September 27, 2003

3:39 AM

Drink! Police action! More drink! Noise! Drink! Ice Cream! You thought it would never happen but you were wrong. The first ever MeFi UK meetup in merrie old Oxford, England. Photography occured...
posted by i_cola to MetaFilter gatherings at 3:39 AM (46 comments total)

As I was saying in another thread, do not believe a word of of wha...)t you read, the police busting me was a setup - after all, I DO know everyone in Oxford (England, for those who caught us on #mefi IRC last night)...
posted by dash_slot- at 3:48 AM on September 27, 2003

looks like you had fun, but what, no uk mefi girls...? whoa, Mint Sauce is gooood lookin'...!
posted by t r a c y at 3:53 AM on September 27, 2003

I hvea a ahgnvoer. Just a shout out really to say... good time had by all...
posted by seanyboy at 3:53 AM on September 27, 2003

There certainly was, um, one uk mefi girl, but I don't think she was in any of i_cola's photos - Spandex! Oh, and ciderwoman turned out to be a man. Lots more photos to come soon of other people at the meet and shoutouts to mefiers in absentia. And over to darilo...
posted by adrianhon at 3:57 AM on September 27, 2003

just another shoutout really. There should be a rule against posting when hungover. If it takes you more than five minutes to type a coherent sentence, don't post. bleh.
posted by DaRiLo at 4:02 AM on September 27, 2003

Yup....more pix & shouts to come...spandex is hiding at the back of this photo. And there was Mrs i_cola who is almost an honourary MeFite.

Geekiliy enuff, we're all sitting round a table in a cafe posting this babble.
posted by i_cola at 4:08 AM on September 27, 2003

looks like a good time! How was the band/performance/whatever it was? and you should shout out to some of us next time tho--unless Bush is an absent friend?
posted by amberglow at 6:23 AM on September 27, 2003

OK guys, I've just gone and reorganised all the UKMeet pages at the wiki. I've put up a gallery of all images of the meetup currently online at UKMeetOxford1 and other people can also link to theirs from that page (as well as adding captions!). My own photos are in that gallery...

amberglow: plenty of other shout-outs were made at the meetup, photos will probably be online soon from other people :)
posted by adrianhon at 6:30 AM on September 27, 2003

Wait, you guys were from metafilter? I thougt you were all in the band.
posted by ciderwoman at 6:34 AM on September 27, 2003

Wow, I never knew there were so many fellow MeFites here in Oxford.

Nor did I know this meet even existed. Oh well. :c)
posted by Mwongozi at 8:07 AM on September 27, 2003

amber: You were shouted! By me! I think dash_slot has most of the shouts...pressure's on John ;-) And I think the plan was for chrismear to get the SNE recording uploaded to MeFiMusic.

I have to say I really enjoyed the gig. Being a clubbing DJ-type it's ages since I went to a dingy room over a pub to watch a bunch of 'erberts make a racket so I've not got a lot of recent experience as to what is 'down' with 'the kids' on the gee-tar wrangling front but this was a laugh.

Anything with a shouty bloke on a megaphone is worth a listen in my experience...especially if he's giving shouts to Matt Haughy & ColdChef (and possibly others that I couldn't make out).
posted by i_cola at 8:59 AM on September 27, 2003

Make that Haughey
posted by i_cola at 9:06 AM on September 27, 2003

Dang, the Oxford crowd looks cool enough to hang with the Noo Yawkers...almost.:)

On the subject of meetups, some of the New York contingent is going to see the Zambonis at Pete's Candy Store in Brooklyn tonight. All NYC mefites are welcome. Put on a hockey jersey and be there. I'll be the guy in the LA Kings #99 jersey.
posted by jonmc at 9:10 AM on September 27, 2003

OK, heres a coupla pix for yez: the incomparable spandex & an overedited mess o' shoutouts...

Woulda been quicker, but had to d/l FTP, jpeg compression, winzip, blah.

