Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

In 2019 my wife Anne and I attended our very first Dragon Con in Atlanta, Georgia, one of the longest-running science fiction conventions in America. We once again made the eight-hour drive from Indianapolis and returned for our fourth nonconsecutive Labor Day weekend at that amazing colossal southern spectacle. We can’t conscientiously afford to do D*C every year, but we’ll see how long we can keep up an every-other year schedule before we’re too old or overwhelmed to handle it…

…and it all comes down to this: everything else we did at the show across our 2½ days that didn’t involve cosplay or actors. Comics! Shopping! Panels! Shrines! Et cetera!

For budgetary and time-saving reasons we combined D*C and our annual road trip into a single eight-day vacation, same as we’d done for our first D*C in 2019. By the time we got into town Thursday afternoon we’d already gone sightseeing in Huntsville and in central Georgia before we doubled back north to Atlanta. So our energy levels weren’t exactly at their peak. As an added complication, I didn’t book our hotel till April 2025 (a mere four months before showtime, like a FOOL), by which time all the nearest lodging was full or even more overpriced than where we wound up — the Hilton Garden Inn Atlanta Downtown, which I think of more succinctly as the Other Hilton, over by the aquarium. (As opposed to the shorter-named Hilton Atlanta, which is one of D*C’s host hotels). Even if I’d booked sooner, the fact that we only attend every other year makes it next to impossible for us to nab a more convenient “legacy” reservation in any of the host hotels or even their nearest competitors.

The Other Hilton was a perfectly fine stay, but its location at a remove meant we’d have to start every morning with a half-mile walk through Centennial Olympic Park without shade just to reach the edge of the downtown-wide “show floor”. In our favor, temps were unseasonably cool all weekend long. Meteorologically speaking, this was our most merciful D*C yet.

Thursday afternoon the traffic up I-75/I-85 was as awful as ever — as many as eight lanes in each direction and all of them backed up. We checked into the Other Hilton at 3:30 and Anne waited patiently while I took a much-needed shower (long story) before we walked the seven blocks over to the Courtland Grand Hotel, the traditional spot for badge pickup. The line wrapped around the building as usual, but also moved as quickly as usual. As if to help us transition into the right frame of mind, we passed a busker playing “Duel of the Fates” on accordion.

We had our badges in hand by 5:15, picked up a few keepsakes from the con’s own merch booth, and availed ourselves of the food truck party in the Courtland’s lot. I enjoyed freshly fried fish from SoFISHticated, while Anne — still stuffed after a barbecue lunch in Pine Mountain — contented herself with a peach mango lemon drink from Lil Rhody’s Frozen Lemonade.

At 7 pm.. we attended our first panel, right there in the Courtland: “Dragon Con 104: Tips & Tricks from Con Elders to Newbies”. Sure, this was our fourth time, but we still don’t know every possible thing about the complete D*C experience. D*C is large, it contains multitudes.

We knew some of what they covered, but still had more to learn. Among the topics:

• The wise “4-2-1” baseline rule — every attendee ought to get at least four hours’ sleep, two meals, and one shower per day. (At the LEAST.)
• Recommendations for useful health-related products such as ZBiotics (a hangover minimizer) and PartyLyte (for electrolytes).
• Quiet places to take breaks from the chaos — e.g., the Art Show, the charity coloring room, certain eateries away from the main thoroughfares.
• The importance and availability of cosplay medics — dozens of unpaid volunteers who wander D*C with supplies for helping cosplayers with emergency costume repairs on the go. (Every con needs to start encouraging these.)
• How to get “fast passes” to attend comic-book panels in Americas Mart 2, whose endless, singular entrance line is a discouraging obstacle.
• Pleas to avoid using the constantly clogged hotel elevators if you don’t have to use them, plus vehement reminders that the old “go up to go down” elevator game that works well in some busier establishments (e.g., my own workplace) is now against D*C rules and can cost you your badge.
• The importance of rest over FOMO.

…and more, more, more, informative and enlightening and fun. And I’m not just saying that because they were giving out badge ribbons. Afterward, in the spirit of the panel I had us try something we’d never seen before: we crossed the street to the Courtland’s parking garage, took an elevator up to the seventh floor, and walked the skybridge that crosses high above the next block and connects to the Peachtree Center food court on the next block beyond that. We’d never used it before. It was a nice way of bypassing a stretch of downtown Atlanta’s hilly streets, which can make long walks even more challenging.

