"I'm going to go back there someday" - Arisia Highlights

After a train, a subway, and a shuttlebus I arrived at the hotel at about 7pm. At the door to greet me were ultimatepsi and slipjig (not together, they had never met each other). We said our hellos and I borrowed ultimatepsi’s key to drop off my bags until I could meet up with victorthecook and ocelotn who I stayed with over the weekend. (Ultimatepsi at one point referred to her room as the unofficial MassFilc storage room.)

I soon met up outlander, rchb76 and happyfunpaul who I also spent a fair amount of time with this con. Friday night, for me, is for getting hooked back in; see who is there; check out dealer’s row, hit consuite, generally mingle.

The one event I wanted to catch on Friday was Drumcircle. I had with me 2 cardboard shipping cylinders (a 2 foot and a 3 foot). When I would hit the capped end against the floor I would get a good tone from each. It was quite fun.

It was nice to see some new faces around the filk circle. Luckily for me the filk room and the game room were very close to each other so I could go back and fourth. Last game of the night was Chez Geek which I played with Slipjig, eustaciavye, David, and someone else I should remember. The game finished at 2:20am, just in time for me to catch the last shuttle to Central Square.

From Central Square I planned to walk the 2 miles to victorthecook and ocelotn’s house, however when I got there I saw xuth on the way home from Arisia on a tandem bike (by himself). I asked him for a ride to Harvard Square, he agreed, which saved me a mile of walking.

Saturday was kilt & cloak day. On the shuttle ride in I happened to meet gee_tar we talked briefly, mostly about the con. I wanted to get in a bit more gaming, I played some Icehouse games. I also did a bit of shopping (didn’t get myself anything), and gave Outlander some advice on Filk tapes to buy.

At one point I was in the consuite, and asked a woman where I knew her from. She reminded me that last spring we had been in a LARP and she played my wife. (How soon new forget).

I did go to the Pirate song circle, Eustaciavye had a good song written by s00j. Also later that evening Happyfunpaul and I talked Slipjig into performing for the filk circle. He was a big hit. (The next morning Paul asked me where Slipjig lived to see if we had any chance of luring him to a MassFilk house filk. Unfortunately he lives very far away.) I stayed at the Filk circle till midnight.

I left because I had signed up for the Midnight Cosmic Encounter Game. (I’ve been doing this at Arisia for about 4 years now.) We played C.E. till about 6am, then one of the other players gave me a ride to where I was staying.
I washed up, got 2 hours sleep, got dressed and rode to the con with victorthecook and ocelotn. I was too late for the juggling, so I wandered, talking with people, I did play in one game of Race for the Galaxy. After the game I went to saraphina_marie’s reading (which went well I thought).

Sunday afternoon got theatrical with audio plays Red Shift: Interplanetary Do-Gooder by the Post Meridian Radio Players, and Second Shift, Episode 11 ½: Campfire Tales by Second Shift. I highly recommend the Second Shift podcast, it is an engaging drama and they are up to Episode 19.

After a dinner break we then had The Buffy Sing Along by the Teseracte Players, which was fun. From there I hurried to the LARP I signed up for For Art’s Sake which went rather well (I think I came in second or third), then a quick change for the Goblin Dance. I had 3 dances one with eustaciavye, one with a woman I met named Jill, and a third dance with a lady in white whose name escapes me.

So far this weekend I have sung along, but I did not perform any songs. At Sunday’s circle I brought my laptop and performed Grand Moff Tardin’s Crew (a request from the floor), Boundless by Blake Hodgetts, and of course I’m Going to go Back There Someday.

Monday I was feeling the results of my behavior over the weekend. I did go back to the hotel, where everyone was gathering, hugging, and saying goodbyes. I had a Wonderful Con