We started out early today. I was so excited last night about taking a vacation at AX that I hardly got enough sleep–three and a half hours. Apparently, I wasn’t the only one who didn’t get any sleep. Also, Lawrence was sick with a cold. Adrian came to pick me up around 6:40 am. We left around 7 to pick up Lawrence and then to the Metrolink station. Just like last year, we took the Metrolink. It was a smooth ride. We arrived at Union Station around 9:30, took the Dash and arrived at the Westin Bonaventure around 10.



We took a little breather in the room. It felt like we did a lot already and couldn’t believe it’s still mid-morning. According to plan, Adrian and I went grocery shopping for our weeks-worth of supplies while Lawrence went back to the hotel to get some rest and sleep. The Downtown Ralph’s we went to was awesome. It was like another world in there. It was so clean, something we didn’t expect from Downtown. We got our supplies and headed back after an hour of running around. You see, we were supposed to have done this last year, but didn’t.



After resting again, Adrian and I took a little trip to Little Tokyo. We didn’t have to, but it was to kill some time until time to get our badges at the convention center. Lawrence stayed again to sleep and rest. When we arrived in Little Tokyo, we didn’t bother with the main plaza. I only wanted to go to Kinokuniya to look for a FM Magazine, which I haven’t bought since last summer. After the bookstore, we relaxed at the local cafe drinking iced café mochas because of the downtown heat. We picked up a few more snacks at the market and headed back. Now we’re waiting for Tim to show up after he called and told us he missed to 2:45 train. Bummer! He left from Bernardino instead.



Tim finally arrived. We spotted him walking down the street from our room. As soon as he arrived, we all took the Dash to the convention center to get out badges. We were all exited to get our badges early so that we don’t have to wait in the very, very long pre-registration lines on the actual first day of Expo. Wrong! As soon as we entered the convention center and followed the registration lines, we saw a huge, huge, HUGE crowd. That was the pre-reg line! So I guess that’s the beginnings to line waiting. It had to start somewhere, so why not the day before? It was a quick two hour wait. During one point in the line, groups were split up into smaller lines for the actual registration. Lawrence went to the closest line, while the rest of us went to the furthest line because it was the shortest of the six smaller lines. Bad decision. Lawrence was way ahead of us because he had the faster line. We, in turn, had the slowest line. When we arrived at the front, the person dictating when to use registration computers let two people or two groups of people use two of the six available computers. While in the other lines, all six of their computers were constantly begin used. WTF! After we got our badges, we relaxed in front of the convention center until it got real cold, then we took the shuttle bus back to the hotel. Woohoo! Cup-O-Noodles for dinner!!!