The place where lost socks go...

Still too much going on for me to get enough sleep, so today's update is a quick one:

This weekend is OxCon, the annual gaming convention organized and run by the Oxford University Diplomacy Society (a.k.a. the Board Game Club that cheshcat and I are lifetime members of).

Yesterday evening -- Friday night -- there were pre-convention activities. The original idea of laser tag was rendered impossible by the recent closing of the Oxford LaserQuest facility. Instead, a few of us met up in west Oxford to go ice skating. Afterward, we met a larger group in east Oxford -- Cowley, to be specific -- at a curry house for dinner. When dinner ended, I headed back to the as-yet unnamed flat in north Oxford. Overall, it was an evening of much fun... but, since my main mode of transportation in Oxford is my feet, my legs felt somewhat sore after all this tromping about (and skating). cassiopia has been writing about Walking to Rivendell -- well, I felt like I walked all the way there in one day! No complaints, though... as I said, it was gangs of fun.

Today the convention actually began. The main event was the Puerto Rico tournament, which consisted of three rounds of eight parallel games. Previously, playing Puerto Rico with people like xirpha and gyades and bammba_m and elision, I had figured that I was fairly good at the game. However, in all three tournament place, I came in third place (out of four or five players). Not terribly spectacular, I must admit. After the tournament ended, a few of us who were not yet sick of Puerto Rico gathered together to play again. Finally, at long last, I ended up winning! So, hallelujah, my self-esteem has been at least partially restored.

At lunchtime, there was a break in the tournament, so cheshcat and I grabbed some lunch and ate it outside in the city centre. Which makes the second time this year that I have been able to enjoy my lunch out of doors. Not what I would have expected from January in England, but I'm not going to complain.

In addition to the Puerto Rico tournament, there was a variety of other games going on all day. cheshcat came for the convention[*], but was not interested in playing so much Puerto Rico, so she played other games like Vinci with the non-tournament crowd. After the competition ended, I played a few rounds of a very silly game called Loopy Louie, and I learned how to play an interesting strategy game called Goa. Which I won, first time out.

At the end of the night, I walked home. Leaving The Mitre, which is the venue for the convention, I enjoyed the realization that I was walking away from a day of gaming and out into a world where the Bodleian Library was a stone's throw away and there was all this historic architecture everywhere around me. Nearly one year later, the sense of awe at living in this amazing place has not worn off. I hope it never does.

Now it is time for a late dinner and then off to bed, as the second day of the convention features the Settlers of Catan tournament, and I would like to be awake enough to compete well.

---

[*] Read her account of the day here.

Got back from Boulder yesterday afternoon. Proceeded to be really busy for the rest of the afternoon with a doctor appointment, a trip to the computer supply store, and my muscle toning class. This was the last class of the first five week session; I liked it enough that I signed up for another five weeks. Yes, it hurts, but I think I am actually beginning to see some change from the semi-weekly workouts.

The evening was not much less busy, really. cheshcat and I tackled the enormous accumulation of stuff in the storage space that we rent. Managed to remove a couple of boxes worth of stuff. Plenty more to do, but it was a start. Then we came home, had dinner with polymorphism, and an Event Horizon house meeting to discuss the upcoming changes in the household. After which, cheshcat and gyades and I wound down the evening with Smallville and a discussion of Illinois state politics.

Once everyone had drifted off, I also polished off issues #227 - #229 of The Flash, leaving only the final issue in the series for me to read. Slowly, the pile of unread comic books in the bedroom is getting whittled down. About seventy left to go.

Now I am getting ready to head off to CapriCon for the weekend. Amazingly enough, I actually get to be in town for a Chicago con for once; usually they coincide with when I am travelling. For those of you who are local con-goers, I look forward to seeing you soon... probably at the poly party tonight!

Congenial was very good. So good that it will need to be described in its own post tomorrow, when I am not so sleepy. One of the many good things about spending the weekend at Congenial was that, for two days, I got to escape from the budding psychodrama that had been unfolding. Unfortunately, while I was away, the drama mushroomed to ever-greater proportions.

Honestly, I thought that I was done with this insanity half a year ago. But no, same shit hitting the same fan. If anything about it has changed, it is that the psychodrama has become more juvenile. I swear, I have not dealt with this sort of thing since seventh or eight grade. It had not been missed.

From where I sit, I can see five relationships that are in immanent danger of being dissolved. I suspect that at least three of them will be. Hopefully that will be enough to break this accursed cycle, because there is nothing at all positive or life-affirming about it. It's only a waste of precious time and energy. I want out.

Thursday in a nutshell:

Started off by going back to the dentist for a scaling in the right side of my mouth. The whole experience was overwhelmingly positive... mainly because it didn't hurt. It seems like a dentist will never tell you when something is going to be painful, so I've stopped believing claims of painlessness. This time, however, was pretty darn close. Sure, the right side of my mouth was numb for four hours afterwards, making speech awkward, but that's okay. Really! And now I'm much less apprehensive about going in next week to do scaling on the left side.

