I went out on two abbreviated hikes (more like walks), one with trinker and family in north Valley, and one alone in west Valley. I'm finally nearing my 200th geocache find, eight years after starting.

I went to my dentist about what I assumed was a small cavity. We were both shocked to discover that it was, instead, a massive cavity that had grown faster than normal humans can manage, and that I now need a root canal. And also, after the root canal, I'll probably need another wisdom tooth pulled. And also my dental coverage had disappeared (though that got cleared up the next day).

I got into more of a routine with stretching and using the exercise bike. Current games for playing on the exercise bike: Castle Crashers, because it is simple and repetitive, and Super Meat Boy, because it causes you to feed the frustration back into your legs.

I made it to Laz's boardgaming night for the first time in 2011, and played Power Grid, which was balanced and fun.

I went to cramerica house-reheating party, and spent some time catching up with folks like Artistry and Bartok whom I haven't seen in a while.

I had a two-day workweek.

Oh, and also, I bought a new car a new car, and returned the Jeep to my parents.

One of the most popular after-hours games at con this year was "Exquisite Fruit," a game received by tmcay in a dream, as befits any pastime of the surrealist vein. One person writes down an answer to be guessed, then seven people collaborate to form a clue for that answer in the style of Exquisite Corpse. The first person writes three words, then folds the paper so that the next person can see only the last word and the answer. The second player writes down two words and folds, and so on until the last person adds a single word and asks the question to the person next to them.

There'd been a massive game of Pyramid on Saturday night, and I hadn't thought to collect the categories for posterity. So I decided to grab the clues from a Sunday-night game of Exquisite Fruit when the opportunity arose. Players included Artistry, rubrick, toonhead_npl, jeffurrynpl, Eddy, /Jabberwock, Wraavr, hahathor, cramerica, tmcay and probably someone I'm forgetting. Some higlights:

• What Kubrick film starring Malcolm McDowell singing in the Nadsat slang like "horrorshow" movie?
• What Depression housing Green Acres pig Dahling presidential administration caused homeless in Annie Warbucks?
• What tacky tartan man skirt has many male skirt Scottish Batman was from Scotland?
• What porcine cocktail do goys drink tref and shaken not stirred not fried shaken?
• What jagged building stepped pyramid in middle of Q-Bert’s block pyrmaid but low-resolution Jews?
• What horror face-off between extraterrestrial against queen creature ultimate face-off between two creatures?
• What underwater weapon energy based illogical Captain Skywalker used in Klingon killing weapon explodes?
• What borough in Welcome Back in New York borough Welcome Back from Manhattan neighbor?
• What snackalicious treat like tollhouse recipe is sweet black sweet drops with brown morsels?
• Jerry Lewis’s partner nutty Jerry Lewis often sings "That's Amore" alcoholic not "G-schploing!" smarmy?

More clues with answers here

Always carry an exquisitefruit.

We're already in a countdown to Christmas. Various things like ojouchan's new job and some annoyingness with banks have meant we got a really late start. And it was only yesterday that I fully realized that I wasn't going to have any more free days before Christmas Eve. (Thursday and Friday are my days off, so my last pre-Christmas weekend just finished.)

But yesterday, Ojou and I cleared up some of the bank stuff, then we went with twilightsyren to Downtown Burbank. I got a lot of stuff done; I've pared down my budget this year, and I'm doing pretty good with it. I think I can get everything else done pretty quickly; my biggest regret is that I'm not likely to get to my regular used bookstore unless they've got expanded hours, or I make a rush to get there on the 23rd.

Still, since I've been thinking more about it, I thought I'd expand the Holiday/Birthday lists:

• Puzzle Books.I mentioned Mutant Sudoku last time, but there's a lot of other good stuff out there.
  • Nikoli Books. A few years ago, cramerica got me Penpa Mixes 1-3, which were loads of fun. They were especially useful once I dropped my nikoli.com membership. I still really love the puzzles, but having them in book form means I can forget about them easily. I'd love to see Penpa, Fillomino, Slitherlink, Masyu, Nurikabe, and Heyawake. (Obviously, they won't get here in time for Christmas, but whatever.
  • Nikoli by Sterling. Sterling Publishing puts out some real quality stuff, and recently they've been publishing Nikoli puzzles in books mixed with Sudoku. I've already got Slitherlink (which I've finished), Masyu, and Nurikabe, but I'd still like to get my hands on the other varieties listed above.
  
