Before I explain how I got stranded at the Hamilton 10k I would first like to introduce myself.

My name is Alex Lasky, I am with Your Move Games. My teammates include Anthony Shaheen, Craig Edwards, Nick Cuenca, Jason Liu, Eric Hunter, Robert Dougherty, and Jacob Rabinowitz; I’m not sure I spelled all their names correctly. I have the honor and privilege of playing with who I consider the best Vs. players in the state of Massachusetts. I didn’t show to pro circuit san Francisco mainly because my brother was graduating that weekend. I am by far the worst player of the 8 of us but I try my best to pull my weight, test the decks, add input, propose viable deck ideas, and break formats.

This weekend since I missed the pro circuit I really wanted to go to a 10k, 10k Hamilton was only an 8.5 hour drive according to map quest, fate had something else in mind however. It would be my first premier level event, not only did I get to go play Vs. in a competitive environment but I also got to attend with some of the coolest Vs. players I know. Originally it was going to be Eric Hunter, Nick Cuenca, and myself going to 10k Hamilton.

The decision that destined me to get stuck in Canada was that of Eric Hunter; Thursday night Eric called Nick and I as we were on our way back from Rob’s house (borrowing some cards), he told us that something came up and he couldn’t go. How did this occurrence get me stuck in Canada? If you haven’t met Eric he is a very tall person, he can not fit into my 97 Subaru legacy outback. Had Eric gone with us we would have used his car instead of mine.

So we leave my house friday at 11:30am hoping to get to Canada around 9-9:30pm. We drive for 6 hours, passing Springfield Mass., Albany NY, and Rochester NY. Suddenly the car starts to slow down “what the f**k?!” I said as I fiddled with the cruise control switch “The cruise control just broke, now I have to use my legs.”; I thought nothing of it, I just thought m cruise control broke. About 2 minutes later I notice that when I signaled the needle on my RPM meter went back and forth a bit along with my signal. At this point we decide to get off at the next exit… we never make it there, soon after the needles on both the RPM indicator and the odometer start spazing out followed by my car dying and me pulling over.

I call AAA, they take an hour cause they can’t find me, the tow guy doesn’t see anything wrong and hooks up a battery pack to my battery; my car starts. He tells us if something goes wrong before the next exit to take the exit, otherwise, shoot for Canada; he follows us to the exit he spoke of. So we finally make it to the border and RIGHT between the inspector and the toll taker, ON THE BORDER, the car dies again. We get another jump by a nice group of Canadians who were on their way back home after trying to get a jump for another 20 minutes; I figured we were lucky to have broken down in such a convenient place.

So we drive the final stretch of the trip, my first time driving in kilometers, and finally make it to the hotel. Before we finish finding a space in the parking lot, you guessed it – THE CAR DIED AGAIN! We get another jump and park the damn car. We check in at I don’t even remember what time, we meet some nice VS. players who charge my battery with their car so that it will be able to hold a charge when It finally gets fixed, and go to sleep.

So my friend performed well using what we call the “knights” deck (the name is derived from the team-up) while I performed HORRIBLY with the same deck. He went 7-3 and made 8th place on his 2nd tie breaker while I barly made top 64 after going 5-5; I made a lot of play mistakes (worse then those of Nick in his quarter final match) as other things on my mind contributed to my already normally bad playing. Remember that metagame breakdown on metagame? The number "2" next to what was described as "Wrecking Crew combo", the other guy playing it was me.

While my friend was playing in the top eight against the worst match-up possible for his deck I got a tow from the CAA to the Subaru dealership in Hamilton… which was CLOSED, on top of that my tow driver said some really… politically incorrect things that made me feel REALLY uncomfortable. So now I’m missing work on Monday but I guess it can’t be helped and I make the best of my situation. I get a tow back to the hotel get a jump so I can drive into the garage myself, and go play in the sealed PCQ.

Nick and I both made top 8 but scrubbed out. I made a draft mistake, taking a 3rd Michael holt over a JSA Headquarters. It didn’t matter though, my opponent hit Dr. psycho on 2 and fatality (I hate drafted the one I saw) on 4 game one… this is against my off curve deck that I drafted with 2 KO effects, I didn’t hit one against fatality. Game two he plays Catman on 3 and Fatality on 4… this time I have a useless no mercy.

So we check in for a 3rd night, get another tow to the Subaru Dealership. After I tell the guy my story he goes out back to take a look at the car, the second he gets out the door I hear him laugh his head off. As I suspected the alternator was broken, not putting power back into the battery; they fix it within a few hours while we wait in a Starbucks. I drive back to Mass., I droped nick off at his place at 2:40am and got home at 3am.

While I was there I asked questions like:
“What do you call Canadian bacon in Canada?”
“Do you ever get American quarters in your change?”
“How do you tip strippers without $1 bills?”

