Hello… been in Houston about seven hours, had the chance to see a lot of it. Needless to say, I’m very impressed with it, and am looking forward to moving here in the fall.
Robin
What a wonderful time! It was so great seeing the HouDopers. I have a ton of pics and will get them up most likely tommorow. Look forward to reading Irishman’s notes as well!
So… should we start planning for the next one yet? 
{{{{{{{{{{{{Y’all}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}
I had a great time. All y’all are so much fun that I’m looking forward to doing it again real soon. 
Robin
I hope everyone else had as much fun as I did. It was great! And MsRobyn, she will make a wonderful regular at the dopefests, and so will StarLight (Robgruvers friend).
We got pictures too, I even caught my LIONsob on film a couple of times.
There are a couple of web sites I just have to check out. They have to be classy places, after all the url’s were written on the stall door in the ladies room ! I started to add our own straightdope.com but knew dopers everywhere would hunt me down and do evil things to me if I did it.
Lucky I didn’t come: I’d have been the skeleton at the feast. Looking forward to the pictures, though!
This was my third Dopefest (unless you count my ten-day road trip last month), and one thing I’ve learned is that you WILL fit in. This board is blessed with many different people and you will find at least one person with whom you can talk. And the Houston Dopers really did a wonderful job of making me feel welcome.
Alonist, see ya at the next one?
Robin
Max good time. Met MsRobyn and Starlight and renewed acquaintance with Mamapotomous, Ayesha, LionSOB, Irishman and robgruver.
Irishman’s a ringer at darts. I’m not.
Sorry you didn’t make it Alonist. As MsRobyn said you’ll fit in. If they can put up with me they’ll certainly welcome you.
A headcount comes up with the following participants:
Irishman
my buddy Brent
beatle
Mamapotamus
LionSOB
Ayesha
Robgruver
MsRobyn
Starlite - a newbie
And of course our waitress, Nana, whom we kept very busy.
I was first and I was early, standing around in the place until someone else showed up. Fortunately it didn’t take that long for beatle to arrive. He decided to hike it from his apartment down the road - and discovered that it was a little warm for a long hike.
Mamapotamus showed up shortly thereafter. We hit at a shift-change and couldn’t find a waitress right away, but once she showed up we were rolling.
We were asked two or three times if we were the group that called in, a surprise party. Nope. Never did figure out who they were for sure, but think we spotted them later.
Mamapotamus mentioned getting a ticket recently. She had an excuse all planned out, including having a mechanic to back up her story, but when the cop stopped her he was Mr. No-nonsense and didn’t give her the chance to even try. That spawned a conversation on traffic violations. Beatle recalled an event 20 years ago when he had three tickets in a row - back before defensive driving and when 3 was enough to get your license revoked for 6 months. He had his car checked and got a speedometer calibration receipt, and took that and his buddy who was with him in the car to the judge, and argued that they figured out the speedometer was hanging up at about 25 mph, then freeing up and jumping. So the judge made him pay the first ticket, reduced the second to court costs, and waived the third one.
Beatle also recalled a DD class taught by a retired cop, who concentrated on “These are the things that cause accidents.” He mentioned watching slides that they had to pick out the item in the picture that was wrong, like a baby not in a car seat. One picture showed a guy passing a joint. Hmmmm. “Okay, wrong morally, legally, or just bad form?” 
Mamapotamus mentioned that she rented the video and then filled out the form online. Of course she’s now had to watch the video something like 3 times because her hubby had to do it, and needed someone to keep him awake through it, and as the other designated adult in her house, it was her duty. So she’s really bored by it now. I mentioned my experiences visiting the Comedy Defensive Driving class, and how it was reasonably interesting.
Somewhere along here Ayesha and LionSOB arrived. And we came upon a plan whereby every time the waitress came by to check on us, someone had to order something.
The thread on lust at work stories came up, and beatle mentioned that he told one involving four people. Mamapotamus quipped, “Four parties in a lust story, that’s porn.”
About this time we found out that the Ale House is haunted. :rolleyes: “Maggie” the ghost lives upstairs, and Nana (our waitress) informed us they have some “real live Ghostbusters” coming out to check her out. The Ale House is part of a new tour of haunted places in Houston - High Spirits Tours. Mamapotamus was curious, “Why is she here?” I replied, “She’s here because it brings in more people.”
Not long afterward, the tour group came by. They walked through the room and upstairs, never to be seen again…
Somewhere in here Robgruver and MsRobyn arrived, and brought Rob’s roommate and new poster Starlite. Ms. Robgruver didn’t come along this time - something to do with us being “those computer people”.
Mamapotamus had to take a phone call and stepped outside, and got startled by a lady sitting on the step next to the bushes. The lady asked her to come in and find a 9 yr old boy playing on a video game, and ask him if he knew where his parents were, because they went outside and he didn’t notice. When she did so, he looked around, and sprinted out the door. Got to hate it when those parents sneak off like that.
