Wasn't so much a 'don't want your money', but rather how much time would someone be able to spend in the store before they close.   The alternative is to sit in line and they just close the doors and you wasted time in line.

Yeah for as much as it always used to confuse me when they closed seemingly so early on Saturday night (particularly as they used to even be open Sunday morning), actually being involved in the close-out process for the first time this year definitely helped me understand it better; basically, the "formal" Auction ends at 7 on Saturday, as everything registered for sale beforehand is finished at the end of T.O.V.A. when the Consignment Store closes simultaneously, and the remaining things are outside the registration database.

As someone volunteering at a booth, I had a wonderful experience with an amazing team, and it's one I look forward to repeating again next year.

The Good:
- Getting ambushed by a friend with a spare True Dungeon ticket. Also, it was my first time playing on Nightmare, and surviving with 6hp made it a close call. And it was my first time playing a Barbarian, which I managed to make a couple of the actors and room coaches laugh at with my antics.
- Running demos for dozens of eager players per day. Shenanigans occurred. Some folks just couldn't catch a break.
- Setting up in record time, easily a few hours ahead of our last few years of setup, and tearing down almost in the original time limit (though thankful for the extra hour the ICC gave us, even if we were done and gone in closer to 15 min past the target, and likely would have made it handily if more docks had been in use (apparently a whole stretch weren't for the first few hours, for some inexplicable reason, or so the scuttlebutt says)).

The Bad:
- ... it was all pretty great.

The Ugly:
- Eh... nothing really comes to mind. Setting up in a mask, running demos in a mask, not exactly ideal, but better than not attending.

Hopefully the world is in a slightly better place in the next 50'ish weeks, but I'm not counting on it. We'll make it work.

The Good: getting to play games.

Good & Bad: My Cthulu game getting cancelled and refunded. I didn't see the email, so I found out when I showed up. However, the same group had another game running in the room, and I got to buy a spare ticket and play anyway.

The Ugly: I just learned how much I rely on being able to see a GM's mouth. I may have to skip next year if they make us mask. Also, only one vaxx check line on Wednesday evening. It may have moved fast, but it was just over an hour and about a mile long.

The Good: Seriously, there is a question?  Gen Con Happened!  As a person attending since 1989, this event is the single largest (U.S) event that I attend and look forward to every year!  Everyone should take the Con in a bigger scope of what can and cannot be.

The Bad: Unfortunately there were people that couldn't attend due to various issues they dealt with.

The Ugly: Cannot speak for all the hotels that advertised "Room for 4" and two of the four were on a pull-out couch, but the Embassy Suites pull out couch was ridiculously bad.  We took the "mattress" out, threw it on the floor and people slept on that.  Truly stupififyingly (<<not a word) bad, even from my days as a 20-something sleeping in a Ford Escort.  Embassy Suites are simply shameful for suggesting "sleeps 4", nuff said, won't go into my discussions with the front desk and manager.

We usually slept 4 in the Embassy Suites, though I must say I was always surprised by the guy who said the pull-out bed was comfortable.  I can absolutely confirm though that throwing the couch cushions on the floor makes a pretty solid makeshift bed.  Easier if you have two people who normally sleep together anyway, though. 

THE GOOD:

• My daughter's first Gen Con at age 12, and she fell in love with the whole thing. People were so welcoming. She felt like she was treated as an equal and not a newb at the game tables.
  
• Didn't get a connected hotel, but the one we had was three blocks away from the ICC and absolutely perfect, with restaurants on the way. Still a shorter walk than if we'd stayed out by the airport and parked at Lucas Oil every day.
  
• Everyone seemed so happy to be back together. Only saw one incident of conflict/rudeness the entire time, when a group of oblivious people showed up at the last second for the cosplay parade and tried to set up camp right in front of other people who'd staked their positions early.
  
• The vax line looked horrendous Wednesday night but took us only about 30 minutes to get through. I didn't find it awful like some people did. The Will Call line immediately afterward was way worse for us.
  
• Fantastic, helpful teammates for both of the True Dungeons we did.
  
• Some really fun fellow D&D players over at the Baldman ballroom.
  
• Many of the smaller new vendors from 2021 were back. HOWEVER ...
  

• A number of these smaller new vendors got half or less of the booth space they had in 2021 because of the bigger companies returning and gobbling up dealer hall real estate. There's one company in particular that I was hoping to open my wallet for, and they had a fraction of the room and product from a year ago. Barely any space to get in and look. Meanwhile, some the dice companies had three or four booths, as usual. Sometimes it feels like Gen Con is shifting more and more to be about boxed board games and dice at the expense of other interesting merchandise and game accessories. 
  
• That weekend heat was brutal. Waiting at a food truck for 20 minutes on Saturday was no fun.
  
• A couple of dud events, especially considering the ticket prices. Craft/art events that cost more than $30 per person had better deliver.
  
• Every year, I find my legs below the knee are in more and more agony. It was hell by Saturday night. I either need to "train" better for all the Gen Con walking/standing or accept that I need to start wearing old-man tennis shoes with actual support.
  

• The I-65 mess on the way down. Pothole on a bridge or something? Should have been a 3.5-hour trip, but it was almost six hours after a long detour through Indiana farmland.
  
• Hot Box Pizza was out of mushrooms by Sunday. No mushrooms?! GAH!
  
• The AC wasn't working in a wing of the Omni, where we had an escape room Sunday. It had to have been 85 in there. We had to bail before it started. Gen Con refunded us, thankfully.