What in the world just went down?
Whatever it was, I am soooo glad that I was there. First off, as far as steemit meetups go, this one was rare! I think that there were many firsts that occured at it too. So far as I know, this meetup was the first one to include the following:
BALLOON HATS
A BOUNCY HOUSE
AN ELECTRONIC UNICYCLE
FIREWORKS
FISHING TOURNAMENT
A DRONE
PEOPLE UPVOTING RECIPES WHILE THEY ATE THE FOOD IN THE RECIPE
HACKY-SACK
I am going to try to fit this all into one post, so here it goes.
@provider
First off, I have got to thank @provider for, well, providing! This meetup was his idea and he is the one who took care of planning it and securing a location.
That location even had a park, swimming area, and playground. When you consider all of that and add in the shelter house that we used, it was an excellent location!
@Provider also provided some excellent food and beverage options. The meat in the photo above was apple-wood smoked and was extremely delicious.
@Papa-pepper brought some Lychees, Rambutan, and dried Longan fruit for everyone to try. Since I like checking out different things anyway, I thought that I would share some of these, which are among my favorites.
I also threw in some seaweed, cucumber-lime flavored rockstars, cranberry juice, and gatorade.
@Paradise-found brought his Zestful Italian Cucumber Salad and I was able to upvote the post while I served myself some. How cool is that?
@paradise-found
@Paradise-found is also the reason that we had a bouncy house! I am pretty sure that this was the first steemit meetup to have one of those at it. @Mama-pepper helped set it up, and I took photos of it for a GIF, because I am a steemian and it is what we do.
Even though the @little-pepper and other children who came to the meetup had the beach and playground, they sure took to the bouncy house. Imagine that!
Thankfully, they were still kind and helpful, and they asked if they could please use it every time that they wanted to get back in.
@Paradise-found is also working on an NFL pick contest where he will have "STEEM-lebrities" do come picks for each week. Since @papa-pepper is a "STEEM-lebrity" according to some, I did the picks for Week One! Keep your eye on the @paradise-found account for more on that.
I also took a minute to interview @paradise-found for my "Getting to Know One Another" series. I will work on getting that post out in the near future. This was especially nice, because it gave us a chance to hang out and talk a bit more. Interestingly enough, @paradise-found lives in my old hometown, but we never met one another until steemit. After talking for so long online and on the phone a bit too, it sure did not feel like the first time that we met each other in person!
FISHING TOURNAMENT?
Since the meetup was on the shore of Lake Arrowhead, I decided to put together an impromptu fishing tournament. I had some fishing poles with me anyways, and we found some worms in the woods, so all that I needed was a prize.
There, in my pocket was a troy ounce of silver, in the form of a bullion round. On the face of it was featured the U.S.S. Constitution.
Interestingly enough, on the back it read, "No state shall... make any thing but Gold and Silver coin a tender in payment of debt" from Article 1, Section 10 of the US Constitution. Hmmm.... how the times have changed. Anyway, I put the ounce of Silver up as a prize.
The tournament was to be a 1 FISH contest. Each person who wanted to (basically those with fishing licenses) had the opportunity to cast a pole and catch one fish. Whoever caught the biggest one would win.
@Papa-pepper went first and fished really hard for about one minute. Then, I caught my fish!
So far, I was in the lead and mine was the biggest!
Next up was @provider, who also fished really hard for about a minute.
Though he did see even bigger ones, he caught a small one instead, so I was still in the lead...
Until this guy came along. Just look at how the fish that @paradise-found is reeling in is bending the pole and making big splashes!
Unlike the little Bluegills that @provider and @papa-pepper caught, @paradise-found catch a bass. Unfortunately, it was the biggest.
Sure enough, it was big enough for the win! @Paradise-found was the big winner and took home the Silver!
The @little-peppers tried to win my Silver back, but unfortunately they were unsuccessful.
@jasonhenza
Now this guy was a treat. First off, he had drove up from the Chicago, IL general area, which put his jaunt at about 4 hours. Not only did he drive all the way up here, he also brought something very interesting.
I am not sure how many of you have seen one these before, but it was my first time. Interestingly enough, it is an electronic unicycle.... no, really!
Just check that thing out. If you want to see more of it, you should follow @jasonhenza, but here are two short videos that I recorded just to get you more interested about it.
Not only did @jasonhenza bring his $1500 electronic unicycle, he even let some of us try it!
I never did get the hang of it, but it was still fun.
Since this was my first time meeting @jasonhenza, I took the opportunity to interview him too. In our discussions later that night, I was impressed with how much he knew about crypto.
