Carrie and I got up, packed everything out to the car, and then went to check on the Puerto Rico semi-finals along with Cathy Raymond.  Cathy didn't make the semi-finals, but Eric made the semi-finals for Monsters Menace America.  Carrie and I went to breakfast at Perkins, nicely beating the after-church rush.

We went back to the hotel to check out, reserve a room for next year, and socialize.  Carrie helped Ken "Burnsy" Burnside organize his demonstration pieces-parts while I sat down with Eric and Cathy and learned how to play Steam, which is a simplified version of Railroad Tycoon (which itself was a simplified version of Age of Steam).

Eventually we went out to Jennie's Diner for lunch with Eric and Cathy, then with a quick stop back at the hotel, drove home to Sterling.

Much like Friday, Saturday started at a sedate pace.  Carrie and I had breakfast, then I headed down to game, then Carrie went to spend the day with Beth and Diana.

• 11am, Puerto Rico (PRO), Heat 3 of 3, won (in fact a tie for first place).  This win plus the earlier one earned me a bye for the quarter finals.
• 1pm, Race for the Galaxy (RFG), Heat 3 of 4, won.
• 2pm, Race for the Galaxy (RFG), Heat 4 of 4, 2nd place.  Collectively, close, but not close enough to make the semi-finals.
• 3pm, Dominion (DOM), Heat 3 of 3, third place of 4.  Collectively, not enough to make the semi-finals.
• 4pm, Ticket to Ride (TTR), Heat 3 of 3, lost.

At this point, I went out for a quick muffin and hotch with Eric and Cathy Raymond.

• 6pm, Puerto Rico (PRO), Quarter finals, third place of 4.  I had earned a bye for this round, but chose not to take it as a favor to the GM (he needed one more player to round out the game).  This ultimately wiped me out of the competition, but I was in the mood to play, and I played well -- just not well enough.

Carrie came back, so we went out to dinner at Cracker Barrel with Eric and Cathy.  I hung out to see who would go to the Race for the Galaxy semi-finals (Cathy Raymond and Ken "Burnsy" Burnside did, Kathy Stroh and I didn't), then socialized for a while, before heading back to the room.

Friday started off more relaxed, so Carrie and I were able to get a leisurely breakfast and stroll through the dealers room before gaming commenced.

• 11am, Dominion (DOM), Heat 2 of 3, 3rd of 4?
• 2pm, RoboRally (RRY), Heat 2 of 2, 4th of 5.  Yeah, I lost, but I never died, and I had a lot of fun.  The game was set up with 2 boards and 3 flags, so that the start and flag 2 were at one side of board 1, and flags 1 and 3 were at the other side of board 2.  At one point, I was so far behind that I was just leaving flag 1 while the leader was approaching flag 3.  I deduced that he was going to take advantage of a certain conveyor belt.  I changed my program so that I met him as he left the conveyor belt, then proceeded to push him back up the conveyor belt, shooting him the whole way ... with ramming gear.  I did 8 points of damage to him, and someone else shot him in the back for one more point.  He ended the turn with all 5 registers locked ... and I finished him off the next phase with the ramming gear.
• 4pm, Puerto Rico (PRO), Heat 2 of 3, 3rd of 4.  This was a close game; I made a mistake and Mayor'd when I should have shipped (I miscalculated the value of my shipping).  I ran a factory where I was producing 3 sugar, 4 corn, and 1 indigo, feeding either the corn or the sugar to my wharf.  A lot of fun.

Carrie and I met up with Paula and Dave Matuszek for dinner at Perkins, then we taught them how to play Dominion.

• 9pm, Race for the Galaxy (RFG), Heat 1 of4, 2nd of 4.
• 10pm, Race for the Galaxy (RFG), Heat 2 of 4, 4th of 4.

Afterwards, I met up with Eric, Cathy, and Jordan, and they taught me Maori, which should be a fun game for Ludus.

Thursday's games started early (9am) and I woke up late (8:15am).  Carrie helped me rush around to get ready, and even get breakfast before gaming.

• 9am, Vegas Showdown (VSD) Heat 2 of 2, 4th of 4. I dominated in people and money, with beaucoup bucks, but just didn't have the  fame.
• 11am, Power Grid (PGD), Heat 3 of 3, 3rd of 5 on the Italy map.
• 2pm, Dominion (DOM), Heat 1 of 3, won.

Met up with Carrie and Cathy Raymond, and taught Cathy (and some kid named Max) how to play Dominion.

• 7pm, Puerto Rico (PRO), Heat 1 of 3, won.

At 9pm, Carrie and I went out to dinner at Perkins with Eric and Cathy Raymond, Ken "Burnsy" Burnsides, Ken Watanabe, and Jordan Malokowski.  Afterwards, we played a couple of 6-player games of Race for the Galaxy.

Wednesday, Carrie and I slept in, ate breakfast in the hotel, and then I prepped for the day's games.

• 12pm, Power Grid (PGD) Demo, I volunteered to run the demo so that the GM would be able to get Heat 2 started sooner.

• 1pm Power Grid (PGD) Heat 2, 5th of 5, on the USA map.  I made a critical mistake early on, and just wasn't able to recover the pace.

Carrie and I went to dinner at Perkins with Beth and Diana, a couple of Carrie's friends from college.  Afterwards, we went to our room and crashed for the night.

Carrie and I drove up Tuesday afternoon.  We got checked into the hotel (and I into the convention) in time to grab an early light dinner.  Appropriate use of Tylenol, rest and food avoided my traditional Tuesday night migraine.

• 6pm, Power Grid (PGD) Heat 1, 4th place of 5, on France.

After the game, Carrie and I met up with Eric and Cathy Raymond, along with Rich Shay and went out to Perkins for dessert.  Afterwards we played Race for the Galaxy and chatted until midnight.