The topic of computer woes came up. Mamapotamus (and she loves how frequently her name is mentioned in these notes ) acquired a demo model laptop from a friend, “so she could evaluate it for him”. (You should have used that explanation. ) She left it set up, turned around a minute, and found her daughter pushing buttons on the keyboard. NOOOO!!! After that, she couldn’t get it to do anything. All it would do was go to the “Windows is shutting down” page. But she couldn’t call the company for help because it doesn’t have a serial number. She called the guy who she acquired it from, and he said “You don’t know what she did? You’re screwed.” Finally some other computer geek buddy of hers recalled some strange feature he’d read about called “hibernate mode”. Mamapotamus looked through the user guide, tried that, and it worked.
Beatle mentioned his nephew got ahold of his computer, and he came in with it stuck on a dialog box trying to rename a file to “what”. It wouldn’t except “no”, so he finally hit yes and renamed the file. Then pulling it up and checking the info on it, he noticed it had the same creation date as all his other system files. So eventually something isn’t going to work right.
Everyone also chimed in with stories about their first computers - like the TI994A.
While this conversation is going on, a cop walks into the bar and the other room. Then some bald guy who was in the bar earlier sneaks in and hides behind a wall. We’re watching this, and the cop asks some other guy to go out in the parking lot. Turns out it was some sort of joke. The bald guy set it up with his cop buddy. We didn’t get any explanation from him though we tried. And thus we have “Evil Fun With Cops” stories.
I think it was beatle that mentioned some guy who was driving around at 2 in the morning with friends, and had a buddy cop pull them over on the interstate. Then he proceeded to start beating up on the cop, and his friends freaked out and started running all over the place. What a riot! (It’s all in good fun till somebody gets shot.) That would be funny until some other cop comes along and catches you. DOH!
Turns out Mamapotamus and robgruver are big comic book fans. Spiderman is a big deal to robgruver. What was that, a Spiderman dildo poster? Spiderman DAREDEVIL poster! “I don’t know where you’d even get one of those.” They started talking about Marvel comic books, and crossovers between different characters. Then rob mentioned a ST:Next Gen/X-men crossover. Now they’re just getting weird.
Robgruver started talking about his idea to start up a comic book store that is not just for “fanboys” - the comic heads that know every detail and judge you by how much you know. That’s so intimidating and keeps passerbys from looking into it and becoming interested. So he wants to start up a store that is run like a good customer service center, with knowledgeable people who are interested in the customer answering questions and not sneering at customers who don’t know the difference between Captain Marvel and Captain America. If only he could come up with the investors… Mamapotamus said she’d invest if she had any money - sadly hers is all tied up in the paintball field and paying off debts on the paintball store she used to own.
Robgruver apologized for his coworker that showed up. The guy came in and on his first post spammed the board, then said, “By the way, do you know robgruver?”
Someone brought up chili - why I’ll never know. There was a profound agreement that Damn Yankees spoil chili by putting beans in it. Except for Mamapotamus, who learned her mother’s recipe which has beans. Of course she was from up north…
Mamapotamus (can we tell whom Irishman sat next to?) then brought up iced tea, and the southern practice of sweetened tea. (The only real tea is sweetened!!!) She commented that she grew up with unsweetened, so sweetened makes her gag. She had a road trip to Florida once and kept running into places where the only tea they sold was sweetened, and it kept taking her by surprise. Her friend was like, “Oh, how neat, this is sweet,” as she’s going gag “This is sweetened!” I was surprised there are places that sell it sweet. Usually anywhere I’ve been you only find it unsweet, and have to add the sugar yourself. If you’ve ever tried this, you know that sugar does not dissolve in iced tea. You have to put it in hot. Apparently there may be one thing I’d like about Alabama.
The topic of parenting - to spank or not to spank? - came up. Robgruver mentioned getting his first tattoo, and telling his mother who didn’t mind. So when he saw her next, he was showing it off, and showed it to his 72 yr old grandmother. Grandmother didn’t appreciate it much, and leaned over and slapped him across the face. Doh!
I think this is also when Mamapotamus ran down a list of things she finds tiresome about her daughter. Like when she discovered she has another hole “down there”, and is suddenly flashing people in Albertson’s as she checks it out.
Parents having sex was discussed, and how that’s generally something children don’t want to hear about in graphic detail. “Your father’s sex drive is…” EWWWWW!!! Of course sometimes the flipside is true, too. Starlite mentioned hearing a couple girls talking in intimate detail about their date last week with this guy (yes, both), and then she figured out that the guy was her son’s date the previous weekend.
Somehow this brought up boobs - and specifically training bras. “What exactly are they training?” They’re training the girl to bra bondage before she actually needs to wear one.
