Tag: noon

Dragon*Con 2010: Day Four

Dragon*Con

And we comes to Day Four of Dragon*Con, the cruelest of Dragon*Con days.  Why?  Because most people don’t stay through Tuesday, seeing as how everything is done by 5pm (the panel schedule is so light that most people won’t find much to attend), it means they have to check out.  By noon.  Or 11am. Or whatever hour their hotel kicks them out.  And many people when faced with the dilemma of having their luggage sit in the holding area under bellhop guard or just proceeding out to the car and heading home will head home.  Checking out means Dragon*Con is over.

Where will I be today?  In the Sheraton, Savannah room, hiding.  We run a panel on legal issues in MMOs, another on Guild Wars 1 & 2, and our last panel of the con is where we talk about how the track did: what rocked, what sucked, and what we missed.

But what about yesterday?  The Guild panel was great.  Sandeep (Zaboo) and Jeff (Vork) are both great guys, oh and Sean Becker too (the director).  After that I took my annual tour around the exhibitors and dealers halls, things were bought, pictures will be posted in the aftermath post tomorrow.  I enjoyed the rest of my afternoon in my hotel room, trying to stay off my tired little feet.  But after not going to and later hearing about the Kingdom of Loathing party, I knew I had to go.  Plus, you know, last night of the con.  Essentially, it’s like going to a room party in a hotel, only you don’t have to have a secret handshake to get in, we post it in the schedule and invite everyone!  Day Three was a smashing success.

And look at that… I didn’t stumble into bed until nearly 5am and my 8am post is only 45 minutes late.  I am a con warrior!

All Hallows Eve.

Random Thoughts

Last night was Halloween. One of my favorite nights of the year, even though I partake of it too little.

I’m happy to say that Cobb County didn’t try this year to celebrate Halloween on the 26th or some nonsense to avoid work and school conflicts. I’m also happy I wasn’t innundated with warnings about rapists and murderers about. I wasn’t told to make sure the kids start trick or treating at noon and are done before sundown.

People seemed a bit more relaxed this year. Well, except that perhaps they were looking at Halloween as an escape from terrorist threats, anthrax scares, and all the real world bring-me-downs that we have seen since September 11th.

I headed out this year to a local Taco Mac. The best Taco Mac around in my opinion. Built in an old Steak & Ale building it looks totally different from all the strip mall steel and glass crap many of the others are made of. It’s homey. Smokey. More a bar than a restaurant. And I went with my fiancee and a few friends. We talked and drank. I think my friends were bored, or just had too much else going on to relax.

One by one they left. The band came on the stage, Tommy Gun, and with the end of their first song, the last friend left. My fiancee and I stayed. The band was good. Bordering on great. We drank. We sang. We danced. Ahhh… relaxation.

After the first set was done, we too headed out. We got home and decided to take a stroll out in the full moon light. The night air was brisk, and we wandered the streets, empty of trick-or-treaters in our apartment complex, and talked. We laughed. We smiled. Ahhh… relaxation.

The worries melted away last night, and once my friends were gone and the music began to play, up until I drifted off to sleep during the final credits of The Amityville Horror with thoughts of bleeding walls and demons in the basement drifting through my head, it was a great night.

I love Halloween.

9 July 1998

Random Thoughts

Some time just shortly before noon, Clan DoS died.
DoS, the Disciples of Syrinx (not satanic, its from a Rush song), was the gaming clan that I was in for the last… jeez… almost 2 years. Over the past 6-8 months however, we fell on some hardships as RealLife(tm) set upon many of us.. myself included at times. I like to think I did a nice write up on the closing of our doors, check it out, http://www.clandos.com . Now, so very unlike me, I’m going to quote myself:
“Well… even though I’m one of the guys who helped make the decision to disband the clan, it’s kind of like when they have to shoot Old Yeller… he’s your best friend, he’d give his life for you and you’d do the same, but it just needs doing… Ending the clan hurts… but so does anything worth having… memories more valuable than gold, my friends, that’s what life is all about…”
I actually said that. I look back on that and think, where the hell was I when this got said. It’s like it’s not even me. Same with the write up on the clan page. But then something happened about 30 minutes after I said that and signed off IRC and was working on my webpage.
I still love computer games and comic books… I like cartoons… but somehow… in the last couple of weeks… really the last couple of days… I’ve grown up. Not so much that I forget what it’s like to be a child… but somehow, I saw all this coming… my new job, the clan disbanding, and other things… and I’ve come to understand the world a little bit in places I didn’t before. Things I did yesterday that seemed so cool and fun, today seem irresponsible, like a waste of a few of the precious moments we are given here on this Earth, like time I could have better spent somewhere else, on something else.
I’ve always held that I never regret anything that I have done in my life. And I still don’t. Because I cannot regret the things that made me who I am today because I like who I am, and I would not be the same if I had not made those mistakes that I made. But for the first time I see that maybe, just maybe, I can keep myself from wasting time… from wasting life… on things that in the end give me nothing in return, no sadness, no joy, no “memories more valuable that gold”…
Today is just a sad, sad day all around…
…Tomorrow will be better, if not by nature then I will make it so.
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Theater Review: [none]
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Today’s Song: Oven by Seven Mary Three. Just kind of fits my mood today.
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Today’s Movie: Crossing The Bridge. This is one of those films you’ll never see if you aren’t the kind of person who takes chances on videos you have never heard of. It’s written and directed by Mike Binder, who also did Indian Summer (another good one). It’s just a good movie about three close friends. Makes me feel good when I watch it.