Close Encounters of the 2old2play Kind

Last week I finally had a chance to meet (in “real life”) some folks from 2old2play that I didn’t know before joining the site.  It just so happens that Sunburned Goose, the overlord of Wheezing Geezers, lives here in Birmingham, and one of his clan members, A Hovis, was coming into town from Houston, TX on business. (Raste had been trying to get something together with Goose and OMM’s own Dr. Esquire for a few weeks, but we couldn’t get everyone’s schedule to line up.)  So Raste and I met up with Goose and Hovis at a Thai restaurant in downtown B-ham on Wednesday and then went out to a bar for some drinks and conversation after. The short version of this is that I had a blast and the next night we actually met up again at Goose’s apartment for some Halo 2 action.

In the picture below (from left to right) are “A Hovis”, “Raste”, and “Sunburned Goose”

Sunburned Goose is getting married in less than two weeks, and his fiancé was kind enough to bake some cookies for us while we drank beer and blew stuff up. I actually didn’t play very much since I didn’t want Hovis to have to split his already smallish TV screen, oh yeah, and I suck really badly at Halo 2. Being terrible at Halo 2 when you are in the comfort of your own home is just a little less intimidating than sharing a console with a 27 in team slayer who is not at all shy about pointing out your errors in judgment (“What the heck are you doing over there? You’re gonna die.”) It was very entertaining to watch, and I think I learned a few things about some of the maps and strategies. I had never really sat and watched anyone play Halo 2, especially someone good, but I highly recommend it.

Oh yeah, so when I took the above digital picture, I explained that I pretty much had to because when DanLeCrinque finds out you have met other 2old2play members he insists on seeing pictures (God only knows what he does with them…). Goose responded that he had something he would like for Dan to see.

The coolest part of all of this was just how easy it was to hang out with people I had never met. I had played with Hovis and Goose before, but not often enough to get to know them really. But after talking to them for just a few minutes the conversation just seemed to flow naturally and I learned a lot about both of these guys. (Actually, I found out some things about Sunburned Goose that I don’t think ANYONE should know. Some of the things he has done while playing rugby are just stomach churning J ) Having a common interest like video games of course helps move conversations along, but I was surprised by how much we wound up talking about our real “grown-up” lives. Wives, girlfriends, college experiences, Hovis’ football days, Goose’s appreciation for the female form, the list goes on. The bottom line is, I feel like I have made two more friends and I have an even greater appreciation for the other people on this site that I play regularly with but have never met face-to-face.

Speaking of meet-ups, I might be able to go to the Chicago LAN now. I didn’t think I would be able to go because I started a new job in November as a contractor and I didn’t think I would be getting my vacation until 6 months after I went permanent, meaning no vacation until around Thanksgiving. But my boss told me last week that I will be given my 2 weeks vacation right away when I go permanent on June 5th. So now I have to get cracking on my plans and see if I can make this work. I have to go to Pennsylvania for a family reunion on the weekend before the LAN, so I may go up there, stay in PA until Thursday, and then go over to Chicago for the LAN. That would be hella sweet, and it would be a great vacation since I haven’t had a full week off from work since early April of 2005. I’m going to start looking at the cost of plane tickets and stuff, but this is really starting to look like a possibility. I hope it will work out because meeting Goose and Hovis has gotten me even more excited about meeting up with other 2old2play members, particularly my fellow members of the Old Man Mafia.

In closing, I want to thank Hovis and Goose for meeting up with me and Raste, and for not making TOO much fun of me for wearing my Halo 2 jersey and hat out to dinner. (I’ll admit, it was a dumb move on my part, but come on, when else am I going to wear them? What’s that you say? I shouldn’t even own them in the first place? I shouldn’t have designed them and worked on creating them myself? Well, that is just mean spirited, and you can go to hell. J ) And thanks again to Goose for letting strangers come to his house to play Halo, and to his lovely fiancé for putting up with what amounted to a home invasion and making some of the best chocolate chip with walnut cookies I have ever had. Hopefully I can return the favor soon and we can frag some fools on my 75 inch projected screen. I just have to get that network cable run to the media room…