Some important context: avoid the increasingly hellish traffic up and down I-95, we charted a winding alternate route up through rural Virginia to approach DC from the West.  For the MOST part, it worked out really well… minus some sketchy GPS directions at a few points.  Now, to be fair, PART of the problem was that I’d turned off the “no, seriously, DON’T try to send us down a toll road” setting at one point and neglected to turn it back on, so it kept trying to “help” by diverting us to a faster route.  And I’m sure being out in the boonies wasn’t great for phone reception, which probably didn’t help either.  But still, I’m not exaggerating when I say the thing would explicitly TELL us to turn left while simultaneously SHOWING us a right, then flip out when we chose poorly.  Technology making our lives easier and more convenient.

But yeah!  That’s it for Otakon 2023!  …EXCEPT IT’S NOT!  Yes, there’s still a few more Otakon memories left that’ll be going up on Patreon in the coming weeks.  And not just comics, either!  There’s one bit that I couldn’t squeeze into drawing form, so it’ll be a big ‘ol blog post!  Remember back when I used to do THOSE regularly?  …and no, all those free Halloween movie blogs don’t count.  Anyway, become a patron and get even more Otakon stuff, among other things!

And speaking of other things, CONVENTIONAL WISDOM’S GOT ANOTHER CONVENTION COMING UP!  That’s right, if it seems like I’m wrapping up the Otakon stuff really quickly, it’s only because I am.  Very much to my own surprise, Otakon isn’t the ONLY convention making a belated return to the schedule.  Next weekend, I’m gonna be at Anime Weekend Atlanta again!  This was very much NOT in the plans when this year started, but a perfect storm of circumstances came together in JUST the right way after I got back from Otakon, so now 2023 is seeing the return of TWO conventions I haven’t been to in five years!  And I’m not even sleeping in a van this time!  Stay tuned for more updates in the coming days!