(no subject)
If there is someone on your friendslist who makes your world a better place just because they exist andwho you would not have met without the internet, then post this samesentence in your journal.
So, this meme is going around again. And for me, it's a fundamental truth of my life, and as such, kinda gives me an excuse to try to (start?) making this post, which I've been half planning for a long while. I'd like to see this laid out in black and white, and considering all the new people who've come into my life recently (because of the internet, or at least because of that part of fandom which resides on the internet) it might work as a partial introduction to some of the history and geography in here.
Okay, so admittedly she was talking about Venn diagrams at the time, but it's such a great line I had to use it again.
1981: I am born. The internet does not exist (I don't think?) and so I am unaware of it.
1997ish (possibly 1996. I don't remember precisely): We get our very first baby internet connection. From memory, I think it had a maximum download speed of 24 kbps. Oh man, that was hard core. I remember getting my email and ihug account set up by a family friend who knew about computers. He asked what I wanted my user name to be, I provided him with a sheet of A4 paper with something like 20 names on it. Unsurprisingly, every single one of these names was inspired by one or another of my fandoms. The majority were Star Wars related. He came back to us and told us every single one on my list was either gone or unavailable (of course, I didn't know about punctuation and dashes not being allowed for ISP usernames back then) aside from the very last one - one that I'd added on the complete spur of the moment thinking "well, it won't end up getting used so screw it if it doesn't really suit me. Which is why, O Best Beloved Flist, my ihug email address for nigh on ten years now is an homage to Admiral Paul Benden, one of the first settlers of the planet Pern in Anne McCaffery's series.
1998: It's after my bedtime, sometime in the school holidays, but somehow I've got away with my parents not yelling at me and making me turn out the light, and I've just finished reading a Star Wars novel. I suspect it was probably The Courtship of Princess Leia or possibly one of Tim Zahn's original trilogy. I turn to the back page, because even though I've read these books before, I always read all the "coming soon" pages and all that guff at the end. (Side note: That's actually how I discovered Miles Vorkosigan, really. There was a page of people's recs/reviews of Lois' books in the back of, um, from memory a Mercedes Lackey novel? Possibly a "ship who..." by Anne McCaffery? Either way, it was mentioned in something else, and so when I saw "The Warrior's Apprentice" on a table in Whitcoulls Queen St (for five dollars!) I pounced on it and was smitten from that day forward.) Anyway, tucked on the very last page of this book was a mention of the Official Bantam Spectra Star Wars Bulletin Board. And I thought, "hey, I have the internet now, I should check this out." And I got up, went down to the other end of the house where the computer was, turned it on, and joined up.
I didn't sleep for nearly three days. Because I'd just discovered my first bulletin board, and my first group of like-minded people who were not only (not to diminish them!) my friends from school and the only other people geeky enough to be into the X Files and Star Wars and Indiana Jones and read comics and fantasy books, but people of all kinds of ages and backgrounds, from all over the world. The other thing I discovered is that I have mild OCD to the extent that I found myself compelled to read everything that had ever been posted on those boards and I did. Thank god they hadn't been running all that long at that time, is all I can say. Thus, no sleep for three days, and beginning to start to get involved online. I made friends with an Australian guy called Alon, who went by the pseudonym of WedgeAntilles. Right off the bat, he started telling me I should read the books starring him, which I'd been picking up and then putting down again while um-ing and ah-ing, because the only character in them that I'd heard of was Wedge. He encouraged me to branch out, and I picked up the Bacta War because it was the only X Wing novel they had in the bookstore in Manukau City shopping centre. It was also the newest one, at that time. I never looked back. I got hooked on Star Wars: X Wing and discovered how far superior those books were to almost everything else in the expanded SW universe. I posted a fair bit to this board for nearly two years, but Alon was the only one I really kept up contact with after a while. (We stopped emailing in 2001, I think - he got a bit too 'grown up' and distracted by other things, I was pretty much wholly consumed with my own pursuits.)
November 2000: Random searches of the internet lead me to RebelPilots.com. I join up, do the same trick again of reading everything bloody ever there, and start making friends. izzybeth. mishloran. analise. A whole bunch more. izzybeth's site (red2 at homestead.com, if I recall correctly?) introduced me to the terminology "slash", and I sent her a shy email saying that I liked her site, liked her fanfiction, and, um, where could I find some more of that "slash" stuff she hinted at? I still have this email, saved somewhere in my archived email from The Time My Netscape Email Imploded And Died A Final Death. She led me to the yahoogroup Wedge Antilles Admiration Society, hereafter referred to as WAAS, a phrasing that is still something my brain but not my vocal cords can pronounce. I got even more into and involved there. mishloran introduced me to her friend katrin. We hit it off something major, and she's been one of my best friends and the best little sister a girl could have ever since. WAAS started to pretty much be my social cirlce outside of school/uni friends. antigone_ks. glimmergirl. katrielle. The slightly-lamented She-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. (See, some of y'all think I'm nice. When provoked, I can hold a grudge with the best of them.) We turned into a tight, tight group, emailing back and forth constantly, to the point where my RL friends started telling me to shut up about the internet people (ahahaha, oh how little they knew, like, the fact it was only going to get WORSE.) Multiple emails, every day, worrying about each other when people didn't check in, injokes and round robins and porn and Mary Sues because damnit, it was fun and slash. Getting banned from RP.C because we were "too smutty" for them to want us associated. (That was fun, and Anti has a great fic about the whole affair.) The Disneyland fic. The Hallowe'en round robin. Much Abides. Glim's Ho!Mart. A multiplicity of things most of us would probably rather not be reminded we'd written as well as some great things.
2001
February: glimmergirl has had a livejournal for a while, and has mentioned it in the sig file of all her emails. izzybeth gets a livejournal as well, and I decide I want to comment on them/play as well, so I join LJ. Taking my usual pseudonym of ShihadChick in reference to the great Kiwi band (www.shihad.com) and having no idea of what I'm letting myself in for. Near the beginning of this year, decide to do a working holiday in the United States at the end of the year with my friend gemmaij, who I've known since 6th form at school. We settle on Madison, after some research and debate, and I start looking forward to meeting the very first of my internet mates, Izzy, who had already become one of my closest friends, just over email.
LJ picks up, and almost all of my WAAS friends transfer over there in the next few months. Our participation in the mailing list decreases, because all the stuff we used to email back and forth is now going on LJ. Right from the very beginning, I've had a slightly different view of LJ than I think most people do - for me, it's always been a convenient forum for maintaining contact with close friends. As a result, I probably live a lot more of my life 'out there' on LJ rather than any other way. I'm introduced to the fanfiction.net website, via Star Wars again. We invent a whole lot of traditions and injokes, most of which survive today in one form or another. (Though, actually, probably we should bring back our old rule of "if you say something mean about yourself/your writing you are bound by honour to write a hoedown (or a ho!down) on a topic chosen by whoever calls you out on it first." because that was fucking FUN.)
