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I stayed up until 4am talking with John and Val and then until 7am talking with Suzie. This is in no way a complaint, quite the opposite, I miss talking until dawn and am glad that while it is rarer it is not gone from my life. I took a nap and then attended to household chores for the next nine hours culminating with a run to the post office at 2am.

When I returned, I was a bit tired and decided to try my immersion blender for the first time. an immersion blender looks more like a torture device than a kitchen utensil and mine was this guy in a stunning spring pink. My first experiment was to shove it into some heavy cream. You know what happens when you whip the hell out of whipping cream? You get the most amazing topping in the history of human invention. I started with just heavy cream, but quickly graduated to adding sweetener and vanilla extract. I will never buy CoolWhip again and may never purchase whipped cream again. The product of combining 200 watts and 36% milk fat is heavenly and coats the mouth in way only rivaled by some mayonnaises.

Next, I add berries.

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I had a few people over this evening and my ability to gauge food demands for a group seems to have not improved much over time. While all 24 mini-cheesecakes were consumed, I still had 2/3rds of a golden cake, 1/2 an angel food cake, a lb of brownies, 11 2-liter bottles of soda, and an untouched bag of Doritos. I also have all the components to make a baked brie.

On the plus side, I’m getting really good at gauging meatballs. I prepared enough that everyone had their fill and there were enough left over for two days worth of leftovers.

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Yesterday’s return to sugar resulted in some neat ancillary benefits. My weight lifting capacity seemed to jump suddenly as I can now do a whole 2 pull-ups in reasonable form. Additionally, I’ve found my mood to be generally better although that may be other factors.

This evening, Randy and Kelly Booz held a game night where I took pictures and I discovered a wonderful game called Jungle Speed. It’s like a combination of Uno and prison rape or Egyptian Rat Screw meets rugby. I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves.

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I intended to drop off of low carb eating in advance of the Rock n’ Roll half-marathon and have ended it a bit earlier than I intended. I thought I’d ease back into eating carbohydrates but, well, did not. Returning to sugar has triggered some things. Here are my notes:

  • Pears are f-ing awesome.
  • Bananas are f-ing awesome.
  • Apples are f-ing awesome.
  • A slice of cake after the above slows my metabolism down to the point where I can hibernate.
  • A second slice of cake slows it further to the point where I feel I can begin to see through time.
  • There’s a shift in bowel movement that accompanies entering and leaving keto.  Entering, I have a poop that looks like ground up mummies, exiting, I have a bowel movement so powerful it could chip porcelain.

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I returned home a little after 2am and set my alarm for 7am to make a 9am set of interviews with a firm in Philadelphia. I was interviewing for a reinsurance position, a branch of actuarial work I very much enjoy. The first four interviews were straight forward and I only made one or two small mistakes. After that, I was asked to speak with the hiring manager who had stopped in and then went to lunch with two more members of the department. Upon returning, I met with another actuary and then two more and in total met 10 of the 11 people in the department. I am happy that I was able to talk to almost literally everyone but this comes at a cost. I now have 10 thank you letters to write. Ugh.

The ride back to Trevose station featured another first. I sat in a three across bench seat on the West Trenton line and all three people in my row had space between them.

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I have made the sleep-deprived trip from Cincinnati to Philadelphia a number of times before but this time Suzie was in the car as we headed East. We passed the Centennial Barn that marks 76.2 miles having passed and we passed Columbus, OH and the dozens of signs for Zanesville. We passed Wheeling, WV and the last Hardee’s before Philadelphia. We passed Harrisburg and Valley Forge and Willow Grove and eventually we passed my mailbox. In a stupor, we walked into my house and re-collapsed in our respective beds for a nap until noon. We rose at 4 PM, I got a haircut that I didn’t much like.   We sat in Chipotle to wait out the rain. Despite having driven across the Gulf states it was only Philadelphia that we encountered a deluge.

We picked up miscellaneous items in Walmart and drove to 18th Street in Philadelphia to drop off all of the non-bed things which went quickly. I drove back home, picked up a bed, a night stand, a table, and some Uncrustables and returned for a second round; this time to assemble flat pack furniture and move a bed. The bed didn’t fit.  Not even, it did not fit.  Not by a long shot. Today was a long day.

