WAMALUG: Meeting: March 12, 2000

Jeff made the original announcement of the meeting on lugnet.org.us.wamalug

This was our first non-train play day—Jeff insisted. So mostly we sat on the floor and played. :-)

We had three new people attend: Ian met us 2 weeks ago at the Great American Train Show (GATS) where we had a display and brought along his mom and brother Wesley; Nathan, who drove up all the way from Norfolk!; and Christina. A good showing from our membership: Stephen, Chris, Jeff, Denise, Tom, Dan, Jenn, Kevin, Martha, and Rich. Rich’s son Michael—still referred to as Timmy—made it too.

Kevin brought a huge pile of bricks for sorting and introduced us to his sorting system, sparking long debates on how to sort. At one time or another, just about everyone hunched over the pile throwing pieces into various bins and seeing what treasure was buried. A great thing about sorting is seeing what pieces there are and thinking of new ways to use them. And it’s fun to just sit around and talk to others while shuffling through bricks.

Kevin also embarked on his latest creation, a more to scale Metroliner with corrugated sides (more like the real thing). Luckily for the world’s supply of corrugated bricks, he had to stop after making just two cars—check out Kevin’s Brickshelf gallery from today for more pictures.

Even though the meeting wasn’t about trains, Rich and Chris brought their stations to show off. Chris is experimenting with a Metro-like subway station to very good effect. Rich went the more traditional way with his new blue station with lots of great detail on the inside—and all pure! Rich just may be learning!

Another theme at this meeting was Castle, with both Christina and Jeff bringing their creations. Christina’s castle was very well articulated and nicely detailed on the inside. Jeff’s is just huge and still growing. They both spent a long time talking Castle and modeling ideas and playing with Castle minifigs. :-)

Chris and Dan (with help from Timmy) also collaborated on an animated stop motion ice-planet movie (the page for today’s meeting at Jenn and Dan’s cool LEGO® site which linked to four sequences is long gone).

Last but certainly not least, Dan brought his MindStorms RCX brick and its remote control and built a remote control car that he ran around the room (one version even had an auxiliary arm with which to bat people and otherwise cause havoc).

…it was an eclectic meeting in all, but a good one, too. :-)

Stephen’s further notable memories from the meeting:

• The religious debates on sorting theories—does a curved, sloped, dark-gray thin-wall belong in the dark-gray box or the slope box? :-)
• The Don’t touch me! animation extravaganza.
• Presents and gifts. :-)
• Telephones clamped to walls.
• Remote controlled mayhem (more reasons for me to get a MindStorms set!)
• Holly’s not scared of us anymore! :-)

Chris had his own list of favorites:

• My Metro station
• Vegan brownies
• Jeff’s ever-expanding castle
• Jeff’s catalogs
• Bringing home lots of cardboard to recycle
• Being able to do animations again, thanks to Dan and Jenn and Mike and Stephen, etc.
• Having Ian and family stop by, sorry you couldn’t stay longer

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