XIBO'S
VACATION (LONG)
[Please note this was written in March of 1992; we were all younger and
less experienced then.]
Several months ago, a few angst-list members were mulling over the
idea of AngstCon III, where to have it, and when. It became quickly apparent
that if we held it in Minneapolis, then the turnout would be pretty good,
since five of the members live in that area. So a few arrangements were
made, the date debated wildly, and eventually the weekend of March 27th was
decided upon.
I decided that since I was going to fly all the way out to Minneapolis
from my humble abode in Tucson, I might as well see other parts of the midwest
as well. Utilizing my knowledge that round-trip tickets don't have to be
with the same city, I chose to visit Chicago, because it's a big famous
city that I've never been to before. All I had to do was arrange to get
from Chicago to Minneapolis on my own, via bus or with a friend.
As it happened, I was able to convince Pope_751 to drive down from
Milwaukee, pick me up in Chicago, take me to Purdue for a couple days,
and then drive me to Milwaukee, where I would meet up with another friend,
Markian Gooley, who would then take me to Minneapolis, where I would do
the AngstCon thing and then fly back home.
The overall adventure took nine days, from Friday, March 20th to
Sunday, March 29th. I planned to take a week off from work, but made
no official arrangements with the department secretary, as I was rather
displeased with having to work panic-level hours for a couple weeks,
getting the RS/6000s back on their feet after they had been decimated
by IBM's kludge-filled AIX 3.2 upgrade. If you are considering doing
this upgrade on your RS/6000, DON'T. If you are looking to hire someone
who has experience managing RS/6000s, please hire me, I'm very underpaid
currently.
So, armed with airplane tickets, ride plans, and contingency
plans, I ventured forth on my adventure into the great midwest. What
follows is a short summary of my travels, along with some of the observations
I made at the time.
Friday, March 20th
After two weeks of pure hell, the RS/6000s were rescued, and the
laboratory had almost returned to business as usual. It was amazing
that I was able to clear things up in that time, and leave for vacation
with a clear conscience. Casually I packed my luggage, one really big
suitcase with a week's worth of clothes and my camera, and my briefcase
for carry-on entertainment, and "maps". These maps, for the most part,
consisted of text descriptions of how to get here and there, which I had
received via email. For entertainment I put the day's Wall Street Journal,
my Game Boy (with Final Fantasy Legend II cartridge), and a paperback
novel, "The Difference Engine" by Gibson and Sterling.
It was a calm, sunny day, near 70, as I drove to the airport.
I managed to get my car parked at the $2/day long-term parking area,
check into the airport, and find my gate, all with no difficulty. I
was really early so I treated myself to an expensive breakfast at the
main restaurant in the airport.
The flight to Chicago was non-stop, and only about three hours,
which I thought was really short. It was a fairly modern plane, with
phones in the back of the seats. For $2.00 per minute, you could make
a phone call from 30,000 feet. I was tempted to call my brother and
tell him I was talking to him from a few miles in the air, but I decided
against it.
By some really strange act of fate, we flew over the Very Large
Array. The pilot was pointing it out so that the people on the other
side of the plane could see it. A few minutes after passing that, I
looked down on the ground on my side of the plane, and saw a most amazing
sight: Socorro, New Mexico, home of New Mexico Tech, where I went to
college and suffered much angst and mental anguish. The college, which
only has 1300 students, looked really small. I could see "M" mountain,
the whole city, the Rio Grande, the explosive test sites... all at once,
and it was quite miniature. It was comforting to know that I had risen
so far above all that.
It didn't take long to reach Chicago, touching down at O'Hare
airport. I'd never been there before, but I knew it was supposed to be
pretty big. At the gate, I looked around, but could see no sign of
Wanderer. Damn, I thought, I sure hope he isn't late. He's the only
person I knew in Chicago. So I stood around for a couple minutes,
making sure he wasn't there, and then I proceeded to the baggage claim
area, making sure he wasn't at the security checkpoint site, which was
pretty big and partitioned off and confusing. He wasn't at the baggage
claim area either, and my suitcase quickly arrived. So I looked around,
confused, trying to figure out what to do. I called his house and left
a message on his answering machine, but that didn't really cheer me up
much. Finally, I decided that there was little I could really do, and
I sat down and read some for a while. A few minutes later Wanderer
runs in, explaining he's been waiting right outside, in a line of 40
cars, and he was expecting me to walk out of the area and see him
instantly. Yeah, right, I thought. All this just so we wouldn't have
to walk to a parking area. *sigh*
So I resolved to write up an airport protocol, in the hopes
that in the future, people everywhere would use the protocol, and no
more confusion would have to be suffered. [See Appendix B]
We drove off, doing smalltalk about the weather, and freeways,
and before we knew it we drove under a plane. It was the first time for
both of us. How it happens is that O'Hare, like DFW, is so big that
the freeway separates some of the landing strips from the gates, so
there is a heavy-duty bridge the airplanes taxi over, to cross the
freeway. Thus, with some lucky timing, you can drive underneath an
airplane.
Traffic was a bit congested, as it was rush hour by this time,
so when the Burger King on top of the Freeway came into view, which
I thought was a crazy place to put a Burger King, we exited and hid
there for a while. There were arcade games, including my favorite,
Smash TV. So we pumped a few quarters into the machine and won big
money, big prizes (I even won a toaster!). Then we killed more time
by actually ordering some food.
Wanderer's place was actually in a distant suburb, and the
streets began to have familiar names. I was told that this was normal,
as the suburbs of Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York City all connect,
and we were currently somewhere in Utah. I nodded, wishing I had known
this before, as I would have just driven instead of flying.
I got to meet the cats, Boris and Rigel, both of which were
very playful critters. Wanderer showed me his lovely abode, a nine
foot square cardboard box that leaned against a supermarket. (It did
have net-access, though.)
After settling in, meeting one of his roommates and cute asian
friend, we headed back out into the cold night of Chicago. The skyline
was simply awe-inspiring, but unlike New York City, you could actually
drive around without delays. We stopped to get some power steering
fluid for the car, which was screeching a lot. My friend hadn't thought
to do this before, as car maintainence isn't one of his strong points.
The view of the Sears Tower at night was really impressive.
Strangely, it didn't look as mind-boggingly tall as I had hoped; this
may have been due to several nearby buildings being almost as tall.
Still, with the night lights, it all looked very modern.
We drove past downtown and on towards another person's apartment,
where picked up someone else, and then we headed back downtown to go
play BattleTech. This was a stripped-down version of Mech Warrior
that had been reprogrammed to allow several players at once, using
a network using LANtastic and run on 286es. We made several sniggering
comments on how primitive the hardware was, and then played a couple
games. The games were very expensive ($8) and only lasted a few minutes.
The selling point was virtual reality, which is to say that they sit
you in a box that blocks out external light, so all you see is several
buttons and switches that do things only advanced players can guess at,
a couple hand and foot controls, and the viewscreen. I guess if one
wasn't aware of all the simple software tricks involved, it might have
looked impressive. But personally I thought it was really lacking.
After that we cruised through downtown streets that were made
by famous by the movie, "The Blues Brothers". That was entertaining,
and then we stopped by the Sears Tower so I could take some pictures
of it from up close. We couldn't get in, for it was closed by that time.
A persuasive black man tried very hard to sell us some gold chains; he
was rather insistent, but I just blew him off entirely. The others
actually tried to talk him away.
After dropping off Wanderer's friend, we drove back, discussing
along the way several ideas on how to improve on the BattleTech idea,
how to rip it off entirely, and how to make a much better product.
Sometimes, even now, I think about getting a few people together, and
building a simulation involving space dogfights, but it would require
about $50,000 investment to start.
So I just laid down on the couch and let cats walk over me all
night long.
Saturday, March 21st
When I woke up, there was snow on the ground. And it was falling
lightly. Wanderer was still quite asleep, but I didn't feel at all
tired anymore, so I played with the cats for a while. They were really
cute, fun things. I'd never get one, though; you have to feed them
regularly and clean their litter boxes and that's just too much of a
hastle for me.
I just laid there for a long time, and pretended to be asleep,
and watched one of the roommate's girls leave, and then come back an
hour later or so, as if to pretend she hadn't spent the night there.