D*C offers a complimentary shuttle service that we’d never used before, but those wouldn’t begin running till late Friday morning. The nighttime walk back to the Other Hilton was long, dark, and not the most charming. No one attacked us or even glared at us menacingly, though as we walked the park’s perimeter we were treated to the cute sight of two cosplayers as Dr. Strange and the Scarlet Witch entertaining a few local youngsters. Across the street, the World of Coca-Cola also looked cooler at night, but our attempted pics of it suck. I blame our exhaustion.

Friday morning we took our sweet time dragging ourselves out of bed. We overpaid to stuff ourselves at the hotel breakfast buffet, just in case we didn’t make time for lunch later. (And that’s exactly what happened.) Based on past experiences we knew we’d need to hit Americas Mart 2 first thing — the commerce center that hosts Artists Alley on the top floor and the official vendors’ hall that completely takes up the other three stories. Due to compounded lethargy we didn’t join the line till 9:00, behind some six million others. We’re usually much better at early arrival at other shows. Sometimes we’re the ones who start con entrance lines. This time…well, as we just learned, rest is more important than FOMO.

The line had looped inside the Mart’s parking garage before we found the end and could finally stand still and commence waiting. A badge ribbon swap-meet with our line-buddies helped pass the time. Badge ribbons are such a huge part of the D*C fan experience that this time we brought our own to trade with others. (Anne tried this first at a couple other shows last year, including Creation’s big Star Trek to Chicago show and Galaxycon Columbus. She delighted a few attendees, but the practice hasn’t yet taken the Midwest by storm.) We also enjoyed chatting with a recent Trek convert, who in turn educated us in the ways of the hot new video game Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, which explained why we saw so many folks dressed in red berets and mime costumes. (If you don’t know, you don’t want me to explain it.)

The Mart opened at 10:00; we got inside surprisingly quickly at 10:15 and took all the escalators up to Artists Alley for what we rightly feared would be our only walk-through this year. Quite a few creators weren’t at their tables yet, but we had the pleasure of meeting a few folks.

Not pictured: artist Tana Ford! I met her at C2E2 2019 and…I’m annoyed to find just now that we failed to take a photo of her at that show. Back then she’d just wrapped up the Dark Horse miniseries LaGuardia with writer Nnedi Okorafor; this occasion was the launch party for the same team’s latest project, The Space Cat.

Also not pictured: an associate of William Shatner and You!, the Star Trek legend’s next book, which will apparently be about his own fans. The associate handed out postcards inviting anyone who pre-orders it by December 31st to submit their story to him online (150 words max) about how one of his characters touched their lives (“whether it’s Star Trek or Boston Legal or even The Transformed Man!”). A select few will then personally be interviewed for the book by Shatner himself. This means you’ll have to pre-order the book before he’s finished writing all this down, but still.

Not actually tabling at Artists Alley per se, I think: some guy with a slightly gym-teacher demeanor was offering badge ribbons to anyone who could do at least one push-up.

As you’d expect, the vendors’ halls their share of sights and wonders and merch among the hundreds of purveyors of geek goodness. We took the most pics at the booth of Bricker Builds, a must-see for Lego fans.

…and we were done there by 12:15. We didn’t need to fill up our bags with that much new stuff, which we’d have to lug around town for hours and on the long walk back to the hotel. As it was, the hardcover I bought from Paul Jenkins did my back no favors, though my brain looks forward to reading it.

Our next stop was the 1:00 opening of the Walk of Fame, what D*C calls their actors’ autographing area. After the two-block walk from the Mart to the Marriott we wound up in the Walk’s second overflow line after the first overflow line overflowed, but were ushered through the doors at 1:20 after a reasonable wait. We already recounted our experiences with the celebrities in our first chapter, albeit out of order. At this point we learned Emma Caulfield’s flight had been delayed, which pushed her appearance back to Saturday, and Brandon Routh was at an Arrowverse panel one building over. But for now we were happy to meet Star Trek: Voyager‘s Robert Duncan McNeill (with whom we gabbed about FDR State Park, which we’d just visited the day before) and Star Trek: Discovery‘s extremely friendly Oded Fehr. And I busied myself on my phone while Anne met her all-time favorite actor John de Lancie for the tenth time (by her own count).