Clocks are not always measurers of hours. In war, the clock is blood and iron and in moving it is steps and sweat. Suzie’s new apartment, her apartment, was on the third floor of a building with narrow steps and every foot placement was laced with a little fear that I’d fall.  Suzie’s clock had recently measured days but now ticks in time with opportunity. There is something lost when saying “hello” to someone becomes easier by at least a factor of 10. The power of “this is what I did just to be here” is lost but it is a small loss, one best mourned fleetingly lest it return. I don’t know what happens now as I’m very used to friends becoming more rather than less distant. I look forward to finding out.

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Suzie and I arrived at Ryan and Bree’s after midnight and headed to Denny’s for a long meal. Having broken low-carb after the blood-drive I decided to continue this by having a burger and fries and stealing some of Suzie’s pancake balls. Pancake balls are donut holes served with cream cheese frosting and serve as a reminder that fried starch is a highlight of world gastronomy. Ryan and Bree talked about their upcoming wedding and their life in North Carolina and this was interspersed with asides to internet culture.

Ryan mentioned that he spent little time with non-internet people and I noticed that I feel less connected to said folk. Maybe this is a byproduct of doing contract work, spending less time with Team Interrobang, or reconnecting with Scouts and school friends.

Their home was uncluttered and hosted a new large DDR setup that stood out from the simplicity of their decor. They had a rescue dog that drank too much water and was very happy to see people and Ryan and Bree crept around trying to be polite as Suzie and I slept in. They are feeling out their future, I wish them well.

Our next stop was Cincinnati and for the first time on the end of a trip it wasn’t to drop off Suzie. She’s moving to Philadelphia and tonight we will put as much of her life in the back of my car as we can. Nine hours after leaving Charlotte we landed in Florence, Kentucky. Suzie had most of her things already packed and the move consisted largely of moving things from her room to my car.

Me: I think we got everything you wanted packed.
Her: Everything?
Me: I think so. We still have some room if there’s other things you’d like to bring.
Her: Well then, I get to bring more shoes.

More shoes, indeed.

It was a Monday.  I had a job interview in a day.  Time to drive.

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Dragon*Con was interesting and in some capacity I’d like to return in 2013. A four day badge is only $65.00 when purchased far ahead of time and the convenience of this seems like a good benefit versus the possibility of not attending next year.

I spoke with a number of photographers about their craft and next year I’m going to bring a flash come hell or high water and preferably a soft box.

My two favorite photos are characters out of character where someone breaks costume to eat something or talk to someone and cross-over ideas like Steampunk Rorshoche. A lot of people in costume would instinctively pose when I pointed the camera at them and I’d have to ask them to unpose so I could get Leia taking a call or Q smoking.

While Dragon*Con was full of nerds, I considered few people there to be “my people”. I don’t participate in any sort of Fandom. There is no nerd culture item about which I maintain encyclopedic knowledge nor are there any figures where I’d spend more than an hour in line waiting to shake their hand. Costuming seems interesting but I much more enjoy capturing others’ work. On reflection I feel a guilty irony to my dislike of arts that are ultimately imitative yet very much enjoy photography. Maybe this is why I so much more enjoy costume variants than people who go for spot on recreation.

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I didn’t feel well at the start of the day and slept until noon. I dropped off Reuben and Suzie at the registration area and immediately found parking, registered for the day and disappeared into sessions.

Sessions

Mad Scientist Lab – I learned what cattle prod feels like. Usually my willingness to raise my hand when someone calls for audience volunteers nets me something cool, usually. Here, it net me being hit by a cattle prod. Anyway, I now know what a cattle prod feels like.

Presenter: Please stop asking us to cattle prod your children. I think that counts as child abuse even if you say it’s ok.
Audience Member: But I thought you were evil?
Presenter: Yes, but at scale. It’s hard to be evil when you’re locked up in prison.

They also had made a Jolly Rancher railgun but decided against it because the acceleration caused the wrappers to come off and that’s just not sanitary.

The next few hours were passed walking around and much enhanced by simply popping in on panels that looked interesting and out on ones that weren’t.

Walking Around

If I thought a shot turned out particularly well, I’ll show the costumed person the LCD on my camera for approval and often they’d ask for a card from me. I had four or five on me, I should have brought several dozen more.

Saturday night at the Hyatt’s many lobbies proved to be a massive party. I met up with Suzie around 3 AM to leave and things had just gone from 11 to 10.

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