BUT
For the first time, I felt really out of place.
I can't tell you exactly why, at least not with everything. Some of it was dealing with health issues that are still really in the front of my mind, some of it was dealing with people being oblivious or downright rude at times, but I think most of it was the realization that my channel of geekery is not mainstream.
I could care less about Katamari. I've played it, and I understand the draw, but it's just not my thing.
I found Donkey Kong Bongos annoying. DDR I like-- it's at least active, and it's not really noisy. Bongos and clapping for long periods just wasn't conducive to relaxing (
chebutykin, I don't know how you managed). The games just really didn't interest me. I have nothing against Salad Bowl, or Apples to Apples, or Settlers of Catan, or anything. This weekend, there was just no draw.
A lot of the group geekery went into topics that I know nothing about.
Almost all of my geek-focus is in filmmaking, or audio, or making stuff in general. Theatrics, illusion, that kind of thing. Acting, performing. And that just wasn't represented much, or what there was wasn't anything that I managed to catch.
Granted, I could have been more proactive. I probably could have taken some clips of the movie so far, but I really don't want to display it publicly until it's had a final polish. I could have hunted down
mag_anghusa and had some film-geekery discussions, but he seemed to be much more busy in general. I had a brief bit with alisgray, and a bit with cajones, but overall I just felt out of place.My fault, mostly-- if fault is even the right concept. It just is what it is. And apparently, I suck ass at relaxing.
There was a lot of fun stuff too. Pretty pretty playtime, where
dramatekcv made me look all goth-pretty and moneygod painted my toenails alternating blue and green (which they still are, and it makes me happy that I have painted toenails at work), and both mle292 and 7thstranger made my hair all black and spiky. vanaabegra ended up looking really quite pretty with the lashes, and windelina was in rare form with hair for both andrewthescot and dramatekcv, who ended up with a thing on her head that I can only call "bait". You had to see her walk for it to make sense. Crafty-time: I was not my best form this year. I suppose the "Salute to Gay Porn" from last year was a bit hard to top, and I just couldn't come up with anything remotely horror- or smut-related, so I ended up making something that looked like a homeless version of Kermit the Frog on acid.
I don't know if it was just me or not, but there seemed to be fewer snuggly-spaces this year. I seem to remember that there were more couches, or places where a couple of people could sit comfortably. I don't know if they all got commandeered for other things, or if there were just fewer of them or what, but there was a distinct lack of snuggle-space. It may have partly been that it was generally too warm/humid for the fireplace to be on, because fireplace and snuggles go together well.
Then again, I don't think I was in the right mental place to be all snuggly. I did get a few times with
gingerpook and the odd hug here and there, but for some reason I felt awfully guarded the whole weekend through.Yeah. I don't know if that's carried through into "normal" life. I think it just might be.