"That's odd..." I thought, and shrugged.
So I pulled out my Game Boy and vegetated to that for a couple
hours. It's not an exciting game, it's not even a good game. But it
was better than watching the snow fall down. The icicles on the pine
trees were really awesome, though.
Eventually though, we did get back in gear, and walked out to
the car, which was covered in snow. Actually all the cars were covered
in snow, and if you didn't remember where you parked you car, you had
to wipe snow off cars until you found yours, as they all looked alike,
all the same size, all late-seventies boats.
The drive back to town was a bit of a challenge; there was ice
on the roads, which didn't please me at all. But for the most part the
car stayed under control. We found Wax Trax, a famous alternative record
outlet, without much difficulty. Parking was another matter, though;
and when we travelled on a side street, which had not been salted, the
car decided not to stop at at stop sign, and we slid into traffic. Whee.
Amazingly, there was no collision.
I really do not understand how people can live in a climate like
that, where losing control of the car and endangering yourself to collisions
every day is just a normal part of life. It's absurd!
But we did make it Wax Trax, and they had a very impressive
selection of CDs, but not as good as the Wax Trax in Denver. Actually,
I thought the place was rather small, but I did find 9 CDs worth buying
there. [See Appendix A]
So, one of my big goals of the trip over with, I sat back in the
car and relaxed, as the snowstorm got to be rather severe. We had planned
to visit the Sears Tower, but after a few minutes of driving, it became
obvious that the best thing to do would be to manage to make it back to
secure shelter. Traffic was not pleasant, and road conditions were an
unhappiness. I even got Wanderer to admit that he didn't like to drive
when the weather was like this. Gee.
We stopped at a grocery store and picked up a case of RC cola
so we'd have stuff to drink. The roommates were watching "Robin Hood"
with their girlfriends when we got back to the apartment. I ordered
some pizza from Pizza Hut, and got chewed out by the roommates for not
getting real Chicago-style pizza. Fuck 'em, I thought. I wanted pizza,
and I didn't want to risk having it be weird. Pizza Hut is the same no
matter what part of the country you're in.
After the movie they put in "City Slickers". This was a very
good movie; I didn't get a chance to see it when it was showing in the
theaters. When it was over, I thought about it, and decided that my
trip to the midwest was kind of like a reverse of the movie's concept.
I'm from the desert southwest, and I'm spending my vacation visiting
highly urban cities. So if there's a term for the reverse of a city
slicker, then that would describe me on this trip.
Sunday, March 22nd
So after another morning of being walked up on by cats, vegging
out to Game Boy, and contemplating the weather, things picked up again.
We did the food thing, eating out at Arby's. Wanderer drove in circles
in the parking lot five or six times, because he was bored.
I was finally able to contact Pope_751, and convinced him to
drive to Chicago and pick me up. Then it simply became a matter of killing
the day off, because he needed to sleep first.
So, what better way to kill time than to preview OS/2 2.0? A
copy of one of the latest beta releases was on hand, so I got to play
with it for a couple hours. Overall, it was much better in appearance
than Windows 3.0, which impressed me, as IBM has a habit of making a lot
of hype about things that are actually just so-so. But this is actually
a better product than Windows, so I think IBM might actually have something
here. Problem is, you need a 386 and about six megs of RAM to run it
effectively. Most people have a 386 by now though, and it shouldn't be
long before people clue in to the concept of buying more RAM.
Still, I'd rather run UNIX. Even AIX, which is evil and buggy
and had a disastrous upgrade recently that caused me a lot of grief.
I just don't think having a cute graphical interface hiding command
line prompts is enough reason to justify suffering all that overhead
in making a multi-tasking DOS-compatible system. But, oh well.
Wanderer had to take off to do some urgent work, so I was left
to play with the computer and get in some net time, catching up with
email and doing a little mudding. While I was mudding, I heard some
sounds behind me, and I turned around to see a large iguana climbing
the closet door.
I stared at the iguana. It stared back at me. I nodded at
it and went on typing away at the computer. It went on climbing the
closet door. There was balance in the universe.
So, the computer thing got old after a while. It got dark.
I read some out of the novel I brought along, then vegged out some
more to Game Boy. It wasn't the most exciting time, but it wasn't
particularly stressful either, and pretty relaxing compared to my
normal life.
But alas, it had to happen, Pope_751 finally did arrive,
driving a (Surprise!) late-seventies boat. We loaded the car and
took off. His car a had a totally awesome sound system, it was
capable picking up frequencies from 530 kHz to 1600 kHz.
So I became mesmerized by the sounds of talk radio and we
drove in circles in the suburbs of Chicago, looking for a freeway.
On the second time around we found one, and half an hour later,
past a few toll booths, we were on our way to Indiana.
We got gas near Gary, Indiana, and coke, too. As an added
bonus, the car picked up a nail, and a while later we discovered
that the tire had gone flat. This was a bummer, because it was
cold outside, but we were near a rest area, so we parked there and
checked it out. Simple flat, and there just happened to be a jack
and a spare tire in the trunk. What luck!
Only thing was, the jack was a seventies-style thing, that
had to be assembled. But with a little effort we got the two-ton
car jacked up and the tire swapped out. Yay. But that was all too
easy, so the jack decided that it liked going up, but not down.
We could not convince that jack to come down. It was so old and
probably hadn't been used since the seventies, so something stuck
inside, and it wouldn't go down, no matter how we banged it, shifted
the levers, or anything.
I was not impressed. "Jack," I said menacingly, "you are
not going to prevent me from getting to Purdue." And so I told
Pope_751 to put the car in neutral. My, the jack didn't like that.
The car rolled right off the thing, taking a piece of bumper off with
it. We nodded and headed back on our way.
Monday, March 23rd
And so about an hour later we found our way through the dead
trees and ancient houses to the thriving metroplis of West Lafayette,
Indiana. We followed the fun directions that took us through a shopping
center, to the secret hideout of Finrod & Tourmaline's apartment.
A lightly bearded man with really long hair answered the door
and welcomed us in; it was Bishop_III. On the couch was Tank Girl, his
girlfriend, who was mudding away on a laptop that had been set on a chair.
It was a friendly welcome, and we all gathered around Tank Girl to see
what was happening on the mud. She announced to all our friends in
our favorite corner of cyberspace that we had arrived. Riana, another
mudder from Purdue, heard this and said she'd be right over to meet
us. We all joked back and forth how Blackbird would kill her if she
set foot in the apartment, as her reputation was not the most favorable
one. But Blackbird was elsewhere at this time, so nothing prevented
her from coming on over.
So half an hour later Riana arrived, although she was only a
fifteen minute walk away. With her was Nilrem, her current boyfriend,
and some other guy, whose name eludes me, thankfully, as he gave the
appearance of a totally clueless loud-mouth, which, in fact, he turned
out to be. I noticed Nilrem had a Battletech patch on his jacket, which
I thought was cute. The three of them looked like they were from a local
high school but I was told that they were indeed college students.
Pope_751 and I were rather hungry at this point, and decided
to get food, although it was late and the best place anyone could think
of to eat was Denny's, which was fine with me. We took the three
young'uns with us. On the way there it was explained to me that the
people who work at Denny's don't appreciate students. Well fuck them!
We were paying customers, and neither Pope_751 nor I were students.
So I ordered eggs, because I love to eat eggs at Denny's.
Everyone quickly ordered their stuff, except for the loudmouth, he
bungled his order, talking confusedly with the waitress for five or
ten minutes. I wanted to reach over and kill him, stab my fork in his
eyeball repeatedly. Bastard. Hasn't he ever been to a Denny's before?
Didn't he know how to order food? Christ!
During the course of our meal, Riana explained to us how she
found Nilrem at GenCon, like a lost puppy, and took him home with her.
I didn't believe the story, but she stood by it, and everyone else
seems to believe it's true. Nilrem talked at length about how he
was kicked out of here and there and hitchhiked from place to place
looking for a new home every few months. I just stared at him.
Pope_751 bought a copy of USA Today and spent most of the time reading
the articles.
