Silicon Valley...

Surgo · Post by **Surgo** » Wed Jun 18, 2008 4:31 am

...sucks, if you don't know anyone around you.

So this is probably a long shot, but do any of you folks live around Silicon Valley? And possibly want to do something nerdy on some weekend? I'll be living at Moffett Field for the next 8 weeks. This is the first time I've been to California, and I've lived my whole life on the east coast before this. Not really knowing anyone out here...it gets pretty lonely/boring at times. If somebody lives near Silicon Valley and wants to play Smash Bros. or let me temporarily join their D&D game or something, that would be awesome.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Wed Jun 18, 2008 7:41 am

I know that I'll be back in Silicon Valley around mid July.

Right now I'm in Eastern Europe.

-Username17

Surgo · Post by **Surgo** » Thu Jun 19, 2008 12:55 am

Cool. Now to just see if this train system they have going on here will take me where I need to go.

Jerry · Post by **Jerry** » Thu Jun 19, 2008 1:09 am

FrankTrollman wrote:I know that I'll be back in Silicon Valley around mid July.

Graduating from Med School, or a College Summer Break?

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Thu Jun 19, 2008 9:54 am

There are four completely separate trains here. Make that five.

There's Amtrak and ACE and Capitol Corridor. It goes from San Jose to Sacremento, supplementing with busses to places like San Francisco and Santa Cruz. It usually also goes to Portland, Seattle, and LA. Very expensive, unless you want to go to Sacremento. But who would want that?

There's BART. It's nowhere near Moffett. It goes to San Francisco from near SFO (SFO has its own BART) and also from Newark and other East-Bay locations.

There's VTA. It has a stop at Moffett. It'll take you downtown, to two of the five malls down here, and to Mountain View.

There's Muni which really doesn't go anywhere except everywhere in San Francisco. Technically this includes all their streetcars, the cable cars, and the subway and light rail. But they go to all the really good places, as long as they're in San Francisco.

Most importantly to me, there's Caltrain. It goes from San Jose south to Monterey - but more importantly, it goes north, linking with VTA in Mountain View and San Jose; Bart near SFO, and Muni in San Francisco.

All of these systems use different fares, different fare systems, and different web pages. So we also have 511.org and be scared at the long list of transportation choices.

And yes, I live in Sunnyvale. K lives in Santa Clara. At least, last time he talked to me he did... We'd both rather live in Santa Cruz, but luck has it, we can't.

-Crissa

K · Post by K » Sat Jun 21, 2008 12:12 am

Yeh, I'll be in the Bay for the next few weeks, then things are up in the air.

Ravengm · Post by **Ravengm** » Sat Jun 21, 2008 2:22 am

Oh God, California-based Amtrak.

I fear the Coast Starlate.

Surgo · Post by **Surgo** » Sat Jun 21, 2008 4:21 am

So, would anyone like to hang out and play Smash Bros or do some other nerdy thing next weekend?

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Sat Jun 21, 2008 11:30 am

Camera 12 downtown has Rocky Horror this weekend - it was at Pruneyard last night and I went to it as well as watching Mongol (which is one heck of a love story).

Dunno what else is up.

-Crissa

JonSetanta · Post by **JonSetanta** » Sun Jun 22, 2008 2:12 am

Sure I'll play with you!

Come 3000 miles east.

What's wrong with Silicon Valley? Pretentious Californians? Are so many as resistant to meeting people outside of a clique as the Californians that come here east?
Maybe it's like the New Jersey of west coast.

Count Arioch the 28th · Sun Jun 22, 2008 3:47 am

I'm not entirely sure where Silicon Valley is, and don't care enough to look it up, but I have a friend that just spent a couple months in LA.

He says on one hand, people there are incredibly superficial compared to his hometown of Norfolk, VA. On the other hand, if you make the right friends, people there can be surprisingly generous (Like buying you an $80 pair of jeans and not expect anything in return.)

Surgo · Post by **Surgo** » Sun Jun 22, 2008 4:28 am

LA is about a seven hour drive from here. So it's pretty different.

I never said there was anything wrong with Silicon Valley, sigma...

