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Pow Wow, Patapsco
J: I
actually took a break last weekend and went to a little (very little) game
designers' convention in Charlottesville, Virginia. The convention was
called Pow Wow. I had a great time tossing ideas back and forth with
about
twenty other designers. We playtested many unpublished games, morphed
rule sets in between playtests, and cooled off with late night poker
games.
I met some fantastic guys, all interested and experienced in many game
design issues. Everyone was helpful, kind, and critical—
very good qualities in game design work.
I saw some good games there;
some will be coming soon to a store near you. I showed two of my
designs and
had one, called Smellivator, accepted for submission in an upcoming book edited by
the convention's organizer, Stephen Glenn. If my game is accepted for
publication, I'll be in there with the "big dogs" of game design.
Smellivator improved enormously over the Pow Wow weekend after
surviving several playtests, critiques, and rules changes. One of my
favorite games (which will also be appearing in Stephen's book) that I
played at Pow Wow was an ingenious "fix" for that old kid's card game
called War.
I spent most of the weekend in one room, but I did get out to a few
restaurants, including a blindingly fast-food bagel place called
Bodo's. They had scrumptious, fresh food at very low prices. A big
delicious avocado sandwich cost less than three bucks!
If I had enough time I would have visited Jenny or Peter, two friends
who have farms near Charlottesville, but I efficiently wasted all my
weekend as a game geek. Besides, I wasn't driving.
G: I hosted our
monthly party without John but with Lori, who was a big help and
reports having a good time. We made vegan cake and cupcakes for all the
July birthday people, there were 10, count 'em, 10 people with
birthdays in July at the party! And 2 that I know of missed it. Oh, and
one of them is ME! I had all the birthday people wear little party hats
and necklaces and everyone got a little prize. It was fun.
The next day I went to Shaun and Mi Ae's cookout baby shower. I met
most of Mi Ae's family. Her sister, who is about two years younger than
her, is also recently married and nearing the birth of a child. I
thought that was interesting! After that I went home and got Lori and
we drove out to a new place that Paul found to go swimming. It's
somewhere along the Patapsco river. We met up there with Luisa, for her
birthday outing, and many other people, and three dogs. The river was
murky and flowing fast. People would throw balls for the dogs, and
sometimes they'd get into a spot where they were swimming against the
current but staying in the same place.
Kevin and Dylan started wandering up river, and Paul and I followed.
You had to be very careful while wading because there were all sorts of
branches underwater that you couldn't see. We came to a fork where the
river was flowing down another branch of the river. We started
wandering down that branch, or I should say, swimming, as it got quite
deep in places. I was having a ball, laughing like crazy as the river
took me along, screaming and laughing as I was swept into unseen
branches or up to giant logs across the river. You'd have to climb over
or submerge to get under them. We found that even in very shallow
water, you could lie back with your feet out in front of you and be
carried along; it was fun. We realized we were getting further from the
rest of the people, but figured we were just on the other side of an
island and could go around. We were right, but we had some adventures
avoiding sweat flies and trying to swim against the current on the way
back up the other side of the island. We hung out a bit longer, Paul
gave me a peanut butter and apple sandwich, which is very close to a pb
& j, the food I most associate with swimming as my childhood was
filled with swimming in our pond and eating pb & j's. I chatted
with Marlene, she told me about her and Kevin's trip to the Rainbow
Gathering. Hopefully there will be pictures of that and the swimming
outing on her page soon!
On Sunday Lori and I went thrift shopping. We were trying to find a
place Izolda has told me about that has everything 1/2 off on Sundays.
It's in Laurel, but I couldn't find it online by what I thought it's
name was. I found a place called Laurel Thrift Center, and decided that
was it and off we went. It was a really nice thrift store, and they had
some items half price, but not everything. I knew it wasn't quite in
the right spot from Izolda's earlier descriptions to me, so after
shopping and getting some great stuff Lori and I kept looking for the
other place. We did see it on our way home, but had to get back home.
John and Kory were back from the convention, and wanted to go out to
eat.
Jenny came over later and Lori and I went with her to dance night. We
all had a good time. Lori danced well, even though it was her first
time!
Monday night we went over to Mike and Kim Cooney's house to surprise
Erica Johns for her 40th birthday. It was a great party. Erica was
mostly surprised. Mike and Kim had extensive remodeling done and their
place was fabulous. Mike's parents bought a place two doors down and
were in the middle of remodeling, we got a tour of their place as well
(Mike's mom Cass is in my pottery class. Momma Cass in Pottery class.
Woo!). One of the best things about the party was this recipe I came
away with. Erica thought she was coming over to cook with Kim, and she
brought a dish that goes like this: sauté some brown mustard
seeds, grind up some carrots in a food processor, add salt, lemon juice
and the mustard seeds, mix. It was delicious! I've made it twice since
then. We've been loving it.
J:
In case I haven't mentioned it yet, I'd like everyone to know that I
was wrong about Starbucks. I thought for years that the
globo-coffee-corp was owned by Phillip Morris (who own lots of other
globo-corps), and I boycotted it for that and other reasons. I still
think most of their coffee drinks are too sweet, but I was mistaken (or
taken in?) about their ownership, so I've dropped the boycott and I'm
trying to let people know that I was wrong. Many thanks to Shaun for
setting me on a path to truth.
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