2006.09.10
So yesterday's festivities were rather much a success. We had a solid 4 people for much of the gaming in the afternoon, and then it was just over a dozen for the party itself. On the evite I described it as aiming for the "ass-kickingest party this side of the Mason-Dixon line", partially to emphasize the temporary reversal Mr. Ibis' and Felisdemen's southernly location, but in retrospect "ass-kickingest" isn't what I'm really aiming for with these things.
(FoSO's expressed disdain the "prepacked and unoriginal format" of Evite.com invites, though I kind of appreciate being able to focus on one bit of custom art. I redid this one to use Mr.Ibis' preferred public persona, and that just reminds me... man, I have to work on my Photoshop-type skills in general. I use an ancient copy of Paint Shop Pro that barely supports layers, and even there I know I'm missing out on stuff. I don't know if I should seek out a copy of Photoshop or just really focus on learning "The GIMP". My problem is, I still tend to think in terms of individual pixels...)
Anyway, the party: We had lots of good snackies, did some basic grilling with good Trader Joe's burgers and interesting sausages, Ksenia made some great salads and then some damn fine Mojitos, EB made a wonderful batch of Margaritas. I even did an emergency run to CVS for a $20 blender.
Besides the general hanging of out and friendly debate of the merits of the movie Aliens, and if it's a horror movie or sci-fi or what, and general admiration of cndb.com, etc, we played a few games including "Eat Poop You Cat" and "Catchphrase". I wired my rotating-ball-of-colored-lights to the ceiling in my front room, but we didn't quite have the spark to get dancing underway, though my old reliable party mix set was well-received. Feels like we're all getting old though, as things kind of broke down a bit before midnight (They had had an early 6ish start though.)
I really love how empty my physical desktop is at this moment, and it reminds me of my goals of decluttering my life. On the other hand, that decluttering urge is also the kind of thing that makes me have to run out and buy a $20 blender from CVS...
Political Jab of the Moment
So Afghanistan is unraveling, a bit. I've recanted my early naysaying about going into Afghanistan, it looks like a decent decision in retrospect, but man, sometimes I think we are stretched way thin, and I still think there might have been a third way between ignoring Saddam and toppeling him. I don't know if there's much validity to the "honeypot/flypaper" argument or not.