We wrapped up our first Walk walk shortly before the Next Generation panel began at 2:30. Most of the line had already been let inside, so we didn’t have much of a wait and were happy to learn the Marriott Atrium Ballroom was huge and had copious seating. If memory serves, I don’t think we’d attended a panel in that particular room before.

Light wandering ensued after that panel. We took more cosplay photos. We rediscovered the bathrooms. We probably reentered the Walk of Fame to verify Routh still wasn’t back yet. We witnessed some of the shrines, which tend to pop up here and there around the con as fans develop bizarre fixations — ironically or otherwise — on various subjects.

At 4:20 we agreed it was time for lunch/dinner at Aviva by Kameel, that lovely Mediterranean restaurant in the Peachtree Center food court that’s a favorite of many a D*C attendee. We’ve eaten there at least once every time we’re in town, and every time its ebullient founder Kameel Srouji has appeared in person to greet customers and announce, “HELLO, MY FRIENDS! I LOVE YOU ALL!” Free samples are often handed out to those waiting in line, sometimes by Kameel himself. This time I got the lamb shawarma and Anne had the rosemary chicken. Once again we enjoyed our best meal of the weekend.

We returned to the Marriott Marquis for our 5:10 jazz-hands photo-op with Karen Fukuhara, and had the pleasure chatting in the short line with a British cosplayer couple about road trips, Niagara Falls and Southern history. Then we went up two floors for a 5:30 fan panel devoted to Andor, winner of multiple Emmy Awards shortly after D*C. Unfortunately we arrived three minutes late behind 150+ other people who’d taken all the seats, leaving it SRO for us stragglers. While Anne sat on the floor against the back wall, I found an empty spot where I could stand and lean against a side wall. I was careful not to knock down the Star Wars banner hanging behind me, unlike one of my fellow standers who had a bit of a dust-up with another banner behind him.

Deprived of the presentation’s visual component, it was like listening to a podcast, which is something I almost never do. Things got better forty minutes in, when a back-wall chair was vacated and a couple of fellow wall-huggers gestured at me, the eldest unseated listener in our corner.

The discussion was about as lively as one might expect from polite speakers trying to compliment a complicated, uncompromising work about the heavy cost of rebellion against tyranny…in a social environment where many attendees were here specifically to think and talk about literally anything in the galaxy except politics. Each panelist talked about the parts of the show they liked best and kept most commentary about real-world allusions no more than ankle-deep, apart from the occasional fatigued wink toward The Way Things Are Going Right Now. The closest comment to “daring” came from one panelist who in one aspect was reminded of “how the GOP left me behind.” No one directly responded to him, but a susurrus of snap judgments registered more than a few decibels among the crowd. And I may have winced visibly when a very nice audience member and probable feminist ally described Luthen’s assistant/partner/boss Kleya (who, let’s be clear, was an astounding performance) as a “strong female character”. It was cool to be around other Star Wars fans, but it wasn’t quite the Paley Center.

Afterward we retreated to the first floor to take advantage of its quieter, less populated bathrooms. Right before we left, saw a Major Trek Actor wisely take the same advantage. Then ’round 7:00 we indulged in our very first Dragon Con shuttle ride, partly because we didn’t want to repeat the long walk back and partly, simply, because we could. The Other Hilton is the first hotel we’ve every stayed at to have its own dedicated shuttle stop right out front. We’d have loved to take the shuttles all the time, but they don’t start running till 10 a.m. on Friday; on Saturday, not till after the end of the cosplay parade.

We learned each “shuttle” is an entire charter bus — refreshingly comfy seats (especially after you’ve been out-‘n’-about for 10+ hours) but no “STOP REQUESTED” signal you can use to alert the driver you’re about to get off, like on our city buses back home. The driver zipped past the first stop at the Aloft without slowing down much, so I made a point of standing up as we neared ours. (I could swear I heard grumbling from another rider, who presumably doesn’t do city buses.) She passed the Shuttle Stop sign and seemed unsure where exactly to pull along the curb, so I tried to point out the front door, though she disregarded my suggestion to crush the SUV that stood between it and us.