May: Izzy sees U2 in Milwaukee and comes back absolutely raving about the experience. I decide to investigate just what she's on about.
November: Get to Madison. Meet Izzy. Izzy introduces me to the wild and wonderful world of U2slash fiction on fanfiction.net. We quickly go stalking on LJ and find sunrazor1013, eggnoggstick, lardencelover, leici, natlet, bartle_by, fayemeadows and many others. Start talking and bonding with people in that community, although the vast majority of the action there is based on ffn. Late November, antigone_ks and katrielle come up to visit us, and we have an insane weekend of no sleep, U2, pilotslash and general giggling and shriekery. The first U2 fakejournals are started by Lacy, and everyone suddenly has a new obsession.
December: The Boston DVD is released. We watch it on TV the night before it comes out, and I see stateless and I think also achtung12 and pbfallon for the first time, in a blink-and-you-miss-it clip in the teaser leading up to the show. Izzy informs me that 'that girl plays guitar for a cover band in LA, and she's on LJ.' At some point soon thereafter I friend Courtney, as well.
2002:
January: Gemma and I are on the move again at the end of the month, flying to NYC from Chicago the day after MLK day (I think?) I make arrangements to meet up with glimmergirl for the very first time, and she catches a train up to NYC and spends the day wandering round and talking fandom and fic and everything. We go to FAO Schwartz and aww over the cool toys, and are just sad enough to find ourselves in McDonalds not once but twice in the space of one day, mostly because we were poor and it was easy to sit there and nurse a drink for a while. Gemma was remarkably forbearing. :D We make our way up to Washington DC, where I go insane trying to find a net cafe so I can check in with people. Yes, I am a total loser. Shut up. Fly across the country to San Francisco, where we find a bar to watch the Super Bowl half-time performance among doing other actual tourist things. At some point in that week I make friends with rhythmsextion.
February: Get home. Go insane with lack of Izzy and everyone else. Get even more enmeshed into U2 fandom online. It's probably about this time that I get more involved in the wider fakejournal community as well, coming into contact with shmanny, the Goddess of CanRock and get acquainted for the first (and not last by any means) time with Callum Keith Rennie and Hugh Dillon.
September: The Great FF.N Debacle of 2002 takes place, and we recieve the news that RPS is now persona non grata. Shockwaves go through the community. There's a few days of insane panic while brunerhyme, katrin and I (and, yes, others, too, but we're the three I remember) save every bloody bit of fic and feedback we can lay our hands on from the site, fearing we're about to lose it all any second. u2slash is created as the new hub for our Evil Evil Ways, and by this stage I'm also getting to know/aware of the existence of/already friends with ruidoso, rogue_writer, melissa2u, occula, likeamadonna, ljleelah, ides_of_march, frog4 (right?), la_woman, nini_darko (you've been round since ffn, right? I can't remember, eek) ogreatitskate, oldgentleman, beck, abelfan, punkrawkpyro, and the lamentedly gone-from-fandom water_hyacinth. (Did I miss anyone??)
December: Izzy comes to visit me for a month. Insanely awesome, and much fun is had by all.
2003:
January: leici and bartle_by come to visit me and to see the Foo Fighters play the Big Day Out. We have a hectic week of giggling over Hobbits and Orcs and Boromir's Arse, of talking about music and fic and life. It's either during or just before this week that we start to find out more about the 'fan celebration' to be held at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, and many of us our U2 group start talking about how awesome it would be if heaps of us could go. I go completely insane for the first time and decide that I have no commitments, a billion airpoints (thanks dad!) and a burning desire to see Izzy again and to meet people, say 'fuck it' and book a flight to Madison for February.
February: Get to Madison. Have about a day to recover, and then Izzy, her friend Krista and I are driving down to Chicago, picking up lardencelover, driving over to Ft Wayne to stay overnight at rhythmsextion's old house, and then the five of us drive up to Cleveland the next morning. We're greeted at the door by stateless, haul our shit up to our room (approximately 3 of the 60 - 90 minutes total that we spent in our actual room that weekend were then), then go to room 711 to meet ruidoso, welshkeeper, la_woman, sunrazor1013, runaground, rubbertramp, brunerhyme, and Lissie's mom. Insanity ensues. We experience the exhibit ("It's hard to run with a camera in your crotch!" and for those of you not present, I give you three guesses and the first two don't count as to Who Said That), we stay until they kick us out (Shan: "they're shutting us down!" Every fan in hearing distance: *loses their shit*), we take many many photos in- and out-side, we run briefly into kaishijinn (hush, y'all, I'm trying to keep this sort of brief, as well as factual!), we head back to the hotel, then out to the Hard Rock to see Elevation Chicago 'perform', we judge them until we chafe and also some of us try to drink to dull the pain, and there are several infamous incidents ("wrong! CHORD!" and the full body foetal curl of pain from Court; "gloria in te domine is FOUR WORDS STUPID!", etc) and then we head back to the hotel before, in the manner of Fangirls The World Over, proceeding to stay up all night and talk and giggle and watch VCDs from melissa2u and then with great regret we all head home at various points the next morning/afternoon. This was the first infamous "spending nearly two hours just saying goodbye" and involved, well, almost everyone who wasn't bound to a train/plane schedule first thing in the morning hanging in the foyer of the Rock Hall, hugging, saying goodbye... and then getting distracted by something shiny and having to start over again.
December: Cleveland 2 has come and gone, and I had to miss it because of exams (and parental pressure to not go all the way to America for like a week and U2 stuff), but because fandom is awesome there was the now-infamous Cleveland2 tape made by several people who'd probably prefer to remain nameless which will be treasured forever. Cleveland 3 has been in the works for a while now, and the day after Boxing Day finds many of us trickling back to our home away from home at the Holidae In for anything from a day's to a week's R&R, visiting the exhibit but mostly hanging out with each other. Attending for all or part of this conclave are: Izzy, Joy, Mandi, Lacy, Shannon, Ally, Lissie (can you tell I got sick of tagging everything? Heh.) nini_darko, frog4 and melissa2u, (hola, our first known Flight of the Fangirls!)siren338, ogreatitskate, zilxy, mamak11285, the aflac_duck, katrin, monamecha and packt. More insane fun. leici and I go back to Joy's new house in Ohio and have a few days hanging out there before Lacy heads home, and then Joy and I go down to Cinci for the weekend to visit Shan and her family and even MORE insane fun ensues. Some time in this month I get in contact with confluencekid who gives me her spare U2 2004 calendar, how awesome is that??
