Ninjas vs. Ninjas: reschedule planned

HIYAH! I mean, we ran into some small problems with the planned Ninjas vs. Ninjas mission on UT's campus this past weekend. Most of it was torrential rain-out related. So, without further adieu I'd like to make the following announcement on Agent C.E.'s (mission leader) behalf: Due to technical difficulties, the Ninjas vs. Ninjas mission has been has been postponed. Stay tuned for more details.

There you have it. If you thought you missed it, good news! You'll have another chance to take part in the hilarity. Just check back real soon.

May mission: Ninjas vs. Ninjas!

Imagine this scene: you're walking through UT's campus one last Saturday afternoon before the end of the semester and you spot something unusual going on in an art installation you see all the time.  What?  Is that a...?  Ninja?  It looks like, yes, he's fighting another Ninja!  Where are their weapons?  But they're fighting with such focus!  Unbelievable.   Wait...is that even a ninja soundtrack?  Awesome!  This month Flash Mob Austin will be pulling off a fantastic mission: Ninjas vs. Ninjas led by Agent C.E.!  Bring back the incredible Sidekicks in you like it was 1992 and bring your friends with you.  

• When: May 23rd, 2009 at 5pm 
  
• Where: Pre-mission meeting in front of the Tower on campus, southwest side
• Alternate Where: if we are prohibited from meeting at the tower, Littlefield Fountain will we our pre-meeting location
• What to wear: All black!
• Bring: Your most ferocious imaginary ninja weaponry
• Who: You, Chuck Norris and your cousin/co-worker/friend/fellow student/parent/random stranger/little brother, etc.
• Why: Because being a Ninja was never this cool. 

Waldo Pub Crawl Mission Report!

Agent Filkins here to report in on the mission that was the "Where's Waldo?" Pub Crawl! May 14th, 9:30pm and Agent Adams and I arrived at the Gingerman pub for the kick off. We waited. Kevin, our awesome photographer friend showed up for the first stop. We waited some more. Agent ThatGuy arrived in the most authentic Waldo outfit yet. I had a cane and gave it up to him, since that was the only piece of the puzzle missing to make him the real Waldo. Sam and soon enough Schuyler appeared in get-up and we had a drink. Then, we moseyed on out to the next pub. Taking a walk proved attention grabbing enough. With only 5 Waldo's (or 6, as one guy counted muuuuch later on in the evening) you can make quite an impact! We received varied reactions from passersby:

• "Thanks for coming here first so I don't have a bunch of drunk Waldo's on my hands." bouncer at Gingerman
  
• "Ok, I just wanna know why. Why?" very concerned girl at Gingerman
  
• "Hey look, it's a bunch of people in striped shirts!" all over town
• "Go Rockets! Woo hoo!" a girl outside of Ruth's Chris Steakhouse
• "Wait a minute, Where's Waldo? Oh, I found him!" all over town
• "I've been waiting 23 years to find you and here you are!" bouncer on Congress
• After walking by us, talking to a friend "Hey, did you see that? It was a bunch of people dressed like Waldo. Ha ha!" mostly people who ignored us
• "Is this like, Dr. Suess?" dancing on top of The Blind Pig
• "Wait, is this a Flash Mob?" a really excited guy on 6th St.
• "Aren't you that girl who made the Waldo T-Shirt Video?" Pedicabber, high five!
• "I found you, boy!" vendor by Emo's
• "I'm not going to even say anything, I'm sure you've gotten it all night." bouncer, wink

We had a great time with just the five of us and got some great shuffleboard in at Buffalo Billards, dancing at several places, getting a shout out from a DJ, people asking to take pictures with us, running into friends, getting denied free entrance at a bar with cover despite several patrons unbeknownst to us rallying for our admittance (at least we tried!), anf just general crawling fun! Thanks so much to those agents who participated, we had a BLAST. Ya'll rocked it, mini-mission success!

May Mini-Mission: "Where's Waldo?" Pub Crawl!

We have been talking for awhile now about doing one mini-mission (just as it sounds, a mission that needs far less people to succeed) a month, and one major mission as we have been. Coming this month, after much clamoring, is our first ever mini-mission: "Where's Waldo?" Pub Crawl!
Thursday, May 14th at 9:30 p.m. we will meet at the Gingerman to start our crawl and head east to make a spectacular Waldo parade of pub crawlers! This should be tons of fun, as usual, and all you need is
-your over-21 self
-your similarly aged friends
-AND your Waldo getup from Eeyore's Birthday

Agent Filkins will be in charge of hollering "Hey! Where's Waldo?" when you've got 10 minutes to close out your tab before we crawl-on to the next stop. Personally, I hope I can secure some glasses in time for this one. Bring a cane if you want us to really flip out. WOAH. Post any questions below, we'll see ya on the 14th!

World's Largest Live "Where's Waldo?" Search Mission Report!

Want to know how the "Where's Waldo?" mission went on April 25th? Well, here's a mission report...FROM WALDO HIMSELF: This time around, FMA did a giant "Where's Waldo?" game at Eeyore's Birthday, with me as Waldo.

Here's how it worked: I came there dressed as Waldo. We had about fifty other people dressed *almost* like Waldo. Maybe one of them didn't have jeans, or one of them didn't have a cane, or one of them didn't have the correct glasses. Then we also had people wander the crowd with flyers with a description of 'their missing friend'. (It was obviously Waldo, but nobody ever used the name 'Waldo'.) People were told to find this guy and tell him to 'get in touch with Martin'.

Then I just wandered around Eeyore's Birthday for an hour or so. People occasionally accosted me with the secret phrase, and they got prizes^[1] -- mostly tickets to Hideout shows, tickets to the Alamo, and free tea. Oh, and they got stickers that said "I found him!" and had an image of Waldo. About a dozen times, somebody saw me, pointed, and shouted "I FOUND YOU!" (Those people received no prizes.) Generally, I found that walking around dressed as Waldo generated lots of spontaneous goodwill.

Anyway, that was pleasant. It mostly went off without a hitch. There should be photos Real Soon Now. This was actually my first time at Eeyore's Birthday party. It was pretty much what I expected. Drum circles. Hacky-sack circles.^[2] Large clouds of pot. I admit, there were fewer costumes than I expected, and more commerce -- lots of tents for people selling food, and drink, and henna tattoos, and so on.

Still, I'd felt bad about skipping Eeyore's Birthday every year I've lived here. Now I can put a checkmark next to that particualr Austin tradition. And hopefully there are a ton of random photos from Eeyore's Birthday with me barely visible somewhere in the distant crowd. :) Anyway, kudos to Indiana & friends for organizing this, and I'm very happy I got to be Waldo for them.

__________
[1] I swear one guy cheated -- he just happened to be around while somebody else said the phrase and got a prize, and was unaware of the whole setup. But what could I do? *sigh*

[2] ... which I would have totally joined in on if I weren't wearing hiking boots -- I used to pwn at hacky-sack. (Come to think of it, my right foot was bruised, too -- which made having the walking stick very convenient.)