All I can say is I had the most fun in ages, from the shirt-splattering noodles and a friendly word from the coppers, to the most-excellent Sunnyvale Noise Experiment and geeky gadget fun. I really can't wait till the recording is uploaded (chrismear: hope you are OK after the 2am tyre blowout...)
posted by dash_slot- at 9:21 AM on September 27, 2003

The skippy the bush kangaroo story that all in Coco's had missed earlier this week.
posted by biffa at 9:24 AM on September 27, 2003

amber: You were shouted!
yay! my first shoutout! thanks i-cola! (i may be there in feb.--i'll do a day trip to brighton and we'll meetup)

i can't wait to hear the SNE.
posted by amberglow at 9:29 AM on September 27, 2003

Yup, I'm absolutely fine, just a bit tired... 1 hour's sleep in the passenger seat in a motorway service station will do that to you...

I will get my photos up (yup, all four of them) soon... don't worry, none of them are too embarassing (unlike this one -- how did my belly get that huge!?) And more importantly, I will try MP3-ize and uploadify the gig recording later tonight. The recording actually came out pretty damn well, if-I-do-say-so-myself... the music sounds good, and you also have the added ambience of pre-set MeFi conversation.... although unfortunately there is a break of a couple of minutes when my battery ran out, and I was trying to find a power outlet.

(Yes, I had charged it beforehand, but then forgot to put the 'Hold' switch on before putting it in my bag that afternoon, so I now have a MiniDisc containing 284 silent tracks of varying lengths. Maybe this is an unconscious artistic statement.)

Anyway, yes, I had a really fantastic time and would definitely do it again. Look out for the recording later on today!
posted by chrismear at 10:03 AM on September 27, 2003

Looks like you all had a fantastic time, up to and including the obscene gestures in the last photograph... we didn't have police at the Vancouver Mefi meetup, but we did have people with spinning torches on fire on the beach. That was nice.
posted by jokeefe at 10:26 AM on September 27, 2003

Good night - wish I could have stayed on longer but have had to be in the office all day. Good effort to all involved in the organising, keeping the Wiki up to date, etc, much appreciated.
posted by biffa at 10:56 AM on September 27, 2003

jon: I'll be with you guys next May...get planning ;-)

amber: Damn! I'll be down under in Feb!
posted by i_cola at 11:28 AM on September 27, 2003

Yay! Silly dances! I knew I could count on you guys... Thanks, seanyboy!
posted by taz at 11:58 AM on September 27, 2003

Yeah, huge props to my mainman adrianhon and his mad wiki skillz - that kept it all together, and was entirely his idea. I was happy to bring a little local knowledge to the mix, and glad that the itinerary for the night turned out satisfactorily. Crucially, the gig was worth it on it's own.

Meeting a couple of my pikey ex-clients on the Cowley Road in the company of a bunch of mainly male geeks got an interesting comment: "hi, john, are they all, y'know, kinda like..." /flicks limp wrist!]...

Actually, bumping into my best friend's brother in the bar of the Wheatsheaf, and explaining the concept of MefiUK Meetup to him was amusing in itself -- 'Web-community-meets-in-Real-Life-and-The-Band-are-in-on-it' kinda blew him away. Plus, we were documenting it all...[--> friend has a brainfart]

Aah, memories...

More pix:

'I thought you oughta know...'
Symbolic Shoutout'
'He has a wicked look about him'
'Q & A'
'Darilo & adrianhon'
posted by dash_slot- at 1:07 PM on September 27, 2003

jon: I'll be with you guys next May...get planning ;-)
amber: Damn! I'll be down under in Feb!

i'll see you in may for our meetup then : >
posted by amberglow at 1:44 PM on September 27, 2003

'Darilo & adrianhon'

Hey Dash!. And there was me thinking I would actually get more than one photo of me other than the back of my head.
posted by DaRiLo at 2:09 PM on September 27, 2003

Now, how did you find that....?
posted by dash_slot- at 2:14 PM on September 27, 2003

Hey, good crowd, well up on clean-living fun and looking cool as fuck. Damn, it brought back happy memories of Oxford and England in general, I can tell you!

Thanks for the shout-out!

Couldn't imagine the old MeFi without you big lugs. :)
posted by MiguelCardoso at 3:16 PM on September 27, 2003

Though you did forget the Saint part of my name, you bastids.
posted by MiguelCardoso at 3:20 PM on September 27, 2003

You'll notice there's always one sad sod who turns up with their notebook to any meetup involving more than 3 people from the Internet ;-)
posted by wackybrit at 8:41 PM on September 27, 2003 [1 favorite]

Why, thank you for the shoutout, friends. If the evening was indeed 'Drink! Police action! More drink! Noise! Drink! Ice Cream!' then you know I was there in spirit(s)...
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 11:15 PM on September 27, 2003

More Pictures.
posted by seanyboy at 3:00 AM on September 28, 2003

Have just posted my four pictures to the Wiki.

