#okboomer

я на завтрак сьела илью муромца 😜

It’s been a long while since I wrote a post-Thanksgiving blog. And yet, it’s only been about 6 years. So in honor of that, here it is. With upgrades. By now, you had the turkey. You had the dressing. You had the cranberry sauce, vegetables, and pie. You’re probably stuffed with all the food. And yes, you probably went to a late-night club and got started by shaking down those pounds, carbs, and…

September 14, 2025 | Steadfast Brewing Co. Toronto

Photo by Matt, used without permission.

Toronto had its first mid-sized cube event! Gray told me about his idea for Untap TO back in March, and it was incredible getting to be there to see the culmination of all of his work, as well as Koby and Kyle from the Toronto MTG Cubers Discord. Pink Sleeves was one of the featured cubes, but this post will only cover my experience of the day, not thoughts on my cube.

A small upside of small children waking you up everyday is that being at a brewery across town for 9AM on a Sunday isn’t a big ask. There was a moment of panic, or maybe just sadness, arriving at Bloor-Yonge and seeing shuttle buses were running, but I ran into Kirrin, the bus ride was only two stops, and the walk down Lansdowne to Steadfast was beautiful. Free pastries and coffee were delightful generosities to start everyone on a foundation of calories and stimulants, and I was relieved to feel the breeze through the open garage doors.

I reviewed the cubes in advance, mainly looking at random packs to get a feel for their gameplay aesthetics. The two that stood out were Volcano Manor (the only desert cube at the event) and Modern (8ED-WAR), but I meta-gamed my rankings a bit and lowered Volcano Manor and 10oz in my rankings, cuz I know I’ll have the opportunity to play them again. 

8ED-WAR asked me to read so much less than the other entries. Cards were recognizable, or else not too wordy. That contrasted with others, which had a lot of cards I would have to read. That isn’t a negative experience, but it means more attention paid to a less fun part of the game.

I was a little disappointed there wasn’t more variety. I was hoping for something Old School-adjacent, and it would’ve been nice to have another cube with rules modifications or novelty, although I’m glad people were able to have pretty “normal” cube experiences, because not everyone has the opportunity. I did my part by going against my better judgement and putting Cogwork Librarians in every first pack of Pink Sleeves. The cube with eight seats is probably better without them, but I wanted to offer something cheesy.

The Hedron Network algorithm did its job and put me into my top choice…

Draft 1: Modern (8ED-WAR)

cubecobra.com/c/ okboomer | Sebastien's 360 card cube using only cards from Standard sets between Eighth Edition and War of the Spark.

I started this draft with some nice pieces for an artifacts deck: Chrome Mox, Mox Opal, Arcbound Ravager, and then we realized the cube was really not shuffled. Not clear how that happened, but Freyja encouraged us to start over and at that point I realized my second pack was 15 white spells. Judge Vivien was amazing and got us back on track.

Second time around, I took combo pieces highly and ended up in Boros. I got Dark Depths and Thespian Stage with no way to find them, Kiki Jiki plus Felidar Guardian and Pestermite as a splash. The deck was not good, but I had a lot of fun with it.

Pick Order

My first match was against Will. I ended game 1 with 10 damage from burn spells and Guttersnipe. Will used Makeshift Mannequin in game 2 to reanimate Griselbrand early, which I titdily answered (post-draw 7 of course) by giving Griselbrand +3/+3 and flying with Elspeth, Knight Errant. That felt great but didn’t stop Will from winning. At 1-1 with about 4 minutes left in the round we started game 3. I drew Dark Depths and Thespian Stage and got the quick win before turns expired.

Game one against Freyja went well, getting her down to zero before she could hit back at all, but she completely controlled games 2 and 3. Narset, Parter of Veils blanked my Skullclamp and I lost my legs. I dug myself a little deeper by taking a turn or two longer to get rid of Narset, but I was floundering regardless. 

I appreciate that in the clarity that comes with familiar cards it’s easier to identify mistakes in my play. Cards that you don’t have stored in memory make the decisions more opaque, at least to me as a bad magic player.

