Kim IROP 2002 – Part 1

As I made my way towards the baggage claim area, I was doing what I do best. Talking. I think it took a few times of Katherine calling out "Kim! Kim! KIM! KimKimKimKim!" as she scampered towards me before my head swiveled in her direction. Like an alarm clock, you only realize it’s been going off a while after you wake up. Katherine was the first smiling face I saw and the last hug when I left. That was nice. Next Catalina arrived. Cat and I have been close friends for so long, the chance to actually meet her was extra special. We clicked just as well as we had hoped, and were both very happy about it! No one in our room slept in the bathtub all weekend, no matter what you may have heard.

The first thing I did when we got to the hotel was sleep. I was out, hard, almost before my head hit the pillow. Cat skipped down to the restaurant for what she said was a delicious lunch, and when she returned I woke up. Or I thought I did. Perhaps not. I wandered down to the banquet room to say hello, and when I say "wandered" I mean that literally. I realized (but not soon enough) that perhaps I was not fully awake when I had to force my brain to work to answer questions, hugged dear friends half-heartedly, and blinked without comprehension at people I had not met before. I saw Rayek, but was not introduced till later. He made the mistake of wearing orange. An orange shirt at a kink event. "Anything, anywhere, anytime." I accused him of false advertising. Alyana was the greeter at the table when I arrived.  I admired her nails.  They were red this year.  I made a quiet exit back to my room until I was really awake, which took a bit! I’d like to note that I went back to my room for the first time, ever, without crayons. I missed you all weekend, Lizzy, but this was the first moment my heart hurt from missing you.

Fortified with more than 2 firing brain cells this time, I made my way back to the gathering room. I enjoy the chance to talk with people and find some common ground before the weekend kicks into high gear, which is why I like to be there for Registration Opening.  By the time we launched into Truth or Dare, we were all relaxing a bit. I asked Gaston, "Where are my Smarties!" He has made the mistake of bringing them for me at different events. Being a creature of habit, and eminently greedy, I have grown accustomed to my Smarties. He said "I was going to give them to you later, but I can get them now…" Yes, that would suit me fine. He returned with three pounds of Smarties (which is the exact amount of weight I gained this weekend). He knelt, and began to draw out jar after jar after jar of Smarties, all separated by color. This was the result of teasing we’d done in the lair before IROP. All went well, until it was noted that a purple Smartie was in the blue jar. This will never do! Everyone at my table began making "You’re in trouble" noises as I called Gaston over. He arrived and I imperiously handed him the offending jar. He tried to reach the misplaced Smartie but it wriggled out of his grasp. He started to get off his knees to find a container to dump them into so he could sort it out with minimum muss and fuss and I said "Oh no, right here!" He took on the near-impossible task of emptying out a glass jar of Smarties into one hand, juggling two jars, and moving the offending Smartie to the correct jar. He managed, but dropped one. For shame! If this wasn’t bad enough, it happened AGAIN. This time I told him not to start a scene if he wasn’t going to finish it. I understand that little scene actually didn’t end until Sunday, when he found yet a third mis-placed Smartie, and managed to fix it before I discovered it. What fun!

I also received home-baked shortbread cookies. Does life get much better? candie knows how much I love shortbread. She made a tin of them, and presented them to me. I ate them morning, noon, and night. Literally the first thing in the morning I popped my feet out of bed, leapt to the cookies and shoved one in my mouth. Catalina picked on me. So I ate another one. It was worth every bite, even though I'll have to jog many more miles to burn off the calories!!! Deeeeelicious!

Thanks to Amanda-Danda we had a different method of Truth or Dare this year. Three bags, from "mild" to "wild." Katherine started the weekend off right, and head-phucked all of us by putting the nastiest dares in a green bag, and the easiest in the red bag. I pointed at tuatha as I marched to the front with the challenge "You’re going down!" If you don’t know, tuatha has been my dare victim every year. He’s just so much fun. I bravely launched my hand into the green bag for my red-hot dare. What I got was a Goldilocks "this is juuuuuust right" dare. I modified the dare from "describe" to "demonstrate oral sex on the opposite gender." Tuatha was once again my victim. As I studiously explained, and demonstrated, I knelt beside him. Suddenly there was a banana before me in the appropriate spot. I cooed about how sensitive the head is, and explained to stroke it lightly, as my nails dug into the end of the banana, and banana mush came out between the splits in the skin. Next I got to the "oral" part, and explained to be gentle, just before my teeth snapped through till they met and the end of that banana dangled sadly before tuatha. Each year I am more and more horrible to tuatha. He is a very good sport! I really enjoy Truth or Dare, and it shows. I get involved with as many of them as people will allow. I won’t steal anyone’s thunder, and you’ll have to wait for them to tell you though!

Dinner was marvelous as always. The wait was longer than we anticipated, but we were having fun, and had already known dinner would be late so no one was starving. The wait was worth it. Service was really great, the company was fantastic. I presented Kiah with a token of appreciation for her gift back to the community…the IROP weekend. At the very end of the weekend I realized what a good choice it was, because Kiah announced she will not be co-hosting IROP again. I’m certain Katherine will need our help next year. We got a lot of Quotable Quotes at dinner, and this was the first year Quotable Quotes went electronic. I kept the ones I captured in my Palm Pilot. No more scribbles on paper I hunt for and worry about losing!

After dinner was a very special event. I was the witness to my first private collaring ceremony ever. It was my honor and privilege to be the witness when MistressKali collared Kiah. I contributed champagne and Godiva for the special event. The contributions of the two special people were sincerity, devotion, and words so lovely I cried shamelessly.

We were treated to the "Cliff’s Notes of the Cliff’s Notes of Taming of the Shrew" by Cheyain, who wore a lovely medieval gown she made herself. Amanda followed with her tune for IROP, which was hysterical. We made her sing it three times throughout the course of the weekend. Kiah was backup, when she could remember the words. By the third time through I belted out any phrases I knew. What fun! (If you've done everything you should...been extra special good!)

The only one I did anything with on Friday night was ‘manda-danda. We almost always find the time to do something together. First she took a swipe at my ass with Arrick’s mining belt, which packed a wallop so strong I was convinced I was bruised (I wasn’t). A toy to be taken very seriously! Next Amanda brought some of her latest flogger acquisitions for me to check out. I have always wanted to try a swivel-handled flogger, and I love how Amanda’s back marks up so pretty, so I gave it a test run on her. Great fun, as always!

When I fell into bed, which wound up being about 3 AM, I slept like a rock until morning. Which came FAR too early…