Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Sleep

I was concerned about how the SE Gitp Meetup would go. Not that I thought it wouldn't be as fantastic and fun and well-run as every other year, but rather, the concerns were over how I would handle it. Now, I love meetups, and I'm one of those people that hates to miss out on ANYTHING. Most of the time, this results in my staying up nearly all night, getting less than 6 hours of sleep for the entire weekend combined, and basically subsisting on caffeine. Now, this is a fine way to spend an occasional weekend.....when you aren't 8 months pregnant. Before we left, I actually instructed Zeb to make me take a break once in awhile, go to bed by 2, take an occasional nap... he failed at this miserably, and actually, ended up falling asleep before me practically every night. In actuality, it went much the same way as every other meetup... I stayed up stupid late and got little sleep over the course of the weekend. (And mom, if you're reading this...don't lecture and don't worry. I'm just fine and a little missed sleep didn't hurt me one bit...) I did end up going back to the hotel on Sunday and napping for a bit more than an hour, causing me to miss out on Reinholdt's birthday party (le sad), but even that I probably wouldn't have done had I just been tired and not feeling ill as well.

It was a fantastically fun weekend though. Most people showed up Friday afternoon. We missed out on the pre-festivities at the Hippie Hut, because Zeb hadn't slept yet when we got there and I decided to be responsible and make him take a nap first. But then we went to the Thunderdome, which was a rather fun, gaming hang out. There was much Rockband, and a very fun game of Paranoia....in which I DID NOT DIE! See, this is significant, because it's very very hard to not die in this game, everyone else died at least twice, some as many as 4 times. It was a lot of fun though. I was the 'hygiene officer' and got to make everyone wash their hands a lot. We played a lot of other games there too, and they had amazing cheesecake. I can't recall how late we stayed there, probably 3-ish, it was late anyway. We hung out in the room after that for awhile, but probably went to sleep around 4:30, I would guess. Zeb fell asleep far earlier, a combination of little sleep the past couple days and too much beer, I think.

Saturday was the outdoor portion of the weekend. We woke up late and went to get breakfast, which was mildly disappointing. Then we headed over to the ropes course place, arriving fashionably late, as we did to everything, all weekend. There was kubb and grilling and fun conversations, and a few people climbed some. It was also hot and there were a lot of bugs. It was great fun though. We went swimming after that, which was exactly what was needed. Zeb luckily wears swimming trunks as his regular shorts and as such had 3 pairs and could lend some to the llama and nudist. Of course, I'm sure Indy would have prefered to swim without them, but there were kids in the pool. =P

We then went to Mid-City Grill. I don't know that I did too much while we were there. Played a couple rousing games of 'pass the pig', (such a fun, quick, time-waster..I should probably pick it up sometime), Ticket to Ride cards, and one of the 'skippy' b-movie games. Dinner was disappointing, which was sad because I remember it being really good last year. I was rather out of it while we were there though, and if I wasn't actively involved in a game or conversation, found I had a hard time keeping my eyes open. A bunch of people came back to our room after we left there, and somehow I was now wide-awake and happy to play games until 6am. I was rather concerned that the people in the room next to us were going to complain about the noise though, since we did have both Rockband and a poker game going on at the same time. I spent most of the time playing poker, which shouldn't surprise anyone that knows me, poker's kinda my game. We made up a new variant called 'reverse poker' in which you can see everyone's hand but your own...that was actually really fun and called for a complete change in the way that you think. Goof then introduced us to Whiskey poker, which was a ton of fun too, although it involved a bit less strategy and more luck.

Sunday was spent at Jared and Sherri's, which was fun, for the most part. Goof was in pretty bad shape though. Apparently sometime in the early hours of the morning, probably while he was playing poker and drinking very sugary cocktails, his insulin pump stopped working. By the time we got there, he looked pretty much like death, and spent a good chunk of the day sleeping. He did wake up to play Werewolf with us though (Even all ill and exhausted, he managed to play a fantastic game and ended up being the last villager alive), but he then ended up going to the hospital shortly after that game. Which really sucked, although I suppose if it had to happen somewhere, I'm glad it's in JC where there are tons of really wonderful people around to keep him company and take care of him. He's doing muuuuuuuuuuuuuch better now and it looks like he'll be able to head home soon. We went and visited him that evening as well as before we left the next morning and he seemed in good spirits, if rather tired. I'd gone back to the hotel to sleep when they found out that Goof needed to be sent to the hospital (He'd left to go to the pharmacy, not nearly as concerning) so I was a bit late in finding that out. Once Zeb, llama, Thes and Indy came back to get me, they filled me in and we went to visit him.

We made Sunday a bit earlier of a night, although Zeb, Indy and I still stayed up chatting far later than we intended too. Indy finally got to feel Jared kick, shortly before bed, which he had been whining about wanting to do since the weekend started. Apparently it's the 'coolest feeling ever'..he was rather awed. And I have to admit it is pretty darn cool. Except when you're trying to sleep anyway. =P Monday I proceeded to sleep a good chunk of the drive home and passed out not too long after we got back here.

All in all the weekend was a roaring success and a ton of fun. I can't wait to do it again next year. We met a fair number of new people, (Mangosta, Phillistine, Reinholdt, rtg, tyckspoon *thinks* Is that really all? I knew everyone else?...wow..) and they were all tons of fun. And it was great to get to see all the Johnsoncity-ites again, since they're some of my favorite people ever and we don't get down there enough. And also, Indy, cause I've missed him terribly. Anyway, it was great to see everyone else that I already knew again too (Thes, Goof, Krade, Zaragon, the Meyers *knows she's forgetting people*) In any case, we're trying to plan a meetup of our own in October, which seems to be getting a great response, so hopefully it won't be another year before I get to see all these people again. =D

1 comment:

PenguinSushi said...

No, you *don't* get down here enough :-p But, as we've yet to make it up there at all, I guess we don't have much room to talk.

It *was* great to see you and Zeb again. I'm glad to see you had a good time despite being somewhat "encumbered". Next year I'll have another munchkin to take pictures of! :-D

Speaking of, we're hoping to make BabyCon in October, but there are several things we just have to wait to see how they go before we'll know if we can pull it off. Cross your fingers.

~PS