We were back in our room by 7:30, after sharing an elevator ride with a newbie couple and giving them badge ribbons.

Saturday I woke up at 4:30 a.m. for no good reason whatsoever and waited another hour or so for Anne to join me. We hit up the hotel breakfast buffet again for lack of viable nearby options and the sake of keeping a tighter timetable. We were in position for the parade by 7:55 and thrived on lovely cool breezes, complemented around 8:30 by the scents of food trucks warming up behind us. (Mmmm, gyros.) Anne made herself comfy on the pavement next to a trashcan, which the city has someone Saran-wrap shut each year before the parade. She tried to avoid broken glass and an ant feast on one side.

Let’s assume you’re well aware of our previous ten chapters about the annual Dragon Con Cosplay Parade (all linked below), during which we took over 800 photos and, in an unexpected setback on my part, inadvertently maxed out the memory card on my camera, which takes much better parade photos than my phone’s camera does for my amateurish methods. After the end of the parade passed us at 11:30, we immediately darted to the stairs across the street up to Peachtree Center in hopes that the CVS carried memory cards. On this day we learned the CVS has a second floor, where we never needed to venture to before. We gave badge ribbons to the nice employee who pointed us up there (she’d already garnered quite a few) and were relieved to find they carry them behind the counter. I haven’t carried a CVS card in ages, but Anne dug her beat-up old card from her billfold, only for their database to show her record hadn’t been updated in ages. It still listed her former last name and our address and landline number from 18 years ago.

After a desperately needed bathroom stop amid the post-parade crowd rush, we rushed back to the bottom floor of the Marriott for our 12:10 photo op with Simon Pegg, then adjourned two floors up to the Walk of Fame. Anne held my place in Simon Pegg’s growing line (for which we’d prepaid for an autograph, so that was a must to get done) while I popped over and met Buffy costar Emma Caulfield, whose flight finally came in.

Back at Pegg’s line I tagged in and Anne tagged out, freeing her up in time for her 1:20 photo-op with frequent Star Trek guest John de Lancie. (Yes, again. It’s her thing.) Pegg had three handlers, one of whom handed me a black badge ribbon with a Shaun of the Dead quote in red letters. he was in quick-signing mode but managed just enough eye contact and responsiveness to mitigate the cattle-call sensation. In this moment, the only time Anne and I were on separate floors during all of D*C, reuniting proved challenging because Anne wasn’t used to locating the escalators without me. Eventually she managed in time for our 1:40 photo-op with the Voyager guys.

The quest to witness Simon Pegg’s 2:30 panel in the Marriott Atrium Ballroom proved more daunting than it should’ve been. Our first-ever experience with that room Friday had been painless because the line had already been admitted in. This time we needed to figure out where the line was, but were a bit confounded at the sign that said it was “outside” with literally no elaboration whatsoever. Apparently “outside” was just one of those presumptuous things that “everyone just KNOWS”, which aggravates me to no end and all but guarantees I’m about to learn a lesson the hard way.

A volunteer misdirected us as to where exactly to line up and vaguely waved toward a juncture that…look, how ’bout I cut what’d probably be a three-paragraph debacle that ended with me nearly getting crushed by a surging crowd that shoved hard enough to knock a button off my bag and sunglasses off someone else, leading to a frightening moment of separation from Anne, a bit of shouting before we made it in, and us eventually sitting toward the back 10-15 minutes after the Q&A had already begun.

Our next event, the Voyager guys’ panel, was in the exact same ballroom. Now that we had been hazed and inducted into the Clique of Everyone Who Just KNOWS What “Outside” Means, we headed out the nearest exit — the glass door to a designated smoking area — down a two-story concrete staircase and clear around to the opposite side of the rather sizable Marriott. We didn’t mind all the walking as long as it’d take us to where we were supposed to go. Following unwritten procedures worked, and our seats were much closer to the stage than our Pegg-panel left-field seats.