After a while, I began to realize that things were too absurd
to obey the laws of any normal reality, and I decided to have fun with
this. Riana was kind of cute, and playful, so I asked her if she'd
like to have sex, in a low voice, while Nilrem was talking about something
else. I don't think anyone else heard, except maybe Pope_751. She
resisted this offer, making some excuse about Nilrem, so I offered to
give him $20 to go entertain himself while we had fun together. I
thought it was a reasonable offer, I mean hell, he could go to a movie
and get popcorn and a drink and still have cash left over to play
arcade games. Riana, however, turned this down.
Maybe I should have been more generous.
The sun came up and the kids began to whine about how tired
they were, and Pope_751 decided to play the cruel part, and forced
everyone to stay at Denny's an extra hour. But eventually even he
got bored, so we drove back to the Purdue area, and dropped the kids
off. And we didn't see any of them ever again. Yay.
Pope_751 and I cruised around campus and to the brighter
parts of West Lafayette, until we found ourselves overlooking the
splendid view of several hill-sized heaps of rock that a local mill
had deposited. We sat in admiration of this for a long time, it
must have at least forty seconds, and then decided that this town
really wasn't that interesting after all, and seeked entertainment
elsewhere. This led us back to the apartment.
Blackbird was there, doing something vaguely breakfast-like.
No introductions were necessary, we all knew each so well from our
respective reputations that there was simply no reason for confusion.
We made several crude jokes and had a jolly good time together, a
true male-bonding experience, all very macho and rude. After a while
though, Blackbird had to go to some other engagement, probably a class.
This left us two dangerous characters alone and bored, with
nothing to do. I looked at Pope_751, he looked at me. We looked at
the newspaper.
"Scissors," I stated.
He nodded vigorously and thus began the search for scissors.
We didn't want to be too obnoxious turning the apartment upside down
looking for scissors, being guests and all that. But we really did
want some scissors. Eventually I ventured upon a pair in Finrod's
room, and we were in business.
We sorted through the advertisements and cut out several pictures
of young women and girls, especially the ones wearing only underwear.
I was told to search for an ad for a douche, while Pope_751 cut up
the figures into phallic shapes. By the time I found one, he had
made many cute figures, mixed and matched. If we had glue we would
have made quite a collage.
But we didn't have any glue. And it was getting boring. So
we tried to get access, instead. We fiddled with the computer, and
managed to get it to call the university, but weren't able to get either
an external line or access to an account. It was a bummer.
Fortunately around this time, Tank Girl had waken up and
stumbled her way out of Bishop_III's bedroom. She was able to supply
a few more clues about hacking into the system with Tourmaline's
account, but we still weren't able to get through. So then she did
the logical thing, she logged into her own account. Finally, access!
While she was occupied with checking her email and seeing who
was on DreamScape, I decided to occupy myself with fulfilling some
promises and threats I had made previously, via mud, a week before.
This involved fondling Tank Girl, groping her, and massaging her
breasts. She didn't object, which set off an ancient, dusty voice
in the back of my head.
"Pursue your ambitions," the voice said.
I needed no further encouragement; I went for it. She was
wearing a button-down dress, so I started by undoing a couple buttons,
so I could get some fingers through, and did some exploring. She fidgeted
a little, but I kept at it anyway. She was mudding on DreamScape by this
time, telling the gang how she was being molested by Xibo, and then the
term "xibolestation" appeared.
I discovered she wasn't wearing anything underneath, as my
rubbing fingers discovered pubic hair, and ventured further. Things
progressed quite freely, and I found myself finger-fucking her. I think
this finally got her attention, as she gave Pope_751 the controls and
let him take over the computer.
The glasses came off, and the kissing started. We made out
on the couch, giving it reason to exist. Pope_751 was doing the play
by play, exaggerating the details a little. I figured since everyone
had heard I was molesting her, I might as well do it completely. I
sucked on her neck, we sucked face, we squirmed and thrusted. It was
a blast.
Eventually we cooled off and went back to mudding, to see just
what Pope_751 had told everyone. Unfortunately no one had logged it,
which was a pisser. I was feeling most amused at this time, and was
well beyond caring what Bishop_III might have done, had he woken up
and walked in on us, which was pretty abnormal for me. But I didn't
give a shit; I was on vacation, having a good time. They were supposed
to have an open relationship anyway, so I chose not to worry about it.
I did wonder, though, whether the people on the mud believed what Pope_751
had told them. It was all true, but rather unexpected.
Tourmaline and Finrod arrived at one o'clock for lunch, and I
finally got to meet these cool people. Tourmaline wasn't near as fat as
I thought she was, and Finrod wasn't as pale as I was expecting, either.
We sat around chatting for a while, and Tourmaline wasn't at all
surprised to see Tank Girl and I being all cuddly on the couch; my
assumption at the time was that she was used to strange events occurring
when mudders come to visit, but on retrospect I suspect that perhaps
she felt such behavior was normal for Tank Girl.
Finrod bypassed conversation in favor of lunch. Tourmaline
showed Pope_751 how to use the computer to get access, and then grabbed
some quick chow for herself. I blinked my eyes and they were back out
the door, promising to be back later, in time for quarter night at
McDonald's.
That left our afternoon with time to kill. Pope_751 passed
out at this point, but I was still good for several hours, as staying
up for thirty hours at a time was something I picked up in grad school.
So this of course led to more playful xibolestation, and I grew to
really admire Tank Girl's curvy features. I should have fun like that
more often. (At least more often than every three years, but I'll not get
into that here.)
Bishop_III woke up to find her bare legs in my lap, but he didn't
even blink, he just sat down on the couch next to us and looked over to
see what was going on the computer, with the mud. Did he mind that
Tank Girl and I were so cozy? I don't think so; at least, he gave no
external sign. Lucky me.
Around sunset I was running out of motivation to stay awake,
and had been up a while, so decided to take a nap until dinner time.
It felt like I was lying there for only a couple minutes, but was told
that I had been there an hour when the dinner call came.
Tank Girl and I walked to McDonald's, where we all bought many
fine hamburgers at twenty-five cents each. I could only eat four, though.
Bishop_III joined us there, and we also met up with Tourmaline and Finrod
there, who gave us a ride back, in Tourmaline's poor car, which had been
dented pretty severely by an asshole a while back.
The gang spent the evening chatting and ignoring the TV. We saw
Pickles on the mud and invited her over, and about half an hour later,
Snag and Pickles had arrived. Snag didn't stay very long, but Pickles
sure did. She was a very cuddly, and yet at the same time somewhat
reserved, person. Pope_751 latched on to her in full-force scam mode.
He was doing the nice guy routine though, so I didn't think
he'd make it. I thought he should have talked less and felt more. I
didn't think to tell him this, though, as he was obviously enjoying
himself, and my hands were finding Tank Girl again.
Things began to melt and twist, like they usually do when I
achieve the sleep-deprived state. At one point Finrod had Tourmaline
and Pickles on his bed, in no particular order. Shortly after that
I found Pope_751 had managed to find his way in there, too. Bishop_III
and Tank Girl went to bed, so I laid back on the couch and thought
about things, letting my brain vegetate to images on the TV screen.
I became half-conscious for a while. I remember Finrod and
Tourmaline going to bed, Pope_751 and Pickles returning to the living
room. We discussed how firm her right nipple was, but her left one wasn't,
and as they were cuddled at the side of the couch, I was able to reach
over and confirm, yes, her right nipple was quite firm. So I told him
that he just need to rub her left nipple like so, and I demonstrated,
and she didn't move to knock my hand way, which I thought was neat.
But any thoughts of a menage-a-trois faded as I drifted thru valleys
of dreams and fantasies.
Tuesday, March 24th
So, he continued to sweet-talk her, trying to figure out why
she didn't want to go all the way. For a while he played with her
using his stuffed rabbit (he always takes it on trips), shoving it
in her crotch, saying "FUCK DA BUNNY", which I thought was amusing.
As the days went by later, though, "FUCK DA BUNNY" grew to be a
hilarious inside joke.
They did get to making out, so I guess all of the nice guy
routine talk worked for him after all. This impressed me a lot. It
was also entertaining because they thought I was asleep there on the
couch, when I wasn't, entirely.