  
  • Crosswords. Also from Sterling, Frank Longo's Vowelless Crosswords looks good, as do Patrick Berry's Crossword masterpieces.
• Tea. Specifically looseleaf tea, not bagged/packaged. Our tea reserves are dreadfully low, and we haven't had time to restock. I like most kinds, black, green, white, oolong, herbal infusions, etc. I'd avoid Teavana and Lupicia because they're overpriced. We usually shop at specialteas.com or dragonwater.com online, and when we want something in person, we go to Wing Hop Fung in Chinatown, which stocks birdpick.com. (It looks like they have a store in Pasadena too.)
• One-Time Maid Service. Ojou and I are way behind on cleaning, and a burst of professional help would go a long way, especially now that we rarely have a full day off together.
• New Year's Eve Plans. I'm working most of the Christmas weekend, and as a result, I've got a nice five-day weekend from December 29 to January 2. Ojou's got a sexy, sexy Foxy Brown outfit to wear . . . and a lot of our friends are going to be out of town. We need something to do, something big. Scrabble with Ellen isn't going to cut it this year.

And that's the end of my proactive gift list.

I'm writing now on WiFi on a Virgin America flight from San Francisco to Los Angeles.

"But tablesaw," you protest, "however did you get to San Francisco in the first place?"

Well.

Last week I got a cryptic e-mail asking what I was going to be doing today. The answer was "working," but I asked if I should change this answer.

The e-mail had come from a friend who works at Google and who was looking to pack a flight from Los Angeles to San Francisco with puzzler/gamers to help promote A Day in the Cloud. The game was meant to be played anywhere on the internet (you can still play right now, if you've got a free hour), but to promote Virgin America's connectedness, they were also having special contests where different Virgin flights would compete against each other for a prize in addition to a chance at the grand prize. Also, this particular flight would have some press coverage.

After some back-and-forth, ojouchan and I got the day off of work and were confirmed for the free flight.

So we got up early and drove to LAX, where there was a nice little breakfast spread before boarding. The plane looked fantastic, and everything went really well.

Right up until everyone started competing.

Apparently, there's a big difference in demand between WiFi that you pay for ($9.95 for one flight, apparently) and WiFi that you don't pay for, especially when there are prizes on the line. The moment everyone opened up their laptops, the sign-on screen that stood between us and the Internet became slower than frozen molasses.

Ojou and I had special problems in addition. Ojou's computer had some weird application (possibly from its previous life as an employer-provided laptop at my firm) that prevented her from signing on. I was making progress (slowly) when my laptop (actually cramerica's laptop; it's complicated) died when the battery ran out. Of course, the battery was not supposed to run out, as I'd plugged the laptop directly into one of Virgin America's much-vaunted regular power outlets. Mine was dead, though. An attendant ran the cord back to a different row that had a free outlet, and I restarted the computer, but at the end of the queue again.

Eventually, Ojou and I got on at about the same time, some of the last people on the flight. It was painful listening to people shout out requests for answers and hints when we couldn't even see the game. (Later, we solved those puzzles pretty quickly, so we could've been some help.)

After we'd been playing for about ten minutes, the Google employees started coming through the cabin letting us know that we were going to have to turn off our WiFi early. Why? Because one of the reporters was going to be doing a live broadcast, and they needed the bandwidth. We ultimately got to see less than half of the contest.

We were sad. Not only did we not get to solve the puzzles (which ranged from cheesy "let's learn about Google" questions to impressive little gems), but we didn't get to contribute very much. We're not sure exactly how the scoring worked, but we were pretty sure our meager 13,000 feet combined wouldn't make much of a difference.

But for all the problems, we did have an ace in the hole, or rather, an ace in first class. The real ringer for the northbound flight was onigame, and while most of us were asked to disconnect for the news broadcast, he was allowed to keep going.

The Google person sitting next to us had access to the two planes' scores and let us know that it was close, possible a thousand feet difference. And all our hopes rested on Onigame. The press crowded around the front of the plane, and we started chanting his name from the back.

Finally, we had the results. LAX to SFO beat the opposite flight. Everyone who participated would be receiving the prize of an HP Netbook. As the two people on the flight with probably the oldest laptops (and mine wasn't even mine!), we were very pleased.

(Not so pleased was the woman who had booked a flight not realizing that she wasn't on an airplane so much as a press event. When she found out that we'd been circling so that we could finish the press broadcast and that she might miss the connecting flight to take her to the hospital bedside of a family member, she was a bit upset.)

We got off the plane and grabbed a bite to eat in the airport, then hopped on the flight back south (the one that we're on now). I suppose we could've paid for a later flight and spent some time in San Francisco, but hey, we're cheap. Besides, we already had a plan.

