Well, I made it to the art opening, and back to the airport, where I await my plane... I failed to find any other TONMOers (or at least any that introduced themselves as such), although I did meet Sierra, the head of the Seattle Cephalopod Appreciation Society, and I volunteered to be a blindfolded artist trying to draw a giant squid as one of the 12 or so poets read her poem... I didn't win the grand art prize, but I did get a free squid fishing lure. I also didn't recognize Cassandra from pictures, I'm not sure if she was there or not... I should have looked up what Roland Anderson looks like in case he was lurking at the periphery.
I wish I'd brought a stack of "if you like this sort of thing, check out TONMO" cards or something. There were a lot of good ceph clothing items and such, I'll post some pics in a bit (I'm not sure I have time to get them off the camera and upload them before my plane boards.)
The "Squid Ink Cocktails" were approximately blue Hawaiis with an eyedropper of ink (not sure if it was legitimate squid ink or black food coloring.) They also had calamari appetizers with a waiver that the Cephalopod Appreciation Society did not condone or encourage that.
All in all, a fun time, and the gallery and crowd were great. Unfortunately, I didn't quite come out of my shell too quickly, so I didn't strike up conversations with many people... it was unfortunate that I had to leave to be sure of getting back to the airport immediately after the poetry and such, so one I was a bit more social, I had to leave... but I nevertheless give the event high marks, and I'm pleased to have gotten the adventure of visiting an art opening in a city I don't know my way around where I don't know anyone during an air travel layover.
edit: pictures are uploading to
http://www.lorax.org/~monty/Stuffed_squid