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[personal profile] jedusor
Earlier this month, I went to the National Puzzlers' League convention in Portland and saw a whole bunch of my favorite folks. I met a few new ones too, although not as many as usual. I think I've gotten to the point where there are enough NPLers that I really want to hang out and catch up with that I have very little time and energy to seek out new people. But there were a few! I don't remember having interacted with Ender before, and he was cool. And Joanna wasn't really a new person, but I hadn't met her in meatspace before. Also, Xemu's daughter Iboo kind of glommed on to me, and hugged me for approximately 10 minutes straight when she discovered it was my birthday.



This is Joanna, whom I tried to christen "RooPol" for reasons best forgotten. She ended up picking the nom Joey instead, which is kind of silly because that's just her nickname, but it's not nearly as silly as RooPol so I suppose I'll forgive her. I don't remember why she was hiding in a lamp. It may have had to do with the group's decision that the person wearing the "Projectyl" nomtag should be in charge of all hurtled objects in the vicinity, and my own decision that throwing people into the pool fell under the "hurtled objects" umbrella.



There were rum balls. Kind of. Gabby helped make them by smashing cookies with his face.



I spent Friday afternoon hanging out with my boo Colin, whom I hadn't seen in four years. We were best buds in 2007ish, and he lived with my family for a while that summer. I found out right before the trip that he'd just moved to Portland that week, so we met up at a bar at three PM, because that's just how we roll. It was fantastic to see him again, in a "oh fuck, are we about to get kicked out of this place for talking about individual variation in rectal mucus production too loudly?" kind of way.



Joanna brought a bunch of little koala clips and distributed them to NPLers in exchange for true stories that she deemed interesting enough to deserve them. I told her about losing my virginity at the Googleplex, which earned an immediate koala. Here it is clipped to Neuromancer's martini glass.



This is Rubrick stripping and Ertchin tucking a dollar bill into his waistband.



This is Rubrick doing a headstand because I made him.



This is my toes interspersed with blueberries. This was not my fault. There was a really glorious moment about half an hour after this picture was taken, when the blueberry bandit (Iboo) had wandered off and we had moved on to less blueberry-related topics, and Rick kind of paused and said, "Is there a blueberry under my foot?" and we all looked and assured him that there was not, and then a moment later he said, "I'm pretty sure there's a blueberry in my sock," which turned out to indeed be the case. (There was a roll of Oreos in his other sock, along with his foot. This is the kind of wild partying puzzlers get up to in the wee hours of the morning.)



After the awards ceremony on Sunday, at which Hathor had subjected me to a surprise public spanking, she hauled me off to the bar to buy me a birthday beer. This picture is terrible because I was too interested in what she was saying about the process of brewing beer to bother trying for a decent one.



After that, Cram and Artistry and I went out for Thai. Cram and I played Con High-Low-Crush-Bane while Artistry drank vinegar and refused to let me take any pictures of him. These guys are awesome. The food was really good, too.



I was housesitting for a local friend to duck hotel room costs, which meant leaving the con twice a day to let their dog out, which meant I had a lot of fun navigating the seething mass of bicycles at the entrance to the parking area. Apparently there had just been some kind of big Seattle-to-Portland biking event, and it wrapped up right outside the hotel.



This Italian place apparently closes for da Vinci's birthday. Cute.



The people I was housesitting for are big on gardening, so my breakfast the day we left consisted of my weight in berries and snap peas. Check out the size of that fucking peapod.

After the con, Ertch rode back up to Seattle with us and spent the evening hanging out before his flight home. He and Mike and I played a variant of Catch Phrase made up by me wherein every clue had to relate somehow to the NPL or a particular NPLer, which was great fun. Also, I performed a "Tim Tam Slam" as instructed with diagrams by Joanna, who had given me some vegan chocolate-covered cookies from Australia. A tasty end to a mostly-fabulous weekend.

Date: 2012-07-30 09:01 am (UTC)
greedy_dancer: (MCR - askpoison)
From: [personal profile] greedy_dancer
TIM TAMS!!!!!

Yes, that is all.

Date: 2012-07-30 05:21 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] jedusor.livejournal.com
They weren't actual Tim Tams, since those aren't vegan, but somebody made a vegan version. They are delicious! I just finished off the package the other day. Turns out Tim-Tam-Slamming with cold drinks works a lot better, since the chocolate doesn't start melting right away.

Date: 2012-07-30 07:48 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] mamagotcha.livejournal.com
Colin! Yay! and all the NPLers! Yay!

Is that cryptic clue of your nom original? Nicely done!

Date: 2012-07-31 06:54 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] jedusor.livejournal.com
It is, and thank you!

Date: 2012-07-31 09:21 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rubrick.livejournal.com
Great writeup and photos, but I really think you should credit the assist on the headstand.

Date: 2012-07-31 05:36 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] jedusor.livejournal.com
I don't think your desire to show off to cute women is an "assist." :P

Date: 2012-07-31 11:55 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] joee-girl.livejournal.com
It was because you were threatening to throw me in the pool fully dressed without letting me take electronics out of my pocket first!

The stripping and cash photo is way too blurry to see what's happening :(

Also, you forgot to mention you LOST THE KOALA D:

Date: 2012-07-31 05:34 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] jedusor.livejournal.com
I DID NOT LOSE THE KOALA

MIKE WAS ENTRUSTED WITH THE KOALA AND FAILED ME

Date: 2012-07-31 11:29 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] elainetyger.livejournal.com
I tried to friend you on livejournal, Joey, but the goat says not today. If you want, friend me and I'll reciprocate.

Date: 2012-08-01 08:50 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] ertchin.livejournal.com
The stripping and cash photo is way too blurry to see what's happening :(

You can't hope to contain Rubrick's sweet moves in a still image.

That stretch of six hours may have been the most fun I've ever had with >4 people in a room.

Date: 2012-07-31 11:28 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] elainetyger.livejournal.com
Nice set of pictures! really captures the silliness of your group that took over Maso's hospitality room.

Date: 2012-08-01 10:35 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] jedusor.livejournal.com
I actually did have my digital camera with me, but ended up not using it once, since my cameraphone was easier and usually closer to hand. Especially in cuddle-piles that would have been difficult to extricate myself from for purposes of camera-fetching. :P

Date: 2012-08-01 12:58 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rikchik.livejournal.com
I'm sorry we didn't get to hang out more - I didn't have the stamina for very late nights this year. Hopefully I'll be less jet-lagged at Austin.

Date: 2012-08-01 10:36 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] jedusor.livejournal.com
I am sorry too! I'm hoping to make it to the Austin con--I've never been there, and I've heard it's the cool place to be in Texas.

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