Starlite mentioned how her mother had always worn the extra padded type, and one day decided to get a non-padded one for a camping trip, because it would be so hot. But she didn’t know her size, so the lady at Monkey Wards did the tapemeasure thing, and promptly pointed her to the training bra section.
Mamapotamus also had a breast story - fancy that. Hers was being the early developing girl, the only fourth grader growing “spare elbows”. So her mother took her up to Sears, where apparently the girls lingerie section is right next to hardware. So here she is all uncomfortable and awkward, and doesn’t know what size to get, and the lady has her put up her arms and does the tape measure bit right in the aisle next to hardware. Ugh!!
beatle mentioned how many guys probably learned stuff about women from their girlfriend’s mothers. robgruver said, “Actually, I did!” “Rob is a pervert.” - Ayesha
Ayesha told us the story of the first time she slept with LionSOB. He was married at the time to another lady (who was screwing everything on two legs with a zipper - doesn’t matter what was on the other side of the zipper). Ayesha’s first husband had died just before. She went over to talk to the wife, but she was out, and Lion offered to let her sleep on the bed with him - “I promise, I won’t try anything.” The unstated half of that sentence - “I WILL do something.” The wife came in while they were in the middle of it.
Rob’s note to me: “Irishman is Sooo going to hell.” And your point is…?
Quote from Mamapotamus: “Do your boobs get in the way while your shooting pool?”
Somewhere in here LionSOB got the waitress to bring us some darts, and we began chewing up the board. I had brought my own - causing people to panic and run for the hills. Not that I’m any good, but apparently I’m better than drunk people who haven’t thrown in 10 years.
Mamapotamus was chatting away about her daycare difficulties surrounding the series of religious holidays this weekend. Robgruver quipped something about a religion that worships a corpse on a stick.
Now we get to the section of notes added by others while I was dodging - I mean throwing darts.
Starlite: “Come on over, there is going to be felching and comics or possibly pickle relish but be careful of the cats.”
“I couldn’t get my pants up fast enough.”
Mamapotamus covets her neighbor’s giraffe.
Irishman is a dart sharp.
LionSOB: “Excuse me while I whip this out.” (I think he was referring to me with my darts.)
Mamapotamus: “I want to lick the ball.” “If it doesn’t scream, I’m good.”
Robgruver: “It’s Mamapotamus beating time. Beating, felching, reading comic books and smoking… my kind of night.”
The dart games went okay. Two games in, my darts suffered an impact failure, and had to retire, so I had to finish the night with the house darts. I played a half dozen games or so, from LionSOB, beatle, robgruver, Mamapotamus, then beatle again. At some point another couple showed up and started playing on the second board. The girl’s first three shots were right around the bullseye. She said, “wait till I’m warmed up.” LionSOB called her a dart shark, and she said, “Nope, I’m good, I’m not going to lie about it.”
Somewhere in the middle of the games we had the waitress divy up the checks, and it took us till then to get it all resolved. We payed up, and people headed on their ways. A good time was had by all.
That was quick, Irishman. I know you love being our scribe ;).
It wasn’t me, but I can’t remember who it was that told the tale of the the guy who got his brother the cop to pull them over. I thought it was you.
I’m glad you reminded me of Nana’s name - that’s my neighborhood bar and she’s new.
One tiny correction, the LIONsob was not married to that woman, they were living together but not married. And she came in right after we had finished. (But yes she was a slut. Then again so was I. )
Just a quick post to let y’all know I got back home safely.
Once again, I had a great time, and hopefully, we’ll get together again soon.
Robin
I probably would have enjoyed it if I’d been in the mood. Maybe my little brother (the one with a car) will deign to notice the next Dopefest and make it easier for me to get there. I had to stay home and comfort a friend over the phone, anyway- no chance of getting her out to a party, though she could use the fun. (She is pretty sheltered and might have succumbed to shock about 15 minutes into the conversation.)
I hope Houston, with its (to my mind) undefinable and unfinished character, agrees with you, MsRobyn.
Thanks again, everyone, for a great time. It’s taken awhile, but I think I’ve finally figured out not to sit next to Irishman.
Not to nitpick, but I don’t think I’m responsible for a couple of the pithy comments attributed to me. Felching and giraffe coveting, yes. Ball licking, no.
I especially enjoyed meeting MsRobyn and Starlite; I can’t wait for the next one!
Every doper in Houston should at least come to one DopeFest. The mix of people is wonderful- different ages, occupations, backgrounds, and everyone is too nice.
Thanks again, everyone!!!
Well it sounded like ball at my end of the table, ball / bowl what’s the difference ?
We’ll sort it out next time! That was a good one.
Cheers, y’all!
I would love to get this group together for a monthly dinner or something. I have so much fun around you guys, I would love to see you more often!!
Perhaps I will start another thread on that at some point.