Usagi Yojimbo DojoBoard

Tom Spurgeon at The Comics Reporter posted everything you need to know, and many you don't need to know, about the San Diego Con. Hopefully, it will later be filed under a separate posting, but you can find it today at:

http://www.comicsreporter.com/

or, later, look in his archives under May.

He gives very good tips.

Excellent article, Stan!

He had some really good advice with regards to travel and lodging (although getting a hotel now is still a royal pain for some my friends planning to attend Sandy Eggo this July).

I thought I was crazy to get my airfare to SD back in February, but the price has since doubled and the cabin is 95% full already. Not to mention all the fees the airlines are now tacking on to cover fuel costs.

Or in my case, booking before AA levied a charge onto every check-in bag you wish to have...

Mayhem wrote:Or in my case, booking before AA levied a charge onto every check-in bag you wish to have...

Yeah, I heard about this. I wonder if other air lines will soon follow? I'm taking my wife and two little girls to Disney World in September and am wondering if Continental will soon join in on this extra bag charge.

Charging for check-in luggage is standard practice here for low budget and cheap airlines, but this is the first time I've heard it used for trans-Atlantic and long haul destinations...

Mayhem wrote:Charging for check-in luggage is standard practice here for low budget and cheap airlines, but this is the first time I've heard it used for trans-Atlantic and long haul destinations...

I believe when it comes to international flight, AA still lets the first bag go for free. Also, if you are a member of their Gold or Platinum Club flight plans.

Here is a direct link:

http://www.comicsreporter.com/index.php ... ary/14163/

Mayhem wrote:Or in my case, booking before AA levied a charge onto every check-in bag you wish to have...

A little bit of advice for those who have purchased their airline tickets in advance to avoid these check-in bag fees:

Contact your airline directly (by phone if possible) and have it confirmed with an airline representative that you purchased your tickets before these fees were applied (have your Confirm # handy too). My airline rep today added a note to my reservation file to alert the ticket agent on the day of my flight to exempt me from any check-in charges (which might have been applied to me anyway if I had just walked up to the counter without doing all this).

Each airline does things differently, but it wouldn't hurt to find out now rather than getting into some hassles late next month.

This will fall under the guideline of "after the con advice," but for those of you flying into San Diego, when you leave make sure you actually get to the airport AT LEAST 1.5 hours early (if not 2). Lindbergh Field is normally bad with security lines, but during the con, people routinely miss their flights leaving from terminal A. Terminal B, the monster terminal, doesn't always have this problem, because it can open up more security lanes. But A is very limited in space and sometimes the bottlenecking is literally unreal, and I have had friends call me to come pick them up because they missed a flight and had to stay over another night.

I know that after a long weekend of con, the last thing you want to deal with is standing in a security line with sore feet, and then missing your flight. Just trying to throw a little help out there...

Four day memberships are sold out. There are still some individual day memberships available, though those expect to be sold out as well come con time.

Here is Mark Evanier's Con Tips:

http://www.povonline.com/ConGuide.htm

One Day memberships for Saturday (July 26) are now sold out.

http://www.comic-con.org/cci/cci_fastfacts_2008.php

khyron82 wrote:One Day memberships for Saturday (July 26) are now sold out.

http://www.comic-con.org/cci/cci_fastfacts_2008.php

At least the other days still have a lot of single day passes left, which may shrink soon.

Actually, it's much easier to simply MOVE to SAN DIEGO instead.