cassandra_7 | My Adventures at Spiel

Wow. What a weekend. It started off about as bad as it could. Then it got better. Since this is a REALLY long post, I'm going to put it behind one of these all fangled cut things.

Day 1 -- Things can only go up from here.

First, the trip to Essen. Went fairly smoothly, although the sandwich on the plain was Weird with a capital W. Cheese with like chive cream cheese spread and some kind of chutney (interestingly I forgot and asked for a cheese sandwich on the way home as well).

Then came German passport control.

Turns out that the laminate on my photo page has come loose at one corner. I made the mistake of admitting I understood German and then had to defend myself in German. But the guard finally let me go with a warning to get a new passport as soon as possible.

Then, I cried. And cried. And cried. I'm sure the people in the airport thought I was crazy. But I couldn't do anything but try to get to my hotel. My friends were meeting me there at 7:30. So I headed for the "Sky Train" to go to the train station. Turns out, much to my shock and dismay, that the "train" from the airport to the trainstation required a ticket. And I had no change. More tears. Then I realized that it took bills. Bought my ticket, got to the train station, managed to get a ticket (EVENTUALLY) from the ticket machine with cash, after trying two that only took cards (but not MY cards) and boarded the train for Essen.

Made it to my hotel without further incident, and began drinking. I had 0.4 liters of wine before my friends got there. I was ... tipsy. Lovely way to meet new friends for the first time. Ah well. Here I meet Kuni, Foxlady, Toppler (aka Micha) and Stefan for the first time although I've known Foxlady and Kuni for some time via the internet.

We began to drive to the restaurant, where FoxLady had made reservations. And drove. And drove (in circles). And DROVE. About 30 minutes later (five minutes before our reservations) we find it!!!! And it's closed. Out of business. But the website http://www.stilbruch-essen.de/ was so nice?!?!? Ah well, we then drove for about another 30 minutes, trying to find a restaurant. Finally we stopped at a filling station to ask. "There are many restaurants near by," said the attendant. "Direct us to ONE," said we. So he did, and we found it, and we ate at "Sombrero" where the food was good, although not really exceedingly Mexican. And my "Fiesta Meal Menu" included an after dinner drink. In a cute little tiny pail. It was awesome.

* End Day 1

Day 2 -- The day that could only be better

Friday was fabulous.

The U-bahn (tube) was right around the corner from my hotel. AND my stop was before the train station, so I got a seat. *glee*

I got to play a demo round of Friedemann Friese's new game Fiese Freunde Fette Feten (which I didn't like - it seemed to me me an unnecessarily complicated variant on Chez Geek ) but I was glad to have a chance to try it out, as that booth is always crowded.

The "Spiel des Jahres" (game of the year) was Niagara which I got to try out, and bought (New game for game night!!!) I played whatever games looked interesting, took my time at things, and had a relaxing day. It was terrific. I met the group at 1pm and decided that I would go it alone on Friday and join them on Saturday evening. So after a long, fun day of looking and playing (and a little bit of buying) I headed back to the hotel.

I had a *lovely* shower, and decided to dress for dinner. Spent a few hours in the hotel restaurant because the service was HORRID, but I had a lovely eis-becher (sundae) for dessert. And some wine. Then I went to my room and talked to Fnord7 about my day (on the phone) and then slept.

* End Day 2

Day 3 -- My birthday!

Again, a fabulous day. I woke up lateish, strolled down to the hotel lobby to have breakfast (see breakfast rant later) and had some lovely coffee, and a Broetchen (roll) with cheese and a few slices of tomato and mozzarella. Then I headed once more to the Spiel. Played some more games, and started buying the games on my list that I'd made the night before (and forgot to bring with me).

At 1pm I met up with the crew, and they brought a lovely cake and presents. I had a lovely birthday with a muffin with a candle in it on the steps in the courtyard at the Spiel game fair. They also gave me a RL KOL Cocktail crafting kit with LPU, TPS, Magic Ice Cubes and various gummy fruits. AND a RL fuzzy dice familiar who can never roll snake eyes or double 6's because on one the 1 and on the other the 6 are replaced with CATAN. I have a few photos that I'll post later.

I stopped by to say "Hi!" to John Kovalic

muskrat_john even though I didn't have anything for him to sign. We talked for a bit and he signed and gave me one of the new Dork Towers that he had, and I didn't even tell him it was my birthday!

I also got an unexpected birthday text from

hyzenflay which cheered me to no end.

By 5pm I was exausted, and decided to sit down and learn "No Limit Texas Hold 'em" poker. The young German man demoing the game was very excited to have the chance to teach it to an American. TWO Americans, since the most obnoxious fellow American I've ever met in Europe also joined the game. ("Quit yappin and deal the cards, we'll learn as we go" he said to the man trying to explain the game in German to the German couple at the table.) So I played poker (for fun, we re-split the chips fairly often) for about an hour.

Then I met back up with FoxLady and Co, and we first went to my hotel so I could check out (at 8pm) so we wouldn't have to come back. I had to pay for the last night, as I knew I would, since 1) I'd made a non-cancellable reservation and 2) it was past checkout time (although the English information in the room said checkout was 12am)

The Breakfast Rant: I thought breakfast was included. I even mentioned to the lady showing me a seat at breakfast I only really wanted a cup of coffee. I had a cup of coffee, a roll, and a few slices of cheese. They charged me 15 Euro. Yep. One Five. What the ---- breakfast is worth 15 Euro. If I'm paying 15 Euro I at LEAST want them to BRING IT TO ME. This was a ----ing buffet!!!!!!

Then back to FoxLady's house (which is AWESOME). She has two flats, across the hall from each other. One for living and one for gaming. And the kitchen in the gaming flat is only for cocktails. And she can make ANY cocktail in that kitchen. And the decor in the gaming room..... man.....

We talked for a while, then made a birthday Buttonman tourney, and then had Strawberry Margaritas. They were yummy. It was a wonderful evening and a terrific end to my birthday.

*End Day 3

Day 4 -- The going home.

It's safe to say now that's it's come true, that my birthday wish (To have a great birthday with my new friends and to make it back to England without incident) came true.

The coming home stories are boring because nothing went wrong. I had a lovely breakfast with Foxlady, Kuni and Micha, and then Foxlady and Kuni took me to the airport. I flew home, and after an unusually long wait in the Taxi queue at the train station, made it home to Fnord7.

And that's the story!

Summary: Essen Spielmesse was FABULOUS. My birthday was Terrific. Although there were some darkish spots, everything came out ok at the end of the story.