*F* Reading 2.0 report - The Chandler version
Bryan
So, there i am, in my office, last thing on a Saturday. No goddam business
all day and i'm reduced to trying fit a new network server to stave off
that ground-down feeling you get when the excitement just don't cut it.
This dame walks past the frosted door, real sweet but she don't knock and
i'm still looking at the echos she leaves on my retinas two minutes later,
that being the most interesting thing i've seen all day. This is when it
happens. I open my eyes and i realise i'm looking straight at the wall
calendar which shows 28th of September.
Remembering what this means - some of us don't need no stinkin' psions - i
jump up an' head straight for Chippenham station. I remember that my
sister took the wheels, so i'm travelling by thumb once again.
I scored surprisingly quickly. These two skirts in a beat-up Fiesta took
me straight to the station. This is unusual for a guy in a leather jacket
but i figured i didn't look like no threat to anybody. I got one of those
faces you can't draw when you're six years old, so police ID artists almost
never peg me.
I take the train, grab a coffee from the godawful buffet car and sit down
in the smoking section with a Stephen King and a packet of lung busters.
It's a pretty easy trip. Three stations, no more no less. These two
gorillas start something in the gap between coach A and coach B just
outside Didcot and the conductor scuttles up there like a frightened rabbit
to try to ease things down. I pay no attention. Nobody needs a beating
who ain't getting one, so i draw on my king-size and keep on with _Rita
Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption_. Good decision. This story's
really got something.
We get in to Reading, maybe seven thirty or just a little past. I get out
and and try to remember the name of the pub and the MIME-mangled map that
Darrell posted to afp. Walk up to Burger King, ask the idiot in the clown
outfit for directions, which he gives, once i agree to buy a cola.
Bin the cola. Head down to the Monk's Retreat which, at first sight is one
of those open-plan style bars - you know? No real tables or chairs, a few
barstools and these raised platforms to stand your beer on while you take
in the scenery. Of which i may add, there is plenty but hey, not my type.
The braincells down here you could count on the fingers of one Kit-Kat.
One of the small ones.
Anyway, i waited for my Caffrey's to settle, and took a stroll around.
Further up the bar there's four or five stairs and up here there are
booths. I check out the booths looking for faces but nobody grabs me. At
the end of the booths there are a couple big round tables and here, in a
crowd of people i don't know i see Paul Rood and with him are Darrell and
Mark and of course, Karen. My first thought is that maybe the infamous
DiscCon gang are starting up on their old racket again but then i catch
Helen Highwater and Tim standing nearby so forget that. So far as i know,
the heat have been too dumb to post a bounty anyway.
I got introduced to a lot of folks, Rob Collier who isn't part of the
lspace cabal so i didn't bust him, Lunie who's kind of detached from the
proceedings, her friend Thomas with the worryingly high voice, Adam, who's
okay, Dan who's paranoid, Kitten who is too goddam sweet to be in this bar,
a deck of Simons and a raft of others i don't remember.
Soon the Bellinghman and Colette turn up with another Simon so i start to
think up poker rules for faces but forget it when Helen says it ain't funny
and i can't use Gideon (did i leave Gideon out? Tall, wears black, upsets
chemistry teachers) as a joker.
I talk to Paul about his big Con job in the summer. If i'd been there he
would have gotten more than just custard but i was working on fixing some
peripheral damage at the time so he got lucky. I checked out what i could
of Helen's prepublished copy of _The Hogfather_ but it had to compete with
alcohol and caffeine enriched chocolate so.....it lost.
Can i stop the Sam Spade now? Thanks. It was rubbish anyway.
Can't remember much in the way of quotes, but psions were in evidence so no
doubt there will be some. We talked about the usual things, i remember
trying to convince Tim that Neil Gaiman's comics aren't like the Beano and
that Grant Ennis's comics are like the Beano done by Tarantino. The
Quentin Taranbeano? Naah. Alan got some sneaky photos, Darrell and i
agreed to finalise the Survival Guide if MTB will help us a bit, erm there
was more.
White chocolate is the work of the devil for he spake unto the eaters of
God's Dark Chocolate and sayeth "Oi! Check this out! It's really nice"
when actually it was horrible unto the seven times seventh generation.
Sorry, just felt that needed to be said. A good time was, i feel, had by
all, and the name of the Good Time was not Emmet nor was it Leo, nay it was
"atmosphere" which everyone enjoyed except me as i was not permitted to
smoke into it by the feminazi behind the bar.
Darrell still has strange hair. Mark's would be strange, were it not
escaping from his forehead at a remarkable rate, several inches during the
course of the meet i thought.
So, we left the pub. We wandered through a wet and windy Reading, our
babble making it more windy and Thomas' presence making it more wet. A
Balti House summoned us, and we were forced to seek admittance. At this
point the estimated twenty-seven revellers soon became seventeen. My
pakoras failed to materialise, and indeed i was so relieved by the presence
of ashtrays that my hunger for food vanished almost entirely. Dan was
convinced to eat a Korma, none of us wishing to be present in the vicinity
of an exploding Dan. I don't know what Lunie and Thomas had. Probably a
nice conversation about the animals i was eating.
Then we staggered off to Darrell's place. He has a bidet in his bathroom.
At least, Paul says it's a bidet. I vaguely remember wondering why the
handbasin was so low. He also has an enormous collection of dice and
gaming materials but everyone else said they were tired and i sulked a bit.
Darrell supplied coffee, which was welcome, and Alan supplied 80% by
volume Polish Spirit. I now understand why the Poles mounted a cavalry
charge against a Panzer division in 1938. Ow. Alan and Colette didn't
stay long.
Thomas, Adam, Lunie, Paul, Karen and Rob stayed upon Darrell's amazing
expanding sofas and the inevitable floor, although Paul cheated in
supplying his own duvet and pillows which i call underhand. I arose quite
early, made the coffee, went back to sleep, arose quite late and buggered
off home.
My thanks to all involved, and i hope i was tolerable. I don't think i
behaved any worse that i have reported here, but my memory is not what it
was. Before the Polish Spirit, i mean.
Regards to all, and very well done.
--
Bryan
A man is like a red, red nose
With regular blowing, it's perfectly serviceable.