@Mama-pepper enjoyed meeting him too, and thought that he kind of looked like Mark Mohr, the lead singer of Christafari. I would agree.
@truconspiracy
This guy is another one of my RFL from LBS. (RFL = Real Life Friend / LBS = Life Before Steemit.) In the photo above you can see him signing our meetup board with @paradise-found.
He found out about steemit last year too, but did not get active in the community or on the platform until recently, and he is kicking himself for it. I'll be trying to interview him next weeked.
He had our own hackathon... well, actually we just played hacky-sack with one I picked up for him in Mexico. I did learn something though.
If you play hacky-sack with your giant STEEM-chain on, you could cut open your eyebrow. It did not bleed much, but it was still cut open.
RARE TREATS!
If you saw the sign up board, you may have noticed that another steemian showed up. Some of us at the meetup have known him for years.
He brought some of his fireworks to light off, which may also be a steemit meetup first.
He also brought a drone and a some very tasty beef jerky.
CLOSING THOUGHTS
When you look at this interesting group of people with balloons on their heads, it should make you consider what is going on. Here we have people to drove to another state just to hang out with some folks they met online. You also have people from the same town meeting one another because of steemit.
Even though the event was scheduled from 4 pm - 9 pm, we were still hanging out until just after 11 pm!
When balloon animals are still being made after dark, you know that it is a good party! As always, it was a blessing to attend this event and so great to meet even more steemians in person! You may want to keep an eye on some of the accounts that I mentioned above, because these are some very interesting steemians.
As always, I'm @papa-pepper and here's the proof:
proof-of-mulberry-trees-to-give-away-to-other-steemians
Until next time…
Don’t waste your time online, invest it with steemit.com
Great post.
Beautiful photos.
Cool videos.
The balloon hats are Top Notch!
Sweeeeet electric unicycle!
- Amazing, the advancement of computer dynamic control of motion devices!
Great group of people...
The food looks fab! Now I'm hungry...
The meet up looks like just too much fun...
But, far and above all else....
GREAT BEARDS!!!! 😄
Take it from someone who knows...
😄😇😄
Thanks for the real comment! I appreciate it @creatr!
Hey, @papa-pepper,
I'm always very happy to see you and your little flock doing well, both when you report news from your homestead, and when you make these road trips.
Will you be taking in the eclipse while you are traveling?
Your reports about meeting other Steemians also always get my juices flowing. I've been in communication with @captainobviou3 who is another Steemian in southern cali... He has been collecting a list of Steemers who are in the general area, and I am strongly hoping that we'll be able to put together some kind of a meet-up.
Thanks for the inspiration you provide! ;)
😄😇😄
I am planning on shipping some items to give away at that meetup.
We had planned on checking out the eclipse from in the middle of Missouri, which is where it will be viewed best in our are, but now we will be up by Lake Michigan. We will still check it out.
I'm glad to hear you'll be seeing the eclipse...
Enjoy the rest of your travels, and may they all be safe! :D
Blessings, friend!
Steemit = Love, the perfect demonstration.
Thank you @papa-pepper, this makes me wonder if anybody would be down for a future Steem-Up out here in the Rockies. A 2017 Steemit Colorado campout could be fun.
That sounds like a lot of fun. I bet that people would be excited about that!
Upvote for all the fun!
wow you , @provider , @paradise-found , @jasonhenza , @truconspiracy and @Mama-pepper had a great time indeed. Always great to meet up and show all our great steemit family. More success
It was incredible! Thanks @charles1!
welcome, keep up the good work.
That nice meeting between steemians, it is very nice to be able to observe such wonderful post of great people who belong to the community as @papa-pepper and especially my great friend @paradise-found, I congratulate great initiative
Just want to thank everyone that came and contributed to this awesome event!! And a special shout out to @papa-pepper for his excellent posting skills. Without you it wouldn't have happened! Thanks brother. I love you man!
I love you too, and thanks for the idea and all of your hard work.
wow...got refreshed from your post it self.
and i m on my office table working in saturday too..
That looked like fun, thanks. I vote for a Steemit meetup in Arkansas next fall at or near that place where @mericanhomestead picked peaches. Pick some peaches then eat some peach cobbler or peach dump cake or any other yummy peach dishes. The peachiest Steemit meetup ever.
I second this idea.
What a minute! You and @mama-pepper listen to christafari? I thought I was the only white guy in Arkansas that listened to them. SaWeet!
Yeah, we dig Christafari for sure!
Awesome. I haven't heard any of their new stuff like in the video you posted. I have their Soul Fire and Valley of Decision albums. The title track and boomerang are my two fav tracks of the first album and this is probably my fav off the second.
An extraordinary simplicity, meet up with family.
