[vox] Being more obvious at Crepeville

[Darin Wick]

On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 3:11 PM, Bill Kendrick <nbs at sonic.net> wrote:
>
> How can we be more obvious at Crepeville?  Last night I noticed one fellow
> (Darren, if I recall) looking around like they were looking for something,
> and I was able to flag them down.
>
> Another person emailed me today asking if our "first meeting was cancelled".
> (Not sure what they mean by 'first meeting'... maybe because it's early
> in the UCD school year, or something?)
>
> They apparently showed up at 6:30pm (our _old_ meeting start time, so no
> wonder they didn't find us), and came back at 7:45pm (when about 6 of us
> were at a table... most of whom were still there by the time I had to leave
> at ~8pm).
>
> When I arrived (at 7 on the dot) Jeff N. was already there, with a laptop
> and a plush Tux penguin on the table.  We were not too far from the main
> entrance.
>
> Obviously, this was not enough, since at least _one_ person came and went
> without noticing us...!
>
> What else can we do, without being obstructive to Crepeville's staff and
> other patrons, to be more obvious?!  An easel?
>
>
> A plush Tux is a good start, obviously.  In the past, I've also scribbled
> a little paper sign and put it in one of the 'order number' flag stands,
> in the center of the table.  Having laptops out is meaningless, since many
> people there are working on schoolwork, so we can't say: "look for the geeks
> with laptops."
>
> It seems would-be attendees are too shy to actually go to tables that have
> lots of people, and ask "are you LUGOD?"  Though last night, the person in
> question _did_ apparently ask the Crepeville staff.  I don't know if this
> was at their 6:30 or 7:45 visit, though...  obviously the former would've
> been useless.  But it's not like we announce ourselves to the people at the
> cash register.  And there are so many waitstaff that even then, it'd be
> a hit-or-miss if you went up and asked them: "Is LUGOD here?"... unless they
> spent the time to ask every other waiter/waitress there for you.
>
> Sigh.
>
> What do we do? :^/  I can't guarantee to be there myself every time...
> or at 7pm on the dot, when I _can_ make it.
>
> Ideas?
>
> -bill!
> root at lugod.org
> http://www.lugod.org/
> Linux Users' Group of Davis
> _______________________________________________
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> vox at lists.lugod.org
> http://lists.lugod.org/mailman/listinfo/vox

I'm Darin from the meeting last night.  It was nice to meet those of you
who were present, and I had a good time.

However, when Bill flagged me down it wasn't the first time I had come
in to Crepeville looking for you - I came just after 7:00 with a nagging
idea that the meeting was actually today (Wednesday).  So I went
back to the UC Davis quad, pulled out my laptop, used the campus
wireless network to check the meeting schedule, and returned to
Crepeville.  That's when Bill caught my eye.  In retrospect, I remember
seeing Jeff working on his laptop on my first visit to the restaurant,
but since he was obviously running Mac OS I didn't have much
reason to think he was part of LUGOD.

If somebody - whoever gets there first - could put up a sign when they
arrive it might be sufficient, so long as the website tells people to look
for it.  It would also be helpful to explain on the site that the meetings
at Crepeville are rather informal and aren't necessarily large.

As to the confusion over the start time of the meeting, you might want
to change the "Add this event to your Google Calendar" button
because it still lists the meeting time as 6:30, even though the
website itself says 7:00.

--
   73 for now,
    ~Darin Wick