2004:
January: I get to stay in LA for the first time, scamming futon space from packt who has just moved there and monamecha. I get to meet nostalgicecho the day after I arrive, at the Dave and Friends concert that Cheryl was awesome enough to get me a ticket for. I think I get to meet achtung12 this trip, and I know I get to meet nodogsonbeach then as well, because the only photo that survived a heartbreaking camera fuckup which ate every photo I'd taken in Ohio onwards is video of Dave and Court and I in Cheryl's room with Court trying to play a DMB song (on reflection, it was "Satellite") which we had by this time renamed "Shit!" because there was one bit that she missed about four times in a row and every time she'd yell "Shit!"
June/July: Plans which we'd started hatching back in 2000/2001 come to fruition, and despite the fact that most of us are now more interested in Buffy or U2 or music in general and all kinds of other things, the Great WAAS Invasion of England, england04 is on. the_antichris and I fly for-fucking-ever (28 hours, give or take, plus a helluva lot of sitting in airports) to get to Heathrow, where we meet mishloran and then go batshit insane trying to find antigone_ks and katrielle in the confusion that is Terminal 2. We meet glimmergirl and then settle in to wait for katrin who's arriving that afternoon, productively spending our time in being told the Interrupting Squid joke by Katrielle and in crafting an awesome 'Pervy Hobbit Fancier' sign for Kat. Her flight comes through customs superlate so we traumatise approximate three hundred people with it before she's finally out. Then it's time in London, and the invention of nigelpet, and Bristol and driving up to Scotland (passing Manchester: "Look, Kat! Dom Monaghan!" We are horrible, horrible people, and made her fall for that about five times), visiting the Lake District (Keswick and the Pencil Museum!) before ending up in Glasgow, from where we flew out to Dublin. Had a week in Dublin, where we discovered that our two roommates not only liked the same stuff we did, and were totally awesome chicks, but they were also on livejournal! So that was scai and zil, who left us a great goodbye note before they headed onwards, and we stayed in Dublin, with a side trip down to Cork and a Blarney, along with a Car Incident That We Do Not Speak Of. Most of our party departed before Chris and Kat and I, but Kat and I had U2-related and Ireland-related things to do, and Chris had friends in Dublin to catch up with, so we filled our time very happily.
Chris and I flew back to NZ via Los Angeles, where we had a huge layover, luckily in the same terminal, as she was going on to Auckland and I was taking the opportunity to visit my Americans again. Nine hours of playing rummy and drinking our 'endless refills' from the McDonalds because we couldn't afford anything else, she was off home and I was off to Joy's. A few days with Joy, driving down to Cinci to see Sting with Shan and Lissie, then driving up to Detroit to pick up Lacy when she missed her connecting flight, then flying on having not really slept to Izzy in Madison, another week or two there just on the heels of rogue_writer who I managed to miss by the space of a week or two every place I went in 2004, or so it seemed. Then flying back to LA, seeing the whole gang there again, and getting out to Malibu (and seeing a certain house) for the first time.
November:(I think?) The Ziegler Luck kicks in and I win a competition at work for a Mystery Break Weekend. I take my mum, and we end up (as I predicted all along!) in Christchurch, doing geeky LotR things on the Friday and then meeting amphibious_one after Scriptless that evening. The next day, I meet Emma and domsecondbfast in town and we wander around Real Groovy together and generally geek out.
2005:
March: And U2 is now a reality, we have tickets and we have plans, and I'm back to LA the third of March, flying out two days later to Chicago with Court to see the Frames, meeting eyesmakeacircle for the very first time, seeing Sunny for the first time in over two years, catching up with Shan and John again, meeting ron_vanburen, meeting Shan's Partner in FakeWebsite-age jillybinks who I'll see again in Denver, tenar and having no idea that I'd get to see her again in May and that we'd hit it off nicely then, too, and cramming seven of us into a cruddy little motel room which was only meant for four. Hee.
Then back to LA, meeting and bonding with maccaj the morning after she got in to LA, driving to San Francisco and back in one day for the Frames, Cheryl trying desperately to stay conscious, "it's really stretching me" in the style of MSG guy and way too many phone posts that didn't work. Then the California U2 shows, all the usuals in San Diego and Anaheim and LA, getting to meet trevi05 one evening after they got in from rehearsal and oktobergirl before LA 1 and having an amazing time together at that show, and then driving up to San Jose to catch up with nini_darko and katrin again there.
April: Flying out to Denver, the biggest mistake of my life in running for the plane in Phoenix and an asthma attack at 12 000 ft in a tin can. Scaring the crap out of Izzy when she met me at the baggage carousel, my luggage still in Phoenix, and driving back to the apt_of_luuuv with Joy and Frog, relieved to be there. antigone_ks driving over from Kansas for the two Denver U2 shows. oldgentleman calls and offers a last minute invite to the Seattle shows but I'm too poor and sick to manage it, though I desperately wanted to. Not meeting Boa is pretty much my biggest regret/still-to-be-accomplished thing from this past year. Seeing Serenity at a preview screening with Joy, Frog, Iz, Lacy, Jilly and Lace's sister and flatmate. I don't think I've ever cried so much in my life.
May: Flying to Chicago and literally falling through the hotel door onto ogreatitskate as she helped me toss my stuff into the room before we headed straight back out again for her first U2 show, making it in the GA entrance just on 7pm, and the first thing I see is la_woman on the screens, front of the ellipse. Show over, and finding Kate and Lissie and Laura, and then Shannon and Andrea, and Mandi, and Melissa and ladylardence, and screaming our heads off with excitement by the Michael Jordan statue before we headed back to the hotel. Up early the next morning to sort out Laura and Lissie's tickets for Bono's birthday show, then heading to the United Centre to meet occula for the very first time, sitting in the tiny tiny box office line and scoring GAs for everyone, Kate scanning in, Shannon in her pink tank top scanning in (hello GMA!) and getting Dawn and Andrea both in with her.
Flying to Philly and another bad night, being rescued by Kate and her family, who are just as fantastically awesome and accommodating and generous as she is herself. The Philly U2 show and getting to see Rob for the first time since Cleve 1, getting to finally meet fayemeadows, seeing Sunny again. Meeting emmsythekid later that week, in the midst of baseball and hockey and more hockey and then one final U2 show on US soil.
