Jun. 18th, 2003

dr4b: (tran iidx)
Today was work, I got lunch outside with my group and there was a protest going on with real picketers and everything! We went to check it out, but couldn't actually figure out what they were picketing. Something about healthcare and Pacmed.

After work I took a bunch of buses home (and got a Subway sub on the way) and then drove out to Tanya's house, getting there like 8pm. Didn't know there'd be pizza at the party. Anyway, it was a fun party, there were a bazillion people there, well, more like 20, but since she has a 1BR apartment, that's a bazillion. I got to play Super Monkey Ball with one of her coworkers (Matt?) and he was cool. And I also got to play with everyone else like Ray and Charlie and Keevon. We ate ice cream cake (they nearly set the apartment on fire trying to light the candles) and it was really good. We did IIDX session again, first it was me and Keevon and (insert third person) against Met, then we ended up with 6 people doing 14-key, which was pretty fun. It was mostly me, Pale-Charlie, and Edgars on one controller, and Foy, Keevon, and Steve (and later Tanya) on the other controller, and then Tanya and I played some IIDX, and then Pale-Charlie and I played some IIDX together. I need a better way to refer to the Charlies. Hmm, so people played Apples to Apples in the other room with my copy, but I didn't play. I did some Stepmania and watched Rez, and later played some Tetris Attack with Rumi. And then I went home.

I'm not very coherent writing about the evening. But I really had fun talking to people. The best was meeting Charlie because he's so cool. It was also fun meeting Tanya's coworkers and playing videogames with them. 6-person IIDX session was so neato. And when Foy saw me he gave me a big hug like "congrats to our new Team Seattle prospective!" which was awesome. Haha and when Lith showed up I was stepmaniaing and he was saying hi to everyone so I turned to say "HI KEVIN!" and he's like "Oh no, don't break combo for me!" And I got a lot of Rumi hugs, which was good.

Oh yeah, so the birthday present I got for Tanya was a Hamtaro book. There was this time that Steve and Tanya and I went to Kinokuniya and to Oasis the bubble tea place and we hung out talking all afternoon and that day was just amazingly awesome, it was one of the best days this year (afterwards was an IZ evening and ending up at the Kirkland TGIF with a bunch of awesome people and taking an infamous picture of a fork). And in the bookstore Steve and Tanya had both been exclaiming over this super-cute Hamtaro handbook thingy and I was like "WTF IS A HAMTARO" or whatever. And so when I was at Kinokuniya yesterday looking for some stuff I saw that book again and was like "DUDE. THAT'S A BIG HAPPY MEMORY. I WILL GET THE BOOK FOR TANYA."

Uh, so it was a good day. Haha and the Mariners beat the Angels again, and the PHILLIES BEAT THE BRAVES. YEAH! I spent a few minutes just now reading the Phillies history stuff and you know, reading about the 70's and 80's Phillies just brings back a HUGE amount of childhood memories... the names, the games. Hmm. I want to go to the Thurs afternoon game! I wonder if I can get a cheap bleacher ticket and just bring my laptop and work from there? Do they let you bring laptops into the stadium? :)
I overslept this bus this morning and was really pissed off. Eli picked me up from the bus stop, which was weird. I got in just in time to have lunch with my group. Finished off the spreadsheet, hacked Mason, left around 5 with Hemant to go to the CMU alumni thingy. Haha, we had fun trying to get to Microsoft in rush hour.

So the CMU alumni thingy was kinda cool and kinda scary. LOTS of people from early years... and then a smattering from the 95-02 set. (Sigh, my nametag said "Deanna Rubin H&SS '98". Bleh...) I saw a lot of people I hadn't seen in ages. Kevin Babbitt and Brian Grunkemeyer I'd seen a few months ago... but some people, like Charlie Anthe and Matt Centurion, I had NO idea they were even in Seattle let alone at Microsoft, etc. The best was when Brian was like "Do you remember Dave Quinn? He says he was in our class at CMU... I met up with him at the SFF... and he was like 'I see Deanna in Uwajimaya all the time but she doesn't recognize me!!'" and I'm like whoa. Because not only do I of course remember Dave, but I swear I've never seen him in Uwajimaya! Eeek. Anyway, I sat at a table with Drew and Matt and Kevin, and Josh and Megan and Megan's friend Joe, and Eli, and we watched the presentations. I think I've seen too many Jim Morris presentations, but Charlie Thorpe's stuff about RI was pretty cool, and he showed the Robocup Aibo stuff and all. Afterwards they raffled some free stuff, and we also got general alumni freestuff like mousepads and bumper stickers. And I ran into Brian Yeung, and Laurel Fan, and I met Rob Leidle, who seems like a really nice guy. Talked to Kevin and Brian for ages and then headed home.

We took the scenic route to Bothell from Redmond, then went to M+J's house, then drove home. I want to play IIDX. Bye.

February 2019

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