So like, yeah, I'm back now from the Messenger Meet in London. I guess the others are still travelling; they had a lot farther to go than I did. Here’s my report on what we got up to in the last 2/3 days…
Messenger Meet, London ’05
What is a Messenger Meet?
Well some of you may remember that back at Christmas time last year, Patchou invited several of the prominent members of the Messenger Plus! Community to visit him out in Paris, for a general get together. We had dinner, walked around a bit, saw a movie; just had a good time.
The summer came around, and a couple of us (namely TheBlasphemer and Sunshine) decided that we should repeat the experience. This time we chose London as our venue. Luckily for MoRiA and I, it was a little closer to home.
So who went?
The people invited to go were again prominent members of the community, but this time not just Messenger Plus! but all things Messenger. By prominent members I mean people well known in the IRC channels, the msgplus forums, coders of famous plugins and the like.
Present were
- Optimism_ (myself) (plugin coder and #msgplus op) [UK] (arrived on the second day)
- MoRiA (one of my friends, used to be a #msgplus op) [UK] (arrived on the second day)
- TheBlasphemer (coder behind StuffPlug) [The Netherlands]
- Sunshine (#msgplus helper) [The Netherlands]
- Inky (coder behind Bot2k3) [The Netherlands]
- CookieRevised (should be a msgplus forum moderator, *hint hint*) [Belgium]
- TReKiE (#msgplus idler
, Microsoft MVP) [Canada]
- Segosa (#msgplus op) [Spain] (Picture removed by request)
- Time (ex IRC oper, #msgplus helper/idler ) [UK] (joined us for a fewhours on the last day)
What did we get up to?
Well MoRiA and I joined on the second day, so someone else will have to fill in for the first. However it sounds like they all had a lot of fun, and there may or may not have been some large quantities of alcohol (I’ll let them confirm that
)
When we arrived, the others were still at the hostel (lazy gits
) We hung around for a bit, and made our introductions etc. Having only been there about 30 minutes by this time, even we were getting tired of TB’s insistence of going to get an “English Breakfast”. By all accounts he’d being going on about it for hours
(obsessed!!) So we indulged him and headed out to a nice little Spanish café/bar place that just happened to serve what TB was going on about.
The food there was very nice
as TB will attest to (and yes wtbw, he drank his tea *with milk*
)
After sitting in the café for waaaaaaaay too long, we headed out to find something interesting to do. Segosa mentioned wanting to see the pigeons in Trafalgar Square, so having worked out the best underground route, that’s where we headed.
But all the pigeons were gone!
(Some piccies of people at Trafalgar Square)
- Cookie
- Segosa (Picture removed by request)
- TReKiE (plus Cookie’s elbow)
Since that was essentially quite boring we moved out, and after some bad choices of directions, ended up walking for ages in the hot and humid London sun (England, hot, what’s going on?
) Eventually after passing
Big Ben and
Westminster we found the “Manga Bar”, by the London Eye, and got to drink the worlds most expensive Coke while watching crazy Japanese cartoons. Fun ¬_¬. It was here that Cookie created the soon to be famous
Decision Cube! A cardboard cube with some advert or other on it which was adorned with “Yes,” “No,” “Dunno,” “Try Again,” “Left,” and “Right” on each side. From this point on, whenever we couldn’t reach a decision between us (this happened a lot) we let the cube decide for us.) It had us go “Right”
Deciding that’d we’d had enough walking around, wanting to sit down somewhere we walked over to the IMAX to try and find something to watch. Nothing appealing so to Oxford street and the Odeon cinema. Despite it being a mere 100 meters from the underground station, and with a map in my hand, I still managed to lead us off
in the wrong direction. Got three or four blocks before I got us turned around and headed back in the right direction. (Sunshine wasn’t best pleased
)
We ended up watching War of the Worlds, which got some mixed reviews from the group. If you’ve seen it, you’ll probably know why. More walking took us through a very Arabic region of London, until we decided enough was enough and we’d catch an underground train just as long as there was
no more walking!!
Ending up back at the hostel for no particular reason, where we spent some time trying to retrieve the photos from various cameras, and TReKiE using whatever program it was to try and locate us somewhere to go eat. TB’s latest obsession was somewhere in Chinatown where there was an all you can eat restaurant (like could he be any more specific kthx). According to TReKiE’s trusty laptop, over 57 restaurants in Chinatown; so we gave up on that idea pretty quick. More than an hour passed before someone lead the way out of the door, and we found ourselves walking around Bayswater until we got to TGI Friday’s, an American family restaurant.
Having not booked a table, we were sent to the bar to get royally drunk (mebbe) before we could sit down and order. Odd… because the place wasn’t at all busy all evening, but hey. We got to watch the barman try and juggle bottles and cocktail shakers over and over again, progressively dropping things more often. Once at the table, much food was consumed and laughter shared. Once the plates were licked clean, it was back again to the bar, where we managed to stay until kicking out time
Again the barman was up to his antics, and this time provided TB with much amusement getting him to try balancing a wine class on its edge using just a paper napkin. Easier said than done, involving the charging of much static electricity, and careful balancing of breakable objects. But try as we might, we couldn’t achieve it (without cheating that is) until the end of the evening when he let on to the little straw wrapped up inside the napkin. Another party trick to learn for the next time you get bored at a gathering, and need something to start conversation…)
Having had something to drink, we managed to convince TB that the lockers in out hostel room really were
big enough to fit in. A nice safe haven perhaps, until we locked him in that is
Claustrophobic?,
aww, too bad,
There is no Escape
After reluctantly letting TB out (he made rather a lot of noise when confined in a small metal space
) the Decision Cube really came into its own. Hours of enjoyment just in asking it silly questions such as “Is Inky a female” (apparently “Yes”
) , “Should we throw TB out the window?” (a no go, the answer given us being “Left”) and the more disturbing question TB posed, “Should Cookie be given spankings?” (I don’t want to know what the answer was!)
Following these antics, for some reason TB
broke out the towel. It looked as if he and Inky were having lots of entertainment “towel whipping each other” (just don’t ask)
We then had TB say something to insult Sunshine (bad TB
) but it was ok, because Sunshine certainly got
her own back. It culminated with TB on his knees in submission… that or
proposing marriage, we’re not quite sure
/ –
