So this turned out to be quite an interesting little weekend after all. I'm back on my one-day-delay cycle (posting one day after the events I'm describing - and usually, as now, only writing about the day after that), which is fine, and as it happens, potetially practical. Assassins, which has been filling in the cracks of my time, providing interest and excitement in the interstices between activities if not actually disrupting very many of the activities themselves, is similarly infiltrating the blogworld; and I am not blind to the thought that some intrepid assassin may be using this site as an information-gathering tool. Fortunately, in that regard, I tend to be somewhat obscure about the generalities of my routine, as detailed as I can get about their specifics, and I rarely mention plans for the future. Still, it can't hurt to have my movements removed from their print time by an extra day or so. But blogging does add an interesting little dimension to the game, which in some way encompasses nearly every aspect of life while it's going on. A number of the sixty-some folks playing have blogs, including Zabby, whose extreme paranoia (just read her last few entries) is both adorable and smart (and working), Sarah Kelly, whose updates are further along than mine - check that for an amusing account of the intersection of our trajectories, and Rabi, whose most recent post is an absolutely fantastic account of a hospital visit that no doubt relegated any thoughts of the game to the deep recesses of her mind, at least for the time being. Speaking of Rabi…

Yesterday morning started with a trip down Chester Rd a block to see the womens rugby game. I've never been to a rugby game, or indeed any sporting event at Swarthmore, but after encountering their impressively numerous and exhortative chalkings the other day, I figured that they really wanted people to show up for this game, and that it would be just an all-around good and fun thing to do. Rebecca came too, though she feared for her ass, and we had a cute little parry as we left the porch, where each gestured for the other to proceed, and then I took both her hands and we sashed along, facing each other. The opressive heat of the previous few days had subsided, and the sky was now grey, but it was a light grey, and bright enough that I wished I had worn my sunglasses. We skirted the rail fence and faked wide-open Amy Robinson ("you take one cheek i'll take one cheek"), keeping vigilant and finding a nice grassy seat a couple yards back from the center line. Several other players were in the vicinity, not to mention a number on the field (Aja, who's not playing this time but was in Anna's video, made a series of really impressive tackles and scored a few goals; Rabi, who left herself vulnerable as she was talking to a medical guy about her pained face, but we didn't have the heart to fake her); Brett, who sat with us and explained the basics of the game, and Susie Ansell, Aisha, and Adrienne Fowler, several yards away, with whom we exchanged a few meaningful glances. After watching the game for a half hour or more, we got distracted by Misha and her cut-out pictures of climbers; the game ended not much later, and Rebecca said she was ready to go, rather than stay to watch the mens game. As we headed for the fence, Aisha and Adrienne got up and started following us; we all four broke into a run, made difficult by the fact that we were all in sandals (I nearly lost one on the way; if they had been after me I might have been toast). It quickly became clear that the pair involved was Rebecca, who was safe for the moment, lying in the grass beside the sidewalk, and Adrienne, pondering the best way to go about things. I royally embarrassed myself by not being able to remember whether it had been her, Susie, or Mara who had been assmaster last semester, thus appearing not to know the difference between the three. Ad tried to flip her, a little less than wholeheartedly I think, and then lost her patience and started to walk away. Becca made a dash and gained a few yards (I seem to be using that measure a lot today) towards the barn before A changed her mind and leapt back over the fence. This sequence repeated a few times (at one point Pablo came over to see what was going on, used the opportunity to nab Aisha), and Adrienne finally let Rebecca walk free, with the distinct advantage of now knowing her enemy.

So we were back home and safe, and I stayed here for most of the afternoon, playing with my CDs and puzzles (completed the Times acrostic for the third time running, albeit with a bit of help from google - "Narghile" and "Inkberry"? come on now), until my 5:00-5:30 slot in the special SRN beach broadcast schedule. Except it turned out, when I made my wide-eyed way to campus, that there were few people on the beach, and they could barely hear the music that was being blasted out a first floor window on a dinky boombox. They had set up the two CD players, two mics and a little portable board on a table in Parlors, which made for an amusing DJing environment, but not a very, well, outside one (why exactly couldn't this have been on the porch?). I took over from (my erstwhile killer) Christine as her G. Love and Cibo wound down, and took the chance to play through some new and old favorites - "Welcome to Tokio" "Drop" "Anything You Want" "Bleeps and the Blips" "Wound that Never Heals" "Tear Off Your Own Head" "Immortal Billionaires" "The Bird that You Can't See" and "Dr. Pepper" - as Sproul, Shargel, Kluchin, Alvarez, and others cycled through, some with protective buttgear or at least vigilant hands, and at one point formed quite a crowd of an armchair circle. That was fun but no great shakes.