Although I did fall asleep for a while, with a few random
dream segments. I was wandering through a mall, lost. Then I
escaped the mall, and shot my gun at people who were chasing me,
but the gun wouldn't work right. Finally I got away from them,
and found myself at some well-trimmed lawn, with water-sprinklers
running, ka-chick, ka-chick, ka-chik. I realized I was in a dream
at that point, and used my dream power to fly. So I was floating
above the lawn, watching the water sprinklers, listening to them,
ka-chik, ka-chik, ka-chick, when I thought that they didn't sound
quite right. This bit of suspicion took me out of the dream state,
but the sound continued.
I continued breathing slowly so as not to alert the two
on the floor that I had awoken. They didn't notice. Pickles was
mostly undressed, and Pope_751 had his finger going in and out
of her in the most sexual manner, rhythmatically, making the noise
I had heard. Pickles just laid there, quietly. After a few minutes,
he moved to her breasts, and fondled those for a while. All I
could think of at the time was, gee, there's a cute naked girl on
the floor.
Discussing this later with him, he told me that he had
suspected that I was awake, but wasn't sure, and if I had made
goofy faces at him, he would have cracked up laughing. Apparently
the experience was kind of wacky for him, as she wasn't really
into it.
Anyway, they coolled off and redressed, and I slipped way
under this time, not awakening until way past dawn. Blackbird
was there doing breakfast things, Pope_751 and Pickles were snuggled
up cutely on the floor. When they awoke, Pickles left rather
abruptly, and we didn't see her again.
The morning went by listlessly; I wanted to play with
Tank Girl some more, but she was in Bishop_III's room sleeping next
to him, and I couldn't think of a way to get her out of there without
waking him up. Thus I concentrated instead on convincing Pope_751
that we really shouldn't drive to Milwaukee without getting the tire
fixed, so he went out to fix it. I watched Finrod and Tourmaline
come in and leave, played some more Game Boy, and basically vegged,
thinking about Bishop_III, in utter confusion. When Pope_751 returned,
after doing a couple errands, we discussed the possibility of hitting
a Milwaukee nightclub that night, and possibly making a side-trip to
Urbana-Champaign to visit cthonics, another mudder-type person. We
contacted him on DreamScape and got directions, and which included a
7-11 where one can get "many fine slurpees".
Pickles made a brief appearance on the mud, and she said was
dead now, her parents had found out that she was gone out all night.
I couldn't understand the problem, she is twenty years old, but apparently
still firmly in the grip of her parents. I hate parents like that,
and I think people over eightteen should move out and develop their
own life. Apparently she really was in trouble, though, as there
hasn't been any sign of her since then.
Pope_751 and I then went cruising around town again, and
stopped by a Von's, where I bought postcards and CDs [see Appendix A],
wondering why even a little town like that had a good selection.
With great effort I convinced Pope_751 to stop at a pizza joint,
and my stomach stopped growling as I chomped away. My cohort
didn't eat much, and spent the time writing a letter to one of his
girlfriends.
When we arrived back at the apartment, Tank Girl was awake
and Bishop_III wasn't, which was an opportunity I just couldn't pass
up. Quickly I hopped onto the couch and commenced cuddling her all
over again, breaking her attention away from the computer. Pope_751
did his part by convincing her to let him take over at the keyboard.
This allowed her get more intimate with me, and so we did. Things
were going along merrily when Pope_751 tells us that the people on
the mud wanted to get the show on the road, as we discovered he was
doing a play-by-play, and logging it this time.
"Okay," I said, "I guess I'd better get the condoms out, then."
"I guess so," replied Tank Girl.
Right. Wow. Meanwhile, Tourmaline was in the room too,
fretting over whether to do Logic or Differential Equations homework,
and I had the opportunity to have sex, even though it meant there would
be two people watching.
It was a simple decision, I didn't even hesitate.
It went like yesterday, but more intense; she responded well
to my bites on the neck, and quickly my pants were open, her dress was
skirted up, and we were in business. It was fast, yes, and I would
have preferred a slow night of nude snuggling in a warm bed, but such
luxuries weren't available at the time. It was really intense, though,
and we enjoyed ourselves. And I even remembered to use the condom!
So, we recovered after that, and I looked over the log, trying
to figure out whether the people on the mud believed what was happening,
and basically felt pretty happy overall. Pope_751 figured out the
way to get out of town and we prepared to depart. Bishop_III came
around, and I got to sit there cuddling Tank Girl, wondering if he
knew what just went down, and what would happen when he found out,
and so on.
But enough of that. It was great, but Pope_751 was driving,
and he said it was time to leave, so we blew, and kicked on down the
road towards Urbana-Champaign. While Pope_751 grumbled about the
slow truck in front of him, I got a chance to lie back and ponder
what just happened. It's not every year I get this lucky, or whatever,
so it was worth some thought. It really had me confused, too.
After a few interesting grain silos and miles of tedium, we
were back on the Interstate, and Pope_751 began to mellow out, listening
to Rush Limbaugh on his low-tech radio. A strange structure came
into view, and I asked him what it was.
"Oh, that? That's a farm."
"Ah."
It was a peaceful, quiet moment, perfect for reflection and
consideration of the puzzle I had before me. My problem was that I
suddenly felt that it had all happened to easily. I began to wonder
if there was a secret explanation behind it all, some ulterior motives
that I hadn't noticed. Why had I succeeded here, when I had failed
so many times before, elsewhere? The scary thought occurred to me
that perhaps it was just a pity fuck, that she had heard about all my
angst-related problems, and wanted to give me a pleasurable experience,
out of pity for me. But the more I thought about this, the more it
just didn't seem right; I felt she was not acting out of pity, out
of curiosity maybe, but not pity. So I marked that idea off, there
had to be some other reason.
"And that? Is that a farm?"
"Why, yes."
"Imagine that, two farms in a row."
So my mind wandered over to stranger ideas. Maybe someone
else at Purdue felt sorry for me, and chose to make a present of Tank
Girl to me, paying her a small fee. I wondered who I knew there that
would do something like that for me, and while I entertained a few
ideas, I had to reject this train of thought, as she really didn't
seem to be the type who would act as a hired-out prostitute-type person.
My mind was jumping among random guesses.
"Dude, look!"
"What?"
"A farm!"
"Whoaaa..."
Perhaps, then, she didn't do it for pay, but as a favor. Just
to make my life a little bit brighter and more hopeful. People have
done me favors before, although nothing like this. Still, this didn't
seem right either, as I could swear that she wouldn't have done it with
Bishop_III right in the next room unless she had her own personal reasons,
a more self-satisfying motive. So another idea fizzled out because it
just didn't make any sense.
"Hey, is that another farm ahead?"
"Why, yes... I think so."
I twisted Pope_751's bunny's ears and thought some more. Could
it have been a challenge? A dare, perhaps? Maybe someone told her she
wouldn't dare do it, and the challenge was set, and she felt obligated
to follow through with it. But who would make such a dare? Well, truly,
there a lot of obnoxious people who do that, just to see what kind of
reaction could be evoked. This didn't explain the hints of action I
was seeing on the mud during the weeks previous to the trip, though;
we had been joking about it for quite a while before I had arrived. In
the end, I chose to shoot down this idea also.
"So, what's that building, then?"
"I don't know, let's see what it looks like when we get closer."
"Hmm. It looks vaguely familiar."
"Ah, yes. It's a farm."
So maybe it was my charming good looks, my winning personality,
my outstanding charisma... hell, maybe it was the beard. Only in the
past couple months have I had a beard, which would explain why no one
had noticed me before, as I've been working nights for the past few
months, not seeing anyone in my daily life. But the illusions of vanity
only lasted for a few minutes. Sure, I was no longer the dweeby kid
I used to be many years ago, but I'm no dashing heartthrob either. It
was fun to contemplate, though.
"And that thing over there? Is that a farm?"
"Yes, I believe it is."
"What a coincidence, we just passed one a few minutes ago."
He nodded in agreement.
Finally, it occurred to me that maybe she was simply a very horny
individual, and could not resist sex whenever it was offerred. I just
happened to be in the right place at the right time. Whee, I should be
so lucky more often. But then I remember how she actually lived in a
dorm, and chose to stay at the apartment the whole time I was there.
