My Yule Ball Experience: The Crystal Ball

So for those who know, I am a member of the Harry Potter fan community. For those who may not have known, well, I just outed myself so there you go. At the beginning of January I traveled to Pittsburgh for a Harry Potter/wizard rock filled weekend.
Thursday, January 8th, I went to Rose's house for a wizard rock jamboree with the members of PAW (Pittsburgh Area Wizards), Matt (The Whomping Willows), Justin (Justin Finch Fletchley and the Sugar Quills) and their friend/merch girl Sam. The house show was pretty laid back. The guys sat on the couch and played accoustic. It was a tiny bit cramped and there were cats bent on sabotage or joining in the fun, I'm not sure which.
Afterwards we went to Freya's place. She made food and got an awesome cake because at midnight it would be Matt's 30th birthday! He was a little sad, but I think being at Freya's made it ok, because how can anyone be sad at Freya's? Well, if you haven't been there before, you can't be sad there. The food is insanely good (JP baked bread!), JP makes super fun drinks and you just can't beat the company ;)
Friday Freya picked me up and we went to get Rose. After stuffing pillows, sleeping bags, suitcases and formal dresses into the car we were off to Loudonville, Ohio, aka middle of nowhere! We were warned by both Freya's parents and my own that there was a bad snow storm and we were headed right into it. Informed, but not deterred, we set off.
The drive was actually not that bad until we got to what should have been about 30-45 minutes away from our hotel. The snow really started to come down then and we sat in traffic and snow for close to an hour.
Once we got to the dirt road that was going to take us to our hotel, we hit problems. Of course the dirt road was covered in multiple inches of snow. Being sensible people we took it very slow. Regardless of how careful we were, driving on a windy dirt road, covered in ice, covered in snow is kinda scary and dangerous. As we drove around the base of the mountain next to a rather large creek, we came around a corner and had to slam on the brakes. We slid a little bit and stopped just before hitting a) the side of the hill and b) the ditch on the side of the road. In front of us was a fire truck (stuck in the ditch) and very intelligent firemen who were all standing in the road. An officer of some sort came over to us and told us we had to turn around. Freya panicked a tiny bit at the thought of turning around in her standard on a narrow slippery road. We asked if we would be able to get around, or how long it would take to get the fire truck out of the ditch. After a very comforting chortle from the officer he told us no, we had to turn around. Apparently in front of the firetruck was an ambulance because a car had flipped off the road and was upside down in the creek! Now completely terrified (not to mention very very late) Freya got us turned around and the officer gave us new directions to our hotel. So, we needed to go out of the way, but it was still possible to make it to our dance! Silver lining!

More harrowing driving ensued. We barely made it up hills, we needed to back up several times to get enough momentum to carry us over. We slid down hills and around bends. We nearly drove into another car. It was stuck in a ditch and I got out and helped push (yay me!). Finally we get to our hotel (the term 'hotel' is used loosely here). They did not accept credit cards so we went in, paid in cash and got a key (like, an actual metal key). Then the guy tells us "Ok, so to get to your room go back out the driveway, turn left and go up that hill." To which Freya replies "you mean the hill we just came down?" and we all thought "and watched another car slide down and off the road? The one we won't be able to drive up?!" Guy says, "Yeah, don't worry if you get stuck someone will help you." I really thought Freya was going to lose it here, but she kept it together, got us back down the driveway and we tackled the hill.
After one or two tries and all of our growing worry and aggravation I asked if anyone would be opposed to getting ready in a bathroom at the dance. We agreed to deal with our hotel later, and head off to Landoll's. We got there after a little more sliding, a lot more stress and as we pulled into the only parking spot left (the handicapped space) we took a minute to collect ourselves. None of us wanted to go back on those roads, or get back in the car after six hours of driving. We went in and asked if there were any rooms available at the hotel (damn the cost!) but no, there weren't. Then at the prospect of having to deal with all of this again in just a few hours, Freya cried.
We decided to venture down to the event center and sign in before getting changed. We were supposed to do that by 7 and it was then 7. As soon as we walked in we saw our wonderful wizard rock friends, Matt and Justin. They asked if we got there ok, Freya began to cry again and walked outside. They both turned and looked at me and I explained what all had happened. Beth (the girl checking us in) overheard and informed me "Oh yeah, that overturned car was our friend Squibgirl, her husband and another friend." Apparently, they were all ok and would be at the dance soon. I felt very stupid complaining about our trip after that.
Matt went out to comfort Freya, and Justin asked if we would like to get ready in their room. We graciously agreed. A few minutes later Justin was walking us to our car to get our things and informed us that we were not allowed to go back to our hotel, get our stuff we were staying in
their suite. I hadn't noticed his wings and halo before, but yep, there they were.
We got ready in their sweet with a heated bathroom floor (so perfect because all of our feet were frozen), and the three Cinderella's finally made it to the ball. We drank, ate, drank, danced and drank some more. We met lots of cool people and after the dance got changed and went to the pool. We hung out there, drank some more, and Freya jumped into the pool with my old prom dress. All of the previous worries were erased and we got to just enjoy a wonderful night with new and old friends.
Stay tuned for more adventures in Ohio!

If you would like to see more photos, but aren't on facebook, follow this link to see more of our shenanigans!

New Years Resolution

Well, I haven't been very good about keeping my blog updated. New Years Resolution: I'm going to try and be better about that. I'm sure all four of you who read this have been getting very worried and wonder what is happening in my life. So, I am going to skip December but recap on January and then try very hard to keep anyone who cares up to date.

Here we go:

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!