It may be a cliche, but after winning, we're going to Disneyland.

I drank more beer while I was in Boston than I ever had in my life. Now, this isn't saying much. I'm not a big fan of beer, so I don't drink it. I much prefer the taste of a well-mixed cocktail. A Rum and Coke is usually pleasant, and there's nothing that can beat a Margarita mixed with good tequila and a whole lot of machismo. I know there's good beer out there, but since I don't drink often, there's really no point in going out and finding the few kinds that I like amid the amber waves of unappealing brew.

It's kind of like Country Music, in that way.

Anyway, the advantage of going to Boston was that there were lots of people who drank beer a lot and knew what was good. Chief among them was Beer Goddess Hathor who, in addition to giving tips on what to drink where, also brewed some fine beer herself. (She has a website [link removed 8/13/11; originally "http://www.fix.org/jennyg/"], though I have no idea where in there I'm supposed to look for a homepage.) And when all of the bars are closed, having personalized beer in a hotel room . . . but I'm getting ahead of myself.

( The story behind the Pub Puzzle Crawl )

So, Monday evening. It was the first chance I got to see people NPLers, mostly locals. Since there were too many people to easily manage, some of them split off into a Ice Cream Puzzle Crawl through Boston. The puzzles, in this case, were provided on the fly by tahnan and thedan. Sadly, the Ice Cream Crawl had far fewer stops, since the participants got brainfreeze or something. The cool kids (wesleyjenn, QED, Sprout, Sue++, Sir+, joecab, cazique, heaneyland, Otherwise, D. Ness, ln sin t, Niff, Ucaoimhu, Artistry, foggyb, Hathor, and I) went off and drank for seven hours.

I wish I could tell you more about the bars and the beers, but I can't, really. I know they were good, but since I don't have much experience with beer (for reasons detailed above), I couldn't really tell you why. I can't even recommend things because I was mostly echoing what other, more knowledgeable people were ordering. I can give you the itinerary [link removed; originally "http://www.gregbrume.net/puzzles/redbones/index.html"] of the crawl, since foggyb has been kind enough to upload it. The itinerary also has most of the puzzles.

The puzzles were really well designed considering what they needed to do. They were simple and fun and rarely required too much thought. The KISS mentality showed up many places in this Con, to the benefit of all. Certainly, the NPL is not a group that will shy away from the obscure, the complex, the byzantine, or the difficult. But there's a lot more going on at a convention. There are things to see, people to talk to, games to play. You have to make sure that nothing gets to frustrating, or else solvers will start to wonder why you're wasting their time when they could be doing something else with someone else. (Also, of course, everything has to be solved without references.) In this case, the puzzles couldn't overstay their welcome, because people wanted to be able to drink and chat. Also, puzzles had to be specially coordinated so that they could be easily solved after drinking beer for several hours.

One of my favorite puzzles was one of the more complex ones: Boston Beer Works [link removed 8/13/11; originally "http://www.gregbrume.net/puzzles/redbones/pc02.pdf"]. It was an early puzzle, and one of the only ones where everyone dug in and did some pencil solving. What I enjoyed the most was that, although solvers were warned that the beer list incorporated into the puzzle was out of date, it still represented the menu very well. Pretty much everyone ordered their drinks off of the puzzle without really looking at the menus. I also sat near Cazique, QED, and the right shoulder of Sprout, triviaites all, who offered and solved variuos sports trivia questions.

At Bukowski's [link changed 8/13/11; originally "http://www.beeradvocate.com/beerfly/user_reviews/963/"], we settled in for the inevitable Pub Trivia [link removed 8/13/11; originally "http://www.gregbrume.net/puzzles/redbones/pc04a.pdf"] game. The theme was "Dead Authors," since Bukowski's is the home of the Dead Authors' Club. (Although it wasn't explained then, I now know that some patrons of this bar undertake to sample every beer on the menu, though mercifully not on the same night. Those who succeed get mugs engraved with their names placed on the wall. And by "their names," I mean "the names of dead authors they choose.") I did predictably poorly, especially compared to some of the general knowledge hotshots. But still, I don't think the questions [link removed 8/13/11; originally "http://www.gregbrume.net/puzzles/redbones/pc04b.pdf"] were balanced all that well. (I'll try to explain more about the balancing trivia, but it's a tough subject and I'll need a separate entry.) Anyway, the balance of the knowledge is definitely a nitpick in this situation. Everyone had fun, even when losing, which is much more important, and difficult to accomplish.

Also, while I was at Bukowski's, I recorded an Audblog. I'd say more about that, but I can't listen to it while I'm work.

