Haven't been to the convention before but I finally pulled the trigger on getting my first tattoo two weeks ago (after 7.5 years of chickening out) and was really glad I did! I hope you also have a great experience if you do.

Had my first good NYE in a long time, and got to spend Sunday meeting up with a long-time online friend for the first time, so it was a 10/10 weekend for me.

2022 was pretty decent to me. Definitely a rebuilding year, but I needed it. Historically my life has imploded in the last quarter of the year every year of my adulthood up until now, so New Year's has been more of a "good riddance" thing for me. It was a bit strange celebrating this weekend and actually feeling hopeful for a change.

Although the roommates and I did forget to make black eyes peas and collards on Sunday so hopefully we didn't jinx anything

I did a semi-cross country move from Florida to Philly 6 months ago, had only been to the city twice before (for a grand total of like 72 hours combined) and only knew 2 people here (my current roommates, who had moved to the city a year prior to me).

Parking ranges anywhere from "not the worst" to "awful" depending on what neighborhood you end up in. It's enough of a hassle that I avoid driving as much as possible and am heavily debating getting rid of my car altogether so I don't have to deal with it. And my neighborhood isn't even bad for parking, but it's still more than I feel like dealing with. Traffic isn't LA bad but it's still not great. I haven't spent too much time on the road circa rush hour though, so other people might have more perspective than I do here. SEPTA alleviates a lot of parking and traffic stress for me though. It has its problems, but it's still a respectably robust transit system and lightyears ahead of LA.

I didn't use actual movers, but I shipped the majority of my stuff up via Uhaul Uboxes and have 0 complaints. Can go into more detail about that if you want.

Honestly even though I moved here pretty blind I can't think of anything I didn't know ahead of time that I wish I had. I just lurked in the subreddit plenty in the months before I moved, did my research about basic moving stuff like updating my residency, car registration, etc, and then made sure I got out and around the city to get my bearings once I got here. I've been doing fine figuring everything else out along the way so far.

I got a tourism ad for West Virginia the other day that was literally just "come see the leaves!"