Suddenly I realized it was no coincidence, it wasn't just luck, that
there was something beyond all that.
Another goddamn farm came into view.
"Isn't that a--"
"YES! IT'S ANOTHER FUCKING FARM!"
"Thought so."
But we ran out of farms, and I ran out of time to ponder the
reasons and motivations. It wasn't until about a week later that I had
figured it all out; the results are left as an exercise for the reader.
Urbana-Champaign was everything I dreamed it to be, and less.
Our directions to cthonics's place were rather vague, as he had no car,
and thus didn't quite understand what the freeways were, much less how
to get to his apartment from them. But we prevailed anyhow.
Actually, Pope_751's car needed gas and the 7-11 we stopped at
happened to be the same 7-11 that was referenced in the directions. So
I bought slurpees, and we made our way up to the third floor of some
ancient slum. This strange Kibo-like person answered our rapping at his
door and it could only be cthonics, so I thrust the cherry slurpee upon
him, forcing him to accept it.
Pope_751 collapsed on the couch, all those farms had really
stressed him out. So we participated in casual conversation, and cthonics
showed me a picture of Claire's breast, so I borrowed one of his pink
crayons and drew a picture of Claire's left nipple and showed it around.
Claire sure is a cutie, as I got to see a picture of her face, too.
Hunger drove us into action and we decided to walk to the strip of
restaurants in this thriving urban area, but it was very difficult
deciding just where to eat. We just wanted to walk up and down the
sidewalks all night long, but something broke our stride eventually,
and we ate sandwiches at a pub-type of place.
After that, I felt much better, but Pope_751 felt pretty
dead. We walked back to cthonics's pad, there being nothing else to
do in Urbana-Champaign. He even made some references to Lemmings,
though I didn't get to see the actual game. I convinced Pope_751
to hit the road, so we could make it to the nightclub in Milwaukee
he had mentioned earlier. This got us back on the road.
We managed to get forty miles north of there when we stopped
to pick up a map. I knew if we kept heading north we'd have to run
into a freeway sooner or later, but Pope_751 was feeling a bit lost.
Once we had the map I realized we had been parallelling the freeway
by five miles this whole time. Oops. I took over the driving, and
Pope_751 whipped out a pillow and promptly passed out asleep. So I
took the boat out of dock and headed it back on course.
It was after sunset, and the farms and faded away into the
darkness, when I heard on the radio that Jerry Brown had won Connecticut.
This shocked me, and pleased me, as I really don't want to see Clinton
in office, I don't even want him as the democratic candidate. He
just reminds me of the guy who won all the popularity contests in
high school, Class President, Captain of the Football Team, and so
on. At least Brown has interesting, if wacky, ideas. Our government
does need major changes, though.
I drove through Chicago, getting another beautiful taste of
that skyline, all lit up at night. By the time we arrived in Milwaukee,
Pope_751 had woken up after a restful four-hour nap. I didn't have
any puzzling thoughts on that leg of the trip, because I was vegging
to talk/news radio the whole time. This mind candy was pretty restful
for me, and I was ready and willing to party. I didn't even mind that
the weather was below freezing, threatening to create ice.
We dropped our luggage off at his house, in the basement where
the computer, stereo, and keyboards were. It was quite an artistic
little cave, with Sid Vicious posters and other cut-outs. Even a
few penguins were present. But we didn't stay long, and Pope_751
snatched his parents' car and we cruised into the Downtown area.
Wednesday, March 25th
Pope_751 led me to Esoteria, the closest thing one could find
to a teenydoomerland on a Tuesday night. It was a small place, with
minimal lighting effects, but at least they did play Skinny Puppy twice.
I drank a couple long island iced teas there, which were mixed a lot
stronger than I was used to, though I didn't notice until later. Maybe
I should avoid drinking when I'm travelling.
There were a few babes there, but for the most part they were
in couples, which led us to watch and chat, and not really do anything
else. It was a great way to unwind after being in a car for four hours,
though. I let the alcohol kick in, so the visions would swim.
Afterwards we drove back to the house, which wasn't a short
drive, and Pope_751 alternated tapes of his punk band's music and his
wacky remixes of popular industrial bands. It was quite a trip, especially
with all the streetlights and funky Milwaukee landmarks zooming by.
The city even had a little skyline of its own, in miniature.
At the house we watched TV for a while, and I must have really
been tripping, because I remember watching Perry Mason in the living room,
and then appearing downstairs in the cave, watching Pope_751 hit the
local BBS/chatlines or maybe it was the muds. Probably both. After
that blackout I chose to do the sleep thing, and slipped into unconsciousness
with a small, but firm, thud.
Many, many hours later, I woke up and showered, any effect of
a hangover long gone. There was a light snow on the ground, and it made
me kind of paranoid, so I played with the Game Boy for a while. Then
after Pope_751 woke up, I got online and my boss caught me, so I chatted
with him for a while. After reassuring him that the systems are doing
fine and that I'd been checking them periodically, he let me go and I
skimmed over email things. Then Pope_751 logged into his chatline where
he spat and cursed and said generally hateful things, as per his character.
Once that was over with, we headed back out and went shopping
for CDs near the downtown or university area. I was impressed with the
selection they had there, and bought even more CDs [see Appendix A] to
add to my collection. I never have the opportunity to buy these things
at home, because the selection in Tucson is limited.
That managed to kill a couple hours, and we drove back to the
house, listening to more of Pope_751's crazy custom remixes. He played
for me a song he was working on, "Senator Jack Kennedy", which existed
as a program in his PC. His collection of keyboards and other music
machines was all linked up MIDI-style with his computer, which gave him
the power to create interesting things, even though his recording
equipment was rather limited.
He got back on the chats and got in touch with one of the local
girls, Penny, and arranged for us to take her to go see the move movie
"Basic Instinct". It was a bit of a rush, picking her up and getting
to the theater on time, but we managed it. Neither of us hit on her,
too, which was amazing, considering how things on this trip had gone.
The movie was entertaining, though the style reminded me of "Cape Fear",
which is to say that I thought it was over-acted and the camera footage
over-dramatic, considering that the sex scenes weren't all that sexy,
the violent scenes weren't that impressive, and the lesbian scenes were
mere hints of what they could have been. I felt like I was watching an
edited-for-television version of a movie I hadn't seen.
Afterwards we plundered through the snow and ice to hang out
with some of their friends at this fundie's house (excuse me, Protestant).
I was interrogated about my political and religious beliefs, which left
the religious wacko rather confused, since she respected how I supported
Bush and the republican party, but frowned strongly on my devout atheism.
I was informed that she'd pray for my soul. Aw, gee. Meanwhile the real
action was with Penny and one of the other guys there, as they were for
the most part pretending the other wasn't there, while at the same time
striving to look natural and relaxed. I found this amusing.
Thursday, March 26th
Around 1:30am we were told it was getting late and it was time
to leave, which was fine with me, as I was bored with the whole affair
by then. We got back in the car and drove away, and the conversation
of course instantly picked up with Penny talking about her boy problems.
Well, she's still pretty young, I thought, excusable for being slightly
immature. Though it really nagged me that her problem was the most classic
one that angst-ridden people have to deal with: she didn't want to be
romantic with this guy, but she didn't want to hurt his feelings, so she
wanted get the point across to him of "Let's Just Be Friends".
Well, I nearly puked right there, and within minutes I was telling
her exactly what I thought about that line of reasoning, where it will go,
and how much pain she'll cause by pursuing this course of action. I rather
doubt, though, that my opinions sunk into her shallow mind. Sigh. I guess
she would learn the hard way, eventually. Pope_751 seemed to think she was
a very smart person, so maybe there's hope. I remain doubtful.
After we dropped her off, it was back to the basic male-bonding
experience: playing with music, reviewing CDs, and chatting with people
via cyberspace, be it the local chatline or a mud like DreamScape. My
own mud was having problems, as usual. Every time I leave town, the
thing crashes. When we bored of all this, we went back to sleep for
a while.
When I woke up, there was a lot of snow on the ground, and it
looked very intimidating. We got a very slow start to the day, and
didn't do very much. Eventually, in the evening, we drove out to the
university, using the old boat, since a bigger car seems to be safer
on ice.