Pav closed out match 3 with a Bitterblossom that never felt unfair, and I even set back with a strong Declaration in Stone. I finished the first draft 1-2, had a blast, and had the highest opponent match win % of anyone at Untap, so I was feeling good.

I tagged along with some of the folks who haunt Kung Fu Tea on Mondays and we ordered a family-style lunch from KHAOSE without knowing what we’d got, but it was delicious and hell yes I’ll vouch for Pakistani street food. The lunch break starting after the last match of round 1 finished was very generous and pushed everyone behind schedule, but I think it was worth it to make sure everyone had a good break, and people still jammed in games of Dandan and other stuff.

Draft 2: The Artificer’s Cube

cubecobra.com/c/TheArtificersCube | Lilith's 360 card artifact cube

After lunch I landed in my second pick, The Artificer’s Cube, and went 1-2 against Carlos, Freyja, and Jack. My deck was heavy into red sacrifice, with some green cards for artifact hate. 

The table got into a bit of trouble because multiple seats were pursuing something like a Scales deck, but a lot of those pieces have decently high synergistic floors, so people (including me) were sniping pieces from the players really going for it. That’s an interesting dynamic, and I’ll have it in mind for future Pink Sleeves changes, as I think there’s some disparity in how attractive the pieces of different decks are.

Pick Order. 2 for 2 on grabbing Faithless Looting!

Lilith did a great job of preventing neutralize.dec from being the dominant strategy by having a more of the threats and engine pieces be non-artifacts than you’d expect. Boards were interesting and I spent a lot of turns one piece away from pulling off an explosive, game-ending sequence. I got tripped up by unfamiliar cards (including a bunch from Edge of Eternities). It’s on me to learn the cards!

My second biggest regret of the day was not getting to say hi to more people I know from Discord, but there was only so much time! My biggest regret was not eating dinner after the second draft, and instead diving into…

Stone Soup

The cards I brought...

The day was heating up. The sun was pouring in and glaring off cards at some unfortunate tables. Despite my best efforts at hygiene, as evening slid in I was soaked with late-Summer humidity-accented sweat.

I did not take a photo of my bad deck.

The energy going into the draft was incredible. People were so excited, and we had an extra infusion of enthusiasm from the folks who bought “sicko” tickets that got them in at 5PM, which was a great idea. We pulled together two pods, and ours was… chaotic. When pulling together my pool I started off conservative, then realized that would be boring so I threw in a bunch of cheat and artifact recursion. Curves at the table ended up not bad, but I don’t know how cohesive game plans were. My deck was basically clones and wheels, and I didn’t manage a deck or pool photo

Corporate wants you to...

In the first match I copied Joshua’s Puresteel Angel, which was ridiculous, but also miserable.I understand why Scheherezade Sharazad is banned. I lost, then swung over to a match with Kirrin. My deck continued to be garbage and we commiserated about how mentally fried we were from playing more magic than we’d ever played in our lives (we're not grinders!). At that point I was still enjoying the event, but I wasn’t having fun playing Magic anymore. I tapped out and headed home to relieve my partner from child-minding and then shower.

And the rest...

Dom Harvey "shockingly" beat Colson in the finals to go 9-0 on the day.

My basic land from Brent and some (but not all) of the tokens available

The prizing was unnecessary (except the pins! Give me a pin! I won’t pretend I earned it!), but I really loved the community contributions. Mae brought tokens by donation (including some I needed to round out Pink Sleeves!), Brent brought collaged basics, including a Mountain with a furniture catalog photo that made everyone ask if they were missing something. Even better, several tickets were donated in the last week and given away to people who wouldn't otherwise be able to attend. That kind of stuff made the event feel so much more community-driven, as so many people played a part in making it a great day.

I’m dying to know what Gray is planning next. He, Koby, Kyle, and Vivien did an incredible job running the day. After expenses they were able to raise $300 for the Canadian Lyme Disease Foundation. If the team just runs it back that would rule, but I bet they'll have new tricks.