June: Arriving back in Dublin and feeling instantly at home. Finally, but finally getting to meet rogue_writer and knowing almost instantly that this summer was going to be great because, frankly, what kind of friendship that leads to chips-up-the-nose within 24 hours of meeting will not match and exceed expectation? :D
Americans trickling in through the next three weeks, Laura first, Cheryl, Pam, Court and Susan next, then Izzy and Lissie, Joy and shinelikeaspoon turning up the Monday, amphibious_one meeting Lissie and I to go to our hostel by the time that the flat_of_gaybies was starting to get very very full, meeting kyrillion and coming up with the sheer genius that is "Adam's milkshake brings all the boys to the yard." ogreatitskate coming in on the DART and drinks at the Clarence, "Bono watched me sleeping!"
Flying to Bristol the morning after Croke3 with Emma, picking up a rental car and just making it over the Welsh border before we have to pull over and pass the hell out. Drive on into Cardiff to scope out the situation and find the Millenium Stadium right away, purely by chance. Out of town again for the evening to sleep in the car and back to the stadium at oh-dark-hundred, meeting up with Niki and Joy and Niki's brother and spending most of the day in the David and Goliath match that is Us vs Cardiff Stadium organisation. Then an awesome show despite all the crap, and attempting to stalk afterwards for the first time, with no success, and McDonalds and the most congested motorway I've ever seen, nearly two and a half hours to get thirty miles to the rest stop where Joy and Emma and I slept in the car again, before going on to Bristol in the morning to stay with Mishloran for a few days.
July: Then back to Dub' and a few more days of lazing and touristing and then everyone's gone but me and Emma and Lissie. Emma heads up to Belfast a few days after Joy and Laura and Charlie went, Charlie comes home to us, we have more adventures than I've time to recount here, Lissie heads to NYC and then velvetorchid comes to visit for another week of insanity.
August - October: Life in Dublin, living with Charlie and kyrillion half the time too and it couldn't be more awesome, working for BT, no intarwebs and too much money at the net cafe, Mum visiting, going to Bradford for the weekend and seeing Bean again, meeting Charlie's family, then back to Dub', and Vicar St and Rattle and Hum, Dundalk, Dundalk, it's a helluva town, and Killiney hill and then it's on the move again, Hallowe'en flying via Chicago to Denver again, back to the apt_of_luuuv again and Izzy, Joy and Frog.
November: Driving 12+ hours across the country to Vegas for two more shows, crammed in our little hotel room just off the strip with Ally and Joy and Court, meeting jigofspite on the day of the second show and driving back from the Tropicana car park with her coke on top of the car. Starting to talk to tapisvolant and giggling over the Hawkmoon pins. I'm probably in the minority here, but I love Vegas, and I always have. *is a freak* This probably helps to explain my crazy love for CSI. I've always just felt very secure there, despite the fact there's no real basis for that impression. Seeing Def Leppard with Lacy and Joy, the same night Exit get onstage and play Out of Control in LA. Izzy moving out and that_one_chick moving in.
December: Flying to Dayton with Joy, driving to Cleveland, -10 degrees C as a high and we're outside all day, catching up with Andrea, Dawn, Mel, Ally, Shan, John, Anti and Izzy, meeting nosferatuvoice and spicedrum, and finally getting to meet achtung_meggie. Telling lysrouge there's no way we're letting her drive home right after the show and having her crash on our couch. Getting back to Dayton just in time to fight impotently with ticketmaster.co.nz, while having the most insane AIM chat ever with Emma and mattmatt and Jeff. Visiting Mel and joking that "it's very rare for a car to actually explode." Wankyhands!Vader toy. Joy trying to drive to Ft Wayne the next day and, uh, the car more or less blowing up. Engine blowing out, at least. Not being able to get out to visit Shan and Kate in Cinci because of said engine blowing. Kate stopping by on her way home from school. Christmas. Dolphin Boy on endless repeat and not sleeping. Flying back to Denver, saying goodbye to Joy and hi and bye to Frog picking her up, "at least you're getting to Canada more easily than Ray and Fraser!" Flying to Calgary, and omg CANADA. Pouncing on katrin and getting to meet her family, staying for a week and meeting michanna on New Years Eve. GAGE PAUL. A lot more due South.
2005:
January: Back to LA again, and all the usuals, as per usual. Finally getting to see Exit perform. Then back to NZ.
...seriously, ignoring the complete arrogance of having tagged the majority of this, how INSANE is all this? I am the luckiest damn person in the world. Hell.
[When it is not midnight and I have to work tomorrow, I will follow this with the post I actually intended to make before I got distracting talking more than I EVER HAVE BEFORE OMG AND THAT'S SAYING SOMETHING which is gonna be a breakdown of exactly when I've seen everyone, mostly cos I wanted that handy. I mean, 2006 will be the first calendar year since 2001 that I haven't seen Izzy. (Unless a miracle occurs, and, well, hell, we know how good my willpower historically is, so lets never say never, anyway.) There are people I have seen every calendar year since 2003 and have seen/will be seeing in 2006 - Joy, Ally, Court, Cheryl, Katrin, Michele. People I've known since highschool/early Uni who jumped on the LJ train: summerlandgirl, the_antichris, mimsy_earmuffs, gemmaij.]
I mean, just to do the quick route now, people I have friended that I have met at least once:
achtung12, achtung_meggie, aflac_duck, amphibious_one, antigone_ks, bartle_by, brunerhyme, domssecondbfast, emmsythekid, eyesmakeacircle, fayemeadows, frog4, gemmaij, glimmergirl, izzybeth, jigofspite, jillybinks, katrielle, katrin, kyrillion, la_woman, ladylardence, leici, lysrouge, maccaj, mamak11285, melissa2u, michanna, mimsy_earmuffs, mishloran, monamecha, nigelpet, nini_darko, nodogsonbeach, nosferatuvoice, nostalgicecho, occula, ogreatitskate, oktobergirl, packt, pbfallon, rhythmsextion, rogue_writer, rubbertramp, ruidoso, runaground, scai, shinelikeaspoon, siren338, spicedrum, stateless, summerlandgirl, sunrazor1013, tenar, that_one_chick, the_antichris, trevi05, welshkeeper, zil, zilxy.
People I am supposed meet this year (best case scenario!):
confluencekid, mattmatt, tapisvolant.
People who need to come visit me so I can meet them, damnit, because I'm too poor to travel again for a while:
ides_of_march, likeamadonna, natlet, oldgentleman, punkrawkpyro, shmanny.
People who I only just friended and thus will not scare off (if this entry hasn't done that already, ahem) by saying I'm panting to meet them, but, you know, give me time!
brooklinegirl, joandarck, mrsronweasley, queenofthorns.
...see? INSANE.
And, um, with the exception of my Cleveland report, I think this is totally the longest waffle I have ever waffled in my LJ and thank you and tawgbless to anyone who made it this far, and what kind of easter-egg based chocolate would you prefer I bring or send you, if I get ambitious this year? Seriously, though, 'net cookies for one and all. Milk's over in that corner.
