Finally relaxing after a really cool weekend. I went to the Seattle Robothon! And it was really great! Robots and geeks and demos, oh my! And another Dallas guy went too! He brought his pretty sophisticated robot to give a demo and enter the Floor Excercise, while I was just there to absorb and enter the MiniSumo event. My robot Sarge 2 (new pics on the webpage) didn't make much headway through 28 other competing minisumos, won 2, lost 2 (double elimination, man, my robots first loss was to a teenage girls robot :), but that was of course Isa Harrison), but it was really fun, informative, and the event is a pretty good crowd pleaser. There were 2 robots in Fire Fighting (tough contest), 6 in full Sumo, 4 in Grand Maze, 7 or so in Line Maze, and probably 8 in Floor Exercise. The crowd seemed to enjoy the sumo events and the floor exercise, a general demo of a robots capabilities that may not fit a given contest. The robot builders enjoyed it all, and the mass of tables of robots really provided a good display of interesting tech. Sony was there demonstrating Aibo (old and new) and a pretty cool robot part seller Acroname displayed and sold their wares. There was also Zorinco(?), Lineo, maybe Newton Labs? FIRST robots, BEAM bots, fascinating devices everywhere. A lot to take in, even in the 8 hours alotted. Even met some "famous" people. And an incredible organizational effort. All in all, probably at least 100 robots, 30+ competitors, + another 20 general robotheads, and a crowd actively observing at any one contest perhaps 80+, perhaps a few thousand over the day just wandering through the various displays. One main organizer, 3 or 4 announcers, 8-12 judges, 2 or 3 registration/sales, with everyone rotating in and out of other jobs and some of the people even got to compete in other contests they weren't involved in. Great location. And you know, they're already reserving space for next year. Why am I thinking like this? Dunno. Perhaps to see what is needed to put together a large event. I often wonder why some of the former DPRGers left, see some of them here. Just random thoughts. And a dang long entry.