damn, you did good

haha it's all good, naturally magfest isn't all about the games and music. it could never be what it is without the people to share it with, so it's great that you got to chill with at least some of the people you wanted to see :smile:

(plus i made some pretty weird mistakes)

I'm sad I really couldn't come and meet so AWESOME people from OCR. One day, maybe... (when I'll have enough money and no f*cking exam...)

Wes, you were _very_ drunk at the ocr panel. It was kind of fun to watch.

mag has this way of getting better and better with each year. that trend continues with this mag being by far the most enjoyable one for me yet.

among my personal highlights are:
- protricity and monobrow graciously extending their room to me for the night, with no indication from me that i was planning on commuting to mag
- reconnecting with everyone from years past
- lukethexjesse's personality not only matching, but exceeding his irc personality
- the xenotones jam session
- everyone loving korean food
- the earthbound papas concert
- josh whelchel being awesome enough to let people smoke hooka off his balcony
- the jamspace nazi with drumultima and audio fidelity
- conversations had at a 5 am food run to ranch house
- west coast cats raging at east coast highways
- finding a solitary garian roaming magfest at 7 am on sunday morning, then going to catch the earthbound papas q&a
- the q&a itself
- the odyssey of finding busboys and poets, met with success this year
- the cognitive meltdown brought on by chugging five hour energies with aeroz to battle con fatigue and the onset of sleepiness from staying awake for 28 hours
- starla and ramaniscence saving the day by jumping my dead battery
- chilling and catching up with bustatunez on the way to dulles

and everything else that isn't coming to mind right now. let's definitely not wait another year to see each other again.

+ The X Hunters concert
+ Portal sing-along with Ellen McLain while her husband played on a banjo
+ Acoustic jam session which was promptly ended by hotel staff at 4 am :P
+ OCR hotel block was awesome
+ Weather was freakin amazing. Walking around in a T-shirt in January :D
+ Having enough money to actually buy some cool souvenirs
+ Extra Creditz panel
+ OCR Panel and the announcement of Unsung Heroes
+ OCAD was even more hilarious than usual
+ Earthbound Papas concert
+ Seeing the best people on the internet irl!

- My body does not respond well to little sleep, little food, and lots of alcohol and caffeine
- Forgot my copy of Portal 2 for Ellen McLain to sign
- OCR hotel block was kind of scattered, wish we could have all been closer together
- Missed Armcannon because Extra Creditz panel went an hour and a half longer than expected (but was totally awesome!)
- Quite literally passed out from exhaustion after the Earthbound Papas concert

Overall, the best MAGFest yet!

Pros:

-Late night Skyward Sword with the Aversas on Wednesday
-Minnesota room with OA and Deia was great
-Addie and Brad improvising a birthday party for me (complete with AMAZING cake) at the Shizz party
-Elegant night at the Shizz party in general
-Earthbound Papas concert

Cons:

-Missing more concerts than I would have liked; you can't do everything!
-There were a few people I didn't meet that I wish I had...
-...and a few friends I wish I could have spent more one on one time with.

To anyone who told me to stick around longer after MAG next year, I certainly hope to. Chilling at the Aversa's place with Shariq, Gario, Bahamut, and newt (in addition to Andy/Jill) is good stuff atm -- a nice slow burn to close out MAG.

Edit: One story I forgot: As Addie, Deia, and myself were waiting for an elevator down, one opened completely packed. Standing in the front of the elevator was Jon St. John. He waggled his pointer finger at us; as the doors closed, we hear "Not this time..." Epic.

Wow.. I really am jealous at you guys. I could have met some OCR people. Sucks to live in Europe and not having enough time to go. Well Tensei lives in the same country as I so maybe I should ask him how he planned all of this.

I got 27 days to spend this year though :). Any cool events planned this year?

Now that I'm up and at work, and don't have to worry about things such as time and overall awareness, here's my pro/con list, and also things I need to remember to do next year.

Pros:
-Meeting Stemage, Virt, Zircon, Mustin, Danimal Cannon, Danny B, and Benjamin Briggs, and then fanboying over each of them.
-So many awesome bands. Armcannon and Metroid Metal melted my face off. Virt got everybody actually dancing. Uematsu pulled in a huge crowd, and did not disappoint.
-Meeting as many of the OCR crew as I did. Thanks for putting up with me and my wife, I almost felt like I was elbowing my way into things.
-Getting hugged by Snappleman
-Wife being impossibly cute with her ChainChomp hat she got.
-Names/faces remembered and introduced to: Amphibious, Prophetik, D-Lux, Zircon, Pixietricks, Darkesword, Abadoss, Benjamin Briggs, OA, DragonAvenger, Dio-trans (pronounced dye-o, not dee-o), Fusion2004, Rama, Starla, DannyB, Snappleman, virt, Mustin, Stemage, Bahamut, Vimk, Level99, Overcoat, Gario, Garian, theshaggyfreak, Brandon Strader, BardicKnolwledge and wife, drunk LuketheXjesse.
-Seen, recognized, but no chance to say hi: Prince of Darkness, Norg, Uematsu (saw him on my way out of the hotel, nobody was around him), Mazedude, Dhsu, and probably a few more.
-Guidebook app was amazing. Nuff said.
-chiptune dubstep. Virt made wobblebass :D

Cons:
-No electronic communication with people. Although there was a pseudo call list, I didn't get any calls or texts. All contact and information was happenstance. Need to either develop or use a way to get all OCR people on the same page. Mass texting is no good.
-Awesome Panel/Awesome Concert overlap. I left and missed several big panels because big things were happening over at the chiptune stage / 2nd Stage. I know others were having the same problem, and it's bound to happen.
-Concerts were too loud, making me bail out on the Thursday ones. I know they're supposed to be loud, but I like not having extensive hearing damage. I think of all the ones I went to, virt's show was the only one that wasn't unbearably loud, and I still ended up using ear plugs. This con is more a problem with concert culture than with the guys running the shows.
-I feel old: I really wish I could have stayed up later a few nights, but once I hit about 17 hours awake, it becomes very hard for me to remain cognent. Add in having to make sure wife is up for it (she's very new to the entire community) and I end up having to retire early pretty much every night.
-I missed a ton of people. Because of the OCR block split, I didn't get to interact with about a full 3rd of the ocr folk

Next year:
-Plan earlier, and get better flights. Way in took too long, way out was too early on the last day.
-find a way to improve communication between all forumgoers. There needs to be a local irc chatroom or forum that's easy to access via phone. Maybe deploy a specialized irc chatroom/channel for live MAG? Keep it in perma slow mode so that that it's more twitterlike in it's use.
-Plan a group meetup before opening ceremony? I know some happen later, but one of my larger issues was that I didn't really run into anybody until the ocr vs dod panel. Till then, I was floating about, pretty much on my own.

Here's a sound sample to use in your remixes. For those who stayed at the Gaylord, this sound will stay in your head and heart forever: http://bsodcomic.net/misc/that_beep.wav

He also invented wobble hi-hat during the Famitracker panel. :P