arrival

After taking my time getting on the road, I arrived at WHY2025 at about noon on Friday. While the official program had just begun, it was clear that most folks had been camping for many days already.

I found a spot at the end of the car camping area, in the quiet zone. This is quite far from most facilities, including the (very nice) toilets and showers, but the relative peace and quiet is already quite nice.

no power!

For my first event I decided to attend Gasman’s ZX Spectrum Chiptune Phenomenon at the party stage. Unfortunately, there was around the time the power outage started, so there was no power for the performance, and no power to run the bar!

So instead of bleepy music I found an empty beanbag in the Party Bar and fell asleep for a short nap then walked back to my camp to make dinner.

midnight tosti

My small contribution to WHY2025 was Midnight Tosti, aka, grilled cheese. I enjoy feeding hungry people grilled cheese sandwhiches late at night on campouts. How to advertise? I dont want too many people to find me, b/c my production throughput is not that good!

I placed 9 of these small cardbard signs leading people to my camper van.

a hand-lettered carboard sign is attached to a wood post. there is a hand drawn "quiet" emoji and the text says "Shhhh.... Midnight Tosti" with an arrow to the right

this is my favorite sign, b/c the placement makes it look like the emoji is hiding behind the post

a hand-lettered cardboard sign with a hand-drawn "quiet emoji," partially obscured by the wood post the sign is attached to. the text says "Shhh.... Midnight Tosti, with an arrow to the right.

The best part was at about 2 in the morning, after everyone had left, I was sitting outside my van having a drink and putting off cleanup, and two late arrivals, Matteo and Flo, walked by in headlamps, stopped and asked if I knew where they can find Midnight Tosti. You have found it, my lovely hacker friends!

So I heated up the last, un-eaten sandwich of the night, made a fresh one, and got to know two very interesting infosec researchers!

They were led in by this sign:

a hand-lettered cardboard sign with a hand drawn "quiet" emoji is attached to a wood post. the text says "Sshhh... left for midnight tosti"

There was also some discussion on the Fediverse.

Thank you everyone who stopped by last night!

a group of people under a campervan awning at night, eating hot cheese sandwiches. there is a person in the foreground handing a light green plate with a golden tosti on top to someone out of the picture

leave no trace

Since it was a one-time event, I took down all of the signs this morning. Someone had affixed googly eyes to one of them, so I was a little sad to take that one down.

impressions

I promised my first impressions! The event is lovely. Super-well organized and everyone I have met has been lovely. I’m looking forward to really nerding out today!

p.s. preparations for midnight tosti

Before people arrived…