It’s really weird writing about the 2nd half of the con 3 days later. I still haven’t caught up on sleep, it’s 11:51am, gotta be up at 7am… !@#$ it I’m writing this out of my system. August 7th was…. Friday… I got up to Friday morning…. Okay! So Friday I slept in and took the day off but still ended up in the office briefly for some stuff then grabbed food and checked into the hotel. Went to Cornish Pasty Co for dinner with friends after being in a depressing slump/nap for a couple hours. Seeing them helped and I met even more awesome people. Then went to Bally’s for the first time and missed the talks again.. it was dead. Went to the chill out area, ran into other friends, heard the Unlocked party was bad, heard the McAffee party was crap, glad I didn’t go. Was walking out of the chill area and this guy asks if we drink and when we said yeah invited us to follow him down a hall. What? I was highly entertained thinking this is either going to be awesome or terrible. Friend from work questions whether or not we’re going to be murdered. We end up in a room with people and a lot of free alcohol. They looked for a conference room that was left unlocked and threw an impromptu party. The best part was the fact that it was in the social engineering village. It couldn’t have been more perfect and appropriate if they had tried. So this one guy would go back out and recruit people to come party when the goons weren’t around. I started texting friends “Do you know where the social engineering village is? Tell no one, make sure goons aren’t around to see you walk down to the side entrance, knock on the door four times.” We had the chairs all over the place in random groups and at one point I was so happy to say four people were there because it was my fault. It was really good… until the party died down. Then we started to wander and went out to the Queercon party at the pool… cause better music. We walked around… it was okay I guess. Then we sat at a table and chilled for a while and talked, and this one dude was spazzing cause the kiosk that manages the lockers was reset or being stupid after midnight and people couldn’t get their stuff back. Security was taking forever and trying to get a locksmith out, but this is a hacker con, so our friends started lock picking, and more friends looked at the kiosk. One friend got one locker to open despite it being double sided wafers and not having the right tools to do it. He kept saying he as embarrassed he couldn’t get any other locks and I was like dude you got one without the appropriate tools, that’s badass. So the kiosk… the group got to reboot from the back and then it went to Windows 7 and we tried to get to admin but realized the kiosk user had an expired password and was showing old password, new password, confirm password. We tried a bunch of simple stuff then left the old and new passwords blank… the password was blank… *blinks* So we got in, rebooted a few more times, the lights on the lockers went green, yellow, then red, then off. People watched anxiously hoping to get their stuff back. I think the kiosk got shorted… it was already a dusty cluster !@#$ of cables. The hackers actually started cleaning up the cables while trying to hack the system, other than the technically shorting it part… and it was already janky… they were leaving it in the same or better condition regarding cable management… I know… they obviously cared more than the dodgy technicians who left the password blank, let it expire, and wadded up the cables and then slammed it in the chassis. This one security dude in a suit, management, some dude, starts walking up while on a cell phone, we all back away from the lockers and go back to our table and other people are hovering around chatting in ear shot. We hear the guy panicing “but it was on and working last time he was there.” This had been going on for over an hour, other security guards had been around and not cared, locksmith never showed or might have after we left, idk. I dropped a friend off at a place they got on Airbnb, went and got Robertos tacos at 5am with another friend then got him back to his hotel, filled the gas tank and finally made it back to my hotel. My face didn’t hit the pillow until 6am. OMG I was ded. Like d. e. d. ded.
Saturday I was getting texts at like 9am asking where I was cause peeps were at the con for talks… I was like… omg only 3 hours of sleep. I hadn’t figured out how to put the burner iPhone on silent and it kept vibrating on the nightstand, a couple times it scared me awake and I thought I was gonna have a heart attack. Seriously, those things buzz louder on wooden counters louder than Samsung phones do… wtf iPhone. I was all… I am not beloved, this iPhone doesn’t have to wake me up… I learned really fast how to silence that !@#$. I actually learned how to get through a couple menus and spazzed when I found all the cute emojis, and liked the messenger when you texted other iPhone users. Having to toggle back and forth between droid and iPhone…. I was considering upgrading to an iPhone next time around…. w t f happened. Idk, I’m a little concerned. Although… everything has vulnerabilities, Apple does a good job with security when it comes to the apps they approve and ios isn’t so bad and.. fml. I sent the text hey… I got in at 6am I need more sleep and got the response “okay.” So I slept then felt guilty about how long I was mia and showered then went and got brunch.. only I made it 20 past 2pm and missed brunch so I got other stuff which is cool I guess, then went to con and again missed talks. It was dead. I wondered around the contest area, found some peeps I knew and was in the chill area for a while, then we went up to the presidential sweets to the different parties. They had full bars, kegs, pin ball , mini remote control helicopters, ridiculous robot wars made from modified kids toys, like toys for itty bitty kids. They had a pay phone, idk where it came from, they had a bunch of tacos from Taco Bell. We wondered from party to party then sobered up getting Johnny Rockets downstairs then went back up and did it all over again, and I was down for the count. I didn’t make it past a certain point and was taken back to my hotel and in my bed by like 10pm at the latest. I missed the freak fest pool party despite drunkenly walking around in my swimsuit at parties the last few hours. Which sucked cause I wanted to go to this party and swim but later I was told it sucked. So yay for good sleep.
