Saturday, July 12, 2025
Franklin, MA
Schedule
Breakfast at ?? and ?? in ?? at ??
Four Square Volleyball at David's house in Franklin, MA at ??
Croquet at David's house in Franklin, MA at 1:35PM
Lunch at Panera Bread and Five Guys in Franklin, MA at ??
Candlepin Bowling at ?? in ?? at ??
Wiffleball at ?? in ?? at ??
Ladder Ball at David's house in Franklin, MA at ??
Dinner from ?? at David’s house in Franklin, MA at 9:30PM
Movie and Codenames at David's house in Franklin, MA from ?? to ??
Participants
Dave (28th), Marc (28th), Span (), Brian (), Eugene (), Matt (), Mehr (), Eric (14th)
Photos: Highlights | Complete Set
Videos: Highlights | Complete Set
Anecdotes
Reviews
Planning
Pre-Breakfast
Eric, Brian, Eugene, and Marc drove together and took a ferry across the Long Island Sound. While on the ferry, they met up with a friend of Eric's who also was a big fan of geocaching. While Eric was talking to his friend, Marc overheard that his friend was a big fan of Star Trek; as Marc was as well, he had Eric formerly introduce him so that they could talk Trek.
As noted above, during the planning of this MBBB, Eric had mentioned that he really wanted to visit Boston again for the first time in a while. He could scout out some new geocaches and also attend a Red Sox game at Fenway Park. Eugene mentioned that he had taken a tour of Fenway many years ago, but with whom? Marc remembered going with his wife and not Eugene. Meanwhile, Eugene said that the tour took him into the Green Monster, and no one else who had toured Fenway remembered that part of the tour. So it remained a mystery.
Eric dropped Marc, Brian, and Eugene at a hotel that was pretty close to Dave's house. He couldn't drop them off at Dave's house because he was on his way to Boston. None of the three wanted to download the Uber app to order a car, but then Marc realized that he already had an Uber account because he got a free year of Uber Eats. The problem then became ordering the car; Marc could not get the app to accept numerous types of payment despite his use of Uber Eats in the near past. They reached out to Dave who was able to order an Uber on their behalf.
During the Uber ride, the three of them had to sit in the back of the car together as the driver did not want anyone to sit up front with him. After arriving at Dave's house, they mentioned it to him (as Dave had to leave a review and asked them how the ride was), and he noted that this had happened to him as well. There was apparently some unwritten rule with Uber drivers.
The Uber dropped the group off at a strip mall, and they went to a Stop and Shop to buy some food. Marc and Eugene both planned to eat a lot of their own food during the weekend as opposed to eating out. Around this time, Mehr texted the group advising that he had arrived in Franklin. Since Dave wasn't quite ready yet to have people as he was still cleaning up, he recommended that Mehr drive over to meet Marc, Brian, and Eugene. David had originally thought that he would pick up those three and drive them back to the house; through a happy coincidence, Mehr ended up driving them.
Dave originally thought that he wouldn't be able to attend the Red Sox game because he thought he had to host people at his house. But then he realized that he could leave them there and on their own?
The three people who didn't go to the Red Sox game spent the night very differently. Marc and Eugene played around with the OLED TV in Dave's living room trying to change various settings including the color to make it look the best that it could.
Later in the evening, Marc decided to do a 10 mile run. He usually wakes up very early Saturday morning to do his runs but felt it would be smarter to do it the night before. This ended up being a smart choice since the group stayed up very late that night partially because Span arrived after 11:00PM due to working a full day at a new job and having to drive all the way from Delaware.
After Marc arrived back the house after his run, he was surprised to find that the house was very dark. Brian and Eugene had fallen asleep very early and remained so until the group that attended the Red Sox game came back to the house, and Mehr drove Eugene back to the hotel.
In the morning?, Span mentioned that he could hear beeping that was apparently a smoke alarm with low batteries. David said that it came from the basement, and he had been unable to find the offending alarm for so long that he didn't even hear the beeping anymore. Taking it as a challenge to find the alarm, Span went down into the basement with David and amazingly found that the beeping was coming from ??
