Well, that didn’t go as planned.

We were to leave for Seattle around noon on Thursday, but just before zero hour, Ed informed me he was sick. I was torn between sympathy and rage, with rage and self-pity winning the battle (I am a flawed individual and the world’s worst nurse). After waffling back and forth for almost 4 hours (“I’m fine! No wait, I feel like hell. No, I’m okay to go! Oh wait I’m going to barf. To PAX! er .. To BED!” and so on and so forth), we were on our way – I drove, while Ed was miserable and stubborn in the passenger seat. We questioned many times his ability to actually PAX and make it out alive, but he insisted on going.

We did one day of PAX, very very slowly. It was fun, but it left me wanting more – having the Saturday would have been nice, but I think I would have wanted the whole thing. Ed and I have been PAX’ing for years now (except last year), but this was the first year I actually knew other people there. Each year I try to talk my friends into going, but each year they bail so we end up doing PAX alone – fun, but ultimately lonely and kind of hollow. I’ve never been to a PAX party, have never been to a concert, have never done much more than one day of wandering .. and I’m tired of it. I didn’t realize how much I wanted to actually SOCIALIZE this year until it was taken away, and then I was sad.

We came home on Saturday, after selling our remaining passes. Ed is better – he was pretty much fine by Saturday morning, but by then it was too late to do anything about it.

I am so fucking glad August is over – it’s been just the worst month ever. I’m not normally one to wallow in disappointment, but they’ve just been non-stop for the last 5 weeks or so: never ending goodbyes at work, rejection, steamrolling, frustration, baffling references to cake and crying babies, small setbacks transforming into mega disasters, a stupid haircut that refuses to grow into something cute .. just bad times, seemingly for 31 days straight. Now it’s September, which is historically one of my favourite months .. interesting secret things are coming up, including something that might change things .. FOREVER.

Plus, those boots I ordered are awesome.

I barely saw PAX at all, but there were a few things that piqued my interest:

• Extraction is an FPS made by the guys who did Enemy Territory, and it looks amazing. It brings back my beloved Stopwatch Mode, is set in London (albeit a sad and destroyed one), and will apparently be free to play
• Neverending Nightmares looks CREEPY AS HELLLLLL and I love the art style. I Kickstarted it right at PAX coz I liked the creep factor so much.
• New Adventure Time game? An RPG? OKAY!
• Murdered: Soul Survivor looks kinda cool, and I totally got murdered
• Maybe it started last year, but it seems like game developers FINALLY realized that nerds have a lot of money they will throw at anything containing references to their favourite games: many booths, small and large alike, had stores set up. I was pleased about this, because I was spending my sad away and also I got a Vault 101 hoodie from the Bethesda booth which I absolutely adore so good on you, game devs.
• umm .. other stuff.

Tomorrow is Labour Day, but I’m working which is sorta appropriate (if dumb and my own fault).