I'll be posting the second part of my "history" soon, I promise.

But tonight was so freaking fun. It started out as the usual solitary trip to the Boardwalk, where I ended up finding the long-lost Pump It Up machine. One guy who's often there, Alex, invited me to part from my money-wasting activity and join him in a rousing round of "Arena," where people run around on public property and play capture the flag, and "tag" people by stabbing them with foam knives. We played a few rounds. I met a whole bunch of cool people. A lot of them play DDR, too. None of them are from UCSC, though, but that doesn't really matter.

And then I had some rainbow ice cream from TCBY to celebrate. Whee!

So yes, a very energetic, fun night. A few more outings like this with the Arena crew and I'll really feel as if I've developed a good group of friends down here. Finally!