Rob's report - ifMUD NY Weekend

It all went very smoothly and grandly, with clement (sunny but often
stabbingly chilly) weather on Saturday and Sunday.

The short version:

Arrival at 4:45pm. Cab to the hotel with chatty native New York
driver. Meeting dfan in the lobby after walking blindly past the
hotel twice. Jota arrives. Jarb and his brother Rob arrive. We
call Kiz and ddyte, and schlep over to a restaurant called Kiev,
where we meet neild, Mindy, Miseri, Steve, Duchess, Kiz, Ampersand,
and devil. Weird jokes about cottage cheese, Lee Majors, and David
Greenblatt, noted Killologist. No inky or Ivan or Ellison or katre
or mcp, but Adam and Jearl show up for a cameo appearance.

After dinner we go to a bar and meet with ddyte, Ellison, katre, 
and Ghogg. Back to Kiz-ddyte pad to wait around for news of inky,
Ivan, and mcp. Eileen shows up and leads us on a search for a roomy
place to get Steve some chocolate cake. Finally, Kiz shows up with 
inky and Ivan (and I think mcp wanders in also), and then we all go
home to sleep. I'm rooming with dfan and Jota in a tiny room at the
Best Western on 32nd St.

Saturday. Jota, dfan, and I are up and ready to go by 10am, but
Ivan, inky, and Ghogg are not. We three go to get all-day Metrocard
fun passes, espying along the way a picture of a moribund, ghoul-like
Bob Hope on a tabloid. We collect the other three guys and head to
Harmony Palace in Chinatown. inky goes in to make reservation for
18 in crushingly crowded Dim Sum restaurant. We realize it is 
Chinese New Year. D'oh. Special year of the Dragon New Year to 
boot.

Ivan and I walk around the block into Little Italy to get him a 
capuccino. Eventually everyone shows up, we eat. Miseri eats
_a lot_. I eat more than some others, amazed I am not the pickiest
eater at a table for once. We exit in time to see dragon dance 
parade and crashy cymbals and stuff. Lots of wondering what to 
do. We walk to get waffles, but it's Chinese New Year, so it's
closed. We walk by a giant inflatable panda balloon. We split 
up into Record Store group and Book Store group. I'm in the 
latter, with Ivan inky dfan Ghogg Jota katre. We go to Strand 
and browse. I buy nothing. inky buys a P.G. Wodehouse book. Jota 
buys Godel Escher Bach. Ghogg buys "The Professor and the
Madman" and some book on Mendelssohn and some other hifalutin
tomes. Ivan buys some stuff but I don't remember what.

Then we head to Bowlmore, a Manhattan bowling alley. I get
coffee. A magician makes twelve children scream. We meet the
other group and start bowling. dfan's not bad and bowls 100. 
I bowl an 83. Adam and Jearl and others show up. We bowl 
another game, and I rule and bowl a 153. ddyte rules and 
bowls a 141. Jearl rules in third place and bowls a 125.

Then we sort of split up again to mosey around before dinner.
inky wants to go up the Empire State Building. ddyte wants 
nothing to do with enormous heights so he and Kiz and ummmm
Mindy? wait in a Starbucks. We wait in a line. (Sorry, _on_
line.) We wait in another line. We wait for an elevator
to the 80th floor. We wait in the elevator. We wait on 
line again. I race up the steps to the 86th floor. We
go outside. It is damn cold, but clear and we see all of
the lights. We get together inside. We go down the steps. 
We wait on a line. We go down. We look at descriptions of
the wonders of the ancient world. We go to Starbucks. I
wait for them to get Jota's hot chocolate right. I have
a hot chocolate, too, trying to anticipate having coffee
later.

Suddenly we realize we have no Ghogg. Whoops. Was he with 
us in the Empire State Building? Um. Uh. D'oh. Well, we
find him waiting at the hotel. Yay. So we go to dinner. 
We get on the subway. Hey, where's mcp? D'oh. We get to
dinner at Artepasta, and mcp shows up on his own steam.
Yay. Liza and Raul are there. Sarinee is there too. Too 
many people are there!! Jarb has a big cigar. inky is asked
to make a speech, then sits on a parrot (Awwwk!). We are all
at different tables so it's hard to, say, talk to Adam. 
Steve makes jokes about half-chickens. Steve remembers that
I'm allergic to chicken. Hmmm. Here comes the bill: eight
hundred smackers! or $28 each for 29 of us, or $29 each 
for 28 of us, or something.

Okay, here we are in the cold again. Cold and indecisive.
Where can we fit all of us? Ivan leads us through the west
village to south George Washington Square to an intersection
of coffee shops. We get money on the way from ATMs. devil 
invites us to his office at his company, but it will be
scary and illegal, so Ivan's plan succeeds. We find a place
playing Beatles music (I recall "Don't Let Me Down," "Eleanor
Rigby" (followed by Ray Charles cover of same), and "Tell
Me Why") with a back room we can squeeze into. At some point
people want to know what the hell my movie is about, and I
provide sketchy details in a diffident way. Steve has a 
black cherry soda that is clear. I have strawberry peach
pie. Mmm, pie. Okay, then Liza and Raul drive north, Jota
tells devil we'll call him in the morning. Mis, Jarb, other
Rob, and Duchess have long since gone to see _Stomp_ and 
go clubbing. We go back to the hotel and sleep. Yay sleep.

Suddenly it's Sunday morning, and inky wants bagels. So we
meet at 11am for bagels, and wait for devil. Adam and Jearl
are here. Jota realizes it was not devil wot called this
morning for directions, but Jearl, so devil has no idea
what we're doing or where we are. D'oh.

We get bagels and go to a place nearby to get coffee and
eat the bagels. Striking blonde waitress is cool with the
plan. Jearl bought coffee with her bagel (salt) out of
habit already (d'oh) so she orders orange juice. I have
coffee. Mmm. Coffee. I get disturbed in short order by
the art on the walls, which is by some guy Adam's heard
of, which are of big fat creepy people in various arrangements.
Musical instruments hang from the ceiling, which has stars
painted on it. Then we decide to go to a museum. inky 
suggests Natural History, and no one launches into fisticuffs
so it's a plan. inky also wants to see Central Park, so we 
get out near the Dakota and see Strawberry Fields and a 
frozen lake. Ivan walks out onto it as we stare at the 
"Danger Thin Ice Stupid" sign. 

Poor Jota is carrying his large bag (we checked out of the 
hotel when we left) and is going slowly. We end up at the 
museum, which is also some sort of Teddy Roosevelt memorial.
I accost Ivan and tell him to accost a stranger to take a
picture of us. So a beautiful brown haired lady snaps us
in front of Teddy's statue out front. It's inky, Jota, me,
dfan, Ivan, Jearl, and Adam at this point. 

We stand on line and start looking at bones and stuff.
Suddenly it's 1:30pm and I have to go, so I shake hands
with everyone and race down the stairs. Two seconds after
I leave, the others look at each other and ask, "So what's
with the hat?" Meanwhile, I hail a cab out front and go to
LaGuardia and get on a plane and come home.

And that's the short version, anyway.


                                           ---jrw 11:57pm
                                                   2-6-00