Post-Voyager we took one last pass on the Walk of Fame and finally crossed Brandon Routh off my autograph want-list. By this time his line was pretty short. Sometimes waiting till the end of the day works; sometimes actors leave the con early and leave you hanging. Much love to him for sticking it out.

We slowly trudged through hundreds of Marriott partygoers and retreated to Peachtree Center for lunch/dinner at Yami-Yami, which sells sushi and Asian dishes by the pound. It isn’t Anne’s favorite thing, but we were too wasted to amble around and methodically evaluate all our food court options. After familiar desserts at Dairy Queen we returned to the Marriott for a bit more wandering and still more cosplay pics, in case 800 parade pics weren’t enough fun. When we’d had our fill, we were chagrined to find the down escalator to the first floor was out of order, but cheerfully took the nearest stairwell instead and escaped.

At 7:10 we reached the same shuttle stop for one last ride. After a 15-minute wait we saw the next Green Shuttle approaching and began leading our fellow riders in a chant of “GREEN! GREEN! GREEN! GREEN!”, which is ten times funnier when you’re delirious and recognize the resemblance to a a particular D*C in-joke. Our driver did just fine without any backseat input. Once again we were back in our room at 7:30 but already collapsed on the inside. We kindasorta wished we could’ve spent some extra time wandering those Saturday night parties like we’d done in 2023, but it had been a long day and an even longer week.

We were tempted to stick around Sunday, but we had to check out by noon and couldn’t justify coughing up another $35-$40 for parking anywhere else nearby. (I checked ParkMobile and SpotHero.) But we’d done so much already that we decided to leave on a high note. We took our leave of Atlanta once more, leaving this year’s reported 75,000+ attendees behind, and drove on to our next hotel near Nashville.

So yeah, we did a lot at D*C this year, but we still haven’t done all the things. We’ve yet to enter the secret food court at Truist Plaza. We have yet to find or browse the annual Art Show, which isn’t the same thing as Artists Alley. We’ve yet to stay out past 9, though it’s just as well considering we don’t drink. (I didn’t figure out how to connect with the Dragon Con Sober group — there’s a group for everything! — till far too late to do anything with that info.) We’re still over the moon with all that we did get to experience.

We got new pics for our jazz-hands photo gallery, new names added to our master list of all the famous folks we’ve ever met over three decades of conventions, and countless new memories to keep us feeling warm and fuzzy inside. That’s all helped me cope with the hardest part of post-con depression: saying goodbye to such a massive, welcoming community and coming back down to solitary dwelling in my tiny internet hidey-hole here.

Also high on the accomplishment list: our badge ribbon collections. We picked up a few in 2023, but this year the badge-ribbon passions were off the charts. It definitely helped that we’d brought our own to trade with other fans. To an extent it helped just by wearing Trke T-shirts, which was all some fans needed to keep rewarding us on sight. And maybe it helped that the more we go to D*C, the comfier we get. I ended up turning my badge-ribbon chain into an asymmetrical sash by pinning it to the side of my shirt using an Atomic Robo button off my comic-con bag. It looked weird, but at least I didn’t trip over it. And Anne finally ran out of the Trek ribbons she’d been bringing to every con since last September.

If you think those are a lot, you should see the extroverted overachievers who’ve made entire articles of clothing out of badge ribbons. We’re nowhere near that level and might never be. Lord willing, we’ll see what Dragon Con 2027 brings.

We’re the Goldens. It’s who we are and what we do.

The End. Thanks for reading! Lord willing, we’ll see you next con…coming in October!

Other chapters in this very special MCC miniseries:

Part 1: The Stars in Our Galaxy
Part 2: Some Cosplay!
Part 3: Slightly More Cosplay!
Part 4: The Cosplay Parade, Star Wars Division
Part 5: The Cosplay Parade, Video Game Division
Part 6: The Cosplay Parade, Marvel and DC Comics Division
Part 7: Pimp My Cosplay Parade Rides
Part 8: More Than Cosplay at the Parade
Part 9: Did We Mention There Was a Cosplay Parade
Part 10: The Cosplay Parade Is COMING TO GET YOU
Part 11: “But Sir,” You Ask, “What About the Cosplay Parade?”
Part 12: The Cosplay Parade Marches Into the West5