Posts on Current Forum | Archived Posts
|
|
|
||
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
| Frequently Asked Forum Questions | |
|||
|
||||
|
|
|||
| ||||
| ||||
| ||||
| Search Older Posts on This Forum: Posts on Current Forum | Archived Posts | ||||
| ||||
| ||||
| ||||
| I Assassinated Claude Errera *IMGs/VIDs* *LONG* | |
| Posted By: munky-058 <munky.058@gmail.com> | Date: 6/24/11 2:28 a.m. |
|
The Dream Water? psh. Food? Whatever. Sleep? Who needs that?
I don't need it. ... I told myself I was taking the month off. I need to focus on my school finals. I don't need to play Xbox Live. I don't need to check social networks. I don't need to get on HBO.
A quick glance, what could it hurt? I just needed a fix.
A flashback popped up in my head. An old video that I watched years and years ago. A making-of video that featured a LAN party held at a certain guy's house. How my young eyes filled with longing when I had watched that video. Attending a LAN party. How a child could dream once... But life has a funny way of waking you up, quelling dreams. You become so busy trying to stay awake for whatever inconvenient hurdle comes your way that you never take time to get enough sleep, let alone dream.
The Machine I went back to the thread, and read it once again. Why not?
And that was it. Or so I thought. The night passed, as did the day. But that evening, an email arrived: "Munky, gimme your name and where'd you be coming from. -M".
As I would later tell everyone, I am not a travel person. I hate driving. I hate being a passenger in a car. I can't stand planes. I don't travel unless I have to. Just that week, I had turned down a second family road-trip to Orlando, FL. Everyone knows that Nando doesn't go on vacations. Even Sammy hesitates to ask me to drive the thirty minutes up to Chattanooga. And here I was now, planning a thousand-mile road trip. I hadn't thought this through. Regardless, I was going to make it work. A ride with Gian was suggested and agreed upon. But I'd have to go on a six-hour drive to get to him. Crap. And what's worse, my only vehicle was a v8 4x4 Tahoe. A drive to and from Gian's house would be $170, and that was just the gas. I hadn't thought about the driving. I had to find an alternative.
It couldn't happen like this. She had weeks to derail the plan, why wait until now? WHY?
The Passenger The catch of having Cindy drive Furhman (Christopher Manning) and I down to Savannah? We'd have to leave Dalton at 7:30 in the morning. I was awake and ready to go at six. I had sent Cindy a text the night before to make sure this house of cards was strong. She sent a reassuring confirmation.
Around 8am, Sammy called me, to see what was up. Cindy had a habit of being a little late, but that was fine by me. Didn't want to bite the hand that fed. Around 9, Sammy called Cindy. No reply. More texts went unanswered. 11am. I was worried. Here was a situation that I couldn't adapt to. There was no last-minute workaround. I had dodged a bullet already, but just barely. Now, there was no dodging. I wasn't in control of the situation. I was just a passenger. I could do nothing but sit helplessly on the plane as the pilot struggled to keep it airborne. A painful feeling in the pit of my stomach began to grow. Why can't things just be simple? As the sun approached noon, the stress was taking its toll on me. I didn't want to be mad. Things weren't down the drain yet, but that wasn't the problem. I feared that Cindy would change her mind, given the fact that our schedule hadn't been kept. I did everything on my end; she was nowhere to be found. Sammy called me once more. I didn't know whether to anticipate her calls with hope or with dread.
Could anything be more appropriate at this point? Apparently the insurance on Cindy's car hadn't been paid, and her brother had taken it, while he paid the insurance and other bills. Cindy wasn't sure when he'd be back. This couldn't be happening. Once more I was the passenger. Once more the house of cards began to teeter back and forth.
After a stop for food, we headed down to get Furhman. There were four of us in the car: Cindy, her boyfriend, their small hyper dog, and myself. Apparently they wanted to stay in Savannah for a bit after dropping me off. The ride down was pretty uneventful, but at one point, I fell asleep. A confusion between an exit and a road as we approached Marietta caused Cindy to turn the car around and head back north for ten minutes, before I woke up and corrected her. At a quarter past Four, we finally arrived at Furhman's place. Only seven hours behind schedule. As Romeo would say, 'better late than never'. We then went on an odd search for a Wendy's ultimately deciding to just stop at a Chik-fil-a... Which happened to be across the street from a Wendy's..... We had originally scheduled to arrive in Savannah hours before Gian got out of work, but due to our delays, we ended up arriving just after he closed up. So in an odd way, the days events couldn't have gone better. I wanted to throw up. The Precedent We arrived at the Maleki Mansion a few minutes later, after thanking Cindy for the ride. I'm not sure what we would have done if we had arrived earlier, but touching anything was definitely out of the picture. Luckily we didn't have to worry, as we had Gian there, and little time to go before we set out on the long ride. As Furhman attempted to nap, Gian and I headed out for supplies. It was going to be a long drive, and we wanted to make sure that hunger didn't force us to make any long stops. We also had to pick up paintball equipment from a friend's house. Gian told me of a humorous keg incident he and this friend had not that long before, which helped me trust Gian's driving skills a bit more, though I double-checked to make sure my seatbelt was safely locked in place. He also told me of an incident involving his license, which I acknowledged could be an issue if we were pulled over, but I dismissed it as an interesting fact. Of course there was to be a catch. There always was a catch. This wasn't really a big one, so I was grateful of the fact. Obvious hitches are generally the least of one's worries, it's the foolproof things that you're not worried about that cause things to fall apart. After a great story about a birthday paintball game and a "Cookie Conspiracy", we headed to Kroger to gather our supplies. We stocked up a bit more than we needed to, because we know that it's better to be over-prepared than left wanting.
