True history: li’l Abraham Lincoln grew up from age 7 to age 21 in southern Indiana, and our fair state will never let anyone forget it.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

On October 15th, downtown Indianapolis hosted a very special convention of sorts. The “Hoosier Homecoming” was a celebration held at the Indiana State House in honor of Indiana’s 200th birthday, with a host of well-known local faces in attendance, an opportunity for self-guided tours of the State House, and the closing ceremonies to the Indiana Torch Relay, a 37-day event in which a specially lit torch — not unlike the Olympics’ own, but inspired by the torch on our state flag — traveled through all 92 Indiana counties by various transportation methods until its final stop in Marion County at the Homecoming.

I mentioned in a previous chapter our mutual impression that the Homecoming was basically like our other conventions — one large building, famous guests, vendors selling wares, a main stage with events, musical performances by singers you don’t know, and so on. And it wouldn’t be a true convention without creative costumes. The State House grounds weren’t overflowing with them, nor were attendees actively encouraged to dress up in the brochures, but a handful of volunteers and Indiana history superfans added to the ambience and in a couple of cases went with super-obscure characters that stumped us until they educated us. Usually that’s the job of anime fans.

(Longtime MCC readers may be shocked and relieved to know we saw exactly zero Deadpool variants hanging around. That’s clearly where the convention similarities end.)

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