So the MOB party was last night. It was the first one we’ve done in about 18 months. I expected sort of a “rebuilding season” kinda vibe to the party, with maybe 40-odd people showing up.
I counted a total fo a little over 70 over the course of the evening, with probably a little over fifty in the room at one time at the party’s peak.
Being the peripatetic sort (and having heard once upon a time it’s a good host’s job to make sure everyone meets everyone else), I did my best to actually try to meet, if not have a meaningful conversation, with everyone there, just to get an idea of how showed up, and from where.
My attempts to get everyone are usually laughably incomplete, but here goes:
- Lileks, of course, with the Giant Swede and a significant-looking other.
- Bob Davis of KSTP-AM
- Laura and David Hemler, fans, activists, and longtime friends of the NARN
- Joel Rosenberg and Felicia Herman
- Gary M. Miller, Jeff Kouba and (I believe) Paul from Truth Vs. The Machine
- Casey, an intern reporter from The Daily Planet
- Jeff Rosenberg of the
Daily LiberalMN Publius - Mini-Flash 2.0 – Flash’s (Centrisity) doppleganger.
- Tom “Swiftee” Swift
- Jordan Mason – formerly of the Taxpayers League – and lucky guy Mark Wernimont.
- The entire Night Writer clan; John “Night Writer” Stewart, the Reverend Mother, Mall Diva, Tiger Lily and Uncle Ben.
- Mr. D – of blog and comment section fame.
- Former MOB Mayor Andy “Andee Applecowskee” Aplikowski and Carrie (bka “Spurringirl”).
- Enge and his daughter
- Doug “Crossword Bebop” Bass and at least one of his kids
- Half of the McCollow/Pivec/Hubble clan; Katie (formerly of Yucky Salad with Bones) and husband Mike, sister MLP (from Casual Sundays) and – !!! – husband Jay Pivec, who was my college’s basketball coach back in 1984, whom I’d not seen in 25 years, who is the head coach at Minneapolis Community Technical College, and who earlier that every evening had won the game that’d send MCTC to nationals, along with the youngest sister and Katie’s twin/friend (whose names both elude me yet again).
- King Banaian and Janet B of SCSU Scholars, and King’s friend Ken Doyle.
- A couple of NARN2 Webstream viewers, including Wendy “Tolowen” and a couple others whose names have dodged me.
- Comment section regular Just Plain Angry
- Jamie Delton of Delton Digest and his friend, er, Shawn/Sean (sp?)
- Marty Andrade
- John “Policy Guy” LaPlante
- David Strom and Margaret Martin
- Duke Powell, former Burnsville state rep and new blogger at Ambulancedriver.com, who had to leave early to, well, drive an ambulance.
- Matt Abe of North Star Liberty
- Chief, Guy and Lassie from Freedom Dogs
- Fresch Fisch
- Joe “Learned Foot” Tucci from Kool Aid Report
- Leo Pusateri of “Psychmeister’s Ice Palace” and, er, Mrs. Pusateri
- Marty Stanchfield, promotions whiz, with the hit of the evening, the Obama spinny-head doll (Thanks, Marty!)
- Kevin Ecker
- Chris from Rocket’s Red Glare
- Barry Hickethier
- the Other Chris, from BuddhaPatriot
- And of course, Mayor Johnny Roosh and the first lady, Mrs. Roosh!
- Commenter Jim C.
I apologize to anyone I missed; I did my best to reconstruct the list from pure, overtaxed memory.
Special thanks to Terry and Virginia Keegan,who made room for the party after I, ahem, neglected to tell them we’d be descending on them (and thanks to Barry for tipping them off last week, averting disaster…)
We’ll do another one this summer, likely at a more spacious location (details being arranged).
And the long-joked-about MOB Day at the Range – wherein a MOB party would start at a firing range and move to a bar of some sort (in that order and no other), long spoke of tongue-in-cheek, actually has a better-than-even chance of happening this year. Stay tuned.
UPDATE: D’oh. And Eric Black from the MinnPost.
Was disappointed to see the MinnPost’s David Brauer didn’t show up to recreate his ambulance scene with Duke. Also hoping some of the MPR crowd can make it next time!
UPDATE 2: Yep, Brad and Jen Carlson were there, too. I reconstructed the list by who I saw sitting where; the Carlsons’ table had all sorts of people who were harder for me to remember, so I mentally kept going “I’ll get back to them!” every time I typed out names from that table. But I didn’t. Until now, I mean…
Thanks for putting this together Mitch, quite the turnout, quite packed without the patio. King Banaian needs to step up next, hold one of his St. Cloud events.