Upon returning, encountered Rae and her folks, and a shorn spiffed-up suspendered Joelly, headed out to Kabul. They agreed to return for me before the EgoShow, and I proceeded back upstairs to figure out dinner. From a guestlist of four (Becca, Petar, Nori, Gabe) we doubled (Mark, Alyssa, Claire, myself) in a matter of minutes, and made many trips back and forth to the porch, carrying parmesan, water, wine, plates laden with pasta, pesto, yummy asparagus, and salty-tofu-crumble, "clean" plates, and plates reladen with other things - Claire had to make another batch of pasta for her first serving and our severalth; there was fun with the phone, fragmented discussion, party sign, WSRN pot-rap 4/20 tributes, and failure to make headway on cryptic crosswords (Harpers carries one that is just ridiculously complex.) And dishes, as I picked out some house and house alternatives to stuff in my new binder. All set to take the 8:30 Bryn Mawr shuttle to the point, since Rae and folks hadn't called, they did at quarter after, and said they'd be back to get me. Of course, Joel called again at something like quarter to nine, saying they hadn't even left the city.

They were here a half hour later, and we high-tailed it to BM (Oh Mercy on the tape deck, and artfrathazing drug ritual discussion), but (at least after we secured parking two long blocks away) we were too late for the short JBE set (they had been kept strictly to 40 minutes despite substantial reaction from the crowd.) But we did catch up with [self-styled] yerinkledan out back, and he snuck/guestlisted two of us in (Rae let her parents pay) for the first couple tunes of the headliner, Vancouverian Celtic-folksters Paperboys (not half bad.) He suggested we head somewhere to talk, so Rae led us (sans cute parents, who shook my hand again as they left) what must have been ten blocks to a Barnes and Noble for to buy a Philly map. It was now considerably colder, and I was still in birks and t-shirt, not having anticipated something like this, but I was okay. He gave us updates on his various projects, and we talked for a bit about Worthstock and IFRB, and then Joel started asking him about "the industry" - leading to a long lecture/discussion on the walk back (the booksellers were closing about fifteen minutes after we arrived) about how different groups have "made it (big)" - Danny pulling out his usual trove of examples - Morphine, MP+EJ, Tracy - Joel unable to supply many besides Aspera. This continued for a while on the stoop of the point, Rae and I having little to contribute to the discussion, and then Jim came out and shook my hand and gave me a CD and I told him I hoped we could have him play, which I really do, since I wanted to see them and didn't get to that night; he's my uncle, it's my show darnit, since nobody else is stepping up to help (they're offering, but nobody's done much yet), and who knows, maybe we can pull off Infectious as well. So that wasn't a total bust, we had a nice chat anyway. And rupture-dynamics made it to Boston, or at least 35 minutes in that direction.

I wasn't really feeling up to partying when I got home, but I dutifully packed up my CD case, borrowed a funky brown hat from Rae, and headed over to "the vicinity of Kohlberg," of course keeping an eye out behind all the lilacs, just in case. Mark was in something of a pickle when I arrived, and was eager for me to throw some music on - so I slipped in "Good Beat," which is certainly house, if you think about it, and then two tracks from Playboy Mansion ("All that Jazz" and the one before it) which got one of the best receptions it has yet. For the next two hours or whatever Mark and I traded off, with me picking maybe at most 2/3rds of the material: "Harder Faster Stronger Better," "Hyperballad" mix, "Hey You What's that Sound," "My Beatbox" LRD mix, "Freakin' You" mix, "Liquidation Totale," "Busy Child." I danced as I wished, always with a thought or two for my ass; more confident as the evening went on in my chances of surviving a dancefloor attack, and eventually I was able to spend more time on the grassfloor, in a circle with boppin' Alyssa, grinnin' Claire, and so forth, or just milling daintily in between Gabe, Adrienne, Abby, Rob, Petar (and Rebecca, who dahsed out frantically when her would-be assassin arrived on the scene), Chloë, Camilla/Nicole goofiness, the dapper bootyduo of Sad Sam and Dam Laura, and other such revellers. Despite the slight chill (which was no problem for the dancers) it was a lovely scene - lights and island-injun-masks strung loosely between the "ruin" pillars around the courtyard, tiki torches and fake plastic trees dotting the area, and three mega drink-dispensers with fruited-up Hawaiian punch. And the faithful cyclotron, on the ground next to Rattech (which featured brandspankinew CD players, which frustratingly made one or two of my discs skip a bit.) As it got later, we got more adventurous - Mark popped in the Av's' "Radio" (prompting Kluchin to squeal "you're a babe and a half"), and I followed with C-shop's "Music Plus One." His "Da Funk" gave way to "Those Gamma Rays…" which might have scared off some of the less hardyhardy remainders, into "Rock Higher." Then Cassius' "Super Jungle Mix" of "Music Sounds Better," and a bit of "At The River" for clean-up music (followed by choice cuts from Prince's "Hits 2.") I stayed to clean-up, along with Aly and Claire, and when all the tikitorch bits were in the trunk and the lights uncrunk, toddled home, pushed the cd cases off my offset bed, and dozed. Again, I say, ngggghhhhh.

TOUCH MY ASS IF YOU'RE QUALIFIED!