bonus_npl

Happy Birthday to my beautiful and wonderful wife, xpell_arielle!  I love you so much, and I can't help but marvel at how lucky I am to have you!

Well, Con is over, and I've pretty much shifted back into the real world.  I got back late Sunday night, fortunately only delayed around 20 minutes, slept until 11 on Monday, and had the longest day of work ever today.  The entire trip was awesome, and I'm not going to take the time to do a full recap, but I wanted to hit a few high points:

• Thursday we went to Rocky Mountain National Park, which was beautiful, and it was also a great chance to spend time with Sax and Zebraboy on the long car ride there, and Gotcha, Teki, and Ed Peebles on the long car ride back.
• There were plenty of fantastic games this year, but I have to give the prize to Tablesaw's Remote Control.  For both playing and watching, I think it was the most entertaining game this year (and it faced some pretty tough competition).  Actually I really enjoyed every game I played.
  
• Wombat's cryptic was just beautiful.  I won't say anything specific in case anyone hasn't done it yet, but it was such a satisfying ending.
• This was the first year that we didn't leave until later on Sunday, and it was really nice to not have to rush out the door after the awards ceremony.  Artistry drove us to the mall for lunch, and afterwards we got to hang out and talk for a few hours with puzzling friends until we had to say goodbye.

All in all, what a great weekend!  I look forward to seeing you all again next July (or hopefully January)!

During my annual post-Mystery Hunt malaise this year, I realized that seeing/interacting with all of the awesome people I know from the world of puzzling only twice a year is not nearly enough.  So, I decided to finally get an LJ account so I can try to keep up with everyone.  I probably won't do much (if any) posting, but hopefully this will give me a way to keep in touch.