The last puzzle I'll talk about is the one from Redbones. This is a fantastic puzzle, though you can't see it or solve it online. Go visit the redbones site, and you'll see lots of wonderful artwork. That original artwork is all over the downstairs barroom. It was the artwork that we were looking at back in January when we thought about a Pub Puzzle Crawl. And it was the artwork that made our last stop an Eyeball Benders-style extravaganza.

We got a huge pile of letters. Each letter seemed to have been cut out of the pictures along the walls. We had to locate, then put them in order according to their position around the room. It was great fun. This might seem a complex puzzle to deal with after seven hours of drinking, but I think that the lowering of the inhibitions helped us to take over the more-or-less empty room staring at pictures. Also, they had great dessert. And great meat. And good margaritas. (Wow, I didn't realize how out of it until I tried to remember it just now. At this point, I wouldn't be surprised if someone there told me that I said, "I love you man! You're like my brother! My puzzle brother! Mi hermano de crucigramas!")

At some point at Redbones, I got a picture of QED, Sprout, Toonhead! and somebody's hair. You can see the wacky Redbones artwork, along with the cute and very helpful bartender who decided to be a semi-waitress even though she didn't have to be. Also, at some point earlier, I got a picture of wesleyjenn and heaneyland, probably in a T station somewhere.

After all of this, those of us who remained were directed by Foggy Blotto to the best beer in Boston. By this time, many of our crew had ducked out to return to their homes or the hotel. Thus, when I snapped a picture, en route to our final destination, only foggyb, QED, Ucaoimhu, Hathor, Artistry, and joecab. Sprout was also there, though he cannot be seen in this picture. As we staggered toward the terminus, Hathor tried to scare us by saying that once we were there, we were going to have to solve a cryptic crossword by Ucaoimhu, known for his labyrinthine crosswords that involving learning Sanskrit [link changed 8/13/11; http://www.alkhemy.com/sanskrit/atul/"] or decoding Cuneiform [link changed 8/13/11; originally "http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~dee/GLOSSARY/CUNEI.HTM"].

Well, the best beer in Boston turned out to be at Hathor's house. But the crossword turned out to be no empty threat. We were provided with two beers that were brewed specifically for this convention. (There was a third prepared beer, but it had been part of an auction, and thus, we were not allowed to drink it.) The labels were designed by joecab, and as you can see, Hathor's threat turned out not to be empty.

And, with no more puzzles, we just kept drinking without puzzles.

( And really, who needs the puzzles? )

I recorded an Audblog after one of these beer sessions. As I mentioned above, I can't relisten to it right now. But I'm pretty sure I talked about Toonhead!, aka joecab. I may even have mentioned a picture.

See, I was "cosolving" thedan's cryptic with joecab very late one evening / very early one morning. I don't know why I thought attempting this was a good idea at all. foggyb was there, and I he may have had a hand in convincing me, since it would have been very amusing for him. We actually managed to do rather well, though all together, we found a completely and utterly wrong answer to the end game of the cryptic.

At a certain point, after the grid had been filled and foggyb and I had started puzzling through the final steps, joecab crawled around us on the bed, then fell down. He didn't get up again. After a while, we noticed.

We took this as a sign of two things: (1) we should probably get out of his room, (2) we should probably take a picture and post it on the Internet.

And here it is:
( Man, this Toonhead! guy should learn to hold his liquor better )

I went geocaching again today, and I was three for five. I'll write more later, hopefully when I do my big "What I'm Learning from Geocaching" post. Anyway, the big story today is that, although I planned on relatively easy outings, I ended up making an unexpected 2.5-mile walk. But the rewards were great. See, I locked my keys in my car, so I had to walk home and then back to my car to unlock it.

Party at cramerica's tonight. Must sleep.

As you may know if you listened to the AudBlog, I was still frantically cleaning as the beginning of the party came around. Bartok was the first to arrive, punctual as ever at 2:30. He was pleasant and accommodating as I continued to run around the house, cleaning things. We chatted, etc. Things were pretty much in order by three, when DeB showed up, and I started set out the chips and dips and jelly beans.

(I'd like to mention that Ken's Peppercorn Ranch) is a very fine dressing for crudites. However, I was disappointed that the baby broccoli that I procured from Trader Joe's didn't get eaten as much as the celery or carrots.)

Eventually, everyone arrived, cramerica, wjukknibs, K., Mel, two of my cousins, and my parents, in addition to DeB and Bartok. Artistry called and said he'd be late, so I held the opening till about 3:45, when I started to explain the investigation/game to the assembled agents.

