Game Summary:
Ouch.  This one was tough - according to Jayson Wechter, it was even tougher than it had been in previous years.  After emerging victorious in the previous game, we entered this one a little unprepared and undermanned, and it showed in the results.  This hunt had tons of people (~1200) and three different divisions.  We competed in the regular division (the middle of the three), thinking that our (what we found out to be limited) experience would be adequate to skip the beginner's division.  How wrong we were!  We were allowed to choose a team name after the hunt (luckily), and it sort of conveys our opinion of how we did:  Anemic Blood & Osteoporotic Bones.  Of course, we were missing nearly half of our regular team, not to mention that one of our four team members (Sarangan) was only with us for the first hour or so.  That left us with three people when 4-6 was the suggested team size.  There were some highlights, though, and it was still a fun time.  Sarangan smooth-talked the desk clerk at the Hyatt Regency into giving us both white and yellow pages for San Francisco before the hunt begun.   This was huge, because we always scramble to find these before any SF hunts, and now we have our own to keep!  Also in this hunt, Robert became the most experienced member of Blood & Bones in that he is the only team member to have participated in every event we have entered - way to go Robert!

Criticisms - One thing that I personally brought home from this was the fact that I realized I don't particularly like the format in which clues are given all at once, and not in order.  This forces teams to solve all of the clues at the outset of the hunt, and then run around the city just confirming the answers.  I feel like the hunt becomes too disjointed and I think that the teamwork is better utilized when everyone is focused on one clue at a time.  Also, there were a few audio clues in this one.  Normally, I am a big fan of audio clues, but when they are cassettes and you have to carry the audio playing device around with you, there aren't many options other than a walkman, and those aren't real conducive to listening together as a team, forcing the clue to be solved more individually.  That said, this one did have some interesting and creative clues and I'd do it again.  Hopefully, next year we will have learned from this one and have a little bit better showing, and maybe we can convince the missing members of our team to join us then, too.

Team Members:  Rich Bragg, Chris Cheng, Robert Cheng, Sarangan Narasimhan
Start Time:  February 23, 2002, 5:45 PM
Finish Time:  February 23, 2002, 9:43 PM (3:58 elapsed)
Clues:  Solved 5 of 16 clues
Result:  20th out of 44 teams, Regular Division