Hi, I'm Wyatt Ferguson and this is my vacation diary. You read it last year, so my editor thought you might read it this year.

I enjoyed last September's vacation so much, I'm trying it again! Let's see if I can skim over the minutiae... I doubt it.

But before my vacation, a job. I'm running security at a conference at Michigan State University in East Lansing.

• My feelings are mixed. MSU is the evil enemy of my own college, since I went to Purdue. Also, most of the original superheroes of the Balance went to MSU, so that's another rivalry right there. But I still have friends in nearby South Lansing.
• Anyway, I'm supposed to protect a visiting scientist who loves crustaceans. I'd best watch for militia connections, like maybe Kristi the Animal Girl.

I try to duck out of the MSU Union as they declare an emergency, but I get inducted into a hair band instead. Our rivals are consorting with Panlucida groups, which is ironic because I am too.

• ... Emergency? Yeah, a militia raid. They come in and say, they're in charge of security by agreement with the venue. I work for the venue and know otherwise, but I also know better than to start a fight with a team of superhumans and melee specialists.
• So I let them stay, but I say I'll have to get the campus authorities to give me some paperwork before they can do anything.
• They get annoyed and try to thump me. I promptly disappear, as is my power. Now they control the venue, but I can call the police and I've got the right paperwork. I've also got some friends nearby in case of crisis.
• As the police show up, the militia have their perimeter set up. I reappear back inside it, alongside the "hair band" which is already there. And I've got a wig.
• I've also got a friend Gillette; he's my backup on this mission. He's got a suitably big Afro wig - and Hercules powers. He clears one door, and the police are in. The militia have to retreat themselves.

We're still trying to figure out what the militiamen wanted. My guess is, they wanted to suppress one of the presentations. They have at least one member from under the sea.

As for Panlucida support... There are at least three factions in the Panlucida movements. I'm familiar with the "Ceiling Breakers" who work with Hillary Clinton; the "Mommy" faction is going Republican; and the "Amazon" faction plays nicely with militiamen.

At the conference, there's an impromptu session about "Militiamen Underwater: The Crustacean Connection". That's what the militiamen seemed most concerned about suppressing, so it's time to not suppress it.

And I'm a guest speaker! I speak about Kristi and her friend who acts like he comes from underwater. I'm kind of an expert witness about Kristi and the underwater Subhumans.

There's a dealer's room at the con, of course. I get a chance to buy a Hillary Clinton as Supergirl T-shirt, but it's XXL and I'd look dorky in it, especially while wearing a toolbelt and a backpack.

The hair band I joined is still playing. Tonight is Van Halen cover night. I get a chance to join them as the backup vocalist, but I can't hit those high notes. Later I float into the audience. Fortunately some friends are holding my place, and everyone thinks it's a special effect.

Off to Massachusetts to visit a youth group I was involved in, though I can't stay to help with their play.

Off to Indiana for an inter-high school conference. I'm involved in tracking some missing ice from the cafeteria. Boy, they've got great temperature sensors.

Off to Florida for a conference at Disney World, with some old friends from the Midwestern FERG! We're all staying, but my friends are going fishing and I'll pass.

This is the holiday of Superhuman Birthday. But I don't observe it.

Today is relaxing. My main problem is figuring out how to get takeout at the fast food hamburger place, though I'd rather have hot dogs or dessert. And should I read a new Groo comic-book treasury, or colorize a lady wrestler picture for one of the old stories?

In the news, Hillary Clinton's car has a wiretap on it. Could be some three-party political intrigue.

I'm in a game as an Austrian counter-revolutionary in the 1840s. Much of the action is on trains. My retinue is not the best, but I get extra points for being energetic. If it were my game, I'd make the movement factors exponential... but then I'm used to superhuman movement factors.

Canada's advertising winter vacations. One is described "North Sun to North Pole by the Light of Jupiter". Canada also has a Four Corners Lodge. I stay on the Nunavut side in communal sleeping, and never get to the Northwest Territories side.

• Brazil advertises six houses by a pond, with pianists in residence and concerts every night. Maybe next time.
• Coincidentally, this is the seven-year anniversary of my Plan Joab. As ever, I observe this by dashing about the landscape like a monkey on crack, just like in Plan Joab. But not even I can visit Canada and Brazil in the same day.

