Being a new noder, this was my first nodermeet. The attendees of this auspicious event:
At shortly after ten, I was the last to arrive, after having just missed the sign on the left side of Georgetown Pike and having to find a place to turn around (which was, unfortunately, a few miles further down).
The hike went off without a hitch in the lovely remains of the small
snowstorm of the days before. The weather was just perfect for the
hike (so all y'all who weaseled on account of the weather--shame!)-- it was twenty-eight degrees but it wasn't really cold at all,
with a nice sun out the entire time we were on the trail and the snow melting around us. At one point
during the hike, we made a wrong turn. Since none of us had hiked the
trail before, we assumed that we would have to do a little
rock-climbing. This bit turned out to be the closest to dear ol' Death that we got. Of course, after successfully mounting the rock face, we figured out that it was actually not part of the trail at all. Oh well! 'Twas still fun, however.
After a short distance we got to questioning our whereabouts once
again. However, we were guided back onto the trail by other hikers who
had been on the trail before, and proceeded back to our starting point,
completing the loop.
As some of us were hungry from the hike (especially Mrs. Jurph who mentioned this fact
repeatedly), we headed over to Panera Bread
at Pike 7 Plaza. IWhoSawTheFace, who couldn't make the hike, met us there for lunch. At this very crowded Panera we partook in scrumptious sandwiches, soups and
salads, and exchanged things. birdlace gave out a number of his mix
CDs, I gave away a copy of the Candide original cast recording, and
IWhoSawTheFace brought a number of his treasures to dole out. All in
all, a good show.
It was cool meeting everyone and putting faces to names (and handles). I look forward to another meet soon!
Pictures of said event can be had at various places, including:
Memorable quotes, anyone?
Corrections and amendments to this writeup are welcome.
And as we all know, African swallows are non-migratory.