ON THE ROAD [part 1 apparently]
Sunday morning I head out to Westerville, OH, to meet Renard who is in the company of the MGD forumgoer Atomika and his buddies. There was a terrible snowstorm that morning. I really shouldn't've left, but I was armed with snow tires and a cautious winter driving attitude, so I wasn't too worried
but hell! once I crossed over into the states and got on the Interstate, it was blizzarding like all hell. I had a couple white-outs, so I decided the safest thing to do would be to tail one of the snowplows. Sadly, the plow pulled off the highway after like 5 minutes, so I ended up retreating into a Starbucks until the storm fucked off a little bit. This snowstorm was so fierce that there was lightning o.o I didn't know you could have lightning in a snowstorm. It's pretty cool when all you can see is white, and then there's a flash of lightning and everything goes BRIGHT white for a split-second. I was like "wtf was that lightning?" and then I heard the thunder so I guess it was. Things were perfectly fine once I cleared a couple hundred km. a 6+ hour car trip by oneself sounds boring, but armed with 2Sense and KnotCast, the time flew right by.
Once I arrived I dropped my stuff off and got acquainted with everyone. Renard gave me my Christmas present right then and had me open it. He got me original cartridges of Tetris Attack and Ecco 2, as well as Street Supremacy for PSP. He did a very good job of gettig me a present that I would love and hate simultaneously. After a bit we head out to an arcade that was in the friggin' BOONIES to play Pump Pro
WinDEU courses
and
CHOPSTIX FUCK!
When we got back, lots of Left 4 Dead ensued
Renard and I got really hungry at about 1am, so we decided to venture out to McDonald's. Instead of doing the smart thing and listening to Atomika's directions, we figured that we saw a McDonald's on the way back from the arcade, so we'd just head to that one.
Problem was, we couldn't find it >.> We drove all around, but we had to be very cautious not to get lost. We eventually found a Taco Bell/Pizza Hut, but we didn't really want that. Across the street was a 24hour Tim Hortons but BLEGH. We drove down the street a little further and found a McDonalds, but it didn't connect to the street. What the hell! D:
We gave up on that McDonalds and went back to the Taco Bell/Pizza Hut. We figured we'd get a few personal pan pizzas, since they had them on the Drive-Thru menu. I drove up and asked if they still had the pizzas and bitch was like "no" so we drove away. We decided that since she works and a Taco Bell, she was a biznacho.
So after the Taco Bell fiasco, we decided to go back to that McDonald's to search for the entrance. It turns out that the entrance was all the way around the back of the plaza D: Whatever, we figured it out. We pulled into the drive-thru and the voice was like "THIS LOCATION IS CLOSED. SORRY FOR THE INCONVENIENCE"
GODDOMMIT!
Despondently, we head over to an ampm in some 24hr gas station. They had a freezer there with some frozen pizzas. Sweet deal! we can still have pizza! So I bought one of those full-size rising crust pizzas and we'd just bake it back at the house. Renard also got some Hot Pockets, and I bought some chips to eat while the pizza was cooking.
We got back to the house, and I wasted no time beginning to preheat the oven. I was quite amused to find that on the back of the box they had three different sets of baking directions: Softer Crust, Crispier Crust, and If-You're-Baking-At-Higher-Than-3500-feet. While I was enjoying the box, I didn't notice that the oven started to violently emit smoke! I was so scared a smoke alarm would go off (as people had to be up for work at 7am). Luckily, no such alarm was tripped, but I was so scared to use the oven that the pizza remains frozen to this day.
Quite possibly the best, most fruitless quest for a midnight snack ever
I had consumed so much "energy" that evening. I had a Brawndo and an Ace and a Mana shot and half a Bawls Root Beer, plus some Crackheads^2 chocolate-covered coffee beans (600mg per box!) and a piece of Jolt energy gum. I still managed to crash at a reasonable hour, but I had trouble sleeping. I had felt REALLY cold and shivery, even inside my "still good in -5 Celsius" sleeping bag. I figure it was a prt-psychological, part physiological reaction to all the caffeine.