So, this meme is going around again. And for me, it's a fundamental truth of my life, and as such, kinda gives me an excuse to try to (start?) making this post, which I've been half planning for a long while. I'd like to see this laid out in black and white, and considering all the new people who've come into my life recently (because of the internet, or at least because of that part of fandom which resides on the internet) it might work as a partial introduction to some of the history and geography in here.
Okay, so admittedly she was talking about Venn diagrams at the time, but it's such a great line I had to use it again.
1981: I am born. The internet does not exist (I don't think?) and so I am unaware of it.
1997ish (possibly 1996. I don't remember precisely): We get our very first baby internet connection. From memory, I think it had a maximum download speed of 24 kbps. Oh man, that was hard core. I remember getting my email and ihug account set up by a family friend who knew about computers. He asked what I wanted my user name to be, I provided him with a sheet of A4 paper with something like 20 names on it. Unsurprisingly, every single one of these names was inspired by one or another of my fandoms. The majority were Star Wars related. He came back to us and told us every single one on my list was either gone or unavailable (of course, I didn't know about punctuation and dashes not being allowed for ISP usernames back then) aside from the very last one - one that I'd added on the complete spur of the moment thinking "well, it won't end up getting used so screw it if it doesn't really suit me. Which is why, O Best Beloved Flist, my ihug email address for nigh on ten years now is an homage to Admiral Paul Benden, one of the first settlers of the planet Pern in Anne McCaffery's series.
1998: It's after my bedtime, sometime in the school holidays, but somehow I've got away with my parents not yelling at me and making me turn out the light, and I've just finished reading a Star Wars novel. I suspect it was probably The Courtship of Princess Leia or possibly one of Tim Zahn's original trilogy. I turn to the back page, because even though I've read these books before, I always read all the "coming soon" pages and all that guff at the end. (Side note: That's actually how I discovered Miles Vorkosigan, really. There was a page of people's recs/reviews of Lois' books in the back of, um, from memory a Mercedes Lackey novel? Possibly a "ship who..." by Anne McCaffery? Either way, it was mentioned in something else, and so when I saw "The Warrior's Apprentice" on a table in Whitcoulls Queen St (for five dollars!) I pounced on it and was smitten from that day forward.) Anyway, tucked on the very last page of this book was a mention of the Official Bantam Spectra Star Wars Bulletin Board. And I thought, "hey, I have the internet now, I should check this out." And I got up, went down to the other end of the house where the computer was, turned it on, and joined up.
I didn't sleep for nearly three days. Because I'd just discovered my first bulletin board, and my first group of like-minded people who were not only (not to diminish them!) my friends from school and the only other people geeky enough to be into the X Files and Star Wars and Indiana Jones and read comics and fantasy books, but people of all kinds of ages and backgrounds, from all over the world. The other thing I discovered is that I have mild OCD to the extent that I found myself compelled to read everything that had ever been posted on those boards and I did. Thank god they hadn't been running all that long at that time, is all I can say. Thus, no sleep for three days, and beginning to start to get involved online. I made friends with an Australian guy called Alon, who went by the pseudonym of WedgeAntilles. Right off the bat, he started telling me I should read the books starring him, which I'd been picking up and then putting down again while um-ing and ah-ing, because the only character in them that I'd heard of was Wedge. He encouraged me to branch out, and I picked up the Bacta War because it was the only X Wing novel they had in the bookstore in Manukau City shopping centre. It was also the newest one, at that time. I never looked back. I got hooked on Star Wars: X Wing and discovered how far superior those books were to almost everything else in the expanded SW universe. I posted a fair bit to this board for nearly two years, but Alon was the only one I really kept up contact with after a while. (We stopped emailing in 2001, I think - he got a bit too 'grown up' and distracted by other things, I was pretty much wholly consumed with my own pursuits.)
November 2000: Random searches of the internet lead me to RebelPilots.com. I join up, do the same trick again of reading everything bloody ever there, and start making friends. izzybeth. mishloran. analise. A whole bunch more. izzybeth's site (red2 at homestead.com, if I recall correctly?) introduced me to the terminology "slash", and I sent her a shy email saying that I liked her site, liked her fanfiction, and, um, where could I find some more of that "slash" stuff she hinted at? I still have this email, saved somewhere in my archived email from The Time My Netscape Email Imploded And Died A Final Death. She led me to the yahoogroup Wedge Antilles Admiration Society, hereafter referred to as WAAS, a phrasing that is still something my brain but not my vocal cords can pronounce. I got even more into and involved there. mishloran introduced me to her friend katrin. We hit it off something major, and she's been one of my best friends and the best little sister a girl could have ever since. WAAS started to pretty much be my social cirlce outside of school/uni friends. antigone_ks. glimmergirl. katrielle. The slightly-lamented She-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. (See, some of y'all think I'm nice. When provoked, I can hold a grudge with the best of them.) We turned into a tight, tight group, emailing back and forth constantly, to the point where my RL friends started telling me to shut up about the internet people (ahahaha, oh how little they knew, like, the fact it was only going to get WORSE.) Multiple emails, every day, worrying about each other when people didn't check in, injokes and round robins and porn and Mary Sues because damnit, it was fun and slash. Getting banned from RP.C because we were "too smutty" for them to want us associated. (That was fun, and Anti has a great fic about the whole affair.) The Disneyland fic. The Hallowe'en round robin. Much Abides. Glim's Ho!Mart. A multiplicity of things most of us would probably rather not be reminded we'd written as well as some great things.
2001
February: glimmergirl has had a livejournal for a while, and has mentioned it in the sig file of all her emails. izzybeth gets a livejournal as well, and I decide I want to comment on them/play as well, so I join LJ. Taking my usual pseudonym of ShihadChick in reference to the great Kiwi band (www.shihad.com) and having no idea of what I'm letting myself in for. Near the beginning of this year, decide to do a working holiday in the United States at the end of the year with my friend gemmaij, who I've known since 6th form at school. We settle on Madison, after some research and debate, and I start looking forward to meeting the very first of my internet mates, Izzy, who had already become one of my closest friends, just over email.
LJ picks up, and almost all of my WAAS friends transfer over there in the next few months. Our participation in the mailing list decreases, because all the stuff we used to email back and forth is now going on LJ. Right from the very beginning, I've had a slightly different view of LJ than I think most people do - for me, it's always been a convenient forum for maintaining contact with close friends. As a result, I probably live a lot more of my life 'out there' on LJ rather than any other way. I'm introduced to the fanfiction.net website, via Star Wars again. We invent a whole lot of traditions and injokes, most of which survive today in one form or another. (Though, actually, probably we should bring back our old rule of "if you say something mean about yourself/your writing you are bound by honour to write a hoedown (or a ho!down) on a topic chosen by whoever calls you out on it first." because that was fucking FUN.)