I don't think I'll have time to go through all of it, so I'm just going to link to copies of the files, for now. You, like my guests, can read over them and ponder their meaning while I drive home from work to continue writing. I will tell you that your experience of these documents will be greatly enhanced by installing the X-Files and Catharsis Cargo fonts.

The first document was a brief introduction from Special Agent Fox-in-the-Henhouse Mulder. Attached were two procedural documents. One explained the course of the investigation to come, and was titled HOW TO STOP THEM. The other document was the beginning of the final puzzle, the Alien Genome Dance. The other steps of this complicated mating ritual would be revealed later.

Because it wasn't clear whether everyone there was going to be working very actively, I devised a system of Field Agents and Supervising Agents, which, I hoped, would allow people to feel free to participate only as much as they wanted. There was an extra document for each. The Field Agents received general instructions on how to attack the puzzles. Supervising Agents got tips on how to stay involved without feeling obliged to run around too much.

I handed these out early because I'm the type of person who likes to read through the program before the show starts. So were most of my guests, so there was much reading of the documents before things even got started. Then, the briefing began . . .

This is definitely the best I've felt after a thirty-hour day. No, I'm not being ironic. I actually feel fantastic. No caffeine either. Just a great week powering me into and through a fun day.

How great? I was singing showtunes while driving home from cramerica's house, inspired by a game of Music Man's guess-that-lyric game. My team didn't get the points, but I got a joyful earworm, which I share with you.

audio post powered by audblog

Two weeks ago, there was an npl puzzle party at the house of Music Man, over in Woodland Hills. To cut down on driving, Artistry crashed in my bed, which was less trouble than one might think, since I was at work at the time. When he got up, we went out for our now traditional meal at Jerry's Deli. (I'm not sure how we'll manage that at the next party, since the location is between the two of us. Perhaps we'll all meet at Cramerica's place beforehand and go to the one in Marina Del Rey. Or Nichol's.)

They day was pretty standard. ( Bartok made magic. ) ( Music Man asked the musical question: Where? ) ( I got a job. ) ( Elfman played hide and 11-Seek ) ( Bluff made us cross-eyed. ) ( Panache banked on it. ) ( And Artistry made all of his answers porn stars. )

After all that, Art and Cram came over to my place, where we played Trivial Pursuit. Then wjukknibs stopped by (he's been spending a disturbing amount of time at my landlords' house), and we played mini-Cluesome and Chain Reaction (the latter doesn't have rules online, and I don't feel like typing them up). Eventually, I managed to kick everyone out because I was really tired. So tired, indeed, that it took me until now to tell thee of it.

The End.

I'm finally home from Indiana. There's a lot to write about. A lot of it will be put into an article for saxikath and The Enigma, but I'll find some stuff to put on here, as well. Short version: On Wednesday, I flew into Indianapolis. There was a party. On the way home, there was a lightning-and-thunderstorm. That night, played thedan's Jeopardy, Telephone Pictionary, and freeform Catch Phrase [dead link changed, 10/26/10]. Next day, slept in, played Puerto Rico [dead link changed, 10/26/10], went to the first night of program, applauded the Sagamore of the Wabash, almost got knocked out by chlorine, played living Scrabble, finished Puerto Rico, did some more games. Friday, had a fantastic tour of The Brickyard, had cocktails in a rotating skybar, ate, listened to an excited Merriam-Webster publisher, guessed (badly) at new dictionary definitions, helped find the hidden contest, listened to some Will Shortz puzzles, answered some (definitely not all) trivia, solved (most of) a vaganza, solved a brilliant Bartok cryptic crossword with cramerica, played more games of various sorts, went to bed around 7:30 a.m. On Saturday, had lunch, solved a fun Slik cryptic crossword with bookishfellow, did some paper puzzles, put solutions to various flats missing a particular symbol with Cram, took a group photo, bought chocolate, ate, solved a hurried Harth cryptic crossword with T McAy, worked through an extra-extravagant extravaganza with tahnan, En, DandR, and Artistry, played lots more games, didn't sleep. Next day, still didn't sleep, ate breakfast, snagged a British dictionary as a prize, said goodbyes to those leaving, slept, woke up for dinner at a famous steakhouse, did some group cryptic crossword solving, slept. Today, woke up, checked out, ate, went to airport, realized I'd lost my driver's license and photo ID, was subsequently subjected to an extremely thorough security check, flew anyway, met reality game show contestants, arrived home, called parents, connected to ISP, logged on to NPL chat.

Tomorrow, mundanity begins anew. Woo.