You know your epic vacation weekend is epic is when you begin it Broadway style. The night before, I watched Miss Saigon in Redondo Beach for the fourth time. Mesmerized by the legendary show, I could not get a wink of sleep on Wednesday. I had to leave for LAX at 4:30AM to catch my flight. After printing out my tickets for United, dad and I rushed to LAX. I hoped to get sleep on the flight. Well, I was able to sneak in a nap.

Meanwhile in San Jose from Tom:
I found myself on a couple fences the night before the Acen flight at 6AM. Should I stay at the airport or at home? Should I stay up all night or catch some Zs? I wound up spending the wee hours playing "The World Ends With You." At 4:30AM, I left the room and noticed my younger brother playing some online computer game. Normally, that wouldn't be something to note. But since I found him at the same place doing the same thing when I last saw him at midnight, I took more notice. Remind me to talk to him when I come home.

I arrived at the airport at 5AM, checked in my baggage in less than five minutes, then waited nearly an hour to get past security. Luckily, I didn't miss my flight. Even luckier, I managed to sleep through the in-flight torture known as "27 Dresses."

I arrived in O Hare at noon Chicago time. I was ready for a long nap in the hotel room. The first thing I saw in O Hare was a poster for Jersey Boys playing in Chicago. Let me tell you, Jersey Boys promotions everywhere! I fangirled. After much squeeing, I met up with our hotelmate, Patrick. An hour later, Tom came into town and met us at baggage claim. We all got lost looking for the car in the parking lot.

We drove off to Chicago's own Giordano's. Though I was running on no sleep, it was great to finally have some authentic deep dish pizza. Yum!

We went to our hotel, the Hyatt Regency. It was not bad finding a parking space. Yet, there was an intruder in the parking lot. Tom and Patrick discovered the enemy Autobot and proceeded to write, "Decepticons Superior." on it. We checked in to our room on the 9th floor. We knew that the weekend would consist of a hell of a wait for the elevators. I was able to take a nice neko nap as we were watching Dreamgirls.

After watching Dreamgirls, it was time to do some exploring of our own. There was a doll meet up at 9PM. We decided to go across the street to the convention center. Press badges wouldn't be given out until the next day. The convention was doing a free screning of Speed Racer. It was tempting, but we were still drained from the flight over to Chicago to hit the movie theaters. it was a bit of a walk.

We stuck around the Hyatt Lobby, taking pictures of the Day Zero cosplayers. There were quite a few roaming around. We were very much impressed by the originality and series that were represented. For a second, Tom and I thought we were the only active Nadia cosplayers in the United States until we ran into a Gargoyle. Tom has not seen a Haunted Junction group in almost ten years!

We finally ran into someone who had dolls set up in the hallway. It was a very small meet up. Yet, it was nice to share stories and to talk dolls with someone from out of state. We decided to call it a night once the clock struck 11PM.

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