The Cost of Flying Across the Country to Be a Guest at a Convention

Opening Uber, seeing the “Surge Pricing” notification: $0 (because NOPE)

Yellow Cab to SEA: $50.70 (I’m going to this convention to talk about freelance writing, but I’m also going as the “occasional nerd musician” part of my bio, so I have music and merch stuff in two big bags. Otherwise I would have walked to the metro.)

Checking two bags: $60 ($25 for bag one, $35 for bag two, and why is it more expensive to check a second bag? It seems counterintuitive, economically; you want people to think checking two bags is a really great deal.)

Airport breakfast, SEA: $5 and change (I didn’t get the receipt so I don’t have an exact figure; included a banana, a lemon currant scone, and an enormous cup of coffee.)

Airplane WiFi, SEA-ORD: $9.99 (First time I’ve used internet on a plane, but I was able to complete five articles on my travel day so it was WORTH IT.)

Airport lunch, ORD: $12.12 (I kept the receipt this time, and had an Italian club sandwich, a flavor-free Red Delicious apple, and a brownie that was as rich as a cheesecake.)

Boingo WiFi, ORD: $0 (I couldn’t get it to work for some reason???)

Airplane WiFi, ORD-DCA: $3.99 (I was hoping I’d get WiFi for the full day since I already paid for it once, but ah, ’twas not to be.)

DC Taxi, DCA to convention hotel: $66.44 (I really did not want to pay this, because the DC metro system would have dropped me off literally right outside the hotel, but my flights were delayed and I got in at 11 p.m. instead of 9 p.m., meaning the metro was running sparingly. So sparingly it would have taken me 90 minutes to get there. So I cabbed.)

The hotel room: $89

Dinner: $0 (I got in to the hotel at midnight desperately wanting a Manhattan and a grown-up meal, but everything was closed. All the hotel stuff, including the bar, was shut down; and Eat24 was like “there is no place that delivers to your location at midnight,” and then I checked Dominos and Papa John’s and all the sad pizza places and even they did not deliver, and then I called the front desk and confirmed that nobody delivered anything at midnight in this town. So “dinner” was two granola bars and a cup of chamomile tea.)

TOTAL: $297.24

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