Part Two: Friday Insanity


Friday, July 19th:

I so did not get enough sleep that night. I woke up at seven and couldn't hold my eyes shut any longer, so I rolled out of bed and took a shower. But our friends were sadly having difficulties with their water heater, so I took the shortest shower of my life and still got hit with cold water right before I finished. I was very much awake by that point. After that I threw on some clothes, ate breakfast and watched the Weather Channel to see just how hot it was going to be in Philly when we got there. Turned out it wasn't going to be that bad, so we generally wasted time looking at maps and such to make sure we knew where it was we were going. Our friends gave us food (Mmm, real food...) to eat on the way, since we'd be driving during lunch time, and we chatted until it was time to leave.

We pulled out at about 11 a.m. after making sure we had everything in the car and drove around in a big circle to get to the highway. We hopped on the Pennsylvania Turnpike and wound up in heavy traffic almost immediately, much to my mother's stressed chagrin. We listened to more CDs and I read yet more of Les Miserables in between looking for our exit.

Not long after noon we stopped in a town with a very Welsh name that I can't remember and drove around until we found a park in a nice neighborhood, rolled down the windows, and had lunch. Since we were obviously going to be very early and check-in time wasn't until 3 p.m., we stayed there for a while and both read. But then it got entirely too hot to sit in a car without air conditioning, so we packed up and left and were back on the freeway by 1 p.m. or so.

Finding our exit to Philly wasn't easy; for some reason the road engineers had placed it on the left side of the highway instead of the right, which is how they tend to do things in Michigan. Then again, there aren't really any cities in Michigan that are as large or as busy as Philly. We managed to make it to our exit, even though traffic was horrible, and drove around until we found the Best Western we were staying at. Realizing that we were still early we drove around some more and found what could best be named the "Circular Drive Of Doom." It was the Ben Franklin Parkway, I think, and once you got into that roadway you never got off again, because all the streets leading off of it had "No Turn" signs posted. That got us lost, confused and driving in circles until two o'clock, when we went back to the hotel and preregistered so we'd get a room right away. Or something.

Since nobody else was there and the hotel lobby's seats were roped off with caution signs (that had to be the smallest lobby I've ever seen in my life) we walked down the street a couple of blocks to the Rodin Museum. The collection of statues and carvings there was very impressive...Rodin had a big talent for hands. He did a few pieces of Victor Hugo too, which were very nice.

By the time we walked back to the hotel it was nearly 3 p.m., and we ran into a taxi cab full of Mysterium goers. The woman I thought was sepdet at first turned out to be Scraper, Kirsehn was there, and so was Riven-chan. Unfortunately, Riven-chan being without her Saavedro costume this year, I didn't recognize her at first which frustrated her and put me into hot water. I managed to guess it eventually, though, and she forgave me for not recognizing her on sight.

My mother and I went back to the car and got our massive amounts of luggage then met up with R-chan and Kirsehn again in the lobby. We were in the lobby for no more than thirty seconds with luggage still in hand when lonelyto25 appeared out of nowhere, put his arm around me, and asked me to marry him. I just about collapsed into giggles and became very thankful I'd warned my mom in advance about the marriage proposals I'd probably be getting. We chatted for a while and then dispersed; Kirsehn showed us where the conference room was and then we embarked off in search of our room. It turned out that it wasn't far from the elevator, so we dropped our stuff in the room and my mom called my father to let him know we were here and I'd already been proposed to. (Run lonely, run!) Our room wasn't the greatest, quite frankly, as we soon discovered: Our window had a lovely view of the air conditioner!

After we decided it would be a good idea to keep the curtains closed all weekend, I loaded some film into my camera and we went back downstairs to the conference room and signed in. We were just in time, too, because right about then they started handing out buttons, folders and Exile posters. I met up with R-chan and lonely yet again and we hung out with sepdet, IMForeman and some other people. My mom started talking with Lee "BookLover" and found out they'd grown up in the same town, so they wound up talking for a while. Danny R booted up Cosmic Osmo on his laptop and R-chan, being computer deprived, immediately glommed onto it and started playing, and the bizarre noises attracted a huge crowd.

sepdet took a picture of the group but strange glowing things appeared, attempting to eat lonely. At first we thought it was M'lah Sihfay's ever-so-evil muses, but since one glowing thing was fond of hanging around my head, we decided eventually that it must've been one of my muses that tried to eat lonely. Err, or something like that. Did I mention I took lots of pictures?

My mom went back up to the room to make a phone call and disappeared until dinner time, so I talked with lots of people, hugged Kha'tie and Jerle, and wound up with the virtual Arianna-as-Tigger plushie on my head for a photo opportunity. And then I bought an EDGE disc and took more pictures.