May: Izzy sees U2 in Milwaukee and comes back absolutely raving about the experience. I decide to investigate just what she's on about.
November: Get to Madison. Meet Izzy. Izzy introduces me to the wild and wonderful world of U2slash fiction on fanfiction.net. We quickly go stalking on LJ and find sunrazor1013, eggnoggstick, lardencelover, leici, natlet, bartle_by, fayemeadows and many others. Start talking and bonding with people in that community, although the vast majority of the action there is based on ffn. Late November, antigone_ks and katrielle come up to visit us, and we have an insane weekend of no sleep, U2, pilotslash and general giggling and shriekery. The first U2 fakejournals are started by Lacy, and everyone suddenly has a new obsession.
December: The Boston DVD is released. We watch it on TV the night before it comes out, and I see stateless and I think also achtung12 and pbfallon for the first time, in a blink-and-you-miss-it clip in the teaser leading up to the show. Izzy informs me that 'that girl plays guitar for a cover band in LA, and she's on LJ.' At some point soon thereafter I friend Courtney, as well.
2002:
January: Gemma and I are on the move again at the end of the month, flying to NYC from Chicago the day after MLK day (I think?) I make arrangements to meet up with glimmergirl for the very first time, and she catches a train up to NYC and spends the day wandering round and talking fandom and fic and everything. We go to FAO Schwartz and aww over the cool toys, and are just sad enough to find ourselves in McDonalds not once but twice in the space of one day, mostly because we were poor and it was easy to sit there and nurse a drink for a while. Gemma was remarkably forbearing. :D We make our way up to Washington DC, where I go insane trying to find a net cafe so I can check in with people. Yes, I am a total loser. Shut up. Fly across the country to San Francisco, where we find a bar to watch the Super Bowl half-time performance among doing other actual tourist things. At some point in that week I make friends with rhythmsextion.
February: Get home. Go insane with lack of Izzy and everyone else. Get even more enmeshed into U2 fandom online. It's probably about this time that I get more involved in the wider fakejournal community as well, coming into contact with shmanny, the Goddess of CanRock and get acquainted for the first (and not last by any means) time with Callum Keith Rennie and Hugh Dillon.
September: The Great FF.N Debacle of 2002 takes place, and we recieve the news that RPS is now persona non grata. Shockwaves go through the community. There's a few days of insane panic while brunerhyme, katrin and I (and, yes, others, too, but we're the three I remember) save every bloody bit of fic and feedback we can lay our hands on from the site, fearing we're about to lose it all any second. u2slash is created as the new hub for our Evil Evil Ways, and by this stage I'm also getting to know/aware of the existence of/already friends with ruidoso, rogue_writer, melissa2u, occula, likeamadonna, ljleelah, ides_of_march, frog4 (right?), la_woman, nini_darko (you've been round since ffn, right? I can't remember, eek) ogreatitskate, oldgentleman, beck, abelfan, punkrawkpyro, and the lamentedly gone-from-fandom water_hyacinth. (Did I miss anyone??)
December: Izzy comes to visit me for a month. Insanely awesome, and much fun is had by all.
2003:
January: leici and bartle_by come to visit me and to see the Foo Fighters play the Big Day Out. We have a hectic week of giggling over Hobbits and Orcs and Boromir's Arse, of talking about music and fic and life. It's either during or just before this week that we start to find out more about the 'fan celebration' to be held at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, and many of us our U2 group start talking about how awesome it would be if heaps of us could go. I go completely insane for the first time and decide that I have no commitments, a billion airpoints (thanks dad!) and a burning desire to see Izzy again and to meet people, say 'fuck it' and book a flight to Madison for February.
February: Get to Madison. Have about a day to recover, and then Izzy, her friend Krista and I are driving down to Chicago, picking up lardencelover, driving over to Ft Wayne to stay overnight at rhythmsextion's old house, and then the five of us drive up to Cleveland the next morning. We're greeted at the door by stateless, haul our shit up to our room (approximately 3 of the 60 - 90 minutes total that we spent in our actual room that weekend were then), then go to room 711 to meet ruidoso, welshkeeper, la_woman, sunrazor1013, runaground, rubbertramp, brunerhyme, and Lissie's mom. Insanity ensues. We experience the exhibit ("It's hard to run with a camera in your crotch!" and for those of you not present, I give you three guesses and the first two don't count as to Who Said That), we stay until they kick us out (Shan: "they're shutting us down!" Every fan in hearing distance: *loses their shit*), we take many many photos in- and out-side, we run briefly into kaishijinn (hush, y'all, I'm trying to keep this sort of brief, as well as factual!), we head back to the hotel, then out to the Hard Rock to see Elevation Chicago 'perform', we judge them until we chafe and also some of us try to drink to dull the pain, and there are several infamous incidents ("wrong! CHORD!" and the full body foetal curl of pain from Court; "gloria in te domine is FOUR WORDS STUPID!", etc) and then we head back to the hotel before, in the manner of Fangirls The World Over, proceeding to stay up all night and talk and giggle and watch VCDs from melissa2u and then with great regret we all head home at various points the next morning/afternoon. This was the first infamous "spending nearly two hours just saying goodbye" and involved, well, almost everyone who wasn't bound to a train/plane schedule first thing in the morning hanging in the foyer of the Rock Hall, hugging, saying goodbye... and then getting distracted by something shiny and having to start over again.
December: Cleveland 2 has come and gone, and I had to miss it because of exams (and parental pressure to not go all the way to America for like a week and U2 stuff), but because fandom is awesome there was the now-infamous Cleveland2 tape made by several people who'd probably prefer to remain nameless which will be treasured forever. Cleveland 3 has been in the works for a while now, and the day after Boxing Day finds many of us trickling back to our home away from home at the Holidae In for anything from a day's to a week's R&R, visiting the exhibit but mostly hanging out with each other. Attending for all or part of this conclave are: Izzy, Joy, Mandi, Lacy, Shannon, Ally, Lissie (can you tell I got sick of tagging everything? Heh.) nini_darko, frog4 and melissa2u, (hola, our first known Flight of the Fangirls!)siren338, ogreatitskate, zilxy, mamak11285, the aflac_duck, katrin, monamecha and packt. More insane fun. leici and I go back to Joy's new house in Ohio and have a few days hanging out there before Lacy heads home, and then Joy and I go down to Cinci for the weekend to visit Shan and her family and even MORE insane fun ensues. Some time in this month I get in contact with confluencekid who gives me her spare U2 2004 calendar, how awesome is that??