Sunday I woke up and had to check out and we went back to the event. My original plan was to transfer stuff from my friend’s rental to my car but we decided to wander the con again. I grabbed an epic sign and pretended to be an employee at the company who hosted the party I went to earlier in the week. Got called out by one goon, showed them my badge, called it good. Walked around the vendor area I had missed because it was in a completely different area… it was weird. Went upstairs to the presidential suits but the doors to get through weren’t opening and you needed a key for it… so I guess that was over. But there was one skytalk still going. I need to look this speaker up, he was epic. This was like going to church on Sunday for hackers… with whiskey. He was making a lot of great points, and then he would yell drink! And drink! When he asked a question and someone answered he’d invite them to come up to the table to pour themselves a drink. All the talks have a table with alcohol near the podium. He asked a question and one guy raised his hand. The speaker called him a liar, said he just wanted a drink,t hen invited him up to get a drink. Then the speaker asked if anyone else just wanted a drink and I shot my hand up so he invited me to come up. I poured myself a shot of whiskey, waited for him to finish his sentence and held my cup up so we could do a shot together, then faced the crowed and held my cup high, they were awesome. Walked back to where I was sitting with the huge sign I acquired. There was some wandering after that then we went to sushi for lunch. After that we were just done so I called it and went home.
Monday felt like death… but some random things.
1. Rio was a better layout than Paris/Ballys. Having the vendor and some tracks separated from other conference rooms was weird.
2. The pool at Rio was better with the beach and hot tubs… whatever.
3. I did statistically impossible things two years in a row. Last year was not getting laid. This year was making out with a girl at the party.
4. She found me on okc online. The guy she was with was her bf. He was cool with it. They called me the “highlight of their weekend.” Awe.
5. I’ve managed another piece of shenanigans three years in a row.
6. Last year my focus was all on the talks schedule. This year was a 180 just focusing on the vendor and party schedule and rsvp-ing to a bunch of stuff. I decided to rsvp to anything that sounded remotely interested so I’d have a bunch of options and then decide on the fly what to attend and what to skip.
7. My sleep schedule is so jacked up and I’m tired. It’s 12:26AM on Wednesday morning.. after an almost 11 hour day… nooo.
8. I can’t believe I’m considering iPhone… damn emojis.
9. I successfully invited myself to an event two years in a row now.
10. Buying the badge wasn’t worth it this year because I only used it twice-ish? I learned some things if I want to go back next year. Things like a couple weeks before the event Looks at the talks schedule and the party schedule, picks things that are interesting for both, then see if you think you’d rather be awake for A or B… or a little of A and B… don’t buy the badge until you go to a party or two and see if it’s something you can replicate. A local con exists a couple days prior. Check that out. The more professional con that happens before this con is more money than I want to deal with.. and their classes are above my level… for now. Find their parties because you meet the coolest people ever. Take more vacation time. Book the room at the venue because the convenience is worth more than the quiet… but book the room away from the pool and away from the main strip… or high enough up on the strip side because the pool is still louder. If the badge isn’t hackable split the price of one with someone so you can both go to talks you’re interested in when you feel like it and trade off, no one is there long enough to need it at all times the entire event. I was informed more than once, including by a friend with a black badge, most people don’t purchase badges. With how little I used it I felt like it was a waste of money this year compared to last year, but at the same time I made up for it with everything I did in the last week and the stuff I pulled and the friends I made… and all the free alcohol and food everywhere. Some people said this year the talks weren’t worth it and they probably won’t go back and they don’t really party. I was like aweee. And I guess now, I party one week out of the year. lol It was like going back on 2nd shift, it was an instant schedule change on my sleeping habits… dammit.
Something else really sweet was my work wifey mentioning last week how Tyler said I reminded him of all the things he likes about women. We grabbed tacos and got caught up, I felt bad I missed his birthday last Wednesday cause of the events.. he randomly brought it up when we were eating in the park and said that I’m her work wife, but he’s claimed me as his friend wife, and he said he could try and describe me but movies do a better job sometimes, and he thought about it and said the movie Juno already did it. I saw that movie when it first came out and barely remember it. He brought up the quote “I was thinking more, like, graphic designer… mid thirties, you know, with a cool Asian girlfriend who, like, dresses awesome and rocks out on the bass guitar. But I don’t want to be too particular.” I was all.. that’s cool but idk how to play.. I mean I wish I did. He said he could teach me lol. Or like… rocking out to guitar hero could count, and I was all I got pretty decent at that years ago. So it works?
It’s 12:47am. Frak.