Right around when we were going to split up and scavenge for food Anna Catherine and her dad showed up with more restaurant choices from the front desk. My mother finally reappeared and we decided to go for Chinese at Long's Gourmet Chinese, which was less than five minutes from the hotel. We invited anyone who wanted to come along and ate with Tanika, Saphira and Saphira's friend Zabe as well. The food was pretty good and the company was better, so we had a nice time. It rained somewhat, but we made it back in time for the fan presentations, and right before the big thunderstorm. Lucky us. When we got there we found out that they'd delayed the "official" fan presentations for a while until all the presenters to arrive fashionably late. So they started the writing contest...and me, fool that I am, didn't know there was going to be said contest, otherwise I would have entered. D'oh.

Tanika went first, reading a set of poems and a small portion of her Fissure Journal. Then M'lah premiered DMV #7, during the middle of which her cell phone rang. So we all said "Hello!" to her mom and she went on reading again. Of course, since her reading was jinxed by the first call, Erithan got a call on her phone from Alahmnat and SR388 who were on their way, but stuck in gridlock. I told them to push the red button (Men in Black II joke) but I don't think they heard me. After that insanity lonely (who had to get into a "sad mood" first) read a little Cyan Chat III interlude...thingie...with some names changed. sepdet read a little Anna vignette with a guest appearance by Catherine, and a little kid whose name I think is Terra (Don't look at me, I've never met him before :blankstare:) read a very short short story.

The crafts contest started soon after, with entries by Tehresah the Mad ScRIVENer (Channelwood masks), lonely's "Spetsnaz O's" and Riven Gateroom "pre-texturing" (being made of a paper plate, spools of thread, and a little lego man), and Fahrmboy's school binder complete with "All Your Squee Are Belong To Us!" sticker. While the Mysterium Committee was looking at Tehresah's masks Alahmnat, SR388 and Ian finally showed up lugging Al's computer Pathos, which was cause for much celebration and excitement. Despite the interruption, however, Tehresah won the crafts contest.

Then the Committee had everyone in costume line up for the costume contest, which Guildmaster Erithan won. Salar's daughter Rebecca won second place. Most people went as D'ni guildsmen/women except for M'lah, who went as Tamra and R-chan, who was simply identified as "Unnamed Villager #4."

Next after that came the filk/song contest, an utterly hilarious exercise. lonely's older brother led the charge with "Linkin' La Vida Riven," which alternated between funny and terrifying. After that I lose my memory of who went when, but lonely, Al and SR pulled out all the stops for "We Are The Lysters Who Don't Post Anything" (done to "We Are The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything") and Kirsehn sang a Myst rendition of "Castle in the Clouds" from Les Miserables. lonely also sang "O Solo Mio" (Gehn's opera in a Riven easter egg) and promptly passed out on the floor from lack of oxygen. He recovered quickly, however. At the very end sepdet, M'lah and Tanika entered Renae's filk of "My Darling Katran" (based off of, of course, "My Darling Clementine") and won the contest; the prize is being sent to Renae accordingly. lonely won for worst singing. ;-)

Afterwards it was finally time for fan presentations. Alahmant, lonely and lonely's brother kicked things off with a presentation of Spetsnaz's plan for world domination, complete with impressive visuals. Dairy Queens and Speed Limit Signs the world over will never be the same again. ;-) There was a brief upset during the Question&Answer session when D'stin mentioned lonely's arch-rival Starbucks, but things got back on track smoothly enough.

Alahmnat followed that hilarious performance with a presentation on the D'niPedia and the Writers' Ring, then showed us some renders of realCyanChat due to popular demand. He was later joined by SR388 who showed off an incredible trailer for the Writing Project which was then repeated due to excessive ooh-ing and aah-ing from all assembled. ;-) Then they answered questions and encouraged volunteers for the project.

sepdet finished off the presentations by hooking up her laptop and presenting pictures of her fabulous Myst Journal and reading certain sections. I took a picture of it, and then my camera ran out of film--and of course it rewound automatically, making all sorts of noise to embarrass me with. I grumbled a lot and almost went to go get more film but decided not to. Meanwhile, sepdet passed the journal around for all to see and drool over.

Once the presentations were over people sort of dispersed in all directions, but most stayed in the conference room. I stayed, chatted with random people about random things and ate Smarties until I started to not feel so good from so many long hours spent in a moving vehicle and being deprived of any form of calcium for two days straight. So I went upstairs to bed at 11 p.m. (long after my mother left) and attempted to pass out immediately. Of course, many insane Mysterium attendees were running around in the hall having a giggle fest, so I didn't get to sleep until somewhere around midnight. And even then the giggles invaded my dreams...or not.


Saturday, July 20th
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