From dawagner@ix.netcom.com Sat Oct 18 17:58:34 1997 Date: Mon, 29 Sep 1997 13:01:59 -0500 (CDT) From: Don Wagner Reply-To: MA-MODS@montagar.com To: MA-MODS@montagar.com, jcl@tucson.princeton.edu, mcwst18+@pitt.edu, vkalia@red.seas.upenn.edu, polina20@wharton.upenn.edu Subject: The RMA-RMAM Dinner Saga OK, here we go... After an early start on Saturday morning, Vandit and Polina show up at my place and hang out for a little while...just long enough to be pounced upon by Freya and exchange a few stories. Luckily, Pol has huskies and malamutes so she's used to this brand of goofball. Vandit is big enough to handle himself. They drop their car off in front of the house and we take off for Penn Station, Newark so they can catch a train to NYC to walk around for the day. A little construction work slows us down, but not too much. So far, so good! Well, the afternoon disappears and I finally get the clerk at the local Carvel shop to put the letters "RMA RMAM" on a cake. "This isn't brain surgery, just put these letters, in this order, on the cake, in icing, now. Here, I'll draw what I want, to scale, for you." No lie...Nod was close at hand. A quick look at the clock and I take off for Iberias...forgetting the construction work that I hit this morning...doh! I'm a little late and Erica, Jennifer, Pai Yili and Susan are already there. A quick round of introductions and we start in with the standard issue RMA-RMAM nonsense. Not too surprisingly, everyone is extremely laid back and not at all shy about letting their thoughts (if any) be known. Slowly but surely RMA-RMAM people begin drifting into the lobby of the restaurant. A tentative look, a bit of drool perhaps, and then recognition from someone that these people standing around are probably the ones they're looking for. John, Richard, Matthew (Ericas student, and a hell of a nice guy, btw), Vandit, Polina and Deana show up and we finally get seating, leaving chairs for Matthew Weigel and Joao for when they show up. Matthew calls into the restaurant and has me paged. "Hey Don, I'm at the train station." "Great timing, Matthew! Ferry street is just outside one of the exits. Iberias is 2 blocks up on your right hand side. See you in a few minutes." 20min pass and no Matthew. Richard and I walk down to Penn, through the station, up to the other Iberias on Ferry street and come back to the restaurant. Hmmmmm.... Another 20min or so pass of us watching the door for Matthew with images of him hit by a bus or eaten by CHUDs or something similar. I'm paged again and Matthew says... "I'm in Trenton. Is that far from Newark?" "Yes it is Matthew. Why the hell are you in Trenton...just for the record, of course?" "My Mum made the train ticket reservations." "Matthew, go to the Amtrak desk and get them to send you to Penn Station NEWARK! When you get there call me at home and don't leave the station. We'll come pick you up, OK?" "OK" I figure it'll cost him an hour plus, but he can still get to meet everyone at least. Joao shows up late and has leftovers from several of our plates...yummy! Jennifer kills, cooks and eats an entire goat while we sit in shocked amazement at the feral display in front of us. OK, she ordered goat stew and shared with everyone, but didn't my story sound better? ;-) A bunch of us order the Rodizio, an endless assortment of dead, cooked, animals brought to you hot off the spit. Richard finds out later that the seafood valencia he ordered had pork sausage cooked in it. He's allergic to pork and he had a bit of a fever that was soon put down by caffeine and mead. The atmosphere is loud and fun. Vandit goads the strolling musicians to play happy birthday (it sounded like a polka tune sung with a Portugues accent) to Polina (whose B-day is in March). She doesn't quite break his finger, but she did make him squeal. ;-) After the sixth "Happy Birthday" in the joint, the humorous aspect of the situation escaped me... Pai Yili is bottomless. I've never seen anyone finish a full meal at this place before and he did so with ease. Must be a "chi" thing. The shirts with the RMAM logo are fantastic! A big WhooHooo! to Pai Yili for a wonderful job. Richard pointed out to me later that the table was pretty much split down the middle according to origin of martial art. Chinese stylists on one side, Okinawan stylists on the other, at the end of the table were the TKD and JJ people. For the most part, Vandit is a GJJ drone-trall but we won't hold that against him. ;-) Erica is photo-phobic and claims that photographs steal her soul, but happily grabbed the camera and took some table pictures. This is the same person who brings a severed alien head lollipop to the restaurant and shoves a blue, radioactive glowstick through its neck and up into its sugary cranium. You monster! We finish up, grab the cars and head back to my place for coffee, cake and a little quieter talk. Part of the fun of meeting everyone in person is that your good stories sound new again. Joaos ceiling fan and bike stories, Pai