Night 2 Parties at Defcon 16

My party source told me that there was a girl hacker party next door at the Peppermill lounge at 10 PM. Cool! A party of women in computing! I went to Carnegie Mellon Univ. and read Unlocking the Clubhouse by Jane Margolis and Allan Fisher. I don't really know any other techie hacker girls who attend Defcon, so it would be interesting. He gave me a pass that had lipstick kiss marks, a skull and cross bones, and a Bond girl-ish cross hairs gun sight on it. I thought that Edgeos must be a hacking group like the Ninjas or Hacker Pimps.

The lounge at the Peppermill was retro lovely. There was circular seating around a fire pit that was coming out of a pool of water. On TV screens above the bar and the fire pit, a soft-porn video featuring the Edgeos girls was playing. They weren't hacking, but they were sitting on computers doing their soft porn stuff. I think a computer security company is Edgeos, but their marketing was confusing. The girls were also there serving drinks and I, graciously, ordered some VSOP and talked to a couple who does computer forensics for IBM. It was a bit of a disappointment that this wasn't the women in computing clubhouse, but the long line of guys standing outside to get into the party didn't mind at all.

I left with Dallas and we went to the Freak Show Party in the Penthouse put on by Dan Kaminsky's company, IOActive. This party was awesome! They really went all out with the carnie theme. They had a contortionist, a freakishly tall guy, a bearded lady, and a Twister game set up. Out on the dance floor, I saw my friends from Seattle, met up with Brenno, and we all got to dance with Cap'n Crunch. Brenno joined a former Fed and me in the back of the room to smoke cigars. I had one Dominican left, Brenno had a small box of Dutch cigars, and the former Fed had a Cuban locked in his car in the hotel's parking garage. When he mentioned the Cuban, it seemed as if techno music slowed down for a moment, my thoughts became fuzzy, and the cognac seems a bit sweeter at that moment. I almost grabbed him by the collar, assertively asked for his keys, and told him I'd happily go get it if he'd share. I distracted myself from this impulse by becoming busy lighting my Dominican and puffed hard until the impulse passed. A locked car in a parking garage is no place for a Cuban cigar! It's to be treasured and shared....Actually, it was an angry security guard who broke our smoking bliss when she demanded we extinguish our cigars. We forgot that smoking is only permitted in bars—or something like that. Don't know for sure. We, regrettably, acquiesced.

Brenno and I danced until the party shut down and we went across the hall to another Penthouse party. At this party, anyone who felt like it went behind the bar and served drinks. I met one of the Agent Orange guys, Obphusc8 (I think), who was amazed that I was, “...like 22 or something and teaching college classes.” Even though I'm sure it was the beer talking, he still got major points for that one. Seriously. You rock.

In the Penthouse after watching limos and expensive sports cars trolling the streets below and the neon-lit Vegas sky scrapers, the the morning sun seemed far from Vegas. Vegas is a city made for the night. The lights, theme-park like hotels and “what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas,” is only made for the cover of night. Before spoiling this intoxicating night-time view with the rising sun, I went back to my cavernously dark room.