We got registered in pretty quick time and BT, SoulWolf and Gryphan spent no time getting into suit to romp around the con.

To be honest Thursday was a blur for me because the con was not on proper but we did meet a lot of people and do a lot of things. It was kinda surreal to be at the space before the con began and yet still seeing everything almost in full swing.

This is where things start to go off the rails in terms of what I can recall simply because there was so much going on. From opening ceremonies, to browsing the dealers room it just became a jumble.

Now to the elephant in the room. Sunday morning.

Souly Gryph and I were relaxing in the room actually heading off to bed when I decided to check Twitter. I see reports of the hotel being evacuated and thought it was some kind of prank. After all most of the time when you see emergency vehicles at a con it is usually ambulances or the occasional fire truck but we had not heard any alarms. I was telling them about it and started to head to the bathroom when I heard distant alarms start.. Then shortly afterwords the alarm went off in our room.

We grabbed shoes and coats and headed out to the stairs. When we hit the main lobby you could smell the chlorine in the air and we saw a lot of emergency personnel with gas masks on ushering us quickly through the hotel. We got across the street and stayed there for a bit when we were told by some members of con security to head into the main convention hall. After a hundred or so of us were in there we got notice that they were incorrect they meant the convention centre across the street so we all filed out of the hotel again and into the convention centre.

We kept getting pushed further back into the space to allow them to set up an emergency centre in the front half of the building for those who needed any additional medical assistance. We located BT and others and eventually all flopped onto the floor, hoping that it would be over soon.

At 4:20 we were given the all clear to get back into the hotel and we were finally in the room at around 5:20 or so. We crashed hard for only a few hours before we were all awake again.

The rest of the con seemed to be in a different head-space to begin with. People were unsure of things and there was a lot tired people trying their best to be as upbeat and bouncy as possible. We did the same as we wandered around. The thing that struck me was how many people asked if we were okay and how things were for us last night. We had all bonded around this and I think we became even tighter as a group.

We tried out best to get to bed early on Sunday because we knew we had a monster of a drive. It was not hard given how sleep deprived we were at that point. We were up at around 4:30 am and on the road by 6 which made for a pretty smooth start to the journey. Not a hell of a lot of traffic and it seemed to flow well which was really nice.

We decided to go back via Detroit just because it is Detroit and we all wanted to see it. BT grew up in Windsor so he had been to Detroit a lot so it was almost like coming back home. I got to see the GM building, Woodward Ave, the old Grand Central Station and more burned out houses then I can count. It was a surreal experience. I wish I could have stopped for a while and taken some pictures but we were pressed for time and had to head on over the border.

The crossing at Windsor was another breeze, we even reported that we had the half full alcohol bottles that were from the room and they didn't bat an eye. I think that he was just happy that we decided to be honest with them and let them know.

BT took us on a journey through Windsor as it is where he grew up. He showed us the waterfront where there were just an amazing array of stunning mansions, and we saw the distillery there too where they make a LOT of Walker's products. He then took us over to his parents house and showed us the block he grew up on. Sadly his mom had to work that night so she didn't answer the door due to being asleep for the shift work but it was still nice to go see his old house.

We left Windsor and started the long drive back to Toronto. It was pretty uneventful and we arrived at their place around 7pm local time. We dilly dallied a lot on the way back just taking in sights and enjoying the trip.

We got to their place and sadly we encountered just a bit of tragedy. It appears that sometime after we left their cat Grey Malkin passed. He was one of the sweetest and most unique cats I have ever met. Ask anyone who met Malkin.. They all wanted to steal him away he was just so special. Souly and Gryph joked that they were going to start a "Rent-A-Malkin" service for their friends so that everyone could enjoy a day with him.

I took responsibility of removing him from his resting spot and taking his collar off of him before placing him in a box. Gryphan will be taking him someplace special to bury him today. We will miss that cute little ball of floof.

BT and I crashed the night at their house because after that much driving I was not up for another 3 hours in the car by any stretch of the imagination. We got up around 7am and by 9 we were on the road again bound for home. We rolled in around noon and were greeted by a notice on the door that the landlord was going to be replacing windows over the next 3 days. Luckily I wrangled getting ours done first so I don't have to worry about them trying to do things while we are not here.

And that sums up everything about Midwest FurFest for this year. Stay tuned for a GAGGLE of pictures to get posted from me I just have to process them and get them ready for upload.

To everyone I saw, I am sorry that I didn't shout you out in this post but I want you to know that I really loved seeing each and every one of you. I didn't want to forget a name and feel bad about it so just know that every single one of you made this con one of the best.

I love you all