Yilis disturbing account of the ring incident, Richards "Multiple Attacker" hubbub, etc... ;-) Jennifer loans me a tape of Black Adders "Cavalier Years" to make an archival copy of. ;-) Thank you, Jennifer! Erica steals the original tape. Matthew calls up a little after 9pm and Vandit, Polina and I head out to get him. For the record I'd like to say that Richard and Vandit are seperated at birth when it comes to their driving skills. They're nuts, and I mean that in the nicest possible way. Vandit gets to the road construction, hardly touches the brakes and says "Just like Calcutta!". Pol takes it in stride and increases the backseat nagging a bit. ;-) Hey! There's a tall Texan guy who looks tired and lost. Hi, Matthew! ;-) We get back home, make introductions again and Matthew tells us of his journey from Pittsburgh. He got to sit next to a guy on the train with quite the collection of Spanish porno mags who went to the bathroom every 45min or so, he walked down Ferry St. in Trenton where he was asked by three helpful gentlemen if he was a cop, he spent 12hours on a train or in a train station. Some people have all the fun. Jennifer, Pai Yili and Susan take off. Jennifer misses her train back to NYC and ends up taking a cab. Erica, Matthew (Ericas Matthew), Vandit and Polina take off a bit later. John relates stories from South Park to us (I want a copy of those episodes!). Freya begs for more treats and generally acts like a canine vacuum cleaner. Not wanting to have Richards family sue my ass for his horrible death on the road I invite him to stay over. Yeah, I know that you were only up for a lousy 20 hrs or so... John and Joao take off and Matthew, Richard and I conduct a mead tasting session until 2am or so. Richard is awoke by a furry alarm clock licking his face and he retreats into his sleeping bag...buts he's awake at least. Matthew finally gets up after Richard and I have finished a pot of coffee already. We head out to breakfast, make a mess of the table, Matthew orders chocolate chip pancakes and pours a quart of strawberry syrup on them, the coffee sucks and we send it back, we screw up the top of the coffee urn, dump coffee everywhere, the waitress treats us like retarded chimps in a Mary Kay Research Lab, and we finally get out. We did run into the senior student from my school and that was nice. Matthew and Richard decide that they have to play Tekken 3 so we head out to the arcade, lose track of time and end up speeding towards Penn station in Newark to make Matthews train. They drop me off and I figure everything is OK. Richard will drive back to Baltimore, Matthew will eventually end up in Pittsburgh, I'll go to sleep...;-) Fat chance. I end up watching Black Adder ;-), get roped into helping out at Deanas yard sale and finally get home to get this phone call... "Hey Don, we missed Matthews train in Newark, drove to Trenton and missed _that_ train too. The next train leaves at like 730am tomorrow." "What?" "We missed..." "Get back to Nutley and we'll deal with it tomorrow." It's occurred to me that the general buffunery that permeates RMA-RMAM carries over into the Real World (tm). This isn't an act for us, this is how we are. Matthew and Richard show up 2hrs later looking like death warmed over. Richard is drive-wasted and sleep deprived, Matthew looks like a deer caught in the headlights of an 18 wheeler. They crash for a while, I get them to help me bring some yard sale crap back to my house and we all head out to a BBQ at one of my friends houses. They got to meet some of the people I was telling stories about, hear some more from the horses mouth, eat like barnyard beasts (its that kind of house where the food is non-stop and pretty damn good too), watch "The Simpsons" and "King of the Hill" (both were pretty sucky) and then head back home. Richard fell asleep a few times in the car and insists that he didn't. He also insists that he could drive back to Baltimore that night. They make me take a disturbing picture. I fix the WinDoze DUN (I'm a Microserf beta tester for Win98, read this as "Masocist") enough to allow the Dynamic Duo to telnet into get their email and for Richard to complete an assignment due today. We sift through some old MA mags, tell some more stories and leave Richard to his assignment which he finishes up around 1am. Everyone gets up about on time and we head out at about 7am. Richard looks awake enough to drive, hits me up for $20 to get home and is on his way. Matthew is awake and I drop him off at Penn Station with time to spare. As far as I know he _did_ get on the correct train and is on his way back to Pittsburgh. Lets hope he has as interesting a seat-mate on this ride too. ;-) People, it was a pleasure to meet you all and I hate to miss the upcoming gathering in the abdomen of the US. John, trust me on this one....think twice about letting Richard drive for 12 hours! ;-) When I figure out the date of my Holly-Daze Open House Party I'll let you all know. --Don-- Hekas, hekas este bebaloi!