Well, it finally happened. After having the dream put off once before in May, the singularity of Lumi and I in the same place was born. And let me tell you, it was an epic trip filled with danger, crazy, and a whole mess of ponies. Let's start at the beginning known as May.

Lumi and I had bonded in the crucible known as May 2013 - a hellish time drowned in a whole bunch of bullcrap. We had floated the idea of meeting during my trip to Austin onto the table, but it just did not work out. Fast forward a couple of months and I found that my summer plans had changed entirely, and the possibility of going to BronyCon 2013 had moved from zero to a nonzero value. It essentially boiled down to this: did I want to spend a weekend sitting at my comp, or did I want to go to Baltimore and celebrate my friend's birthday with arguably the greatest event in the fandom? The answer was pretty damn obvious. The game was.... ahoof.

On Friday, things could not have been more anxiety provoking. I had to wait until work ended. (Has no vacation time until Dec and can't get away with much). Storms were rolling through Chicago all day, and the threat of the flight being canceled or delayed was high. In fact, I was delayed for 45 minutes; however, given that particular evening, it was lucky we got out at all. But once I landed, things were easy. I caught a cab, got to my hotel, and then the fun began.

I promptly made my way to Room 1223 of the Sheraton -- conveniently located across the street and started the festivities the only way I knew how once Luminescence threw open that door. "Hello Amby.... I heard you wanted to break me with feels." And that is when the laughter commenced. Poor Zoop. Poor, poor Zoop. There he was, finally able to get some sleep, and I bust through the door. He kicked me out by the way. "I love you Wing, but get the fuck out." So rude. Undeniable... although hilarious. I cried myself to sleep. Not really. It was a fun time.

The following morning, Lumi and Skygunner awoke crazy early to escort me to the registration line. I'm sure you can imagine the crazy laughter between Lumi and myself. Skygunner was Nightmare Moon, and with his own particular brand of soul-crushing sarcasm dripping from his lips, he played the part well. We showed up early enough that there was no line. Marco ended up meeting us there, at which point I delivered to him the microphone of power. He looked absolutely shitfaced when I gave it to him. The guy had no idea how to react. It was hilarious.

From there, we started the line for the vendor hall. Lumi and I did some hardcore character science while the crowd gathered. At some point, we spilled in to the huge room and went to town. The artists were - for the most part - wonderful human beings. There was one, though, who was a bit rude. Skygunner and I went to his table at one point in the day and complimented him on his style. His response was, "That's what makes me famous," at which point I swiftly departed. I had much more fun talking to 'The Soap Lady', FireBrand, the PWTS people, the owner of the corset store, spittfireart, the paper pony folks, and Sophie Cabra. I'm probably forgetting people in there. Oh well...

Later that night, I wandered off with a large group of people to the MLP Forums Donor/Staff/WTFITWAS dinner. There was a great deal of confusion at the start. Lumi forged the way through fire to get us there. X3 The night was quite eventful. Lugia's RD plush decided to stalk me while eating. I eulogized for melted butter on film, and upon returning to the convention center, M. A. Larson photobombed the crap out of us. Did I mention nachos? Yes... yes we did. Those at the Poniverse dinner formed a giant circle on the convention center floor and attempted to sacrifice Luminescence in the center of the circle. The shield would have none of that. We fled into the upper decks and spent quite some time wandering around L&W style. Aww yeah.

Sunday was also quite interesting. Skygunner and I departed early for the vendor hall. I wanted commissions, and there was a particular mission that I wanted to accomplish. Two actually. The day before, Skygunner had purchased a Braeburn painting from the Sophiecabra store. It had a Big Mac accompanying piece, which for some reason Sky didn't want to buy. The moment was aptly described by Lugia as follows: Wing grabbed the piece, reached into his pocket, threw a wad of money at the vendor, and gave the pic to Sky. Trolling successful. I am a horrible troll... lol

Now, Sunday was also Lumi's birthday, which meant something special was in order. Also, Zoop seemed a little.. well pissy. He did tell me to get the fuck out after all, so I knew something had to be done. I went and commissioned this glorious piece of Luminescence and Keystone (Zoop's OC) eating cake. This is Skype RP canon and was needed. (It can be seen here:http://www.ponywearsthesaddle.com/ -- it's the obvious one ) Skygunner set up the method of delivery and then it was on. We led Lumi and Zoop to the soap lady, which was across the aisle from PWTS. I slipped over, grabbed it, and came back stating, "Look at what I found." The two of them sat there in silence for an obnoxious length of time until Lumi finally plucked the drawing from my hand. Mission complete.

I also manged to pick up two commissions of Wingpony, which is just true awesome, and that covers that. Following the close of the vendor hall, a large number of us went back to the Lumi-Zoop-Sky-Jonke room to watch the "dreaded" Equestria Girls. Whether you liked it or not, the company was certainly enjoyable and it was sad when we were once again kicked out. Zoop said it to me again, btw. What a meanie. X3 Fox had to hug me god knows how many times, and the number of Oh Yeahs that left my mouth was downright asinine.

I was lucky enough to have company on Monday. I went over the the LZSJ room before Lumi, Zoop, and Jonke took off. I finally got my revenge on Zoop by telling him to get the fuck out of his own room. We all shared in the laughter, had some hugs, etc. Skygunner and I spent several more hours together walking around Inner Harbor. We went on the Constellation and took an obnoxious number of pictures for "Bronies on Ships". We then went to "the shipwreck", which turned out to be nothing more than a mast in the ground. Hence, "Bronies at Horrible Memorials". At the airport, I was definitely feeling a bit mopey though. I had a surprising amount of fun -- not because I wasn't expecting amusement, but because it had been such a long time since I felt that way. For three days, I was 17 again. It was great.

Just when I was feeling these vibes, I look up to see Marco, his mom, and Elvis walking down the corridor. We talked until it was time for me to board my plane, and hopefully Marco's mom won't be creeped out by the community any longer. I think we effectively killed that, fillies and colts. X3 I made it home safely --- kinda: my tire blew out on the interstate -- and have a lifetime of memories.