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"it was a run-by fruiting!"
On-the-fly post before I duck back offline to start cooking for today's Food Not Bombs. (After having only a 3 1/2 hour nap in lieu of sleep, after the train got me back to CT last night, and only getting home an hour ago. Yes, I am insane.)
The Great Halloween Slashfen Gathering of 2003 was a mixed success; Caro couldn't make it after all, and I wound up missing dinner entirely thanks to the combined asshattery of CT Transit and Metro North not allowing me into the city until twenty after five. Nifra, Rivka and Viridian did manage to meet up at ONY, or so I hear, and then there was a minor miracle.
My slash-friendly offline friend Heiwa (who was able to come at the last minute) and I, after navigating the maze of blocked-off streets and curb-cut-less intersections, found the end of the parade staging area, and started trying to make our way up to staging area four, where we hoped to meet up with the others. Before the parade started moving, the entire length of it contained approximately 1.2 persons per spacefor one person; this made any forward process extremely difficult, and even more so for two people in wheelchairs who need more room to manoeuvre. Several times we got stuck in one place long enough to consider giving up and staying there, both before and after we finally saw one of the numbered rally point markers (it was #9). After a while, we stopped beside a float pulsing out dance music, covered with gyrating folks in costume (it was very much like the June Pride Parade) and decided we might as well stay there. Several minutes later, the crowd on one side thinned long enough that we could see that, amazingly enough, we'd stopped directly across from the #4 marker. And a short while after that, two strange chicks came up to me asking whether they'd reached staging area four, and if I was Jack. It was Nifra and Viridian!
Sadly, we never did see Unovis or her friend Olya -- or at least, I didn't; V and Nifra said they had seen someone with a moon on her hat, after I described the costume she'd planned to wear. Hopefully the two of them made it to the parade and had as much of a blast as we did! There was a fantastic drum corps marching a little ways ahead of us most of the route, banging out rhythms that had half the parade participants more dancing than marching. We saw lots of fantastic costumes... V and I both took some pictures, and I'll be putting mine up later this month if they come out well.
After the parade ended and we managed to extricate ourselves from the pedestrian snarl at the route terminus, we wandered around a bit looking for a place to eat. We finally, thanks to Nifra's excellent navigation advice, found ourselves at Japanica just outside Union Square; it was accessible with some effort, and Heiwa and I finally got to have our dinner.
Finally, it was time for us to part. Nifra and Viridian took the subway from Union Square, missing by less than five minutes the two guys dressed as the Ambiguously Gay Duo -- that's right, Ace and Gary!
Hm, this post is turning out longer than I expected. Will add more details later.
The Great Halloween Slashfen Gathering of 2003 was a mixed success; Caro couldn't make it after all, and I wound up missing dinner entirely thanks to the combined asshattery of CT Transit and Metro North not allowing me into the city until twenty after five. Nifra, Rivka and Viridian did manage to meet up at ONY, or so I hear, and then there was a minor miracle.
My slash-friendly offline friend Heiwa (who was able to come at the last minute) and I, after navigating the maze of blocked-off streets and curb-cut-less intersections, found the end of the parade staging area, and started trying to make our way up to staging area four, where we hoped to meet up with the others. Before the parade started moving, the entire length of it contained approximately 1.2 persons per spacefor one person; this made any forward process extremely difficult, and even more so for two people in wheelchairs who need more room to manoeuvre. Several times we got stuck in one place long enough to consider giving up and staying there, both before and after we finally saw one of the numbered rally point markers (it was #9). After a while, we stopped beside a float pulsing out dance music, covered with gyrating folks in costume (it was very much like the June Pride Parade) and decided we might as well stay there. Several minutes later, the crowd on one side thinned long enough that we could see that, amazingly enough, we'd stopped directly across from the #4 marker. And a short while after that, two strange chicks came up to me asking whether they'd reached staging area four, and if I was Jack. It was Nifra and Viridian!
Sadly, we never did see Unovis or her friend Olya -- or at least, I didn't; V and Nifra said they had seen someone with a moon on her hat, after I described the costume she'd planned to wear. Hopefully the two of them made it to the parade and had as much of a blast as we did! There was a fantastic drum corps marching a little ways ahead of us most of the route, banging out rhythms that had half the parade participants more dancing than marching. We saw lots of fantastic costumes... V and I both took some pictures, and I'll be putting mine up later this month if they come out well.
After the parade ended and we managed to extricate ourselves from the pedestrian snarl at the route terminus, we wandered around a bit looking for a place to eat. We finally, thanks to Nifra's excellent navigation advice, found ourselves at Japanica just outside Union Square; it was accessible with some effort, and Heiwa and I finally got to have our dinner.
Finally, it was time for us to part. Nifra and Viridian took the subway from Union Square, missing by less than five minutes the two guys dressed as the Ambiguously Gay Duo -- that's right, Ace and Gary!
Hm, this post is turning out longer than I expected. Will add more details later.
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Longer account on my lj when I can manage, later; Foul Ole Ron is due here to monopolize my computer for four or five hours.
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