2004:
January: I get to stay in LA for the first time, scamming futon space from packt who has just moved there and monamecha. I get to meet nostalgicecho the day after I arrive, at the Dave and Friends concert that Cheryl was awesome enough to get me a ticket for. I think I get to meet achtung12 this trip, and I know I get to meet nodogsonbeach then as well, because the only photo that survived a heartbreaking camera fuckup which ate every photo I'd taken in Ohio onwards is video of Dave and Court and I in Cheryl's room with Court trying to play a DMB song (on reflection, it was "Satellite") which we had by this time renamed "Shit!" because there was one bit that she missed about four times in a row and every time she'd yell "Shit!"
June/July: Plans which we'd started hatching back in 2000/2001 come to fruition, and despite the fact that most of us are now more interested in Buffy or U2 or music in general and all kinds of other things, the Great WAAS Invasion of England, england04 is on. the_antichris and I fly for-fucking-ever (28 hours, give or take, plus a helluva lot of sitting in airports) to get to Heathrow, where we meet mishloran and then go batshit insane trying to find antigone_ks and katrielle in the confusion that is Terminal 2. We meet glimmergirl and then settle in to wait for katrin who's arriving that afternoon, productively spending our time in being told the Interrupting Squid joke by Katrielle and in crafting an awesome 'Pervy Hobbit Fancier' sign for Kat. Her flight comes through customs superlate so we traumatise approximate three hundred people with it before she's finally out. Then it's time in London, and the invention of nigelpet, and Bristol and driving up to Scotland (passing Manchester: "Look, Kat! Dom Monaghan!" We are horrible, horrible people, and made her fall for that about five times), visiting the Lake District (Keswick and the Pencil Museum!) before ending up in Glasgow, from where we flew out to Dublin. Had a week in Dublin, where we discovered that our two roommates not only liked the same stuff we did, and were totally awesome chicks, but they were also on livejournal! So that was scai and zil, who left us a great goodbye note before they headed onwards, and we stayed in Dublin, with a side trip down to Cork and a Blarney, along with a Car Incident That We Do Not Speak Of. Most of our party departed before Chris and Kat and I, but Kat and I had U2-related and Ireland-related things to do, and Chris had friends in Dublin to catch up with, so we filled our time very happily.
Chris and I flew back to NZ via Los Angeles, where we had a huge layover, luckily in the same terminal, as she was going on to Auckland and I was taking the opportunity to visit my Americans again. Nine hours of playing rummy and drinking our 'endless refills' from the McDonalds because we couldn't afford anything else, she was off home and I was off to Joy's. A few days with Joy, driving down to Cinci to see Sting with Shan and Lissie, then driving up to Detroit to pick up Lacy when she missed her connecting flight, then flying on having not really slept to Izzy in Madison, another week or two there just on the heels of rogue_writer who I managed to miss by the space of a week or two every place I went in 2004, or so it seemed. Then flying back to LA, seeing the whole gang there again, and getting out to Malibu (and seeing a certain house) for the first time.
November:(I think?) The Ziegler Luck kicks in and I win a competition at work for a Mystery Break Weekend. I take my mum, and we end up (as I predicted all along!) in Christchurch, doing geeky LotR things on the Friday and then meeting amphibious_one after Scriptless that evening. The next day, I meet Emma and domsecondbfast in town and we wander around Real Groovy together and generally geek out.
2005:
March: And U2 is now a reality, we have tickets and we have plans, and I'm back to LA the third of March, flying out two days later to Chicago with Court to see the Frames, meeting eyesmakeacircle for the very first time, seeing Sunny for the first time in over two years, catching up with Shan and John again, meeting ron_vanburen, meeting Shan's Partner in FakeWebsite-age jillybinks who I'll see again in Denver, tenar and having no idea that I'd get to see her again in May and that we'd hit it off nicely then, too, and cramming seven of us into a cruddy little motel room which was only meant for four. Hee.
Then back to LA, meeting and bonding with maccaj the morning after she got in to LA, driving to San Francisco and back in one day for the Frames, Cheryl trying desperately to stay conscious, "it's really stretching me" in the style of MSG guy and way too many phone posts that didn't work. Then the California U2 shows, all the usuals in San Diego and Anaheim and LA, getting to meet trevi05 one evening after they got in from rehearsal and oktobergirl before LA 1 and having an amazing time together at that show, and then driving up to San Jose to catch up with nini_darko and katrin again there.
April: Flying out to Denver, the biggest mistake of my life in running for the plane in Phoenix and an asthma attack at 12 000 ft in a tin can. Scaring the crap out of Izzy when she met me at the baggage carousel, my luggage still in Phoenix, and driving back to the apt_of_luuuv with Joy and Frog, relieved to be there. antigone_ks driving over from Kansas for the two Denver U2 shows. oldgentleman calls and offers a last minute invite to the Seattle shows but I'm too poor and sick to manage it, though I desperately wanted to. Not meeting Boa is pretty much my biggest regret/still-to-be-accomplished thing from this past year. Seeing Serenity at a preview screening with Joy, Frog, Iz, Lacy, Jilly and Lace's sister and flatmate. I don't think I've ever cried so much in my life.
May: Flying to Chicago and literally falling through the hotel door onto ogreatitskate as she helped me toss my stuff into the room before we headed straight back out again for her first U2 show, making it in the GA entrance just on 7pm, and the first thing I see is la_woman on the screens, front of the ellipse. Show over, and finding Kate and Lissie and Laura, and then Shannon and Andrea, and Mandi, and Melissa and ladylardence, and screaming our heads off with excitement by the Michael Jordan statue before we headed back to the hotel. Up early the next morning to sort out Laura and Lissie's tickets for Bono's birthday show, then heading to the United Centre to meet occula for the very first time, sitting in the tiny tiny box office line and scoring GAs for everyone, Kate scanning in, Shannon in her pink tank top scanning in (hello GMA!) and getting Dawn and Andrea both in with her.
Flying to Philly and another bad night, being rescued by Kate and her family, who are just as fantastically awesome and accommodating and generous as she is herself. The Philly U2 show and getting to see Rob for the first time since Cleve 1, getting to finally meet fayemeadows, seeing Sunny again. Meeting emmsythekid later that week, in the midst of baseball and hockey and more hockey and then one final U2 show on US soil.