Is this a steemit family meet up @papa-pepper ? Hahaha
So interesting when meet up with their own family and the steemian. Good luck @papa-pepper
Spending time with family is so much fun. Happy weekend
What a great meet-up @papa-pepper ,you both enjoy!God Bless
very nice party, yeahh! If I could find crypto-friends here, in Crimea (Russia), I'll organize the same meet-up for sure :))
Hello and welcome, I am new on the site , please follow me @hassanemaad and vote I flow you and together we can succeed
Good luck my friend
wow
Hi @papa-pepper it sure looks like you guys had a lot of fun. A Steemit get together could work in my neck of the woods too, provided we could raise enough Steemians in the area. Our towns are quite far apart so I think a I should post a request to teamsouthafrica and see what comes of it. I like the outdoor setting and the after party must have been great. Greetings from South Africa on a chilly Saturday morning.
I've been thinking about a Steemit meeting in Hungary but we are still very few, or just do not know about others. But in the future (next year?) I would like to do this anyway, we would like to invite some of the great ones of Steemit.
Upboat is a friendly half-human, half-robot which hopes to help promote the better posts of Steemit by trying to ensure they get the recognition they deserve.
@UPBOAT looks for numerous signals before deciding on who to UPBOAT and is likely to summon our robot friends to share some robot love with you to show affection.
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That chain tho
Dangerous during hacky-sack! Be careful!
ye, momentum and stuff. There is a reason some people use chains as weapons.
If you would be more submissive to state law and rules you would know that no jewelry is allowed during sports ;P
Great post..beautiful photos..and also videos.., have a nice day..and have a nice wekeend..
@papa-pepper DAMN...
You guys sound like you had a great time. I'll have to try and do this here in Vietnam. Great post
Great post totally refreshed after reading post !!!!!!!!
Love it when people get together @papa-pepper
My kind of people!
Yes indeed!
That looked like fun! How far did the others travel to get there?
Most were about a half hour.
@jasonhenza about 4 hours.
The @papa-pepper tribe about 12 hours.
It is so awesome to see all the steemit get togethers!
You had me at electronic unicycle. This is what I am looking for in terms of content. Lengthy and full of details. You never assume that we are the short-attention-span type. Great article about a community meetup. Oh the food. I'm salivating. Very envious.
Thank you for sharing those great pics and videos of your meet up. I bet you guys had lots of fun even the kids:) That unicycle is really amazing :)
Looks like everyone had good food and a great time. I bet the kids had a blast with so much activity and time with friends. That unicycle looked like fun too. From your contest, it was a good thing you weren't fishing for dinner, it would be hard to feed your crowd with the ones caught :) Thanks for sharing your meetup adventure with us.
That is a pretty cool chain and round. I might have to pour some .999 silver steem tokens now lol Ive been thinking about doing it and actually I just got a bar mold in today with a fresh can of propane.
Let me know if you do pour some of those!
Looks like a lot of fun! That is one cool coin! congrats @Paradise-found ! I loved the balloon hats and the electric unicycles! 👍
I've seen quite a few posts re meet ups recently, but this one looks like the most fun one so far. I love the balloon hats, and if I get to go to a meet up in the U.K., I will insist on balloon hats at it!!
Although bouncy castles do unnerve me a little.
This is the next best thing to being there! Looks like I missed out on a grand time :( Wish I could have made it, but the pics bring a smile to my face.
At least you got to see it all!
It was a crazy time, and I think that we documented it well.
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It was awesome, meeting with my fellow Steemians!!
Many thanks to @provider for getting this event started!!
@papa-pepper, this mega post is really entertaining!!
Thank you @papa-pepper for putting up the silver as prize for the fishing contest!! That was FUN!!
Thanks also to my wonderful wife, @wrladyhawk, who made it for the second half of the meetup!
Let's keep steeming it like we mean it!!
Right! I should have mentioned her too!
It was a crazy time. See you soon!
Have a great vacation!! See you in a week!!
That is awesome I so want to go to a meet up one day soon. Been thinking about trying to organize one
Wasn't that a party @papa-pepper! And a good time was had by all. The electric unicycle looks awesome. Don't think I could get the hang of it - balance issues. The party looked amazing and I am looking forward to the interviews.
Very cool. It looks like it was a lot of fun and everyone had a great time. :D
I've never seen an electric unicycle before. :D I'd probably have landed on my butt if I'd tried it. :D Neat to watch him go around on it though. :D
Another great post filled with fantastic pictures and videos. :D Thanks for sharing and have an awesome day! :D
Haha, indeed, that’s what we do! Loved the report from the meetup and especially that line above!