ShmooCon 2006, Night 1

Uh, I actually miss the religious groups that were here last year. I mean, they left us alone, we left them alone. This year, there's at least three MLM groups in the upstairs conference rooms. There's still the old-time religion style of singing, clapping and haleluyah'ing, it just doesn't involve God this time. The motivation for this bunch is "money".

The Shmoozers see the Shmoo'ers as "opportunities". The Shmoo'ers see the Shmoozers as "victims". Things only get uglier if you mix in $4 beers, $7 mixed drinks, the free MLM-brand hi-caffeine drinks (ala Red Bull-dosage) and their free pizza ("while you eat that, let me tell you about...").

Oh, and we can't forget the ping-pong shooters that various attendees were carrying. By the end of the night, every time there was a loud poompf from one of the shooters, the Shmoozers would duck and look to see where it was coming from.

To make matters worse, it wasn't just one MLM group. It was three rival groups! One even had a youth group that sat on the floor behind the escalator and said things like "My goal is...", prior to being applauded by the rest of the group.

In any case, we're proably going to hear about this during Beetle's "Administrative Remarks" first thing in the morning.