Breakfast
At the restaurant, the non-hotel group called the hotel group to check when they would arrive.
A few people went across the street to purchase bagels and coffee? Brian had wanted to try the bagels for a while.
The hotel group mostly ordered coffee or a light breakfast since they partook in the buffet breakfast at the hotel.
Talked about burger joints and pizza joints (i.e., which are the most popular).
Talked about video game role playing games including Mario themed versions.
Mehr mentioned that he had (recently?) been in a car accident where the rear end of his car was hit.
Eric, David, and Matt engaged in some hockey talk including about trades, free agents, and draft picks.
Talk about conspiracy theories including the moon landing and the NBA, specifically the Luka Doncic trade and how that "led" to the Dallas Mavericks getting the #1 draft pick in the next NBA draft.
Upon paying, Matt "showed off" his "George Contanza" wallet, i.e., a wallet which is so full of stuff that he couldn't even fit any change in it.
Four Square Volleyball
Construction and explaining of the rules took a long time. Dave jerry-rigged a set up so that they could film the game. Since all eight members would be playing simultaneously, there would be no on available to film. Dave joked that they would hit the ball and knock over the phone, but that never came close to happening.
GAME 1
Mehr and Span: 11 points
Eric and Marc: 8 points
Dave and Matt: 4 points
Eugene and Brian: 1 point
Teams would count off the amount of points they had after each stoppage in play. It became a running joke that Eugene and Brian had zero points for such a long portion of the game.
GAME 2
Eric and Marc: 13 points
Mehr and Span: 11 points
Dave and Matt: 9 points
Eugene and Brian: 9 point
Early on in the game, Eric and Marc became the butt of the joke of having zero points as they took the longest to score a point. Meanwhile, the team that was the previous butt of the joke, Eugene and Brian, got out to an early lead over the other teams.
Afterwards, Marc mentioned that he felt that he didn't contribute much to his team, but David said maybe he did better than he thought. They could see on the video that David took.
Croquet
While waiting for the croquet court to be set up and while cooling off in the air conditioned house, Brian and Mehr engaged in an impromptu game of foosball. Mehr ended up shutting Brian out with a score of 10-0 with Brian having one own-goal. Their strategies were very different with Brian trick spinning the players for power and speed while Mehr was more deliberate and tried to use aim and accuracy on his shots.
Once the croquet court was ready, the teams were decided quickly: it would be the Struck brothers vs. the non-Strucks.
Early on, the non-Strucks hit one of the Strucks' balls past the gate and effectively took it out of play.
Game was very long but fun, and strategy abounded with numerous quiet conversations between the teams on how to proceed with their next hits.
In the second half of the game, the Strucks pulled their balls that could no longer be hit through the gates (because they were so far behind) back to the beginning of the course so that they could use them for defense. They put all of their proverbial eggs in one basket (i.e., the one ball that they had been able to hit through the gates).
The win came for the non-Strucks when Eugene completed a combination of shots very nearby the final gate. This was perpetuated by the Strucks making a bad decision. They had done a great job of taking the lead with their lone ball, and this ball was very close to the final gate. And so they used another one of their other balls to try to hit it into a better position. But the two balls ended up very close to each other which allowed Eugene to make a long shot to hit one of them and get two bonus shots.
Finish around 3:25PM.
Lunch
Prior to going to the restaurants, Marc stopped by the Stop & Shop to return some bad avocados that he had purchased the day before.
Matt mentioned that Starry in a rebrand of 7-Up which was a surprise to a number of people.
Someone asked Marc when MBBB was last in Franklin, MA, and Matt joked, if only there was a resource that they could use to look this information up. Of course there is, this website and its Google search! They discovered that the answer was back in ...
A man vomited outside of the restaurant; ugh, while they were still eating! At least no one captured in on video!
Span ended up with some gun on the sole of his shoe.
Since candlepin bowling is local to Massachusetts, people asked David if anyone had ever bowled a perfect 300, and he said that it definitely had never happened. Looking it up on Google, they found that the top score ever was ...