Odds and Ends

The father-son duo was so sweet, especially the dad saying this was a dream come true for him.

The 0-3 ice cream was a great idea but I was never in contention. Curse my innate 1-2 skills!

If I got any details wrong, let me know and I will make corrections!

One of my opponents seemed slightly worried they offended me. You didn't at all, even a little bit!

Other events should sell late entry Sicko tickets! Having those extra folks there made the evening better!

Thank you to Mae for drawing Copy and Beast Tokens after I said I needed those, and to Koby for grabbing them to put in with Pink Sleeves before the first draft

Thank you to Tom for wrangling lunch

Thank you to Kyle for grabbing my Stone Soup cards

Thank you to my wonderful sister-in-law for helping with my kids, and my wonderful wife for you know, just always.

Paddling Lake Woebegone... again.

Viernes 15 de Marzo, 2024

So where to even BEGIN to catch up with myself?

Back to SF Fev 6 - 20; cut short to make sure I was back to MVD in time for my shit to hit the street here — BUT IT DIDN'T, OF COURSE — SO I spent $200 to cut the last week off my trip*, cut the SFUSD by days**, and SIT AROUND for another ten days. So what to do? I know : a BIKEWRECK 🤬 23 Fev: the new bikelane down 18 de Julio, impulse to stare to the right at Crespo looking for the "perfect storage space" that wasn't...

WHAM-BAMM!! Ass over teakettle "en media calle" ; hit that big hard black rubber traffic cone with my left shoulder. Knew I'd jacked it good, and left wrist almost sprained, just above the left knee, left ring fingertip crushed.

People ran up to help the old fool... left arm hanging loose "Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck..." vision pixellated, like my eyeball was hanging out or somethin. Struggled to see and walk, locked the bike to the closest parking sign, walked home bleeding from three spots on my right hand, and from inside my left ear.

Amazed the bike was unhurt, nor were my sunglasses of Bill's, the OPs I spent hundreds on lenses for, just this left shoulder I'd so carefully trained and strengthened since the 2018 surgery to correct the massive rotocuff tear and 40 year old dislocation from the 1977 wreck of Kent C's Alfa. No problem: just let go... again... of the wish, the strength, the confidence, the feeling of some small success. Nothing matters in this BEST of "GOD's will" world. HOW do I know God's watching, maybe laughing? Because the NEXT DAY + 7, Saturday 2 Mar, my stuff arrives at the SimpleBox in Ciudad Viejo 10months and $10K down this road (to ruin). Of COURSE the gold FINALLY shot up past $2100 right after I cashed most of it in to pay off the Aduanas (or Uruvan?) suckers.

Obviously, God wanted to keep me off a bike. Last Friday, 8 Mar, BOTH the blue Retrospec I bought here a year ago, and the newish Trek I just brought from SF were both swiped from just the other side of my door while I was eating my pressure-pot dinner about 9pm.

Not a SOUND. I came out for some reason about 10pm, first noticed the stair's door open, then the clean open space along the tiled wall where the bikes had been. I ran downstairs and outside, talked to a young man working for CUTSCA the bus company standing at the bustop in front of 2033. Yes, he'd seen a man and a woman run out the heavy iron front door into 18 de Julio with my bikes "about an hour" before. The guy almost ran into an oncoming bus in his panic to get away. NO the lobby camera didn't record past 30 minutes before. Pablo, the guy living directly below, turned out to be the building manager.

"We called them to fix the camera system, but they never came." This is the picture he knocked at the door to offer later, and how I tried to make it usable with Photoshop >>>

Juan Pedro, my host's son, was kind enough to offer to let me put off the rent until month's end, but, honestly...

Aikido says: "take the hit — then redirect"... that Saturday I spent an hour with a young policewoman taking my theft report with thinly disguised contempt for another clueless old fuck, this one with such lousy Spanish her patience wore out long before her few questions got answered.