'cause its already yours.

Not this time.   I am very sad to be on this particular plane.  It left Austin, TX about 20 minutes ago en route to Chicago...the place I call home.    I feel so much more alive in Texas to be honest.   That mixed with the insane amount of things that I did with the Texas bemani kids, it was such a great trip and I'm already missing everyone, everything, each event and every vague thought relating to the past 5 days.

When I landed on Thursday afternoon, I knew I was in for a good time, but I had no idea to what extent.  JONZ picked me up from the airport and we headed back to his place where we immediately played beet and pop'n for a while until Crissy and Biggle.   Shortly after that, JON's girlfriend showed up and I met her as well.  Girls in TX play pop'n and beet its so weird since no one but guys play in Chicago it seems.  We hung out for a while there, but made our way out to Conan's for pizza Texas Chicago style (lol I know, right?) and then to UFO to pick up Nym.   Nym was someone that no one knew until he started hanging out in our IRC channel a month or two ago.  Anyway, he came to this to hang out with everyone and meet people and every other word he said all weekend was a bemani pun.  It was so fabulous. (ha).   After picking him up from UFO and having the opportunity to look around the arcade for a bit, we all headed over to Rico's place.   I met the guy behind the private beet, pop'n and DDR machines in Austin and we spent some time hanging out there bullshitting and meeting each other.   I had to try fixing his IIDX PC since his basement flooded a few days prior, but after a good rubbing alcohol rinse and reassembly, the board started up and ran on Friday morning.   After that, we went to get snow cones which unknowing to me would become a major part of this trip.  The next meal in Austin was a pancake house that was aimed at the 20-something age group.  It was very delicious and I had a full stomach when we headed back t Rico's to crash.   

On Friday, Nym and I hung out pretty much all day in Rico's basement playing beet since everyone worked, but after 5PM when everyone got home, we did a lot of fun shit.   Momo and my buddy Justin (from Indiana years before, now Houston) came to town and a girl from Houston that was really really good at beet visited at Rico's.  We played some beet, went out to Salt Lick so I could get same Texas style BBQ (which let me tell you, hooooly shit) and then came back to the house to play more beet and DDR while having a few beers with those that came to visit that day.

Saturday was a day of preparation for the big party celebrating my visit.  Rico's mom made breakfast for everyone that was staying at the house and it was amazing.   I see why everyone loves her lmao. After breakfast, Rico and I went with Simon and bought serial adapters fr the beet card readers and then went to get snow cones again.   When we got back to the house, danadam and breadface were already there and I got to meet each of those well known names in the bemani world.   Shortly after meeting those two, everyone started arriving and a slew of social beer drinking beet playing popn failing events took place.   It was a whole lot f fun and most of the evening we saw at least 8 eamuse cards lined up on beet waiting to play.  Everyone in TX is really sirius about their beet playing :>.   Things wrapped up at around 3am and Justin left early on Sunday morning.  

All afternoon Sunday was hanging out with Rico JON, nym and simon.  Honestly, I forget everything we did, but we went to UFO and got snow cones AGAIN.  We probably played beet too.  I played a couple rounds of popn and technika at UFO which proved to be expensive but necessary for the day.  We also went up to pinballz and saw this giant arcade with about 100 pinball tables and 250 cabinets.   It was pretty insane and I'd love to hang there a bit, but each game is 75 cents to $1 and you'd go broke in a heartbeat there.   I'm spoiled on Chicago's 25 cent pinball heh.   After that, Rico had some shit to do, so Simon JONZ and I went to UFO again and then a place called Big Bite for food.  Fuck that place.   It is the most terrible fr you food ever.   I got a sandwich with BBQ chicken, french fries, mozz sticks and beef on it.   That's it.  It was terrible but I had to try it.   Once I died at that place, we went to Simons for a bit and then back to Rico's where we hung out and then saw off Nym when he left that night.

Monday was all about Momo and going to Killeen to visit him.  We planned to leave at 11AM but whelp, TX.   At 2:30 we got ready to go, so JONZ Rico and I jumped in the car, picked up Stephi and went.  Speaking of which, I was starting to think I wouldn't have a chance to meet her.  She was rather entertaining and made the day trip to Killeen pretty fun.  She gave me melonpan which unfortunately I left in Rico's car :<.  I really wanted to eat that, dammit.  We stopped at Sonic and a used PC place for a DDR PC before leaving Austin, but a carrying tray of rt 44 Sonic beverages, 75 minutes, 60 miles and one speeding ticket later, we arrived at Momo's.    There, we played a bit of DDR and DrumMania before heading to an asian buffet for food and getting snow cones (yup) after that.   I had to make some stops that I knew I'd regret if I didnt, so they took us all to Momo's dad's booze shop.   I finally got to see the place that Momo spent days on end at working and talking on IRC all day last summer.   Damn was it ghetto lol :>.  After that, we went back to Momo's and smoked a bunch of hookah and just sat around the table the five of us talking about random shit and what we've all done the past few days.   It was such a cool way to wrap up the trip.   I love things like that almost more than the giant parties when you can't really talk to anyone because its loud and drunk.  After we got back to Austin, we went to UFO and then got burgers before heading back to Ricos.  The rest of the night was just hanging with Rico and JON getting ready for the next morning where I had to leave :<

Tuesday I basically woke up, wet to ihop with Rico and JON and then went to the airport after failing 7 dan for the last time.   Good times.

I really want to thank everyone for your hospitality, friendliness, taking the time out to show me the city and things to do and overall having an awesome time.    I really can't wait to hang out with all of you again!

 

I realized this morning while trying to get back to sleep that I make habits with almost everything I do.  I break away from the routines once every few months to go to a convention or concert and then I have fun but end up right back in the same rut where I feel like a zombie that is just going through motions.   I've got to change that.  

I do a lot aside from work and sleep.   I don't mean that sort of repetition, but I mean that typically I wake up, go directly to work, directly home, work on [current project or hobby] have a couple beers and go to bed.   I occasionally hang with friends on the weekends and I talk to the same friends on IRC all week, but that isn't really breaking away from the typical routine and I've found that the longer you keep a routine like that, the harder it is to break.

Today I decided out of the blue to grab my bike and go get breakfast in the opposite direction of my office.   It was such a small deviation from my day to day routine, but I can't help feeling 500% more alive than I would sitting on the bus on my way to the office as I do every other day.  I ate my typical breakfast order...typical for those few times I do go out for breakfast I mean.   I just enjoyed the change and now I'm at my office an hour early after a nice bike ride and meal.

I need to remember to do this more often...but still randomly :>