Faithful (and unfaithful) readers of my steemit blog will have noted that I have not posted in several days. I’m sure that is painful for many, but I had a good excuse. I’ve been knee deep in an ocean of super cool steemit people, and have only just waded to the shoreline and escaped into the relative safety of Tuesday.
We’ve been planning this for months. Well, mostly @kubbyelizabeth has been planning this, and organizing this, and guiding this herd of cats into something reasonably close to an organized gathering.
We ended up with an excellent cross section of quality individuals that represents well the many facets of steemit.
From near and far they came to this sunny slice of Florida earth. Gracing us with their presence, we had @aggroed, @isaria, @swelker101, @clayboyn, @crimsonclad, @kubbyelizabeth, @scaredycatguide, @meno, @choogirl, @ankapolo, @morodiene, @negativer (myself), @lenadr, @anarcho-andrei, and @ladymaharet
Here’s a small photo journal of the first half of our four-day adventure.
Friday, March 16, 2018:
Our best proper shot. Naming names, in the back row we have @lenadr, @ankapolo, @meno, @kubbyelizabeth, @crimsonclad, @scaredycatguide, and @swelker101. In the front row we have @choogirl, @negativer (me, looking creepy, apparently), my lovely wife @morodiene, @isaria, and @clayboyn.
Note that this picture was taken after eating a massive home-cooked and home-grilled meal by Kubby’s amazing mom and dad. We ate at their house on the back patio until we were full. Then we ate ice cream. Then peanuts came out, and suddenly @choogirl turns into a peanut destruction machine.
Random chat and chatter as we try to digest all the excellent food that we’ve just filled ourselves with.
No meetup is complete without eggs. In this case, Kubby’s eggs. She gave me and the wife a crapton of eggs from their backyard chicken army. Look at those beautiful colors. Remember these eggs, they will come up later on the next post.
Saturday, March 17, 2018 (St Patrick’s Day):
This is where things start to get funky. @aggroed comes to town, and since Kubby is the delightful taxi lady, she brings him to our place where he’ll be staying for a couple days. Everyone is hungry, so we head off to a local place I’ve only recently discovered (Bond & Smolders in Boynton Beach), where they make an amazing array of tasty food items in-house.
Back at our place, we’re killing a bit of time around our pool while we wait for our St Patrick’s Day activities to begin down in Delray. @lenadr and @choogirl are enjoying a bit of my tasty homebrew in the meanwhile.
In Delray. Holy crap, the place was packed. @scaredycatguide guided (ha-ha) us to pocket of madness, nestled comfortably as it was within the larger pocket of madness that was downtown Delray. It was loud. Full of flesh. But the beer was crap. Seriously, how can you have a St Patrick’s Day celebration and only have Bud Lite and Corona and a few random Guinness? (guinnesses? guinnessi?)
@morodiene and I knew a few cool spots of our own downtown, so we bowed out of the whirlpool of bodies and hoofed it a few blocks away to find some sanity. And good beer.
Mellow Mushroom! One of my favorite beer places lately. 50 taps of beer pleasure. Relatively packed, but we seated ourselves at the bar pretty easily. We had notified Kubby where we were...and pleasantly enough, everyone else came to join us. Here, @morodiene and @ankapolo discuss weighty topics, and @lenadr checks her phone for something important.
And then, I discovered that @meno is a beer lover. This is also when I discovered that I liked him. @crimsonclad is also a beer lover, but I already knew that, and already liked her, so she gained no particular points here.
Our table became ready, and folks were hungry. We got a nice round corner table at the back of the place while we waited for the latecomers (@isaria and @swelker101 and @clayboyn)
Shane arrives. Much hugging ensues. Angelic music plays. Light flares in a backlit halo around our heroes of men. All is right in the world.
You would not believe how flexible @lenadr’s face is. Also, note that this picture was taken before the Great Boiling Hot Marinara Sauce Dumping event occurred. (Spoiler: @lenadr survived).
So much blur. Everyone was very animated, and apparently my phone was unable to keep up.
Night falls, and when that happens, the big men frolic in the moonlight. Here, we have @aggroed, @swelker101, and @clayboyn enjoying each others company. It’s ok. I’m not judging.
The night is still young, so on our way to our next stop we engage in some good natured tomfoolery. I do believe @aggroed temporarily reached a new plane of transcendance here. Did I mention @lenadr makes some great expressions? She's also wearing her new Mellow Mushroom t-shirt. She only had to survive third-degree burns to earn it.
@choogirl also attempts transcendence, but apparently found herself on a different plane altogether.
@anarcho-andrei and @ladymaharet sneak in at the latter half of the evening. Note that at this point we’re killing time. Alert readers here will notice that @crimsonclad and @morodiene are not present. Crimmi could not control her boobs and had to leave for a moment for some mild undergarment assistance at the local Walgreens with @morodiene’s help. Let’s leave it at that.
Second half of the night involved dancing with @isaria and @aggroed at a place that was much like a hip funeral parlor. It's hard to tell here, but @aggroed is a really good dancer. (Granted, it's also really hard to tell in real life too)
More hugs given, offered, taken, and paid for by @choogirl and @clayboyn. The $40 on the table may or may not have been payment for services rendered. It's ok. I understand. With steem prices so low we all do what we have to do to get by.
Thus ends Part 1. Stay tuned for Part 2, where we see @aggroed cooking us breakfast (will we survive?), @crimsonclad, @meno and @ankapolo in my beer dungeon (will they survive?), and @aggroed getting moist on a waterslide (will he survive?).
People may or may not be killed off as we reach the conclusion of this epic tale of love, lust, and roller coasters.
Photos by @negativer, except for the first pic, which I believe was taken by Kubby's mom.
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