We parked somewhere next to the campus, but it had been a while
since Pope_751 had been there, as he was totally lost and refused to
admit it. We walked through several buildings, looking for richter's
office, who we were to meet for dinner. Eventually, after a long
walk through blowing wind and heavy snow, we found ourselves at the
student union, and became unlost.
After that it only took a few minutes to find the lab that
richter was watching over. She still had an hour to go, so after doing
the introduction thing with Markian Gooley and Mark Lippert, a couple
of people from talk.bizarre, I emptied my mind by reading news, as the
keyboards were too messed up to do the typing required for mudding.
Mark Lippert, for those who are keeping score at home, was the total
opposite of Roger David Carasso. Totally different personalities there;
I kept thinking of him as the "anti-carasso".
After the hour was over, richter kicked people out of the lab,
and we ran (again through snow and ice, it was just getting colder) back
to the car and drove over to her place, parking at Walgreen's, because
there was no parking at her apartment building. Fortunately it wasn't
a long walk. The apartment, however, was pretty small, and crowded, for
she had acquired all of her grandmother's antiques. There wasn't any
room to walk around, you just had to stand in the same spot the whole
time.
After several minutes of whining about her broken refrigerator,
richter made us dinner, which was chinese food, dumplings and rice and
stuff like that. It was enjoyable, but I'm not a big fan of chinese
food, so wasn't overly impressed. I would have just gone out to eat,
though I guess that's an expensive luxury to some.
After dinner Pope_751 and Mark Lippert took off; Markian and I
spent the night there, unfolding the couch, rearranging the furniture,
checking the weather channel, and basically being boring.
Friday, March 27th
In the morning richter had to go to work for a few hours, which
left Markian and I with some hours to kill. We walked around, confused,
in the morning sun, trying to find a diner to have breakfast at. Most
of the snow was quickly melting away, which was quite a welcome relief.
I was fairly paranoid about snow and ice, because two years previous to
this trip, I had had an auto wreck on black ice in Wisconsin.
Eventually we did find a place, and I got to experience what
corned beef hash is. It's pretty rare out west, and was a new experience
for me. But a good breakfast makes for a good day, so I merrily chomped
away. I think I ate breakfast more than other meal while on this vacation,
with lots of eggs. I like eggs.
After that we wandered back to the car and decided to kill some
time downtown. Markian's driving was about as bad as a beginning Student
Driver, and it was miraculous that we didn't have a wreck. He ran through
red lights, did left turns from the wrong lane, and generally made other
people have to swerve and slam brakes. I made sure my seat belt was
securely fastened and took comfort in the fact that he was driving a large
american boat, and thus we would probably be safe in the event of a collision.
Finally, after cutting off a city bus, we found a parking space,
and it only took fifteen minutes to finish parallel parking. We spent a
couple hours walking around the downtown area, taking in the architecture
and other scenery. There wasn't much of a street society, though, and
things were actually rather quiet. We killed time in a bookstore, visited
Usinger's so Markian could pick up some sausage, and watched a car squeal its
alarm endlessly. There were several smokestacks, a structure I don't see
very often. I thought they had all been knocked down back in the seventies.
Actually, parts of downtown Milwaukee were basically stuck in that decade,
with very few signs of modern cars or technologies present. Even the grade
school looked ancient, several stories high with horizontally hinged windows.
We also visited a museum, which had many items of historical interest,
including pictures and models describing Milwaukee as it had appearred in
the past.
Eventually we had killed our time, and hit the road again. Luckily
we were near the freeway, where Markian was a little better at driving. We
drove off, in search of richter's workplace. It was easy to find, mostly
because Markian had a city map, and I was able to translate richter's hastily
scribbled directions into something coherent. We arrived a bit early, though,
so stopped at Denny's and Markian had lunch. I just ate some cole slaw.
The menu at Denny's had special Lent selections, for the religious type of
people to choose from. I didn't think anyone paid mind to such silliness
anymore, but Markian and richter both did, I believe.
I don't get it. Christ is *not* coming back, he's very dead. There
is no god, it's just a story that the ancient governments invented to give
the commonfolk hope. Oh well. Luckily, usually it's mostly harmless.
We entered richter's workplace, and had the lady at the main desk
give her a call to let us know we had arrived. But even then we were told
to wait. I shrugged, having had to wait all day, for this and that, and
sat down on a convenient couch, and paged through a magazine. A while
later richter arrived and we got back on the road, after a moderate delay
at the convenience store.
The drive to Minneapolis wasn't very eventful, either. Our cruising
speed was 67 mph, and I played a variety of CDs on richter's jambox. No one
complained about the music, although the Current 93 CD was a bit tedious.
The Enya and Skinny Puppy CDs were very nice, though. We passed through a
part of the state where they were smashing up the Interstate with machines
built for the sole purpose of hitting the road like a hammer, shattering
it. Then other crane and scoop-like vehicles tore up the road, which
revealed that it had steel cables running through it.
I didn't know that the Interstates had steel running through them.
And it was surprising to learn that they were completely removing and replacing
the road, regularly. Every year they tear up stretches of road and replace
them. Winter really kills those roads. Back in the desert southwest, we
have the same roads they put down forty years ago. Every five to ten years
we add a layer of blacktop to it, and that's about it. It just made me
wonder even more why so many people choose to live so far north.
After about four or five hours, we came to the New Richmond and
River Falls exits, and I came to the surprising realization that things
were actually beginning to look familiar, from my visit to Wisconsin two
years ago. This comforted me greatly. It didn't last, though, as we
were soon in Minneapolis, which meant city driving, and things got scary
again. We weaved our way to Brian's apartment, as per the instructions
I had been given, and it was quite a relief to get out of the car. Finally,
I could rest and be with old friends and begin AngstCon III.
But it was not meant to be. On Brian's door was a map to Frang's
house, informing us to go there instead. I sighed very deeply and cursed,
but we got back in the car. The instructions made sense for about the
first half, but after that, they were vague and confused. We got sidetracked
and found ourselves several miles off course, so we backtracked and tried
a second attempt. I decided to skip over the confusing part of the directions
and tried to match the later part of the directions to the city map. We
found one road we were supposed to be on, but we couldn't find Elm street.
Then there were these detour signs and road construction and we found
ourselves in a dark and twisted place. Markian was rather confused, and
richter and I were a bit edgy from his driving, but I forced myself to
concentrate, and logically figure things out. I decided that as long
as we headed in a certain general direction, we had to hit streets that
made sense. And so, after a few minutes parked in a dark, desolate, and
broken road, staring at a map, we ventured forth and discovered a road
that matched the city map. We followed this until we hit a road near
the end of Brian's directions, basically counting numbered streets, and
finally found Frang's house. To this day, I have no idea where Elm street
is supposed to be.
Fortunately when we arrived, there were people present, familiar
faces and new faces. I hadn't met Brian and Frang before, but it was
quite obvious to me who was who. Harlan was there too, as was Anton,
and the legendary Krill-Man (TM). I took an offered beer and drank heavily,
trying to calm down and relax.
I didn't kill Brian. I was informed, however, had we arrived
earlier, that not only would we have found a map to Frang's on Brian's
door, but there was also a map to Brian's on Frang's door. I think, had
I found this, someone surely would have had to die.
So I interrogated Frang until he surrenderred the instructions
to the nearest convenience store, and then grabbed Anton and pulled him
out of there. Markian followed us. I got to see Anton's new car, a Geo,
which surprisingly had legroom. I had heard good and bad things about
the Geo line, but had never been in one before. Overall, it's a good little
car, better than I had expected.
We drove to the store, looking for the large neon MILK sign, which
we found easily. Finding a parking spot was a little more challenging.
I didn't care; it was good to be with Anton again. I walked the aisles
of the convenience store, looking post-it notes, or several small objects.
What I found was a bag of fifty old-style (no spring, just one piece of
wood) clothespins. So I got those, and a heavy marker to write notes on
the wood. I was pleased. I was ready to return to the house.