Great to see pioneers again like Citizen Jo (Jo’s Attic) and meet a new promising blogger, Fresch Fisch.
I would have attended, but since I was there last Saturday with the evil Anti-Strib crue, and next Saturday I will be warming myself in Sarasota, I decided to stay home the The Most Important Person in the World. She hates having to get all dolled up on a Saturday. It’s down time.
Wait a minute, where was Broadkorb? Doing more exposing?
Thanks all for another wonderful event. Mitch, you forgot to list Craig Westover, a.k.a. Captain Fishsticks, of the Minnesota Free Market Institute. Otherwise you were the perfect host!
To quote Groucho, I would never join a club that would have me as a member, except for the MOB!
Facebook members, see my Mob Party page for post-mortems and maybe some of Lassie’s photos.
I wonder if that scrawny, pencil-necked little twerp that was pressed against the wall all night could have been teh Little Peevee? Of course it could have been any Democrat, they all look the same.
It occurs to me that there might have been enough “iron” in the room to host a night at the range right then and there.
Sorry I had to leave so soon. For some reason my normal wake up time of 3am seemed especially early this morning. Thanks for setting this up.
BTW, looks like you left out Eric Black, who I greeted while walking out the door.
Had a good time, held court with King for a bit, and met some other really cool people too. I’m hoping to be less shy next time and meet more cool people! You did a great job, Mitch! 🙂
Is right term? maybe “had an audience” with the King is better. heehee
It was a treat, Mitch, especially to finally meet so many bloggers that I admire, like Leo, Chief, Jeff Kouba, Craig Westover, to name just a few. Oh, and Flash too. Can’t leave out Flash.
Sorry I missed it Mitch.
Hey Mitch, thanks for the shout ou—–Oh, wait. You didn’t mention my gal and I. Well, fine. See if I ever darken your doorstep again.
😉
Well, thank you very much, Mitch. You’ve always been more than gracious to me, and you were a very gracious host last (Saturday) night to everyone else, as well.
Mitch did a great job as host, and clearly enjoyed the heck out of it. Feature, not bug.
Great party Mitch I enjoyed meeting you and I’m also impressed with your name recognition. I hope you enjoy the Obama Spinning Head. Should you need a few extras to give-a-way as prizes on the Norther Alliance show just let me know and I’ll get them to Kate at the station.
Thanks Mitch, si senor, ’twas a fun evening. I know I’m in the minority, but I am a big fan of name tags. What!! What did she say?? Stick it in a hole, lady, we’re not wearing name tags!
I get it, OK people? I do. No one likes to make a sticky mess of their brand new shirt from Kohl’s with some dopey name tag, I hear you. It’s just that some people (who aren’t me) don’t always remember who everyone is and while that same person, who still isn’t me, tries to introduce itself (I say “itself” to protect the person who is not me) to people she or he may have met before, or maybe would like to meet for the first time, but by the time she or he or whomever has worked up the nerve to do that, the person she or it or whatever wanted to meet has left.
And then the person accidentally shatters yet another one of Virginia’s wine glasses on the floor.
So in order to keep Keegan’s wine glass supply healthy, I’m just saying, name tags might help.
I can already feel the person who isn’t me being shouted down.
“It occurs to me that there might have been enough “iron” in the room to host a night at the range right then and there.”
When you’re drinking? Awesome.
Nothing wrong with carrying while other folks are drinking, of course, and the law does allow most folks to have a beer while carrying — the limit is .04. (Since I planned on having a few, I didn’t, but . . . )
Mitch and Chief,
Thank you for your kindness in getting everyone to know one another. As a relatively new blogger, I felt all warm and fuzzy and it wasn’t just from all that stimulus money padding my pocket, either.
>>Commenter Jim C.
I think you meant me. No worries. I really didn’t know ANYONE there (except you, Mitch), and I’m not the kind of guy who goes around butting into conversations, so I headed out shortly after you dragged me around.
Too bad, I’d have loved to meet the Swift one. I love his handling of peev and AC.
And that’s miss#2 for meeting the Mayor. Dangit.
I wish my life afforded me more time to read blogs and comment. Between work and kids, I don’t get a lot of time. There are way too many blogs I’d read if I had more time. But as it is, SItD and Anti-Strib are the only ones I can barely keep up with. I manage to hit True North about once every other week, and I’d love to keep up with the Strom/Martin power duo. Of course, I miss reading the NARN wordsmith’s daily literary masterpiece bleats as well. JoelR’s gun stuff always interests me. I want to add Freedom Dogs, Lady Logician, KAR, NiGP, MDE, Bogus Gold, Speed Gibson, maybe check out Casual Sundays, etc. to the list as well
Someday…someday…