July 31, 2015
Thanks to everyone who participated, this was a lot of (good, cheap) fun for me and I hope for you too!
I’m sharing some of the postcards you sent / received here from those of you who emailed afterward. If you didn’t share and you still want to, feel free to email me images of the postcards you received and I’ll add them here.
Want to go again? Or want in on the next round? Let me know in the comments!
July 29, 2015
Badge purchasing was organized by lottery system.
Hotel booking was a lottery system.
Parking passes were sold on a lottery system.
It’s a flipping miracle that we got passes, secured a hotel room through the lottery system for friends, and secured a parking pass.
Our rental vehicle was booked for the week and I let out a sigh of relief on June 28th. All was set, I thought. Then I quickly sucked it back in because with my luck….
Sure enough, I’d booked the wrong dates for the rental and rebooking was estimated to be $1800. A panicked call to Enterprise + a reasonable service rep = corrected booking. Whew.
Oh wait.
At the last minute, our lodging plans changed and we needed to book a hotel for ourselves. Two weeks before Comic-Con. Now THAT was a hoot. 99% of the hotels in our desired region were booked out and the hotels that were available were the Embassy Suites for $800/night, the Doubletree for $900/night and the Indigo for $1800/night. Awesome.
We needed both a baby and pet friendly hotel and I was not paying over $500 a night for four nights of an average hotel that would then charge for parking and a pet fee for Seamus, no way, no how!
Ten hours of searching, and 6 bookings later, we booked an average hotel somewhat near downtown that didn’t have recent reports of bedbugs. (Ugh!) Clearly, our standards had changed. And it was going to cost nearly $1700 for the whole stay. *clutch throat* I’ve never spent that much on an entire trip to SDCC, forget just on hotel! But it was a last minute change, it couldn’t be helped, and I refused to let it ruin our plans. One side effect of having been a extra frugal Con goer, and spending next to nothing on hobbies, is that our savings are absolutely solid and our cash flow can bear a hiccup or two even in the four digit range.
Packing was a bummer this year because I still don’t fit most of my clothes and that includes my standard Con wardrobe of geeky shirts.
Left: BADGED! Right: a fantastic cosplay (I didn’t know the character, unfortunately).
We didn’t get Preview Night for Wednesday which, in retrospect, was for the best. Logistics were already well nigh incomprehensible, trying to make it to town and ready to hit the floor on Wednesday would have been excruciating stress.
Thursday was our first day on the floor and it was yet another bust: Seamus hurt his paws before we left. While one paw was responding to home treatment, the other significantly deteriorated in just the two days since we left San Francisco. I made the call to give up an afternoon at Con and take him to a San Diego vet to head off a major infection. I was grouchy about the loss of floor time but it was the right call. He responded to the medications overnight, allowing his paw to actually start healing. Hallelujah! And it was “only” $110.
With Seamus all set, we headed out Friday for our full day on site with a lighter step and clear conscience. Despite all the missteps and mishaps leading up to this day, it was wonderful.
Left: I’m really not sure what’s happening here. A unicorn/centaur Colonel (KFC)? Right, top: Ashley on the Iron Throne (Game of Thrones Experience) Right, bottom: Tribbles! All photos courtesy of @ashleyserena
The Kelly Sue headed panel on writing, and then on their company Milkfed Criminal Masterminds, were both fantastic.
We browsed a discount TPBs booth where I impulse bought $45 worth of comics for myself and a friend. Browsing wasn’t even on the list of things I thought we’d have the freedom to do but LB was so incredibly cooperative. Ze was just hanging out, enjoying the sights and sounds, and it was awesome. I picked up gifts for three people and got myself a new t-shirt. We took a dozen pictures of LB and PiC hanging out and having a good old time, and had silly pictures taken at promo booths.
I was sad to miss the panel with Congressman John Lewis, the last surviving member of the “Big 6” from the civil rights movement, who marched in Selma on Bloody Sunday. Even typing that makes me tear up at what people had to go through to be treated like humans. But I’m really happy that it happened.
