See, I told you I was getting better at writeups. Only a.... few...months and a half after the actual event this time. At this rate, I should be able to get it done a few days after or even during the event. Maybe even before... a man can dream.

Without further ado, I am proud to present:

A Padraig08 Writeup

A Bungie.org Production

Funded by the Team Schooly D Foundation

H.B.O.M.B.2.:RELOGRED

I've made mistakes, I've made a few. But this is certainly the worst. I've done this sort of thing before, meeting internet people. By all accounts it doesn't seem to be normal human activity, especially when you tell the other humanoids in your life that these people you are seeing are loosely confederated by the intertubes. I don't know why, but there's always an immediate association with somekind of shameful unknown, perversion, satanic ritual, or just general weirdness that causes this face to arise:

However, It's this bond from playing, chatting, and laughing together online that doesn't make it some strange anonymous trip, but more of a homecoming. And it's certainly why I keep spending money and vacation hours to venture off to LANs, meetups, and the like. You guys are worth it... or at least that's what I told myself before... HBOMB.

Doing the same old song and dance, I was in a mechanized whirlybird on my way to a Schooly D shindig. I had met Schooly before, he wasn't the online older brother everyone had known him as. But I hadn't been to a TSD cool kids super club mountain bash before, so you can expect I was a bit unsure what to expect. I arrived late that night around 11pm, I was the last one to make it in that night. When Schooly picked me up from the skyport, we chatted about programming for a bit until we made it to the hotel. There we had Deafhawk, who looks alot more like link than I remembered, Bryan Newman, who hosted us at his house for a LAN much to Kentucky's chagrin, Kanbo, who is famous the world over for his delicious shirts, TDSpiral, who is the best deviantartist I know under the age of 15, Tex, who was our resident girl for the weekend (with one girl I think we're still doing better than about 70% of LANs, if moms are off the table), and the infamous Nart.

I agree Tex, he is dreamy

I had never met Nart, but it's true what they say, you can see the K/D rolling off his body like a hypnotic aura. Nart and the folks were watching... well more witnessing Trolls 2. Even with the rifftrax, it's hard to stomach such horrendous acting. With that reminder that we are all of us vermin, it was to bed for the night, the next day would begin our trek up the mountain.

The next morning, we were on our way to the airport again to intercept i7, LSR, and Bonk... I mean BoneKin. Not long after we arrived, the group descended into chaos.

They fought like animals

The only thing we needed now was a vehicle. Unfortunately, this was the same weekend as the Sundance film festival, so Rob Riener had all the SUVs rented out. While we waited for our pragmatic leader to handle the situation, we decided the airport was a fine place to start festivities.

Airport security don't know about my ballin skills

Assembly, the best and most popular map in Halo 3

After some funny looks, and some TSA agents thinking we were some Halo know nothings (No, the needler did not come out in Halo 3, you dunce.) We made our way to the acquired cars. And thus began "The Great Salt Lake U-Turnening". I think Schooly made 5 U-Turns in a 20 minute period, which is pretty much every road in Utah.

Bro, do you even U-Turn?

Eventually we all bailed out and looked for nourishment. We scoured the area, and some cross the road and were stuck near the rails of a tram. Too bad they didn't know it was a tram.

RIPIP I7 and LSR

It had been hours of wandering, we started to go mad. Schooly thought rowboat was still alive and standing next to him.

Best hoverhand since GV

Luckily, we found California Pizza Kitchen, and Kanbo began to tempt me with his plethora of pizza.

I bet you want my pizza, Paddy-kun

This would not be the first time kanbo's bourgeois status put the group in jeopardy. You can see next how that played out when the Donner party v2: reloaded reaches bad times.

Schooly abandons us to the fate nature has chosen:

Soon after we returned to the unforgiving road. We drove for what seemed like forever, the sun was going down, things were looking bleak, was I going to die here in fucking UTAH?!

Then, like a green light flashing at the end of the bay, he appeared. The spirit of Hermes, the messenger to the gods himself, Xenos.

New Challenger: Xenos

He had lead us to the promised land, the chosen cabin. After unpacking, I needed to investigate... I had to know what secrets this cabin held. What had I traded my freedom for so swiftly? What lied in the howling dark?

The Truth Revealed:

After being debriefed by the FBI and feeling... different. I saw Xenos doing that thing we know him for doing much and very well. Seeing Wu's money at work.

Working hard for the money

And of course Shenanigans and poor picture taking took route. Observe.

Schooly Adventure 2: Newman's Big Day Out

I think we broke it

While cards happened multiple times, I decided to stack all the moments together here:

And of course, Cards were had.

I wonder if he found the hidden bonk card?

Leave your future career at the door:

To cap the night we had our Fantasy Football Award ceremony:

And the Beer Pong Tourney that ended in a way only the old sages of Lardeo, Texas could've foreseen.


Dunk Denied

The day was ogre, my life was ogre. So it goes...

Day 2

The dawn of the second day began and there was energy in the air, and steak.

