Boy, I still have lots of work to do to get ready.
party.shirl.com
Sat Dec 8 2007
Two Weeks and Counting
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Category Archives: weekend
BGG.Con 2007
I spent four days in Irving, Texas playing board games with people from all over the place. It was a fabulous good time. With a game library of over 1000 games, not including those brought by the attendees, there were orders of magnitude more options than time allowed.
My photos are on flickr, and are mostly of games.
My only regret is not playing a game of Dune, and out of print game. They had an unpunched version of it in the library. A $100-$200 value in the current market. The game is going to be re-released in a year or two but without the Dune theme.
The hottest game of the convention was Agricola, which isn’t even available yet. There was one English copy and a few German ones with the cards in sleeves and printed translations accompanying them.
There were raffle drawing giveaway items each day with fabulous lists of prizes. And every attendee received a free game of our choice (in the pile) in addition to the two small games in the swag bag. Continue reading
Groupo Fantasma, Light Rock Express, Trinity, Colosseum
Started a busy weekend with the usual Molly and the Ringwalds – running sound for them. Less than an hour before the show, Crease showed up with new monitors and a new rack-mounted effect. I plugged the new monitors in – all reports are they’re much clearer and a little louder. The effects i left in the box for him to fiddle with.
The rest of the night I hopped back and forth from watching Groupo Fantasma and the Light Rock Express. Maggart was out with his chica at Groupo. And I chatted for a while with Savage Rose at the Big Top. Of course I ran into dozens of other friends.
Saturday was a trip to Trinity and Allen Bartel’s new 13 acre homestead. He’s still working on it and isn’t fully moved in, but that didn’t keep a disheveled mix of bikers, educators, and random Houstonites from drinking most of a keg of Shiner Bock and lighting all kinds of things on fire (fireworks, bonfires, motorcycle tread). And listening to Sean Reefer. We camped there for the evening and headed back in the morning.
Sunday evening was topped with a first playing of James Civco’s Colosseum – and some grub and wine. Very cool game. And a good preview of the 4-day weekend I will have in the tween of DFW at BGG.Con.
Yesterday was Veterans Day; today random people (esp. government) get the day off. When will they finally move Veterans Day to coincide with election Tuesday?! (last week) What better celebration of veterans could we have than exercising our democratic freedoms?
Weekend of Beer and Games
Here’s the lineup of beers for the coming fantabulous weekend in Wimberley to be spent playing games, sampling beers, cooking food, and perhaps walking down the road once or twice.
Click the image to get a closeup of St. Peter’s Cream Stout1, St. Peter’s Old Style Porter1, Unibroue 161, Malheur 101, Bayhawk California Pale Ale1, Left Hand Brewing Company Imperial Stout1, Shiner 98: Bavarian Amber, Samuel Adams Hallertau Imperial Pilsner, Bitburger Premium Pilsener, Brewery de Block Dendermond Tripel, Brewery de Block Special-Block 6, Brewery de Block Kastaar, Westmalle Dubbel1, Westmalle Tripel1, Mactarnahan Brewing Company Mac’s Ale.
I had the Sam Adam’s Imperial Pilsener, not fully chilled (as the fridge) but cool, and it was amazing!
The list of games is prob’ly longer than this.
1 I have only one of each of these.
Dad’s View
I was in Canyon Lake a few weeks ago for the show in Gruene.
Took this picture from the balcony outside the breakfast area – it’s the same view as the living room. The lake was quite high, and the damn was running full open. You can see the peninsula across the way is partially submerged. It was totally under a few years ago during their major flood. All the trees survived over a month under water.
Below the picture, out of view, is the bocce court and the horse shoe pit.
Music and Derby
Saturday afternoon – a nail-biter with UT barely taking home the win from Central Florida.
Went to the Astro Arena for a concert Friday night. Free tickets + $10 to park. The Killers were the main act. They added a super sucky opening opening band. Louis IV played second.
Louis IV was good, but like the entire night, the balance was super crappy. I think it’s indigenous to all large venues – pumping too much bass and sub-bass to inappropriate music, and leaving the vocals inaudible.
We left soon after the Killers started. I continue to be underwhelmed by them. They are now enhancing their tepidness with gaudy stage theatrics (which were at least a little cool).
I ran into Richard Naudin, Law, and Wiley at various times. Law: “The Killers? Really?” Me: “free tickets”.
Then I tried to get as much sleep as possible, then spent 11+ hours at Verison Wireless for The Governor’s Cup of Roller Derby – 4 bouts. Then several more hours at the after party. I slept hard after that.
Apparently while I was doing derby, the Texans won their game to be 2-0 for 2007. The 8-8 season may be within their grasp.