Musings
an Online Journal of Sorts

By Alyce Wilson

On New Year's Day, we met some of our friends for breakfast at 9 a.m. in the hotel lobby. Once everyone had gathered, we got seated at the hotel restaurant. We were pretty much the only people up that early other than the staff, it seemed.

We were all doing the breakfast buffet, but there was also an option of the continental breakfast, which included cereal, yogurt, fruit and juice. I did that option, figuring I should eat a little more reasonably today.

After everyone had filled their plates, the Court Wizard came in. There were no seats left at the big table for him, so we talked to him while he tried to decide what to do. Then a few more of our friends arrived, and I said aloud, for reasons unbeknownst even to me, "There's some of your little friends!" The Court Wizard took a table with them.

The continental breakfast was filling, and after we were finished we hung around for a little longer, talking to friends. We were talking to the Court Wizard for a long time about various topics including, as I remember, video games. This makes a lot of sense, considering the Court Wizard designs video games for a living and The Gryphon loves playing them.

After awhile, we decided we ought to check out and go pick up my dog, Una, from the pet sitters. Everyone was gathering again later at The Cheshire Cat and The Paper's house.

We called the pet sitter but got no answer and decided to stop by in case they were out in the yard with the dogs. In fact, they were. Una looked really happy to see us and immediately jumped up on my white shirt and got a trace of mud on me (which washed out easily later).

We paid the pet sitter and chatted with her for awhile about Una, New Year's Eve and the comic strip, Get Fuzzy. She said that Una did really well on New Year's until the fireworks started in the neighborhood. Guess they freaked her out. I don't blame her; they freak me out, too.

For an hour or so, we hung out at my place, playing one of The Gryphon's video games and spending a little time with Una. Then at about 1 p.m. we left to meet up with everyone else.

A group of people were already gathered in the living room, chatting and laughing. More and more arrived, until we had people on pretty much every available seat. We were joking around about such things as pop culture and politics, with a healthy dose of quotes thrown in from things like Strong Bad.

As you can tell from the photos, things got pretty animated.

Then, out of nowhere, a voice carried across the room: "So, we're all here. What are we going to do?" This was a college classmate who ran with the Atherton Hall (i.e. the University Scholars dorm) crowd. I don't think he lives in the area, because I don't see him very often.

There was no really good way to tell him, "This is what we typically do when we get together." But he persuaded a couple people to play a board game, so then he was entertained.

A few guys, including The Gryphon, The Court Wizard, Agent Smith and occasionally The Cheshire Cat, played a video game The Gryphon had brought, one where the object is to crash your car into as many things as possible. They even let me try it, and I discovered it wasn't that hard. Plus, it was fun watching things blow up.

Mid-afternoon, a few people made a food run because they hadn't had any lunch. I myself had a light one while The Gryphon and I had been at home. But then around 5 p.m., we all started making plans for dinner. Some people went to the diner down the street, whereas the rest of us went to a Chinese buffet that was having a special lobster buffet for New Year's.

Despite being about 10 people, we got seated right away. The buffet had a variety of sushi on it, and I had a sushi party. It was a great meal and not even terribly bad for my diet.

After dinner, we watched some Strong Bad from a disk that The Cheshire Cat had gotten for Christmas. Everyone loved it, even those who hadn't seen it before. I think Strong Bad has a few new fans. That's evidenced especially by the prevalence of Strong Bad quotes the rest of the evening.

I got talked into playing a board game with The White Rabbit, The Dormouse, and a friend who has previously not had a nickname whom I'll call The March Hare. We played a game called Carcassonne. In it, you draw tiles which you can then use to create medieval towns and roads.

The game was actually pretty easy, and I ended up winning, even though I was new to it. Ironically, it's because I was nice and completed a city for someone once, even though I didn't have a stake in it. Of course, when you complete a city, you get to take the goods contained therein, such as a bolt of cloth or a barrel of beer. At the end of the game, the person with the most amount of trade goods in each category gets extra points. Those extra points put me two points above the next highest player, so I won!

After I finished the game, The Gryphon and I headed home, knowing that my doggie would be anxious to see us and to be let out. Overall, it was a great start to the new year.

Copyright 2005 by Alyce Wilson

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