The Naomi #afp meet

Attending: Ali, Arwen, Barry, Brett, ccooke, Corinne, Flexor, J, Julie, Kate, Martin, Melody, Mole, Naomi, Peter, Thomas, Vicky, Womble

Naomi Ridge, one of the regulars on lspace IRC, was moving to the US at the end of October 2000 and since various people[1] had expressed an interest in getting to meet her beforehand, a meet was thrown together for her. Thanks go out to Mole, who arranged it and Thomas, who made crashspace available.

Since both me and Flexor were going to come to the meet we decided to travel to the UK together, via Easyjet, the favourite airline of cash starved afpers everywhere. Arriving at Luton airport early in the morning, we took the bus into London then walked to the first part of the meet, an exclusive luncheon in Kings Road. Here we were greeted by Corinne, who had been the first to arrive and had taken a strategic seat near the entrance. A bit of confusion followerd as I was called on my brand new nifty keen mobile by my mother and had to shift gears quickly from English to Dutch. Erk.

The next person to arrive was Kate Elliot, who had braved the wilds of London in her car and managed to do so unscatched, quickly followed by Mole and his legal counsel, Vicky. It was now time to move downstairs and start lunch, which we did after Melody and the strar of the meet, Naomi herself had arrived as well.

It was also time to lighten my own burden somewhat by handing out copies of _The Truth_ to those people who had asked me to bring them a copy. All in all Flexor and me had to lug along some 12 or so copies for various persons. Verily, the Truth weighted heavy on my shoulders.

After harassing^Wvisiting Thomas in the tiny toy shoppe he worked in and waiting around in a conveniently located pub nearby, it was time to brave the horrors of the London underground and move out to Kenton for the meet pub. Thomas had to go to arrange some things and Melody had to get home to arrange dinner and the like, so we were left with Mole & Vicky, Flexor, Corinne, Naomi and me to get to the meet proper, which we managed to do after some misadventures on the way.

Arriving there, we met up with the main contigent of the meet, consisting of Barry and Arwen, Peter and Julie, Brett, Womble, J, ccooke and Ali. Time of course to hand out some more copies of _The Truth_, now finally lifted of this terrible burden.

One of the people who had requested a copy was Peter Ellis, whose birthday was not that far in the future, being on the day of Halloween. (Explains a lot, eh?) Fair enough, I thought and gave it to him as a present:

Peter, you know what's in this package and this is my birthday present to you. Of course, you realise you can only open it on the day itself...
His reaction:
You bastard!

After that, we settled down for the serious meet business of getting food inside us, wetting our throats with the various beverages on offer and sampling the cough medicine I had brought along as a going away present for Naomi. This cough medicine being 80 proof Stroh rum, named cough medicine because: "you take a sip and it makes you cough". Of course, as at every afp meet, the silly toys, fluffy animals and puns were out in force.

When closing time arrived, far too early for somebody used to more civilised hours, most of us made our way to the crashspace arranged by Thomas. Yours truly did not manage to sleep there, due to the high density of snoring afpers... The next morning, the after meet ritual of video watching, breakfast and general recuperating was followed until it became time for me to go along with Peter, Julie and cookie to Cambridge, where I was to stay until my flight back to the Netherlands on monday, Peter and Julie generously letting me stay at their place. For which thanks.

Lunch pictures

	Flexor at Schiphol		Corinne was the first we ran into
	Quickly followed by Kate		And Melody was the last to arrive for the lunch.
	And this was the person we all turned up for: Naomi Ridge		Your humble photog himself
	Kelvix, not happy about being photographed..		We had to split the group in two: these are Flexor, Corinne, Mole and Melody
	Walking through the streets of London		Corinne looking scarey

The Meet proper

	I spy a little Peter		The huddled masses of #afp: Julie, ccooke, Womble, Kate, J, Naomi, Arwen, Barry & brett (in clockwise order)
	Good penguin, bad Chuthlu		More huddled masses: Arwen, Corinne, Mole, Peter, Ali, Julie and ccooke
	Kate in a typical pose		Barry showing he supported the right team during Euro2000 [2]
	Ali blowing bubbles. (Should I be jealous? -ed)		Big bubbles... (I should be jealous! -ed)
	Corinne goes Wombling		Ve haff ways of taken der pictures of you, herr ccooke!
	Julie in a characteristic pose		Thomas being very, very spoiled here.
	Ali still blowing strong		Brett and Naomi
	The morning after..		...the night before
	Meow!		Even handcuffs do not stop #afpers from ircing...

[1] Including yours truly.
[2] No, Arwen had nothing to do with this. Honest.