When Geeks Marry

[SickWookie]

Year:2001-2004
Location: Milwaukee & Indianapolis
Store:

My wife and I met at a gaming table during Gen Con 2001 in Milwaukee. I remember looking over the players and thinking that they all looked really grumpy. I was convinced that the game wouldn’t be any fun…BOY WAS I WRONG. It was very well run. The entire party got turned into monsters and if you broke character you risked dementia. Because I was playing a Barbarian my wife, who was playing a Halfling, decided to ride on my shoulder and use me as a mount. She kept smacking my character in the head trying to steer him. When I continually ignored her she got up, crossed the table and started scratching me behind the ear. Against my will and through no control of my own my leg started kicking like a happy puppy. We instantly bonded. After the game some friends of mine were talking about going to the Safe House. All of a sudden this young lady piped up “Safe House? I want to go to the Safe House.” She was bouncing around so much we decided to bring her along.

For those who are unaware, in order to get into the Safe House you have to know the password or else perform a stunt that is televised throughout the bar. I almost botched our task just to have more physical contact with her. Once in the bar we laid claim to a small group of tables and the alcohol flowed. It was a big group and it grew as the night proceeded. Nobody really knew anyone so we’re all trying to impress each other by buying rounds. Throughout the night we absorbed a table of Japanese tourists. Rounds were bought, shooters were bought; the girls from another table were bought. For the price of 2 rounds 3 shooters and a bag of chips, the girls from an adjacent table came and sat with us for about half an hour. At one point a young lady coming into the bar had to perform a lap dance for her boyfriend. Of course it was televised in the bar. She was horrible at it. But we all cheered when they entered the bar. My companion on the other hand complained. “You call that a lap dance? If your going to do a lap dance, at least do it right, put some effort into it. I could do better.” To which my response was simple, “Prove it.” So there I was in the bar getting a lap dance from a girl I had met a few hours ago. But wait there’s more, because one of the other woman we were with decided to try and outdo her. I ended up becoming the recipient of a lap dance duel. GOD I LOVE GEN CON!!

So we partied and had some fun and before long it was last call and we were all pretty lit. I decided to skip the final round and she decided on a shot of Vodka. I warned her that mixing too many drinks could have ill effects. But she laughed me off and drank it down. So we were chatting at the table getting ready to leave and she got this odd look on her face. It was followed soon by her evening’s beverages all down the front of me…not once but twice. Well the other girl with us took her to restroom to clean up; I went got several rags and cleaned up the mess myself. When they came out we left and I walked her back to her room to make sure she got back ok. I didn’t so much as hold her hand.

The next day I got up and went to an event but was very distracted because I couldn’t get this girl out of my head. After the event I started walking around the Con looking for her. In the meantime she was looking for me. I spent most of the day doing this, but alas it was not to be. Our game the night before was the first round of a tournament, Friday I checked to see if we had advanced. Our whole table had!! Joy and rapture all hope was not lost. She would be at the table the next day. That morning I showed up for the final table and…. she didn’t show. The GM later told me that I looked like someone killed my dog. So we began the event and about thirty minutes later she came sauntering in claiming that the time of the event had been omitted from the advancement notice, although everyone else had made it. I lit up like a pinball machine. All things were now right in the world. We finished the game and I invited her to play in a Magic the Gathering tournament, even though I had originally invited the GM, who was a buddy of mine. I was surprised that she knew what Magic was. She didn’t even mind that we got our butts handed to us the entire event. Afterwards we went to the Safe House again where I showed her just how uncoordinated I was on the dance floor. We spent the rest of the Con together. Even though we had just met the chemistry was amazing…. everything just fit. Sunday was the worst day, neither one of us wanted to say goodbye. We tried to maintain a long distance friendship but it didn’t work out well, the pull was too strong. After our existing relationships dissolved and eight months time, I traveled from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to South Carolina to see her. Things went well and a week later she moved to Michigan for the summer so we could try out our relationship and see if it would work. At the end of the summer I put my affairs in order and moved to South Carolina where we have lived ever since.

After living together for a year and a half we decided to get married. But how to do it? I have family in Florida and Michigan. She has family everywhere else, one of the side effects of living in a military family. Almost immediately she had suggested having the wedding at Gen Con. I was worried that it would be too far out of the way for some of our relatives, in addition to my reservations that they might go through some culture shock of the convention itself. I was eventually won over by my lovely bride; her mother thought if was a great idea, and the enthusiastic response of the convention staff when we ran the idea by them. So plans were made for a wedding. We decided to go with a fantasy theme. Costumes were ordered, dresses custom made, chainmail constructed by my bride for the best man, and dragon themed candelabras and chalices were ordered for the big day. Then disaster struck!

The majority of my wizard costume was blown out to sea by the series of hurricanes that hit Florida in 2004. We received word just before leaving to go to the convention. This is where the convention staff stepped in to save the day. Upon arriving at the con we informed the con coordinator we had been working with of our situation. She let us into the Great Hall the night before the wedding, while they were still setting up, where we were able to get all the items we needed. They really bailed us out. The wedding itself went well. We had about a dozen non-gamer friends and family attend the wedding. Then about sixty people we had never seen before, some even brought gifts. We ran the wedding as a free event so anyone could come. We even had the minister start the ceremony off with the first words of the wedding scene from “The Princess Bride,” “Mawage, mawage is what bwings us hewe togewer today.” The local paper even included a small blurb about the wedding in a piece about the convention. It was a really great experience and this year we will celebrate our third anniversary on Sunday the 19th of August. (It's a great way to not ever have to forget an anniversary eh?)

Randy and Kennetha Miller (pictures will be posted in photo area)