There were many other fun and wonderful things this year, and we missed many of our regular visits (Marian Call’s concerts, for one) but this trip renewed our enjoyment of the event. Every year we’re aware it might be our last, but as long as we can go, we will.
July 27, 2015
What is it with people who feel like their sole purpose is to educate on the Right Way to Mother? Not Parent, because I notice these folks don’t ever lecture PiC on parenting, just Mothering. I’ve asked him, he’s puzzled that this keeps happening.
Some people think that because I’m a first time mom, everything I do or worry about is because I’m a first time mom and scoff at my decisions as that of a rank amateur. My life experience, my values, and my ability to evaluate a situation and make a decision were evidently all switched off once a child passed through the birth canal. Nope, it’s all new-mom nerves now! I’m a trembling, jello-jiggly wreck of an excuse for an adult now. Be forewarned!
Other people think that just because they now have experience with their first child, everything that happened to them is absolutely canon and will happen to me.
The latest round was a first time father who thinks, nay, insists! that we must get our wee Bean into a daycare or professional care as soon as possible because, as he puts it, the “separation anxiety will only get worse”. He lectured me soundly on how he’s speaking from experience, and that what he hears from me about finding a suitable carer, it’s “already a problem” because “no one is good enough.”
Mind, he didn’t bother to listen to what constitutes a suitable care provider. He just assumed that because this is our first go-round, we’re incapable – or rather, I’m incapable – of allowing an experienced person take care of our progeny. It’s clearly because I’m a first time mom that I object to bad judgment and blatant negligence or unreliable people. If I had another, I wouldn’t be so foolish as to insist on someone who can care for LB safely and reliably.
Be proud of me for not rolling my eyes so hard they could have doubled for gyroscopes.
Instead of nodding and smiling, which might have shut him up but I doubt it, I mildly noted that I don’t, in fact, have issues with relying on people to help with LB. I could see that he was ratherput out by my inability to just take his well meaning but totally unwelcome and misplaced advice.
Certainly people and children have separation anxiety but I’ll not be railroaded into believing that we’re fated to endure weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth if I don’t give LB the boot now.
LB gets on well with new people, with or without me and PiC in the immediate vicinity. We make it a point to take hir and Seamus out to meet people so that ze can enjoy new faces and new voices. Ze loves the sound of new languages and enjoys a good “flying LB” no matter who administers it.
Sure, we’ll get some things wrong. But you know what? Every parent does. This is the first time we’re raising this child, and we’re doing our best for our child. People who think that we (I) don’t know what we’re doing because this is our first time at this rodeo can get stuffed.
As any parent worth their salt will tell you: every child is different. You learn more techniques that might work with each new one but that doesn’t mean you’ve unlocked the secrets to all children, forever.
If any parent shares their stories with me, I’m happy to hear them. I’m happy to extract useful techniques from those stories. Moralizing at me and outright telling me that my knowledge, skills, and life experience are worthless next to your one experience with your own child and family, though, that just gets my goat. It reminds me of that uncle who spent half my grandmother’s funeral lecturing me on the importance of getting into a good college. I was 24, graduated already, and had been supporting my family for oh, 5 -7 years by then. We don’t speak anymore.
Seems to me that people are all eager to proclaim their right to their own values, morals, or beliefs but completely fail to recognize that they ought to then respect the rights of others to think for themselves.
Though, if people quit annoying me, whatever would I write about? 😉
:: Surely, I’m not the only one blitzed with unsolicited fodder, am I?
:: EDIT: I should note, in both instances, the well-meaning father and the uncle, I wasn’t asking for help or advice or even talking about the subject they brought up. They cornered me, said hello, and then started lecturing. In the parenting case, he basically told me that I was doing it wrong (though he didn’t know how I was doing it) and that his way is the only way. That’s the thing that puts my back up.
