Clubbing at Pax Prime 2012

Ask anyone who’s been to a big convention like PAX or the Escapist Expo to describe their experience, chances are they’ll tell you a lot stuff gets crammed into what seems like an impossibly tight schedule. Our final PAX Loading Time attempts to translate that feeling into video by giving a hyper-condensed version of what actually happened at PAX … aside from slinging spells, going to the Kris and Scott Live show and doing our panel. If you’ve never been to PAX, this video is basically it, condensed into five and a half minutes.

What isn’t really captured in this video is the incredible quantities of club soda inflicted on Graham and Alex. For those who don’t know why that would happen, a couple years ago, we invented the concept of “clubbing” someone, which is not to attack someone with a blunt instrument, but to trick them into finding or accepting a can of club soda from you, which your victim then has to drink immediately. We got the idea from the short-lived “bros icing bros” phenomenon that started around Smirnoff Ice, but substituted a much disliked non-alcoholic beverage instead. Anyhow, Alex and Graham were clubbed many times each at our Bandland table, and Alex was even clubbed at our panel. For the record, if anyone wants to club me, go for it. I like club soda.

Trivia:

• Why does club soda have baking soda in it? Well, when you add carbon dioxide to water, it makes a bit of carbonic acid (H2CO3). This acid makes the water taste a little sour. Baking soda (aka, sodium bicarbonate) cancels that extra acidity out because its a base.
• Don’t let yourself get clubbed too often. That carbonic acid has been proven to erode tooth enamel!
• Club soda and tonic water may look the same but they’re quite different! Tonic water contains quinine, which was originally added to help prevent malaria, but is now added in much smaller quantities just for the taste, which is distinctively bitter. How can you tell the difference between the two without drinking any? Tonic water is fluorescent under ultraviolet light because of the quinine!