I doubt I'm coming, but I checked in on the Xena guild today and realized that you guys are never gonna pull together a con on your own. (No offense. Apologies in advance, if I'm being a pretentious b***h.) Naturally my driven need to take control and organize has kicked in. So I'm gonna try and help out.
The two possible weekends were...
July 17-19
July 24-26
But if they arrive late on Friday and leave early on Sunday, it's really only like 1 day. So they should probably take a relatively early bus on Friday and then an early/midday bus on Monday, rather than Sunday, assuming that it's okay with you for them to stay on Sunday night.
Here's a link to the Mega Bus schedule...Just select Chicago to Minneapolis for Friday, July 17 to Monday, July 20 and for Friday, July 24 to Monday, July 27.
I'd recommend they take the 9:00 AM bus to Minneapolis and the 11:00 AM bus back to Chicago. That'll get them back early enough for the Mitten crew to drive the rest of the way home.
Speaking of which, I need the addresses of all the mitteners. I need to talk to Pinkiebot and Moonlit Potter myself anyways, so I'll get theirs. But if you could ask Eemz and Skillzy, that'd be shnazzeh. I'm gonna need to get a carpool route and organize pick-up times.
Getting them here by 9AM on Friday might be a problem though, because it's about a 4 hour drive from Lansing to Chi town, and I think Lansing is the closest of them. So maybe they could drive down to Chicago on Thursday evening. I'm sure Arkie won't mind having them stay over on Thursday night and even if he does mind, they could stay with me. If they left Lansing at 5:45 PM, right after work hours, they'd get to Chicago by 10ish and crash with either me or Arkie.
And I'll lend you guys my bamboo kendo training swords. I'll also lend camping supplies, if it's needed. I camp a lot so I have a lot of camping shtuff.
whee Since the bus ride will probably be from 9am to 5pm (ish) they'll need to have lunch, a few snack and drinks, and lots of entertainment, for the bus ride. And there was talk of pie....
ninja rofl We'll have to get organized with what everyone's bringing.
Since there will probably be four people, we could have one person bring lunch food, two people bring drinks and snacks, and one person bring pie.
3nodding Everyone should bring a couple things to keep people busy. Books, music, cards, maybe even a small board game or two. And Arkie might bring his little portable TV/DVD player, so they might be able to watch movies and such. Arts and crafts stuff would be really good too. And I've found that paper-fortune-tellers pass the time marvelously.
4laugh Some of the Megabuses have seats that face eachother, with small tables in the middle. If they can get those seats, they should. A little less leg room, but it'll be hella convenient.
They'll each need $25.00 for the round trip tickets. They should also bring some spending money to the con in case you guys decide to go out to eat.
And you should show that Xena barbie movie you made on Friday night. It's a good icebreaker.
blaugh blaugh blaugh And tell them they need to choose a weekend and get tickets SOON. Because if they wait, they might not all be able to get tickets on the same bus, and the ticket prices will likely go up.
And I'd recommend they all chip in to buy an extra seat if they can. Megabuses don't usually have much (if any) room for luggage.
And as childish as it may seem, tell them to go to the bathroom BEFORE they get on the buss. Yes, the megabus has a bathroom.
NO, you don't wanna hafta use it.
xp If there's anything I missed, be sure to ask.
Good luck.
xd 
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