Unlike the previous blog entries on the convention, this one about the trip back to Ottawa is going to be in a different format. Here's the journal entries that I manually wrote, with a few edits here and there, as this day was a jumbled and confused mess in a lot of ways.
August 20th, 2012
6:35 am
I woke up this morning after last night's fun this morning, and don't feel too bad, although I think I have a sore throat. Don't tell me I've caught con crud. :( When I got out of bed this morning, the left hip and upper leg are hurting pretty bad; I think I may have aggravated the bulging disc. Nuts! :(
I've already shaved with the disposable razor and showered, and looking in the mirror, I did a decent job of shaving, but it's not perfect. Ah, who am I kidding? I find shaving a chore, and to be honest, can one ever do a decent job shaving with a disposable razor? No miracles in that regard, but it will do to travel home today. Don't want to be scruffy when I go through U.S. and Canadian Customs later today.
While
10:25 am
I'm sitting in the JW lobby at the moment, talking to a fellow from Edmonton.
I went back upstairs to brush my teeth and finish off the rest of the minor packing that needed to be done, and then headed downstairs to the lobby and the main desk to pay the hotel bill and check out. It was an easy, painless process, no surprises in the bill, but I found out that the room keycard would only work for 15 more minutes. I dashed back up to the room, finished the last-minute packing that I needed to do, cancelled the bellman and luggage cart that
Talked with the fellow from Edmonton that I mentioned earlier, and have just finished up this bit of the journal entry. The sore throat persists, and weirdly, I've started sneezing somewhat.
12:30 pm
As noted earlier, I had decided that
At around 11:00 am,
The line-up was too bad at the Security section, and going through the process was simple enough. I get nervous about having to take all the stuff out of my pockets and take off my shoes and belt (especially since my pants don't stay up with the latter off), but they made the process painless. The only problem I had was that the older man behind me was rude, making various nasty suggestions as I was too slow about the process for his taste, since I couldn't bend over properly because of the back pain. I managed to regroup with
2:36 pm
I've been sitting here reading the book I'm in the middle of - well, not strictly true, I started the book on the first day that we arrived at the con, but only read about 12 pages or so during the course of GenCon, and have already read over 100+ pages today so far here - waiting for the flight, and they still haven't called for passenger boarding, despite the flight being due to leave at 3:00 pm. I think there's something wrong with the plane, as I've seen people going up and down the boarding ramp, and there may have been a mechanic among them. I had a bottle of water and 1/2 a banana/walnut muffin. I've definitely got con crud, I think. I've got a very sore throat, and have been sneezing all day long. Merde! :(
3:50 pm
I was right. We're still sitting in the Indy Airport; the plane has mechanical problems. We don't know if the flight will go out or not, but
4:16 pm
The problem with the aircraft has still not been fixed, let alone determined, and so I don't know if the flight to Toronto is even going to happen at this rate. They say the mechanic will be here soon, so we're supposed to know something around 4:30 pm. We may still be able to make the 7:45 connection to Ottawa, I hope. I went to the nearest pay phone to call home and let them know, but I dialed the wrong service (it cost me $0.75 to do so) and so didn't manage the call; got a bit huffy and pissed off at the operator, and
5:21 pm
We're still sitting in the Indianapolis Airport. They're still working on the problem, though the mechanic finally arrived, and we have to wait another 25 minutes to find out whether we'll be heading for Toronto or not. I've almost convinced myself that we'll be sleeping over tonight in Indy at the airline's expense. I'm not happy about it, but

My philosphy is that the mechanical problem can't be too bad, since the plane's still here at the gate off the flight lounge. As long as the plane is at the gate in question, there's a good chance that they'll fix it and we'll get to Toronto.
6:10 pm
We've just learned that the flight to Toronto will be leaving around 6:50 pm tonight. Finally. The mechanic fixed the problem, whatever it was, but they had to wait to get approval from Air Canada in Toronto on his repairs (since he was contracted, not an airport mechanic, I guess) before they and the mechanic would okay the plane for flight. At least they have our interests at heart.
10:08 pm
We're currently sitting in the flight lounge in Toronto International Airport, waiting for the flight home. The flight from Indy arrived in Toronto at 7:55 pm. We took the long walk through Customs and it was relatively painless. We reclaimed our baggage, but by this point, I was seriously stressed out by the lack of food, and was having a serious case of the shakes. It made me suffer a severe panic attack when we were waiting in line at the ticket agent's to get the flight rebooked for the 10:30 pm flight to Ottawa. We got the boarding passes, had the luggage tagged and did the conveyer belt thing, and then went through Canada Customs. (I think I've got the sequence here mixed up somewhat, but it's been a stressful day, and I'm definitely sick with something, as I'm still sneezing.)
We went through Canadian Customs, and I didn't have any problems with the declaration and stuff, though I was still somewhat panicky. We made our way to the gate for the flight to Ottawa, and then went into a small restaurant nearby, the 912 Grill, where I finally had some food - a (fried) chicken burger and a Caesar salad, and stole some of
I just heard over the PA that the flight to Ottawa has been delayed until 10:45 pm. Just that kind of day, and consistent with things so far.
August 21st, 2012
1:52 am
I'm home. I'm actually lying in bed right now, just finishing up this journal entry.
The flight to Ottawa boarded around 10:50 pm, and was pretty uneventful. Because we'd had to rebook onto a different connecting flight,
The flight arrived uneventfully in Ottawa around 11:55 pm, but it was relatively easy to take the somewhat long walk to the baggage claim, and collect our suitcases. (Note: I was so tired and bleary-eyed by this point that I didn't even notice that my check-in suitcase had been damaged, one of the outside side compartments having the zipper and part of the lining torn away. Fortunately, when I got home, I saw that nothing had been taken or was missing from that pocket area.)
After
Good night, all.
And that's it, the final entry about the actual trip to Indianapolis and the events of GenCon 2012. This was a very long Monday, due to the flight delays and the like, but I'm just glad I got home that day and didn't have to spend a night in Toronto, or Goddess help me, Indianapolis.
In any event, I'll be writing just one more post about this year's GenCon, a retrospective of sorts, some thoughts on the convention, and a pair of photos of my loot from the convention.
As always, thoughts and comments are much appreciated. :)