K · Post by K » Sun Jun 22, 2008 4:54 am

If you draw a line from San Francisco to San Jose, then everything 50 miles from that line is the Valley.

We're smart, liberal, and a little too obsessed with looking good, if you want to put us in a box.

In my experience, you can find cool people anywhere on the planet. I like the Bay because we have hot tanned CA girls(they wrote a song about it) and hot Asian girls, as well as lots of transplants from other nations and parts of the US (gotta love that growing economy and State Department policies).

It tends to make us a little more open-minded and laid-back.

That being said, email me at kazthefirst@yahoo.com. I have class on Sat., but I'm sure we can squeeze in some good times. For example, Crissa and I haven't hung out in a dog's age so I'm sure we can make a night or two.

JonSetanta · Post by **JonSetanta** » Sun Jun 22, 2008 9:04 pm

Surgo wrote:Not really knowing anyone out here...it gets pretty lonely/boring at times.

.... might equate to either "I'm not very good at finding new friends" or "The population here resists newcomers as if they were lepers", the latter being more of a select east coast dilemma in some areas. Or maybe worldwide.

K wrote:I like the Bay because we have hot tanned CA girls(they wrote a song about it) and hot Asian girls, as well as lots of transplants from other nations and parts of the US (gotta love that growing economy and State Department policies).

From what some Filipinos in an MMO told me, the Bay Area is pretty much "Little Phillipines".
Another example might be how, as recently as the last decade, the Maryland beach city/peninsula known as Ocean City (OC) could be considered "Little Russia".

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Mon Jun 23, 2008 12:51 am

There's large Vietnamese, Korean, Japanese, Chinese, Russian communities along with the suburbanites (they're creepy when you find out there's baptists out there among the libertarians), hippies, trailer trash, and latino (both old and new) communities. There's also a large black population in the industrial east bay.

Most notably, most communities are within walking distance of things. Moffett... Isn't within walking distance of anything. They've made sure of that with big fences.

-Crissa

Neeeek · Post by **Neeeek** » Tue Jun 24, 2008 8:04 am

K wrote: That being said, email me at kazthefirst@yahoo.com. I have class on Sat., but I'm sure we can squeeze in some good times. For example, Crissa and I haven't hung out in a dog's age so I'm sure we can make a night or two.

I'm stuck in Santa Cruz where I now know basically no one, and there is about a 50/50 chance I'll have nothing to do on a given weekend. So drop me a line.

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Wed Jun 25, 2008 5:33 pm

Well, I'm going to some political rally on Friday (a friend asked me to go with) and then some rave-thing with my spouse, and over the July holiday I'll be in Portland.

Other days are relatively free.

Where's Keith going to live over the summer break?

-Crissa

Surgo · Post by **Surgo** » Thu Jun 26, 2008 3:20 am

How's your saturday, Crissa? I emailed Keith today, not sure what there is to do around here (I don't get outside the government fences very often) but if nothing else my friend has a really awesome house we can hang out at for a bit.

Surgo · Post by **Surgo** » Sat Jun 28, 2008 6:37 am

Email me, Crissa? mk561 at bard dot edu.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Thu Jul 17, 2008 1:38 pm

I am now in California.

-Username17

Post by **fbmf** » Thu Jul 17, 2008 9:15 pm

For how long, Frank?

Game On,
fbmf

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Thu Jul 17, 2008 9:58 pm

Until September 23rd.

-Username17

Post by **fbmf** » Thu Jul 17, 2008 11:51 pm

What are the odds you can make it to GENCON?

Game On,
fbmf

Surgo · Post by **Surgo** » Thu Jul 31, 2008 3:40 am

Frank/Crissa: want to hang out this weekend?

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Thu Jul 31, 2008 3:54 am

so close and yet so far away... I live in CA, and would love to meet some of you people I regularly bitch at/commiserate with, but I'm a county of Sacramento called Citrus Heights, and getting together with any of you would require a two way train trip and a good 2 to 3 day schedule planned a good bit ahead... plus money for said train and whatever we were supposedly doing... damned distances... and lack of a car... and being stuck in the middle of nowhere in the middle of "somewhere that only matters because it's the capital."