Why? Why not? I need something to do when I'm not flipping out about how badly I'm going to bomb my run.
I left for Summer Games Done Quick around 10pm last night with another runner from the area. Good thing he came too, because by the time we were heading through Illinois I was getting really tired. We would trade off, driving in shifts. This worked up until we hit Kansas.
Anyone who ever bitched about Ohio being boring to drive through can kiss my ass. If you ever wanted to know what the "Great American Desert" looked like, try driving through Kansas along I-70. Not only was there little to speak for outside of endless grassy plains, several signs of civilization were abandoned. In our case, it was mostly gas stations. When we needed gas. Fun times.
I can say this about Denver, though: we never saw it coming. I kept checking the GPS which said we were 30, then 20, then 10 miles away from the city and I still couldn't see the city skyline on the horizon. Denver just sort of appeared after we were within about 5 miles of it, way after I got my first in-person glimpse of the Rocky Mountains behind it.
After getting to the hotel I quickly found out that there was a convention going on at the same time SGDQ would be starting: RomCon. As far as I can tell it's a convention about romance authors, stories or some shit like that. At one point a group of SGDQ people and RomCon people were in the same elevator. One of the RomConers had a riding whip and said "The safe word is yellow." She remarked to the others about how fast the gamers were walking away when the elevator opened, probably not realizing that some of them likely go to anime conventions and have seen as bad or far worse than what she just did.
In the parking lot I was mistaken for Murphagator. Not sure how the hell that happened.
The convention center attached to the hotel is where SGDQ will get streamed live, and holy shit the space is huge. It's one massive open area split into a few areas. The first is the registration and main streaming area where you see everyone speedrun their games. Next to that is the practice area. The third space is the food area, the only space where food or drink is allowed. At the moment all I can say about the entire space is holy shit, it's really cold in there. Hopefully firing up a couple dozen computers and consoles warms the space up a little.
Also, I met another runner there who happens to be an Ohio State student. O-H!
By sundown the practice room was in full swing. A couple dozen TVs were set up with a few more in reserve and everyone was either playing Smsh Bros. Melee, practicing, or streaming their practice. It's weird to stand at a TV muddling through Ninjabread Man while there are some people who have a game running on a TV, streamed to twitch via a laptop and webcam, with a condenser mic suspended over the set. It was one of those "Am I really supposed to be here?" kind of moments.