Earlier in the day, there had been talk of a trip to Dave's apartment when they were all in college. Dave had just moved into a new apartment, and the group traveling to visit him didn't get his address (they might have had the street name but not the house number) or phone number. What a silly thing to do! Eventually, Marc used a pay phone (remember those?) to call information, and thankfully, they had Dave's new address, and they were able to find him. They were considering sleeping in the car if necessary. There was also a moment where they asked some people coming out of a party if they knew who Dave was (they didn't).
Anyway, the question became who specifically had participated in this trip. Marc was sure that the group included Brian and Eugene. Eric claimed to be part of this trip, but the others were pretty certain that he hadn't been with them. Marc argued that Eric couldn't have been part of the group because he was too responsible and would have never let them take the trip without making sure that they had Dave's phone number and/or home address. And so, during lunch, they asked Dave if he could remember who had made the trip to visit him; he couldn't be sure of anything except that Eric was not one of those people. Though Eric had a distinct memory of the trip, Marc reasoned that perhaps it was a false memory because, no doubt, the group had called him when they realized they couldn't find where Dave then lived.
Candlepin Bowling
SCORES FROM GAME 1 GO HERE
SCORES FROM GAME 2 GO HERE
No competition, individual or in teams, just having some fun.
Strikes and spares were exceedingly tough to come by, though David had a nice run in his second game. This was despite the fact that the group had chosen to use bumpers. And despite the bumpers, Span was still able to find a way to throw a gutter ball or two!
Marc was very disappointed that he just missed out on get a score of 100 in his first game. He missed doing so on the final shot of the game. How many pins did he need on his final throw?
Marc was surprised that, despite doing much worse in his second game, that he still ended up with the second highest score.
Brian thought that he lost his shoes; the group looked everywhere to find them only for Brian to find them exactly where he took them off before the games.
Wiffleball
Thought briefly about doing a game (that was the original plan), but quickly decided to switch to batting practice instead. The thought was that a game could be too time consuming.
Marc did almost all of the pitching.
Mehr was labeled the "vacuum cleaner" since he caught almost every fly ball that was hit in his general direction while he played in left field.
Even the best hitters, Mehr and Eric, could barely hit the ball on a fly much further than the innermost section of the outfield.
Ladder Ball
Set up of the game and discussion of rules. Can't bounce the balls onto the ladder. Tight twister would get a bonus, but then they decided not?
GAME 1
Mehr and Marc: 21 points
Eric and Dave: 11 points
GAME 2
Mehr and Marc: 21 points
Dave and Matt: 16 points
Marc made a lot of throws that scored three points. Since both ladder ball and wiffleball require underhand throws, and Marc did a bunch of pitching during wiffleball, he semi-joked that perhaps that helped with how well he played during ladder ball.
Finished around 8:40PM. Happy with how well the photos and videos came out despite the daylight fading.
Dinner
Marc and Eugene both cooked their dinners on Dave's stovetop due to their vegan and lactose intolerant diets.
Dave had a new, nice, large island in his kitchen since their last visit, and so people pulled up some stools to eat dinner there.
Movie and Codenames
Can't remember what prompted the group to watch Office Space. Eric, in particular, really wanted to figure it out, but they couldn't. They also tried to figure out which streaming service had the movie, but none appeared to. Then Marc remembered that he owned a digital version of it. It took a lot of jumping through hoops (logins and code verifications) to finally bring the movie up on David's TV.
After the movie, Eugene said he was very impressed at how the movie looked on David's TV. He thought it was a 4K version of the movie; Marc said it wasn't, but the LG OLED was known to be very good and upscaling lower resolution content.
Who were the code givers and guessers in game 1, and who won?
Marc won the second game with Span guessing his clues. David had Eric guessing, but he had very hard cards to guess. He needed Eric to get 5 cards on his final turn to win. Eric accidentally guessed 2 of Marc's cards which made matters worse. One of Marc's clues was "jail" so that Span could guess "cell" but Span said Marc could have said "mitochondria". Marc tried to think of a part of a cell but couldn't! Marc also didn't realize that "capital" could reference a state or country capital (capitol is the building). Span is a master of geography, so Marc could have even used "Montpelier" (the capital of Vermont), and surprisingly, he HAD thought of that!