The next morning there was more hanging out. Good talk about arrow games in general with Atomika, and then we head out for Ian's
---
OKAY! So I'm getting super-sleepy and this entry is already getting mega-long, so I'll cover the latter half of the trip in the next entry (hopefully tomorrow). I also gotta talk about Christmas at some point. Maybe after Christmas actually happens I'll be able to better articulate my feelings on the subjects
Later Folks~
but hell! once I crossed over into the states and got on the Interstate, it was blizzarding like all hell. I had a couple white-outs, so I decided the safest thing to do would be to tail one of the snowplows. Sadly, the plow pulled off the highway after like 5 minutes, so I ended up retreating into a Starbucks until the storm fucked off a little bit. This snowstorm was so fierce that there was lightning o.o I didn't know you could have lightning in a snowstorm. It's pretty cool when all you can see is white, and then there's a flash of lightning and everything goes BRIGHT white for a split-second. I was like "wtf was that lightning?" and then I heard the thunder so I guess it was. Things were perfectly fine once I cleared a couple hundred km. a 6+ hour car trip by oneself sounds boring, but armed with 2Sense and KnotCast, the time flew right by.
Once I arrived I dropped my stuff off and got acquainted with everyone. Renard gave me my Christmas present right then and had me open it. He got me original cartridges of Tetris Attack and Ecco 2, as well as Street Supremacy for PSP. He did a very good job of gettig me a present that I would love and hate simultaneously. After a bit we head out to an arcade that was in the friggin' BOONIES to play Pump Pro
WinDEU courses
and
CHOPSTIX FUCK!
When we got back, lots of Left 4 Dead ensued
Renard and I got really hungry at about 1am, so we decided to venture out to McDonald's. Instead of doing the smart thing and listening to Atomika's directions, we figured that we saw a McDonald's on the way back from the arcade, so we'd just head to that one.
Problem was, we couldn't find it >.> We drove all around, but we had to be very cautious not to get lost. We eventually found a Taco Bell/Pizza Hut, but we didn't really want that. Across the street was a 24hour Tim Hortons but BLEGH. We drove down the street a little further and found a McDonalds, but it didn't connect to the street. What the hell! D:
We gave up on that McDonalds and went back to the Taco Bell/Pizza Hut. We figured we'd get a few personal pan pizzas, since they had them on the Drive-Thru menu. I drove up and asked if they still had the pizzas and bitch was like "no" so we drove away. We decided that since she works and a Taco Bell, she was a biznacho.
So after the Taco Bell fiasco, we decided to go back to that McDonald's to search for the entrance. It turns out that the entrance was all the way around the back of the plaza D: Whatever, we figured it out. We pulled into the drive-thru and the voice was like "THIS LOCATION IS CLOSED. SORRY FOR THE INCONVENIENCE"
GODDOMMIT!
Despondently, we head over to an ampm in some 24hr gas station. They had a freezer there with some frozen pizzas. Sweet deal! we can still have pizza! So I bought one of those full-size rising crust pizzas and we'd just bake it back at the house. Renard also got some Hot Pockets, and I bought some chips to eat while the pizza was cooking.
We got back to the house, and I wasted no time beginning to preheat the oven. I was quite amused to find that on the back of the box they had three different sets of baking directions: Softer Crust, Crispier Crust, and If-You're-Baking-At-Higher-Than-3500-feet. While I was enjoying the box, I didn't notice that the oven started to violently emit smoke! I was so scared a smoke alarm would go off (as people had to be up for work at 7am). Luckily, no such alarm was tripped, but I was so scared to use the oven that the pizza remains frozen to this day.
Quite possibly the best, most fruitless quest for a midnight snack ever
I had consumed so much "energy" that evening. I had a Brawndo and an Ace and a Mana shot and half a Bawls Root Beer, plus some Crackheads^2 chocolate-covered coffee beans (600mg per box!) and a piece of Jolt energy gum. I still managed to crash at a reasonable hour, but I had trouble sleeping. I had felt REALLY cold and shivery, even inside my "still good in -5 Celsius" sleeping bag. I figure it was a prt-psychological, part physiological reaction to all the caffeine.
The next morning there was more hanging out. Good talk about arrow games in general with Atomika, and then we head out for Ian's
---
OKAY! So I'm getting super-sleepy and this entry is already getting mega-long, so I'll cover the latter half of the trip in the next entry (hopefully tomorrow). I also gotta talk about Christmas at some point. Maybe after Christmas actually happens I'll be able to better articulate my feelings on the subjects
Later Folks~