At least three people randomly asked for money
At least 3 people asked why we decided to come to Hamilton if we were coming to Canada
We saw at least 2 adult movie theatres
We saw at least 1 adult novelty stores
All convenience stores sold adult magazines
And there was a store that stayed in business doing only BINGO.

I'm glad to be home.

Alex, sounds to me like you have some problems with your alternator if your battery keeps dying. If you haven't gotten that looked at then you definitely need to.

My van had similar problems and we found out that I had gotten sand up in my alternator some how, basically your alternator is what recharges your battery as you're driving, it keeps your battery from just dying all of a sudden, if there is a problem with it, then as soon as you use up all the juice in your battery, it'll die and you'll need a jump. The jump might last maybe half an hour and then it'll die again.

That's basically the my diagnoses from what you've said so far... Anyways, congrats on actually making your first big event though, hopefully you won't have problems like that in the future.

Edit: BTW, I just finally got around to reading the end of your post here and I see that you did get it checked out and it was the alternator. You can always assume that if it's something with the battery that it's gotta be the alternator.

How many gun stores did you see? How many liqour stores did you see? How many gun-and-liqour stores did you see? Hamilton may not be a jewel in the crown, but it's not as bas as your last paragraph seemed to suggest. Lordy, I lost count of the number of strip joints my family drove past on our way to Lowry Park Zoo in Tampa.
And what, you never heard of a Bingo Hall???

Now that that's over with... did you even bother trying Tim Horton's coffee while you were on this side of the border? The chain started in Hamilton, after all.

How much inspiration did you take from the Paul Van Der Werk's Masters of Justice deck? Scott Hunstad's deck from $10K Auckland?

the first tow truck drive told me about tim hortan's coffee. I don't drink coffee.

I had never heard of a bingo hall before and assumed it wasn't all that uncommon, I just couldn't see one staying in business in America.

lol, the inspiration for the guy's to try it out was my HORRIBLE golden age build of JLI MOE (without kooeys or dr. light) that I had put together for AWILE and from Scott's deck. Both decks were only inspirational, we do not build decks around the framework of what others have established; we took the idea, built it from scratch, tested and tweaked it to death. At one point I put in 1 District X and 4 Mob Mentalities for Spectral Slaughter.

I don't drink coffee either, all I know is that Tim Horton's is basically the Starbucks of Ontario. One of every other corner, sorta thing. They make decent doughnuts, at least.

Out of curiosity I did a Google search for a Bingo Hall locator... this one (here) came up with 1215 in Texas. This link was a little broader ranging. Apparently you have halls in a few hundred communities in Massachusetts.

Bad beats, but awesome read!

I don't know where you are in Mass, but near the University in Amherst we have an adult store within 12 miles, and there are at least 2 more I pass going back to Jersey (near Springfield, I think, and somewhere in Connecticut).

Yeah, it's not quite the same level of culture shock as crossing the bridge from Windsor to Detroit and seeing nothing but gun & liquor stores and boarded-up shops.

Yeah, that town sounds tame compared to...oh, anywhere in the US I've ever been to. You mean, you've actually been to a convenience store that doesn't sell adult magazines? I don't think I have ever been to a convenience store like that any state, ever in my life. Only two adult theatres and one adult store? I live in a rather small town and it has three adult novelty stores and a half-dozen strip clubs. And, as others have pointed out, the sheer number of gun and liquor stores in the US is staggering. There is an ABC liquor every few miles in any direction you care to travel in any size of population center. Hell, look at the number of pawn shops (who almost all sell guns)!

Gah, sounds like I'd have culture shock at how much less of that sort of thing is entrenched in that town. :)

It sucks about the car, though! Been there, done that. Sorry it had to happen to your guys. :(

I'm not saying anything like this, though. I'm just using it as a way to ask ExiledForce where in Mass he plays.

You aren't, but I've been all over the US, and every town I've been in, excepting the smallest little towns-between-towns (even here in the thick of the Bible Belt), have plenty of visible, adult-oriented stuff. Especially the convenience store selling adult mags thing. I've literally, of the hundreds of convenience stores I've been to all over the country, never, ever been to one that didn't sell Playboys and Hustlers and the like. That statement (of being shocked to see them all sell such magazines) was a complete shock to me. :)

I never said the things i mentioned are uncommon in the US. I was saying them to pervay the quality scenery in Hamilton.

Hamilton is indeed god-awful.

I dunno about god-awful. The hotel we stayed at on Friday night was amazing with respect to girls. Connected to our hotel was a night club that streaming with them, also parking across the street.

I wanted so badly to stay a second night (hoping someone in our group would top-8), but that didn't happen. Seriously, the hot girl ratio and nice person ratio in HAmilton (and most of Canada, from what we saw) is much higher than here in Dayton

Yeah, that was mostly me being a snob, and annoyed that it wasn't in Toronto. There's nothing actually wrong with Hamilton per se.

It's good to hear you enjoyed your visit, and if you liked the girls in Hamilton, it's time to start lobbying for a 10K in Montreal (seriously)!