June: Arriving back in Dublin and feeling instantly at home. Finally, but finally getting to meet rogue_writer and knowing almost instantly that this summer was going to be great because, frankly, what kind of friendship that leads to chips-up-the-nose within 24 hours of meeting will not match and exceed expectation? :D
Americans trickling in through the next three weeks, Laura first, Cheryl, Pam, Court and Susan next, then Izzy and Lissie, Joy and shinelikeaspoon turning up the Monday, amphibious_one meeting Lissie and I to go to our hostel by the time that the flat_of_gaybies was starting to get very very full, meeting kyrillion and coming up with the sheer genius that is "Adam's milkshake brings all the boys to the yard." ogreatitskate coming in on the DART and drinks at the Clarence, "Bono watched me sleeping!"
Flying to Bristol the morning after Croke3 with Emma, picking up a rental car and just making it over the Welsh border before we have to pull over and pass the hell out. Drive on into Cardiff to scope out the situation and find the Millenium Stadium right away, purely by chance. Out of town again for the evening to sleep in the car and back to the stadium at oh-dark-hundred, meeting up with Niki and Joy and Niki's brother and spending most of the day in the David and Goliath match that is Us vs Cardiff Stadium organisation. Then an awesome show despite all the crap, and attempting to stalk afterwards for the first time, with no success, and McDonalds and the most congested motorway I've ever seen, nearly two and a half hours to get thirty miles to the rest stop where Joy and Emma and I slept in the car again, before going on to Bristol in the morning to stay with Mishloran for a few days.
July: Then back to Dub' and a few more days of lazing and touristing and then everyone's gone but me and Emma and Lissie. Emma heads up to Belfast a few days after Joy and Laura and Charlie went, Charlie comes home to us, we have more adventures than I've time to recount here, Lissie heads to NYC and then velvetorchid comes to visit for another week of insanity.
August - October: Life in Dublin, living with Charlie and kyrillion half the time too and it couldn't be more awesome, working for BT, no intarwebs and too much money at the net cafe, Mum visiting, going to Bradford for the weekend and seeing Bean again, meeting Charlie's family, then back to Dub', and Vicar St and Rattle and Hum, Dundalk, Dundalk, it's a helluva town, and Killiney hill and then it's on the move again, Hallowe'en flying via Chicago to Denver again, back to the apt_of_luuuv again and Izzy, Joy and Frog.
November: Driving 12+ hours across the country to Vegas for two more shows, crammed in our little hotel room just off the strip with Ally and Joy and Court, meeting jigofspite on the day of the second show and driving back from the Tropicana car park with her coke on top of the car. Starting to talk to tapisvolant and giggling over the Hawkmoon pins. I'm probably in the minority here, but I love Vegas, and I always have. *is a freak* This probably helps to explain my crazy love for CSI. I've always just felt very secure there, despite the fact there's no real basis for that impression. Seeing Def Leppard with Lacy and Joy, the same night Exit get onstage and play Out of Control in LA. Izzy moving out and that_one_chick moving in.
December: Flying to Dayton with Joy, driving to Cleveland, -10 degrees C as a high and we're outside all day, catching up with Andrea, Dawn, Mel, Ally, Shan, John, Anti and Izzy, meeting nosferatuvoice and spicedrum, and finally getting to meet achtung_meggie. Telling lysrouge there's no way we're letting her drive home right after the show and having her crash on our couch. Getting back to Dayton just in time to fight impotently with ticketmaster.co.nz, while having the most insane AIM chat ever with Emma and mattmatt and Jeff. Visiting Mel and joking that "it's very rare for a car to actually explode." Wankyhands!Vader toy. Joy trying to drive to Ft Wayne the next day and, uh, the car more or less blowing up. Engine blowing out, at least. Not being able to get out to visit Shan and Kate in Cinci because of said engine blowing. Kate stopping by on her way home from school. Christmas. Dolphin Boy on endless repeat and not sleeping. Flying back to Denver, saying goodbye to Joy and hi and bye to Frog picking her up, "at least you're getting to Canada more easily than Ray and Fraser!" Flying to Calgary, and omg CANADA. Pouncing on katrin and getting to meet her family, staying for a week and meeting michanna on New Years Eve. GAGE PAUL. A lot more due South.
2005:
January: Back to LA again, and all the usuals, as per usual. Finally getting to see Exit perform. Then back to NZ.
...seriously, ignoring the complete arrogance of having tagged the majority of this, how INSANE is all this? I am the luckiest damn person in the world. Hell.
[When it is not midnight and I have to work tomorrow, I will follow this with the post I actually intended to make before I got distracting talking more than I EVER HAVE BEFORE OMG AND THAT'S SAYING SOMETHING which is gonna be a breakdown of exactly when I've seen everyone, mostly cos I wanted that handy. I mean, 2006 will be the first calendar year since 2001 that I haven't seen Izzy. (Unless a miracle occurs, and, well, hell, we know how good my willpower historically is, so lets never say never, anyway.) There are people I have seen every calendar year since 2003 and have seen/will be seeing in 2006 - Joy, Ally, Court, Cheryl, Katrin, Michele. People I've known since highschool/early Uni who jumped on the LJ train: summerlandgirl, the_antichris, mimsy_earmuffs, gemmaij.]
I mean, just to do the quick route now, people I have friended that I have met at least once:
achtung12, achtung_meggie, aflac_duck, amphibious_one, antigone_ks, bartle_by, brunerhyme, domssecondbfast, emmsythekid, eyesmakeacircle, fayemeadows, frog4, gemmaij, glimmergirl, izzybeth, jigofspite, jillybinks, katrielle, katrin, kyrillion, la_woman, ladylardence, leici, lysrouge, maccaj, mamak11285, melissa2u, michanna, mimsy_earmuffs, mishloran, monamecha, nigelpet, nini_darko, nodogsonbeach, nosferatuvoice, nostalgicecho, occula, ogreatitskate, oktobergirl, packt, pbfallon, rhythmsextion, rogue_writer, rubbertramp, ruidoso, runaground, scai, shinelikeaspoon, siren338, spicedrum, stateless, summerlandgirl, sunrazor1013, tenar, that_one_chick, the_antichris, trevi05, welshkeeper, zil, zilxy.
People I am supposed meet this year (best case scenario!):
confluencekid, mattmatt, tapisvolant.
People who need to come visit me so I can meet them, damnit, because I'm too poor to travel again for a while:
ides_of_march, likeamadonna, natlet, oldgentleman, punkrawkpyro, shmanny.
People who I only just friended and thus will not scare off (if this entry hasn't done that already, ahem) by saying I'm panting to meet them, but, you know, give me time!
brooklinegirl, joandarck, mrsronweasley, queenofthorns.
...see? INSANE.
And, um, with the exception of my Cleveland report, I think this is totally the longest waffle I have ever waffled in my LJ and thank you and tawgbless to anyone who made it this far, and what kind of easter-egg based chocolate would you prefer I bring or send you, if I get ambitious this year? Seriously, though, 'net cookies for one and all. Milk's over in that corner.