Once our departure time was upon us, we put our foods (and a kitchen trashbag full of discarded food) on top of the car as Gian organized the Prius once more, taking into account the space we'd need for Dan to put his stuff. We had everything in place, and with one last stretch, we sat and prepared for a long, long drive. As the car accelerated towards the end of Gian's neighborhood, I was happy that everything was actually working out. It had been a long day, but everything had somehow managed to work out, and we were off...
. The Journey I don't like planes. There's a bit of a fear of heights involved, though I've vowed that one day I'll go skydiving to get over my fear. Multiple skydiving advertisements in my town are a sign for me to go for it one day. One day. For now, I hate flying.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
. Now once we got to Jersey City, things got interesting. We had originally planned to skip around the madness, but Furhman decided it would be best to go through Jersey City and Manhattan, and his directions were.... less than ideal. .
.
.
.
. Our stop in the city reminded me of a scenario I had been warned about as a child:
.
. . We finally managed to escape thanks to some crafty driving on Dan's part, including breaking a few laws that would get you Rodney King-ed in GA. I praise the man though, he knows how to drive like mad when the need arises. .
.
Shit. {facepalm}" The LAN We finally arrived at Mig's house in Queens. Weary, but safe and sound. It was great to meet Miguel, the guy who answered my message and helped make my dream come true. I don't know how to express my gratitude to him, or how to let him know how much his invite meant to me, but with a shake of his hand, I felt like I had awoken from a dream, except the dream was real, and here I was. I took some pictures at Mig's place, and while most can be found at the link at the bottom of this post, a whole mess of them were taken with my phone, and can be found in their own album on my imgur: http://munky.imgur.com/migs_house As for the rest of the LAN, Wu was nice enough to host them here on HBO, they're generally huge, but can be found at the bottom of this post. I'll highlight a few, but remember that many many more were taken.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.  .  .  .  .  .  .
.
.
.  .  .
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
. As the final day neared its end, and as I played around with Wu's AR, I noticed something. I was wearing my beloved red, and Wu was wearing blue. There was only one thing that could be done:
.
.
.
. I even took some screenshots of a game we played, and Hedgemony helped immortalize our leader with his own image. . . .
Thanks Hedge! I made a video of the weekend too, using footage that nobody knew I was recording the entire time :). That's how Korny rolls guys! I hope you enjoy it:
Chekhov's Gun As the night settled in and we prepared to leave, I found it in myself to try to put my appreciation of everything Wu and Mig had done into words. I told them how much this had meant to me, and that it had been a truly unforgettable experience. And so, shortly after one final thanks, we departed. The amazing weekend was almost over. Now for the ride home... if only gas wasn't so expensive!
. As we drove south, I looked over to the pretty lights of the city at night. If you had asked me a day before Mig's post if I ever had any hope of attending a LAN, my answer would have been a resigned "No". Guys like me never have such good luck. We just dream and dream. But that weekend, I learned that if you actually take the first step towards your dreams, the next step is much easier. No matter what hitches life throws at you, or what precedents attempt to discourage you, you are almost always in control. Very rarely are you ever truly the helpless passenger on the plane. But even then, passengers have taken a chance and helped land a plane before.
"Guys, guys wake up!"
An eternity passed before the officer approached, and wouldn't you know it, he approached on my side of the car. Great. In my groggy state, I figured I'd have to do the talking, which was alright, I wasn't nervous. But why couldn't I stop shaking? My window rolled down as a flashlight shone into the car, and my sleep-deprived eyes. I stayed quiet as he filled us in on why we had been stopped. Apparently Gian had been speeding. Apparently we were still in NEW JERSEY! Dang it. We were nowhere near home. Heck, we weren't even far from Wu's house. And here was a cop staring into a car full of electronics and ethnic minorities. This wasn't a pretty picture.
Gian fumbled nervously as he looked for the court documents explaining his license's state, stuttering the explanation for it. I really should be the one to explain things, but from what I figure was my body trying to force me to sleep as the situation demanded that I stay awake, I couldn't stop shaking. I'm amazed the officer didn't suspect me to be on drugs. He left with Gian's document and an old copy of his registration. I sighed. How could I not have seen this coming?
"Connecticut. We visited family & friends," Gian repeated.
"Yes." Replied Furhman. Now was my turn, show him you're not on meth.
"This says the temporary expired already", the officer said once he returned. There was the hitch I was expecting.
That was it. We were out of the hole and free. Huh. Except now I couldn't go back to sleep.
The rest of the trip was uneventful, though a lot of memorable talks and funny jokes were made. You had to be there.
As we finally got to my house, I felt a sad longing for Wu's house, and the friends that I had made there. I had attended my first LAN. I had hung out with fellow Bungie fans, and met a lot of great people. I got to spend time with Kermit, one of the HBO people that I admire greatly. I got to hang out with Wu, and he didn't think I was annoying (picture-taking aside). Mig was a down-to-earth guy who knew where to get good pizza, and Schooly Dee was an outstanding and memorable guy in person. No wonder the TSD group is so loyal to one another. They're all great guys in their own way, but as a group, they're an entity. If only Tex had been able to come and complete this Voltron of personalities.
. | |
|
| Replies: |
The HBO Forum Archive is maintained with WebBBS 4.33. |
