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Monthly Meetings

We have monthly meetings on the 2nd Tuesday of each month. Our meeting schedule is governed by the Shotgun Rules, as follows.

Shotgun Rules for Brûleurs Meetings

RULE 1: Each month, the Brûleurs meeting will be on the 2nd Tuesday of the month.
RULE 2: Determination for the location for the Brûleurs meeting is like calling shotgun for the front passenger seat of a car. Whoever calls the location first, wins, and that's where Brûleurs is going to be, period. In case of close calls, "first" is determined by date received by the list server machine, and ties go to the runner.
RULE 3: A meeting announcement must be posted by email in the language of your choice (preferably French or English) to the Brûleurs list, with the word "ANNOUNCEMENT" or "ANNONCE" in the Subject header. It must define a time, a location (with address and/or directions by car and public transportation), and use the declarative voice ("We are going to..." not "Would you guys like to go to...?"). It should not be sent before the previous month's meeting has happened (or should have happened). It is friendly but not required to post it to http://wiki.bruleurs.net/ and/or http://montrealburners.tribe.net/ , but not crucial.
RULE 4: If you make the announcement, you have to go, you have to be on time and preferably early, and you have to make a little sign that says "Brûleurs" so people know where they're supposed to sit.
RULE 5: If no one makes an announcement, the meeting will not happen. If nobody cares enough to take responsibility and make an announcement, and everyone minces around with do-you-think's and what-about-this's, we are weak and cowardly and do not deserve a lovely meeting together.
RULE 6: Nobody is making you go to Brûleurs meetings. Your dialysis machine is not at the Brûleurs meeting. You are not a robot of the future who will be stuck in our dimension forever if you don't attend the Brûleurs meeting.
If, for some reason, you cannot make it to the Brûleurs meeting, or you don't like where it's being held, or Chinese food gives you an upset tummy, then Don't Go, and make a note in your calendar to yourself to take some initiative and make the next month's announcement. You'll show them! You'll show everybody!
RULE 7: In case of SEVERE HAZARD -- for example, the originally chosen venue has burnt to the ground or is on fire at the scheduled time for the meeting, etc. -- the original organizer should post a new announcement according to rule 3, mentioning prominently that it is a change.
The organizer MUST put a sign and/or a human runner at the original venue to send people who missed the revised announcement to the new location.

That's it. 7 simple rules. The Date Rule, the Shotgun Rule, the Email Rule, the Organizer Rule, the Have a Spine Rule, the Take Your Lumps Rule, and the System Crash Rule.

Now, as another reminder, here's the non-binding part.

  • Good locations for a Brûleurs meeting will have:
    • Food
    • Cheap food
    • Good food
    • Alcoholic beverages
    • Non-alcoholic beverages
    • Access for minors and people under 21
    • Separate checks
    • Seats for 10-30 people
    • Room to push tables together, or pull them apart
    • Forgiveness for people coming and leaving at will
    • Something for vegetarians to eat
    • Something for carnivores to eat
    • Enough quiet that we can talk
    • Enough loudness that we're not a big distraction
    • Enough light that we can see the drawings we're making on the backs of napkins
    • Access by public transportation
    • Access by car
    • Nearby parking
    • Easy directions

Obviously, there's no requirement that every location have all these things, and most locations won't. And you are the sole determiner of where everyone goes: you can call the meeting for a XXX movie theater or your own home or a cardboard box under the freeway. But it'd be nice to meet these goals.

  • A good time for meeting is A) late enough that people can get off work and drive or ride from their region to the region the meeting is in, and B) not so late that the place is going to close, or people have to go home for sleep. Think 7-8PM.
  • If you think you know a good place to go, announce it. If you don't, shut up. When people post do-you-think's and what-about-this's, it clouds the waters and everyone gets confused. So don't do that.
  • If for some reason you are far outside the preferred region of the meeting, you should think about starting an offshoot group and having separate meetings.
  • A good meeting attendee will bring money for their share of food and drink if they can. If they can't, they will keep their grubby mitts off the food and drink. If they share from common food or drink (such as pizzas or fries or pitchers of beer), they will get up and get another pizza or basket of fries or pitcher or whatever when the current one runs out. They will chip in for what they ate, and pay for what they ordered, and remember the tip, and round up rather than down.
  • A sample announcement email would look like this:
From: Evan Prodromou <evan@bruleurs.net> To: bruleurs@disc.bruleurs.net Subject: ANNOUNCEMENT: Brûleurs meeting 10 May 2005 Date: 29 April 2005 10:22:00 -0400 
  The Brûleurs meeting for this month will be held at Munster's Pizza
Parlor on May 10th, 2005 at 7PM. 
  Munster's is at at 1313 rue Moqueur E. on the corner with rue
  St-Dibiche on the number 33 bus line. It's five blocks west of the
  St-Cyr metro station.

  See you there,

  ~ESP
Note that this message projects authority, it has all important information, and it does not use a question mark anywhere in the message or subject line.
  • There is no shame in announcing the meeting for someplace that Brûleurs has already been before. Heck: if it was good enough before, it's probably good enough now.
  • If you make an announcement, it's entirely possible that NO ONE will come. This is the risk you run. You have put yourself on the line, and it's within the realm of likelihood that you will spend the night lonely and afraid, standing naked in the rain while fire ants crawl on your legs and chomp your skin and all of the people you have ever had secret crushes on point at you and laugh and laugh.
In short, it will be the worst night of your entire life, bar none. If you are prepared for this, any other outcome will be a pleasant surprise.

If you are not prepared for this, and you send a vituperative and bitter email to the Brûleurs list on the Day After, you will come off like a fool, and you will have capped your disastrous event with a bitter and ugly conclusion. This is not smart, so don't do that.