No, this isn't *really* my party report. That's becoming insanely long and will probably need to be trimmed hugely. The fact is I had such a great time that I'm finding it hard to omit a single moment and thus have only made it as far as the vendor fair.
However, as Niki Flynn mentions on her blog, some of the best action occurred in at the suite parties. Specifically in Cat and Matt's suite on Sunday afternoon (and thank you both again for hosting over and over throughout the weekend).
So what happened?
Well, a group of us were sitting on the floor in the corner of the living room (seriously this suite was huge -- probably twice the size of our two bedroom apartment). Said group included Niki Flynn, HH, Bailey, me, Tony Hamilton of Florida Moonshine, Ian (the London Tanner) and his friend the lovely Aurora. A space had been left when Tony Elka had taken Kate James into another room, so Ian sat down with Tony H on one side and Aurora on the other.
Ian, who is an amazingly great story teller, launched into a tale of some sort. After a couple minutes, Tony Hamilton's quiet-yet-firm voice interrupted Ian's story with the line:
"...Ian, please."
Tony's tone suggested many things, including "We've talked about this before" or "I've already told you once."
There was a moment of confusion around the circle. The story hadn't been about Tony and, even if he had heard it before, he's very polite and it wouldn't have been like him to interrupt. Then we all collectively looked down and Ian cried:
"Oh my God! Somebody cut my hand off!"
Ian, you see, had been stroking Tony H's calf and lower thigh as he talked, mistakenly thinking it was the lovely Aurora's (Tony Hamilton has the most amazingly hairless legs -- my envy of either his waxer or genetics knows no bounds). Further, Ian had apparently been doing this stroking for at least a minute or two before Tony finally stopped him.
As the realization of the action between these two friends sunk in, we all started laughing. I mean *really* laughing, like in the sense of being unable to breathe. Ian seemed utterly stunned, sputtering,
"I'm embarrassed, really embarrassed... I'm never embarrassed. I think I may need to be alone."
And the laughing continued, most of us starting to have tears gathering in our eyes and running down our faces.
Ian turned to Tony, as if in accusation, saying "Why didn't you stop me sooner?" Tony replied, "at first I was surprised. Then I wasn't sure if I was enjoying it or not and wanted to see how far you'd go. It was when your hand moved toward my shorts..."
At this point we were all weeping.
"...Ian, please."
I'm sorry kind sirs. But there's never going to be a time when this tale isn't funny.