Off to Massachusetts! I come off Route 146 toward a restaurant and get there before the crowd.

I go in a two-building restaurant with new albums, including Cher and Brian Wilson doing weird music. Shall I stow it all in a locker after dinner?

Oprah's doing a special prime-time edition of her show from Ohio, about lakeshore women with attitude. There may be a mountain-climber on too.

In New Jersey I've found a Best Western with a brewpub, near a lesser highway. Now do I have to drive through the industrial park to get there?

Today, down time. I watch TV and learn how the heroes take turns mixing the potatoes and cheese for a fried egg sandwich for one of their psychic new recruits. He's eight years old and very fussy.

Today, a business trip which is more like vacation time. I see the home of the founder of the Creation Science Party and originator of the little-known "Parsnip Prescription" for soldiers' health during the U.S. Civil War. Now will this help my database queries run better? Somehow I doubt it.

Off to Michigan! While I decide what TV shows to watch on Thursday night in Saginaw, I have to lock myself in a bathroom to keep a crowd from stealing my milkshake.

Back to Oregon, my current home state. A project team is having a staff meeting in the dining room as I stop by the fridge for a beer, but I've rented my own office here and have every right to be here still. But my new girlfriend tells me to take it slow, so we can go celebrate later; it's only 2 pm now.

• I'm taking a leave of absence from work! We all agree, something big is coming up by November; it usually does. Last year, it was the Russians taking over Earth orbit.
• Having me around is like putting up a lightning rod. Besides, I think the boss will value some time apart from me.
• But as far as the general public is concerned, I quit. I'm seen leaving work with Shari, my new Herodias Dancer Guild consort.
• It'd be nice if I really could quit and leave it all behind. But I've tried that already, and I keep coming back. I might as well admit, this is my life.

I'm in Iceland at a historic telegraph site, but the sun's going down and I'm lost. Fortunately I'm near town and the airport has great lights... Hey, if it's vacation, let's go overboard.

In the international news, there's a new U.S. arena baseball league, because arena football is so popular. Hope they have great nets between the batters and the audience.

In the international news, there's flooding back on the MSU campus - well away from the river. Boy, that's extreme. I guess that's why it made the news in Iceland.

In the international news, the Power Patrol is intervening at MSU for disaster relief. Aside from the Powernaut, they're weaker than before - and wearing flannel shirts. All the big-name new superhumans are joining Total Conversion.

Back to Oregon. I've got westbound travel plans, plus some regular gaming sessions first... I play a sort of Snowbird in a game of Marvel heroes presumed dead; what great northern beast shall I be today? There's also a female Captain America who's a former Army chaplain; she discusses her firebird-shaped icon with someone who has Thorpower... Fun thing is, these heroes are all real, at least here.

I play a WW2 Turkey wargame; the Germans get past Istanbul, but I don't know how. Then I board a trans-Pacific flight. The plane's going awfully low, and I have a bad experience with a downed plane... so I give it up. I think I'll just stay home.

Back home in Oregon I fiddle with a stereo my brother gave me, then I take a bath. That's about the height of my day.

Back home in Oregon I've got painting to do, including a plaque of an Elvis Hitler song. Maybe I should take the posters off the wall first.

Still back home. I could maybe afford a paid moderator for my religious online group at a one time fee of $100 per member, but he'd better start writing the Sunday messages. And today's the perfect time to tell him.

Still back home. My basement tends to flood, so I get my backpack out and pack it, just in case I take another trip.

Still back home, after a nice nap. I can work in my garden; one of the plants grows miniature bottlecaps, and you can actually uncork them and drink. Mutant strain, from anti-Green Paste research. But am I thirsty enough for one more beer?

Still back home. My bedroom window is okay, but the wall underneath it is crumbling.

I try to take a nap in my den, but Shari's working there and inviting her friends in. So I go for a walk and see people sleeping in doorways.

... I might as well go back in to work tomorrow. It'll be more restful.

Back at work, I'm better off than Gillette is. He's good at finding the most defensible seat in all his community college classes (he learned that lesson in South Lansing), but sometimes he gets harassed on the way to the restroom.