Weekend part 1: Mystery Hunt

Last year I was nominally affiliated with Left as an Exercise for the Reader, but really did very little, just enough to whet my appetite (and bring snacks :-). Also, this year I wanted to take advantage of the fact that Arisia was still just down the street (for the last time in the foreseeable future), so I joined them again, with the intent to do a lot more. Happily, I did (taking advantage of a more flexible work schedule :-).

I got to the team room early (we were again in 26-314, which is now "26 pies" room in my head) so I could go to the start at noon in Lobby 7 with some teammates (*waves*, especially to team captains rhysara and bubblebabble), meeting some of them for the first time. When we got there, the energy was palpable, rather like what I imagine it would be like to be in Times Square just before midnight on December 31st, though to my mind, with considerably more reason for the buzz. At noon, an mp3 started playing, and everyone listened using the iPods and such they'd brought (this is apparently new this year, to get around the horrible acoustics of the space). This year's 30th anniversary hunt was going to be a pleasant jaunt, an afternoon of puzzle solving to be followed by some puzzles from Hunts past. What could go wrong?

Everyone streamed back to team rooms and waited for the site to go live at 12:30. And then it started! First we saw this year's puzzles, ten puzzles and a meta. Perhaps it would be as originally described? Since the meta went live first, we had a bit of time to play around with what it might mean, knowing there was no way to get anywhere with it, but tossing around ideas anyway.

And then the other ten 2010 puzzles went live. ( Read more... )

[local eating] Enterprise Farm share and fish share (week 3.4)

• ten small red onions (conventional), Long Plain Farm, Whately, MA
  
• a bag of salad mix, Equinox Farms, Sheffield, MA
  
• five medium apples (low-spray/IPM), Bashista’s, Southampton, MA
  
• eleven red-skinned potatoes, Deep Root, Prince Edward Island
  
• nine medium-small beets, Deep Root, VT
  
• eight carrots, Winter Moon Farm, Hadley, MA
  
• a medium-small eggplant, Somerset Farms, FL
  
• seven Roma Tomatoes, Homestead Organics, FL
  
• three small pink grapefruit, Spooners Organics, FL
  
• a bunch curly parsley, Lady Moon Farms, FL
  
• a head of adult bok choy, Lady Moon Farms, FL
  
• a bunch of collard greens, Somerset Farms, FL
  
• a head of romaine lettuce, Lady Moon Farms, FL

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Since the fish share had missed so many weeks, they decided to give us a double share this time. I hadn't been checking email (it was a busy long weekend...), so I hadn't realized this until I got to the pick-up point. Though I could have gotten some flounder, I decided I'd stick to double amounts of cod, since I can process it reasonably quickly at this point, while flounder is rather more fiddly, and it never feels like I'm getting much off the fish, either. Again, the usual: fillets baked in pieces that were topped with 'crumbs' of mayo, chipotle mustard, and white wheat flour mixed together, while the frames poached.

Weekend part 2: Arisia

I decided to be a commuter this year (a combination of uneven employment making me cheaper about paying for the hotel, and knowing that if I stayed there, it would be enormously harder to get myself out of the hotel to the Mystery Hunt). Though I spent more time over at 26 Pies than I'd planned, I had a wonderful time at Arisia as well. ( Read more... )

I'm not sure what I'd like to do next year. If I commute again, saving the cost of the hotel, I would have to skip all of Shabbat at the con, which means I could focus on the Mystery Hunt the whole time, hopping over to Arisia after Shabbat (bonus: not having to deal with the issues of hotels on Shabbat such as electric keys, etc). This feels more feasible because it sounds like Arisia is going to stay a four-day con in spite of moving to a larger hotel. It's not ideal, but doable. If I stay at the hotel, I'm basically giving up on the Mystery Hunt, since it doesn't start until noon, and getting checked in at the hotel before Shabbat is always tight timing.