Anton and ricther fell in love with a large bubble-maker, while we
all chatted and smiled and generally behaved jovially social. Frang's
housemate made an appearance, and boy was she a hot babe. I think having
someone like that as a housemate would be quite a distraction, but I
could sense that Frang was entirely comfortable with it. Hi Ho Silver's
flight was cancelled thanks to a stupid fuck-up with United Airlines, and
wouldn't be in until the next morning.
There were two cats in the house, which richter promptly scared
off, yelling and running at them. Then she whined because they were afraid
of her. I just shook my head. When she wasn't watching, the rest of us
managed to make peace with the cats. As the night went on, Anton blew
hundreds of large bubbles, getting soap all over the floor. We talked
at some length about bubbles, particularly their interesting psychedelic
patterns of color.
For a little while I got Frang alone upstairs, and grabbed some
access. Then he checked the status of a large model he was running an
FFT on. I felt instantly envious of his job, because he got to use some
mathematical code. Though, as he pointed out, the difference between us
was that I actually understood the mathematics behind the operation. This
made me feel a little better, and so I played with some of Frang's puzzles,
of which he had many.
It got late, and Harlan, Anton, Brian and the many thousands of
krill took off, while the rest of us found sleeping arrangements in the
house. Frang carted up furniture to the spare bedroom on the second floor,
and we turned into it a sea of sleeping bags. We didn't stay up all night
talking, though; just shut the light and went to sleep.
Saturday, March 28th
Markian woke up very early, but I could tell nothing was happening,
so I chose to sleep the morning away. When I finally came around, the
house was all quiet, which gave me the opportunity to draw faces on the
clothespins and hide a few. Most of the people were gone, to pick up
Hi Ho Silver at the airport.
I had only hidden a couple clothespins when they arrived, and
it was really great to see Silver again. And then a short while later,
Anton arrived with Ariel, and we all greeted her with a very warm reception.
We then all drove over to Brian's apartment, and he was actually there
this time.
Finally, everyone was present at AngstCon III! Our first scheduled
event was at a pizza place that was supposed to have spectacular pizza,
but there was a catch: Brian had chosen it. The only good thing I can
say about it is that the drive to the place took us down a road that had
some very interesting large houses. It was like a mile-long row of small
mansions. Out west all the really nice houses are hidden in the foothills
and surrounded by acres of land. But here, we had some really nice houses,
arranged as if it were just another part of suburbia, which I found very
amusing.
The pizza place, however, was ridiculously crowded. We could have
guessed at this by the fact that all the parking in the area was taken up.
I thought we would have been better off going, well, almost anywhere that
wasn't crowded. Pizza is pizza, but being able to talk with your friends
in a comfortable setting is very important, especially when you only see
them only once every year or two. But we ate, two slices each, oh boy.
Then we drove to the zoo. I couldn't figure out what the appeal
of a zoo was supposed to be, but most of the other members were keen on
the idea. I thought it was dumb, but then, I didn't even enjoy zoos back
when I was a small child. What can I say? They're boring. Well as it
turned out, this zoo was just about ready to close when we arrived, and
the weather was all very gray and cold, beginning to snow. It occurred
to me that this AngstCon was not very well planned, and that Brian was
actually a bozo, who, though he meant well, was making a mess of things.
So, I regained some control, convinced him that we should go to
the CD store next, and got the instructions from him. Then I got in Anton's
car with richter, Silver, and Ariel in the back seat. Silver really enjoyed
that! Anton even became jealous of the whole situation after a while.
But it was great, having the five of us in the car together, and the rest
of the universe could go to hell. There was nothing like having old friends
you haven't seen in a year or two, comfortably close together, cruising
down the road.
We made it back downtown again, and spent a while in the CD store
there. One of the girls on the staff was a teenydoomer type, which everyone
noticed and thought I should hit on her. I didn't think she was that special,
though. Ariel asked me for a suggestion on which CD she should buy, so I
told her to get one by Dead Can Dance. Silver was finding many amusing album
covers, and I managed to find even more CDs to buy. [See Appendix A]
Since we were downtown, I figured I might as well find out what
the Glam Slam was like, since my brother is a major Prince fanatic. It
was a few blocks away, in cold snowy air, and the place was closed. But
I took pictures of the outside of it anyhow, to send to my brother, so he could
be insanely jealous.
After that, we ventured onto Minneapolis's Skyway, a most interesting
and modern idea. The skyscrapers all had shops in their first two floors,
and one year, long ago, someone connected two of them with an insulated
walkway. This idea caught on rapidly, and now all of the skyscrapers in
Minneapolis are connected with these insulated walkways. So it makes a
sort of an expanded mall, although, as we discovered, some of the walkways
have limited access. One area was even closed off because they were filming
a movie there.
Some of us were getting thirsty, and others wanted to find a
restroom, so we asked Frang to lead us to one of these. He nodded and led
us on, through a skyway and into an upscale retail store called "Dayton's".
In here he led us around clothes and hats and down an escalator, and then
finally we arrived at a fresh produce center. I found myself staring at
pineapples, wondering where the restroom was, where the drinks were, and
just why the hell we had been led to pineapples.
It was time to exert some control again. I asked Anton if he knew
anywhere in this convoluted setup that might have drinks and restrooms, and
was finally able to get him to admit that there was indeed a Burger King.
(There were a few other suggestions from other people, but I had noticed
that many stores were closing up, and I knew Burger King would remain open
for a while, so I basically ignored everyone else.) I commanded him to
lead on, and in a few minutes, we were at Burger King. Many of us let out
a large sigh of relief.
After that we decided to head back to the cars, and Brian was leading
again. This put us staring at dead end sections of skyway, closed off
hallways, and security guards who weren't sure of what advice to give. Anton
and I had had enough, and took off running down a darkened hallway. Everyone
else chose to stay with the group. We ducked into an alcove where there
were elevators, and jumped in one. Anton quickly pressed the Close Door
button, saying, "We've got to get away from those people." I just nodded
in agreement, with an insane smile. We ran outdoors and across the street,
into a more open section of the skyway, and while Anton perused a map, I
took a gander at an awesome babe in leather. It Anton a while to figure
out what I was panting at, but when he did, he asked me if I was going to
invite her to dinner.
I just smiled at him, and thought of the group we were with, and
told him no. Not the right time, not the right environment. It was tempting,
though, because she did look hot.
Then we were walking through skyways and we got sidetracked a couple
times, being just a little bit lost, but having lots of fun. Eventually,
we made it to the car, and relaxed. It took the others about half an hour
to catch up with us, for they had taken an even more circuitous route than
we had. I couldn't believe Brian had actually lived in this area for any
period of time, but he supposedly had.
So, thinking of the pineapples, we decided we wouldn't follow Brian
to the restaurant we were to go for dinner, and Anton got Brian to tell him
and scribble out a crude map of where it was. We recaptured Ariel, Silver,
and richter, put them in the back seat, and took off into the snow. We
became immediately lost. I couldn't even tell which direction we were going.
The best part about this was that we didn't even care. It was just
too great to be together in the car again, and we all had a merry time,
talking away, while Silver did the cuddly-tickly thing with the two girls
in the back seat, making Anton envious all over again. Eventually we found
a major highway and were able to manage to find our way to the restaurant,
about an hour late.
The restaurant was a manchurian chinese place, with a buffet, so
you had to walk downstairs to get your food, and carry it back up. I thought
this was pretty inconvenient, especially considering that I knew the price
would be rather high. As the two groups of five took turns going downstairs
for food, the others rearranged the seating arrangements. We did it first,
so the five of us could sit together, and then they did it second, to switch
ends of the table with us. The food wasn't bad, I rather enjoyed it, though
some people didn't, particularly richter, who spent most of the dinner
downstairs on the phone, making alternative travel arrangements back to
Milwaukee, so she wouldn't have to drive back with Markian.
After dinner we recollected back at Brian's place, and I hid several
clothespins in his apartment. We spent an hour there watching richter and
Brian put his stereo system together, which wasn't overly interesting. I
made myself useful by inspecting a line noise problem on his phone line, and
declared it to be the fault of a bad wire, after some testing. I managed
to find enough wire to hook up his modem and phone, though, so he was able
to use those, but not until later that night.