When I post here, I welcome your thoughts and comments whether it be advice or something else!
July 24, 2015
Short story: “Sorta.”
As not the most helpful PF blogger ever, I took a most laissez-faire approach to saving on newborn and infant expenses. I set up Amazon Prime/Subscribe & Save orders for diapers after price comparing the Swaddlers we use to Target prices.
PiC won’t let me switch because he insists he needs the yellow/blue stripe and I’m not gonna argue with the guy who always says it’s his turn to get up with the baby tonight. We might save a hundred bucks or so over several months of diapers but that wouldn’t buy me sleep.
We happen to love the Amazon branded wipes and they’re the same cost as the best bulk price at 2¢/wipe. Fine. We save on having it shipped free so we’re not wasting time and gas.
Sticking to breast milk as much as possible.
LB eats like a fiend, anywhere between 20-30 ounces a day, and I can provide from 50-90% of that depending on the day’s yield. Formula costs nearly $1/oz so we can see that I’m saving us an average of $20/day. This is a lucky choice: not everyone can breastfeed and I choose to because I can.
We did buy a handful of bottle brushes at $2.50/each. It’s necessary to keep the bottles and nipples clean and sterile.
Almost everything else is optional or preloved.
We have some baby soap and ze is bathed about twice a week to fend off that old shoe funk.
Almost all hir clothes, towels, cloths, gear and toys are hand me downs. Ze has a lovely pile of books to look at (and try to eat) and a couple sets of blocks to play with when ze gets older.
Of four hand me down baby carriers, we picked out the two that fit us each best and didn’t splurge on the lovely $200 wrap sling thing that I yearned for.
We don’t do baby swings but we have a reclining chair that was handed down. The wipes warmer was a luxury concession on baby real estate and also a hand me down. We don’t use it anymore since ze has gotten old enough not to have five changes in the middle of the night.
Everyone kept insisting the Diaper Genie was a Must Have. We just used the plastic bags that the diapers came in, still smelling faintly fresh, as a trash bag and take it out daily. One benefit of living where we are, the dumpster is easily accessible and doesn’t stink up the place.
We’re staying within our allotted cash flow pretty well, only dipping dangerously low in the checking account once or twice when I pulled a large sum out for retirement contributions.
July 22, 2015
My brokerage account is held at TradeKing. Referral Bonus: Open an account, fund with $3,000 and place 3 trades within 90 days, we both get $50!
1. I buy what I like.
2. I look for good dividends.
3. Keep costs low.
We had a great blip in February, one of our holdings decided to pay out a special dividend. A second stock split, which didn’t affect anything monetarily, but I get a temporary thrill seeing that we own “more” (only in absolute value but not more proportionally).
Thanks to the special dividend, this is our highest earning year in the way of dividends yet! Over $400. And it’s just all going back into stocks when I make our next purchase. The goal is that someday we’ll can live off the dividends from these holdings, which are just one part of my long-term plan and portfolio.
July 20, 2015
Here’s a thing that irked me. I took high school biology. I took AP Biology. I took even more biology in college. And I learned the following timelines for gestation:
Mice, 20 days
Humans, 9 months
Elephants, 640-645 days
I can do math, too: 9 months x 4 weeks = 36 weeks.
So imagine my surprise when sometime last year, I learned that “carrying to term”, you know, to completion, was actually 40 weeks. That’s 10 months, folks. That’s not 9 months – what are we doing to our youth telling them that a full human pregnancy is only 9, when it’s actually 10?? [Ok, my outrage is just on my own behalf.]
Experienced parents may ask, to paraphrase one of my favorite shows, “what’s really the difference between 9 months and 10 months?”
To which I paraphrase-answer: it’s a WHOLE OTHER MONTH!
It makes a difference!
At 35 weeks:
I’d be one week away from being done.