MiniDisc transfer is happening as we speak... results will be uploaded by, ooh... six pm London time at the latest.
posted by chrismear at 5:14 AM on September 28, 2003

Thanks seanyboy, the band certainly rocked! Surprised you still have a login here, considering the seditious nature of your shoutout...(",) Mind you, I rather like the impresionistic feel of the dash_slot-/seanyboy CameraWars pic [none of mine were worth posting, I'm afraid, tho' maybe I will link what is decent enough on the Wiki, as well as above.]

I'm not at all surprised by i_cola's NYC/Korean massive references... he's off on a world tour soon! (And Mrs. i_cola - Bud + gig = old hippy fun. I'm sure we will meet again, don't know where, don't know when... you put up with ubergeekery & only bailed out for half an hour at breakfast next day - good on yer!)

darilo - what's with the eyelids??

chrismear: my breath is baited. Will they sound as good as I remember? Thanks for the effort, tho' - you're a star.
posted by dash_slot- at 6:31 AM on September 28, 2003

Well it appears that me and flash photography don't mix. Don't cameras have a light intensity setting other than "interrogation lamp"? It looks as though maybe I'll just have to stick those original shots of my hair in the album.
posted by DaRiLo at 7:34 AM on September 28, 2003

Arse! The recording gets about 30 minutes in, and then the MiniDisc starts thrashing about every three seconds, playing a snatch of music, then thrashing... Dunno what on earth has happened to it, but it looks like it's gonna need some wrangling before I can get the whole recording off it... if at all. :(

But the pre-concert nattering, and a good 15/20 minutes of music are A-OK, so I will try and get those up this evening before I go away for a few days.
posted by chrismear at 8:24 AM on September 28, 2003

Okay, here we go. Presenting, raw and unedited, 36 minutes of music, chatter, and ambient noise:

mefi1.mp3 (33.5 MB)

Once I have a bit more time, and a working MiniDisc player, I will provide a nicely chopped-up-by-track version, but at the moment I thought I'd put up a quick, big file for the fatally curious.
posted by chrismear at 9:41 AM on September 28, 2003

Chris - if your server starts getting hammered too much, I can put up a mirror.
posted by adrianhon at 10:03 AM on September 28, 2003

Thx, chris - streaming now on a tinny laptop from work (as my main machine is farked up, and my 2nd string has no soundcard!)

Cheers!
posted by dash_slot- at 10:15 AM on September 28, 2003

"starts thrashing about every three seconds, playing a snatch of music, then thrashing... Dunno what on earth has happened"

That's what it's supposed to sound like.
posted by ciderwoman at 3:42 PM on September 28, 2003

hehehe, and that's how I remember it!
posted by dash_slot- at 4:33 PM on September 28, 2003

ciderwoman: ha ha

adrianhon: Thanks for the offer. Hopefully it should be okay -- it's on my high-demand webserver (300 GB bandwidth / month, mmmm).
posted by chrismear at 2:20 AM on September 29, 2003

Great meet, great music, great beer .... its all a happy blur, especially after this point ;)

Many, many thanks to nylon and spandex (where ever you are) for the lift home. I apologise in advance if I snored all the way back.
posted by MintSauce at 2:54 AM on September 29, 2003

Damn...I can't believe you didn't shout me...I did a line for you guys.....honorary like...
posted by mattr at 3:48 AM on September 29, 2003

Who are you people?
posted by spandex at 5:21 AM on September 29, 2003

You never can tell what sort of interesting people you are going to find at a MetaFilter meet-up.
posted by onlyconnect at 6:14 PM on September 29, 2003

Shame I missed it! I stayed in London for an Exploding Cinema event, and what a mistake that was! Oh well, next time I will know better...
posted by cbrody at 7:44 PM on September 29, 2003

OK, guys & gals - before we drop off the main page, I just wanna say one last time....

THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR A WONDERFUL MEETUP!

Let's do it again sometime soon....Bath? Nottingham? Wales?
Who knows, but I'll do my damndest to be there.

Cheers!
posted by dash_slot- at 3:31 PM on October 1, 2003