Morning bulk

The morning was our time to play video games, those things that I mentioned earlier that made us less remarkable star crossed friends and more unsocialable Neanderthals who were deeply troubled by growing up in the modern world #90sTrubs

The stage is set, and outputing at 720p

After some games, a challenge began, a tourney if you will. On one side:

Team TSD Omega

On the other:

Team BryHawk

TSD Omega won the Halo 2 off and were proclaimed, "Werld Stars"

Now that game time was over, it was game time feat. Skiing. We ventured over to Brighton to play in the snow.
(Author's Note: play is misused in this sentence.)

"Alright, the loser has to do a humiliating dare"

Bonker status: Clonked

Did I mention I've never ski'd before? No? Well it went about as well as you'd imagine.

But, eventually, we made it back to the lodge for some overpriced beer and pictures.

TSDActual this is TSDUltra: #getrekt, over.

Team Sanic: Lifting for Jesus

After our day of adventure and "fun", we went back to find Team Comfy right where we left them, give or take some algae.

Team Comfy thoroughly using the Comfytorium

There was some more games, but we were beat so the night ended as it usually does... at the bottom of a bottle.

[END SCENE]

Day 3

Being not as sore as I remember, I awoke to the sounds of fooball being dealt out in the yard.

Snow Football, a game of lions...

I quickly donned my gear and head out to show the kiddo's how the 6'3'' Steel City boy plays snow football. It took both Nart and Schooly to stop my leviathan steps toward victory.

And snakes...

In the final moments, Kanbo who was injured for being a total wimp, sat on the sidelines and caught the ball throw ILLEGALLY to him, he just so happened to be lounging in the End-Zone Cafe. I brought it to the official's attention, and learned the hard way how much of a money game this had become. He turned a blind eye to justice, and with it my resignation to the game.

After more video games and excitement, we suited up in our fancy (read as: not as nerdy) duds and went to Park City to eat at a fancy establishment that suited our fanciness.

Fancy eats for the creeps

Good Foods for the croods

All I know is fine dining and breathing

The best part was because of it being Sundance weekend, and us having a large group in a back room away from the commoners, people started asking the waiters if someone famous was back there. Our cover was blown, we had to secure the asset. We moved quickly.

Only known photo of Schooly being ushered out of the building

Then we rushed home to do the HBOMB Secret Santa...

Not before the Comfytorium held the Schoolyb owl: Fistful of Clonkers

1v1 for all the chips

Months earlier, I had drawn the name of Schooly himself for Secret Santa. I was nervous, what do you get the man who has and has done it all? Then the thought took shape, I'll just show him his own life. I wrote it and wove it into song, years of failure as a song writer led to a deep depression. So I gave up music and made this video.

Original Video Presentation

Schooly Cam

After the live video presentation was over, and Schooly was proud of me. I recieved my present from Tex. It was a inviso Spartan figure, and homemade Batman pillow cases, which still house my ungerus head to this day.

After the Santas were unsecreted, the choice began.

A) Drink

B) Play Shrek 2 with Nart

So the drinking began!

And soon, Nart used option A to solve option B

Nart sharing a woeful tale of ogres and godmothers

Drinking to forget

I remember there being a lengthy video of drinking games and jokes that would put those watching in a good humor, but alas the TSD Future Career Crew axed it's release. Adding to it's mysterious allure.

Mutually assured destruction

I can't fully remember what was said and what lead to the two iron patriots to do battle, but the moment was upon us.

(Warning: I'm pretty knurd in this video, and in retrospect am pretty damn annoying, viewer discretion advised)

The real 1v1, for all the marbles

The crowd roars, hungering for blood

And Schooly won honor for all the boys back home.

Lord Champion is named Captain Global

Having an early day tomorrow and not really giving that many fucks, the night turned to black and it was all ogre.

Day 4

The dawn of the final day, a wealth of sad feelings wash over me. I consult my conscience and all I hear is "Regret, Regret, Regret"

The message repeats.

There will always be a morning after

So memories, such cry

So we packed up and said good bye to a good cabin and a wonderous weekend.

Xenos stayed back, bound to Provo by a gypsy curse, while the rest of us shoved off for the Spaceport. The flight home wasn't so lonely as I discovered i7 would accompany me on my 1st departing flight.

But it was over, we all knew that.

It was something else, like nothing I had ever been to, I know it sounds cliche, but I mean... I don't know how else to describe it. I've done LANs, I've loved LANs, I continue to love every minute I get to spend in this community and making new and stronger friends. This was no exception. HBOMB was a weekend of fun, laughs, and bliss. And for the older I get and less time to give to the passion that bought all of us together, that is something I truly treasure.

This last video is all the extra footage that scrapped together into one montage.

Some of the B-Roll set to nice musica:

We'll see when I can get a Smokey Mountain LAN + PAX East writeup done, if this is any sign, it'll be during PAX Prime.

Don't go changing ladies and gents,

Paddy

P.S.------------------------
Rest of the pictures here:

http://imgur.com/a/2lz7Y#0

Tex's writeup: http://carnage.bungie.org/haloforum/halo.forum.pl?read=1191059

Free Destiny Alpha access from our good friend .deej: http://bit.ly/1hC7TYC