Eventually Ariel was about to panic with boredom, and we could
hardly blame her, and Anton ordered all of us out, to go find ice cream.
Everyone stampeded out of the place, but I managed to stop them on the
porch and get a plan set up. Of course, we didn't follow the plan, we ended
up somewhere else anyway, but it was an ice cream parlor.
We made our way to the back of the place, where we took over a
room reserved for children's parties. Again, the five of us at one table,
and the other five at another. Krill-Man, out of tradition, bought everyone
ice cream, and he asked me if he would always be the one that had to do it,
and I reassured him that I would take over the tradition once I made a
higher salary than him. This may be a while, because he currently makes
more than twice what I do.
The ice cream, of course, was delicious. I made everyone an official
AngstCon III clothespin, which people clipped onto lapels and such. Someone
found some crayons, and we all began scribbling on the placemats, making
very interesting pictures, ranging from Ariel's violent surrealism to Anton's
thought-provoking abstraction. I drew a severed hand.
Afterwards, we drove back to Brian's, but only richter and I entered
the apartment. I explained to Brian that we were going to take Jill home,
and that we would go directly to Frang's afterwards. Then richter explained
to Markian that she wouldn't be returning with him. I tried to keep it as
quick and to the point as possible; soon we were back on the road.
The drive to Jill's place was about thirty miles, so we all got
to be happy and chat all over again. It was sad to see her go. She had
explained that she was unable to join in Sunday's activities, so we hugged
her goodbye and then drove back to Frang's house, pleasantly and peacefully
having a conversation among friends.
Sunday, March 29th
As we clambered up the stairs to the guest bedroom, we saw Frang's
housemate again, she had come out of her bedroom, drawn by the noise, I guess.
She was wearing nothing but a red robe, and I quickly took in her sensual
features, from her bare feet to her rounded calves to the inviting cleavage
and welcoming, sleepy smile. We talked for a while, I mean not just me
and her, but all of us, standing in the hallway. I rather wanted to follow
her into her bedroom and trip the light fantastic, but again, I was guest of
Frang's, and that might have been rather rude, so I skipped it.
Later, I was informed by Frang that she wanted to know if I was
always that shy. That rather shook me up. I now have to wonder if I have
finally managed to acquire some sex appeal, for it seems too incredible to
be true.
Anyway, we all dived into the sea of sleeping bags once more and
got some rest. In the morning it took a while to cycle people through the
shower, so Silver and I chased richter around in our underwear, tickling
her, and generally being pests. Anton took advantage of this opportunity
and clicked off a shot with his camera, and I am sure richter wishes she
could burn the negatives. She yelled and cursed when the flash went off,
it was most amusing.
Then we all packed in Markian's car to go to breakfast, but the
first restaurant we went to wasn't serving breakfast that late, so we had
dessert instead, my treat. After that we drove to a different restaurant
and waited for a half hour or more for seating, but were finally rewarded
with a breakfast menu in the afternoon. I ordered eggs, of course.
Frang called up Brian's apartment to figure out what that group
was planning, and we were told to visit the spoon. Actually, this turned
out to be an art museum with rather large outdoor exhibits, one of which
included a spoon about forty feet long, with a cherry on it. There were
several other sculptures there, too, which kept us browsing through the
area for over an hour. We didn't see Brian's group there, though.
When we drove back to Frang's house, and got out of the car,
Brian's car drove up. Krill-Man (TM) jumped out, yelled, "Bye! Bye!
Bye!" and he hopped around and hugged everyone, and then jumped back in
the car, which then zoomed off to the airport. I believe he was cutting
it rather close.
Silver's flight and mine were ten minutes apart, and we had plenty
of time to get to the airport. We hung out at the house for a while, and
I hid a few more clothespins. It got dull, so we moseyed on down the road
to airport, and I got a ride in Frang's CRX finally. In the car he had
some pictures of my hero, Vice President Dan Quayle, from the time that
he visited Cray, where Frang works.
Silver and I checked our baggage and then we explored the bookstore
and gift shop in the middle of the airport. I picked up some reading
material, including a Waldo spoof called "Find Dan Quayle". I had to
grab it and run away to keep the others from pointing out where he was
on every page, for they had seen it before. After that we had lunch
at Pizza Hut Express, yay, personal pan pizzas. A fitting last meal
for the end of a fun vacation.
The trip back home was uneventful, with a ninety-minute layover
at the DFW airport. I spent most of the flight reading Business Week
and the Wall Street Journal, as I wasn't in the mood to concentrate on
the whole Tank Girl thing, which occupied my thoughts for a long period
afterward. It was almost midnight when I touched down in Tucson, and
within an hour I was back in the office, catching up on work.
It was a great trip, and surely the most eventful vacation I've
ever had. The expenses came in a little under budget, since I had set
some money aside for bus fares, had that been necessary. I met many
people for the first time that I've known for years via the computer
nets, and got to see some people who I hadn't seen since previous
AngstCons. I got to experience what city life is like in some major
cities, giving me more to compare and contrast with Los Angeles and
New York City. I became closer to some people, and done things that
I have never done before. It was a very educational, growing experience,
and well worth it.
-- Xibo
|
Chicago - Wax Trax:
|
|
Xmal Deutschland | Fetisch | 14.98
|
|
Edward Ka-Spel | Tanith and the Lion Tree | 13.98
|
|
Current 93 | Imperium | 18.98
|
|
Greater Than One | Index | 9.98
|
|
Current 93 | Christ and the Pale Queens
Mighty In Sorrow | 21.98
|
|
Zoviet France | Shouting at the Ground | 20.98
|
|
The Legendary Pink Dots | The Lovers | 13.98
|
|
Current 93 | Nature Unveiled | 21.98
|
|
Nurse With Wound | Chance Meeting On a Dissecting
Table of a Sewing Machine and an Umbrella | 20.98
|
| |
|
Purdue - Vons:
|
|
Various | Vhumetas Archetypi | 10.99
|
|
Enya | Shepherd Moons | 14.99
|
| |
|
Milwaukee - Atomic:
|
|
Swans | Love of Life | 13.95
|
|
Click Click | Wet Skin and Curious Eye | 16.95
|
|
Skinny Puppy | Last Rights | 12.95
|
| |
|
Milwaukee - Mainstream:
|
|
Bel Canto | Birds of Passage | 10.99
|
|
Various | MTV's 120 Minutes Vol.2 | 10.99
|
| |
|
Minneapolis:
|
|
The Legendary Pink Dots | Greetings 9 + Premonition 11 | 21.99
|
|
Trisomie 21 | "The First Songs" Vol 1/Vol 2 | 21.99
|
Before you commence your trip, be sure that the person who
is picking you up at the airport knows the airline, flight number,
and arrival time of your flight. It may help to confirm the date
and airport, especially if the city you're going to has more than
one popular airport.
Travelling is a hectic, sometimes scary experience, and can
be very frustrating. Thus, there is nothing more encouraging than
seeing a familiar face at the gate when you disembark the plane. If
at all possible, the person picking you up should arrange to be at
the gate.
Note that if you arrive and there is no one there, you are
expect to proceed to the baggage claim area. This will always take
you through the security checkpoint, although in some airports there
are many of these to choose from. Meeting a person at a security
checkpoint might work if they can't get past it (for whatever reason),
but this method should not be depended upon unless there is only one
possible security checkpoint that you could come out of, like in
smaller airports.
At the baggage claim area you will wait and get your luggage.
If your ride is not here either, you must assume they are late; it
may be wise to give a phone call at this point, to see if your ride
has left the house yet. A really caring person will leave a message
on the answering machine saying, "Don't panic! I'm on my way to the
airport! Wait by the baggage claim area!" This is a good place to
wait, as it is unique to your flight, and it is indoors, sheltered
from rain, snow, heat, or whatever miserable weather there might be.
Plus, outside, you'll not know where to meet the person.
Arranging to meet elsewhere should be done with the utmost
care. Parking lots are bad, because they are so big. Restaurants
can be misleading, because most airports have more than one place
that looks like you can get food there.
With some simple advance planning, with consideration and
patience on both sides, and contingency plans, you should never have
to worry about being stuck in an airport of some strange city, alone
with no friends in sight.
