Speaking of Gen Con: for the first time this year, I'll be able to get there early enough to participate in Trade Day as an educator.  Anyone have any recommendations for must-do activities?

If anybody needs a room at Gencon this year I have an extra available.  It was going to be for my son but due to a scheduling difficulty he cannot make it this year.  

The room is in the downtown Marriott which is the absolute best hotel in which to stay at for Gencon IMHO

Anybody interested in this please let me know ASAP.  You will have to Prepay one nights stay to me before the end of the month and then I would need the balance prior to the start of Gencon.  The room is for 5 nights Wednesday to Sunday night.

If anybody is interested please let me know, I will let this back into the housing bureau by the end of the month if there are no takers.

I will be there, with wife in tow. The downtown hotel chaos didn't affect us, because we're still cheap motel people.

I'll be there with my wife (of six months) and her two sons.  Lucky for me both of the boys love playing D&D.  They had been playing 4th edition, but I've introduced them to 1st edition and we're having a lot of fun.  I'm sure they'll be as awestruck as I was on my first trip to GenCon and we'll all have a blast.  

I wanted to go really badly this year, but we decided to make a baby instead

Next year hopefully!

Things have settled down enough with our move for me to attend. I'll be helping at the auction again this year. (With more time set aside to auctioneer than last year.) my son is coming Sunday but I get there Tuesday.

Looking forward to seeing you all.

Ach, my first missed GenCon in about 25 years

My best acquisition this year was a piece of original Steve Crompton art originally slated for the first Traps book.  It got lost, resulting in a large blank space.  (The trap, if I recall correctly, was "The Bridge at Rue Vincent.")  Apparently, it turned up years later, wedged behind a desk, and has been restored to the new compendium edition.

I also managed to drop three pounds--that's probably due in large part to hauling, unrolling, and rolling those giant vinyl banners Stratochamp mentioned.  Princess Leia is heavier than she looks!

Just as we were exiting True Dungeon whom did we (we being Blackmoor and Saxon Angel, Bracton, Melnibonean, Prufrock and I) run in to? Contrarian and his new bride.
At the auction I picked up the Titan that McAllister used at TitanCon I & II, a few convention Tournament adventures from the 1980's (one of which was the whole line-feed original sent from the RPGA to the tournament director with set-up notes etc.), an Ars Magica Jump-Start kit from 1988, Imperial Courier magazines 1-3, a Blue Camel for Thieves World, and a very clean & bright white EPT (3rd print).
Thank you to Blackmoor and Saxon Angel for getting the True Dungeon tickets, Bracton for driving me down and back (and filling up his car with boxes of magazines), Martin for organizing the Acaeum dinner, Melnibonean for splitting that EPT with me (he wanted the 1st print War of Wizards that I had discovered was in the box) and to Frank Mentzer, who not once, but twice gave my collection a big shout out during the auction. Then Frank got the buy of the weekend picking up a big box of Exin Castillos for $20 (!). It was karma.