I was remarkably unwieldy but every time I think “nearly there!” someone moves the goal posts. First it’s “LB could come at 36 weeks, no problem!” Then it’s “It’d really be better if LB came no earlier than 37 weeks!” Then, “38 weeks is really better …” This was extra time for me to get even more clumsy, folks, which I didn’t think was possible! (update: more unwieldy? Yes. More clumsy? Actually not possible.)
Under the new system, I had five weeks left.
The WHOLE 5 weeks remain fraught because it could still happen at any minute. I was surrounded by “oh I delivered at 33 weeks. I delivered at 35 weeks. I delivered 4 weeks early and had nothing ready!”
At 38 weeks, I see that we’re still working on some pretty important stuff that maybe should have been taken care of earlier:
“His lungs continue to mature and produce more and more surfactant, a substance that prevents the air sacs in his lungs from sticking to one another once he starts to breathe. Most other changes this week are small but important: He’s continuing to add fat and fine-tuning his brain and nervous system (so he can deal with all the stimulation that awaits him once he makes his entrance into the world).”
Sigh.
We were not concerned about physical-things readiness. LB had a place to sleep, a box of diapers, a stack of clothing and a car seat. Those are pretty much the things you need to bring the newborn home. Also a name would be good. But if LB arrived Week 35, it wouldn’t be a big deal in terms of stuff.
It’s just that for our peace of mind, in the disaster zone of Craigslist-bound stuff and all the donations and crap that our place had become, this stuff needed to begone before LB arrived lest we go right off the deep end.
One, I can’t stand being surrounded by so much stuff. Two, cleaning is going to be the last thing on our minds with a (potentially squalling) infant to tend to, ’round the clock.
I don’t know why we keep saying pregnancy is 9 months but here’s my plea: stop!
Update: I’m laughing at having written this months ago when still pregnant and never re-editing it after. Note to self, mathing is different when your brain is extremely preoccupied with creating a new creature.
July 17, 2015
For a hermit/homebody, I’ve sure been doing a lot of travel deals scouting.
It’s a restless, bargain hunting soul that’s trying to rev up the trip planning machine. There’s nothing quite so satisfying as nailing a deal combination that gets you to a Must See Destination for way less than expected. Add to that the desire to travel before the Wiggle Worm doesn’t fly free anymore and you get a particular sense of urgency. So I figure why the hell not? I’ll figure out how to juggle travel and work and an increasingly active baby.
Destinations we’re stalking bargains for now through 2016: San Diego, Hawaii, Seattle, Asia, Chicago.
***
All my flights of fancy trips are big time-consuming things, requiring lots of time off and probably a lot of patience, possibly more than either of us have. No reason not to dream, though, right?
Someday trips:
Take the whole family on a road trip across the States. Take a few months to do it properly and go through: the Eastern Seaboard (visit friends, eat seafood), Louisiana (visit friends, eat seafood), Tennessee (visit friends, eat BBQ), Montana (just because), Iowa (visit friends, food?), Utah (I’m told the drive is spectacular, but what food is there?), Colorado (visit friends, food suggestions?). I think other states were suggested on Twitter: Massachusetts, Kentucky, Washington. Am I missing any?
Australia for a month. Maybe Australia + New Zealand for 6 weeks? I’m hearing that food is expensive in at least Australia, though, which isn’t awesome because travel is all about food for me.
Japan for a month for all the Japanese food I can think of, particularly sushi. Katherine at Feather Factor has blogged about some really neat ryokan I’d love to try.
Iceland. Peru. Thailand (again). Italy (again). Galapagos.
***
Then again, I get the yearning for home after two weeks abroad, almost like clockwork, so maybe these month(s)-long journeys aren’t truly my cup of tea. The trek across the States could happen if we got truly brave and did an RV, maybe, so Seamus could come with us. Missing home is much worse when missing the dog is part of the mix. Being away is much better when your whole chosen family’s with you.
This website and its content are copyright of A Gai Shan Life | © A Gai Shan Life 2025. All rights reserved.
Site design by 801red