Reddit's Fantastical Voyage Pt. One

By Jake

Thanks to our hosts: LinuxFreeOrDie, lefeministe, and BinarySolo

Approximate Time Line

Tuesday September 7

• 11:00am - I arrive in San Fransisco
• 12:00pm - Exploring downtown with LinuxFreeOrDie
• 4:30pm - Pub break
• 5:30pm - Tom arrives in San Fransisco
• 6:30pm - Dinner at Chavos
• 7:30pm - FoodProof sponsored meet-up at the Lava Lounge
• 11:00pm - Driving to Mountain View
• 12:00pm - Beer and passing out at lefeministe's house

Wednesday September 8

• 10:00am - Walk to get coffee. Get lost on the way back. Realize how hungover we are.
• 11:30am - Drive back to San Fransisco with BinarySolo and LinuxFreeOrDie
• 12:30pm - Tour of Reddit and lunch. Hangover intensifies.
• 2:00pm - Digg
• 3:00pm - Golden Gate Bridge, rescue depressed Reddit alien
• 4:00pm - Unsuccessful suit shopping
• 5:30pm - Burritos and churros with Kickme444
• 9:00pm - Leave for the airport

And so the trip began. I arrived in San Fransisco and got a mini-tour from LinuxFreeOrDie before heading back to the airport to pick up Tom (Draynen). I was nervous meeting the person I was chosen to spend the next month traveling with. What if we hated each other? What if he smelled? What if had had no smell like Jean Baptiste Grenouille and started killing people? I had no idea. It turns out that aside from the crabs we seem to get along quite well. He talks about murdering me in my sleep frequently, but I'm pretty sure at this point he won't follow through.

We headed back downtown to grab some food before the first big Reddit meet-up. Stomaches filled and prepped for alcohol consumption, we headed down the block to the Lava Lounge where FoodProof had kindly provided an open bar for everyone. I didn't keep tabs on how many people showed up, but I would guess around twenty including several of the Reddit guys. Conversations ranged from web dev stuff to the possibility of bacon beer (in development apparently) to USAF policies. Everyone had a good time, and those of us who stayed until the end drank copious amounts of alcohol.

When everyone parted ways LinuxFreeOrDie drove us to his girlfriend's house (lefeministe) in Mountain View for a few last beers. His girlfriend made us bacon. I slept in her love sac.

The next morning Tom and I woke up feeling pretty good and went off in search of coffee. While lost of the way back we realized that the hangover just hadn't quite set in on us at full force yet, and the alcohol had a long ways to go before it worked its way out of our systems. Joy. We left Mountain View in the company of BinarySolo and LinuxFreeOrDie who would be our guides for the day. First stop: Reddit HQ!

We went and had lunch with the whole Reddit crew, at which point the hangovers we had been nursing made themselves prominently known. We were given a little tour of the offices and gathered up some swag for the road. Now joining us on our trip will be a Reddit alien bobblehead to be signed by all the Redditors we meet. His journey will continue past our trip, hopefully spanning the globe.

When we walked out the door we serendipitously found a map leading us directly to the Digg offices, high atop the fabled San Fransisco Guardian building. At this point there is an accompanying video I believe you should watch...

With that done, we set off to find the famed out of order suicide telephone of the Golden Gate Bridge, but it looks like they not only fixed it, but replaced it. Oh well, that didn't work, but I did get to save our new bobblehead from trying to kill itself when it found out it would be traveling for a month in a cardboard box, only seeing sunlight when we need an opportune photo. We also tried to class up the trip by purchasing some suits, but we couldn't find anything in our price range ($0-10).

Dan from FoodProof invited us out to dinner at his favorite burrito place which was over in East Oakland. When we got there the place was packed because Mexico was playing Honduras in a World Cup qualifier, but we unfortunately arrived just as halftime was starting and didn't get to see much of the game. The burritos were delicious, and I tricked Tom into eating brains. For desert we had churros stuffed with pudding. Both were delicious, and you can read more about the food side of things over on FoodProof. When dinner was done, we had to head out to the airport for our red-eye flight to NYC.