Following the dental visit was a session of productivity, getting both work and busywork accomplished. Due to my inability to speak clearly, I worked from home and, thus, had the pleasure of seeing little furballs every time I left the office. Often, I would go into the bedroom and see various pairs (or triads) of kittens cuddled up together; each time it made me so glad that we decided to keep an entire litter. There is really such a strong bond between these cats, as they have been together every single day of their lives. And they act like such siblings, too: Quickly going from a mutual licking session to a fight back to cuddling. In case I haven't mentioned it before, Nona has a crush on Totoro (the one cat currently here who is not from the litter). She follows him around, sits where he sits, and generally begs for attention. Totoro is not an ideal boyfriend; he would rather be left alone and frequently hits her when she gets in his face.

In the evening, I went out to the monthly Poly Karaoke gathering at Sidekick's. As usual, much fun was to be had. There was a pretty good turnout, eleven people, so there was good conversations to be had. The music was a little late in starting -- it didn't get going until nearly 9pm -- but once it did, there were many good singers in the crowd, making life a little easier on the ears (not that I'm one to complain!). Angie had brought a caseload of karaoke CDs, so the selection was a little wider than the usual Sidekick's fare. I sang five times, splitting my selections between some old songs and some that I had never done before.

So the day started off good and got better... for a while. Unfortunately, it did not end all that well. It seems that the ghost of psychodramas past may be rearing its ugly head. I'm not going to go into details here, but I did spend about three hours, once I returned home last night, attempting damage control on multiple fronts. Feh. I hate psychodrama -- outgrew the stuff by the time I was seventeen. Hopefully it will die down on its own, rather than flare up into something worse. I'll keep fingers crossed.

In about two hours, polyfrog and I are heading up to Wisconsin for Congenial. Honestly, I have no idea what to expect from this so-called "relax-a-con", but it should be interesting. Looking forward to it...

To anyone who is planning to go to Congenial next month, I have a question: Do you have any crash space that you can spare? I cannot chip in to pay for the hotel room, but I can barter with things like meals, backrubs, fuel costs, sexual favours...

Is this a monetary issue? Can I not afford to get a $79 hotel room for two nights? No, that is not it at all. The problem is that Congenial is being held at a Marriott hotel. For several years now, I have refused to stay at a Marriott (or any of their subsidiary hotels, like Courtyard or Residence Inn) because of their poor record on labour disputes. If interested, you can read more about that here or here... or do your own research.

In any case, I would like to be at the con, but unless somebody has floor space to offer for free or for barter, I will not be able to attend. There are other things going on that weekend (like the Local to Global Justice teach-in at ASU -- with David Rovics performing!) that I could attend instead, if this doesn't work out...

Monday, the local blood bank was visiting the lab. This was only the second time that I've donated blood in Illinois; the first time, my arm was bruised for several days afterwards. That never happened during all the years that I donated in NY, so I was a tad apprehensive about going back. Thankfully, it went off without a hitch. Since needles are a phobia for me, I am always nervous when I go to give blood. Usually I bite my right hand, leaving noticable marks, when they insert the needle (and I've never actually looked at the needle itself). This time, I challenged myself not to bite down on anything, and was successful. Rationally, I've given blood donations so many times that I know there is nothing to be afraid of, but phobias aren't rational. So long as my actions aren't being dictated by the phobia, I don't mind being afraid.

Monday night, I had a date with Lang. We rented the movie American Splendor, which based on the "underground" comic book of the same title. Both movie and comic are auto-biographical stories about the author, a fairly ordinary guy named Harvey Pekar. The movie was good; I may have to check out the comic book. After the Arisia panel on "Cool Comics You're Probably Not Reading", I now have a rather long list of new comic book titles to look into.

Tuesday evening, I went into the city for a vegan potluck hosted by jennie and Liberte. I saw a few Chicago Anarchists that I had already met, and I was introduced to a several new ones as well. I spend time in so many different communities, like the Pagan community, the sci-fi community, the Anarchist community, and the particle physics community. In general, though, I feel most comfortable in the Anarchist communities. There is, of course, the natural comfort of being amongst like-minded people, but there is also something comfortable about the welcoming nature of people who believe strongly in mutual aid. As the evening went on, the typical political discussions gave way to talk of Star Trek and the Tick. Anarcho-geeks! I love it!

This afternoon, the lab had a coloquium given by uber-physicist James "BJ" Bjorken. The title was "The Classification of Universes," and the topic was on multiverses and the athropic principle. Yet it was a science talk given by a prominant scientist. Being aware of the meta-physical implications, he rated his talk "TO" for "Tenure Only" and explicitly warned that digestion of this material could be bad for your career.

This evening was the monthly dinner outing of the Poly-Chicago group. I had been to the restaurant (Whistler's Restaurant) before with Lang, and wasn't impressed. Last night, I continued to be unimpressed. However, the company and the conversation was fun. After dinner, a few of us went back to Raven's place to help move a king-size matress up a flight of stairs. Raven has an amazing studio set up in his apartment, in lieu of a living room. There are computers and instruments a'plenty; Lang and I were suitably awed.