The folks who attended? @karenSTL @tojosan @nanna_j @STLConciergeGuy @Rebecca_Rene.

Some other blogs written about the tweetup:
Todd Jordan: Crooked Tree Coffee House Tweetup
Karen Goodman: Coffee House Review – Crooked Tree Coffee House

I had never eaten at The Atomic Cowboy before and quite honestly didn’t hold my standards for them very high.  However, afterwards, I was sold on their flavor! I only ordered guapo fries with cheese sauce and cheeseburger sliders but Oh.My.Goodness! They were soooo good. I believe @mdhugo helped me eat the fries but I have no doubt that I could have finished it off.

As we left, it was decided that we’d go to Novak’s which is a gay bar across the street.  In fact, most of the bars in this neighborhood are gay bars. Not really a problem for me to be in a gay bar but as we were leaving, I made a comment like “Ok, let’s go to the next gay bar”. Everyone kind of got quiet for a second. I believe it was @tojosan that said “What do you mean ‘next’ gay bar?” As I explained that I thought The Atomic Cowboy was a gay bar, everyone began laughing at me. I really had no idea that it was NOT a gay bar. It really didn’t matter to me one way or the other…but the whole situation was comical and provided a laugh for the rest of the night.

As the night moved on, so did the fun. A few people had to take off, but a few more hitched on for the ride. Novaks ended up being alot more fun that planned on since there was Karaoke. We had a few of our party goers sing, like @SgtHotPants and @AngeBird.

The end of the night came sooner for me than the rest of the party animals because I had to be up for work by 4:30 in the morning. Sonya and I had a few minutes to say our goodbyes. It was very emotional for me and caught myself shedding a tear or two. I know that she needs to do this, but selfishly I want her to stay. We wish you well Sonya Kim and hope to see you very soon! Todd mentioned making a road trip to Seattle one day…I’m totally down with that!!

I tried to take a bunch of images throughout the night and managed to capture some really good shots. You can even check out the video below of some of the Karaoke happenings. Click on the image to the right to view the Flickr album.

The afternoon started off with a little bit of excitement though as we stood in front of the Country Store.  There was a 2 car accident out in the street.  No one was seriously injured that I could tell, but it was remarkable how fast the paramedics made it on the scene.  There was an off-duty Search and Rescue worker who showed up on the scene within literally 2 minutes…I’d say about 5 minutes for the actual ambulance.

After that bit of drama, we continued on to the line for getting on the tractor trailers.  It was busy…but we waited in line patiently and ensued in some conversation.  I’m not sure of the exact time, but I’d say it was about 30-40 minutes of being in line before we hitched our ride.  We had alot of kids come with their Twittering parents, which made this a really fun family event.  We definitely need to plan more family friendly events in the future…I think that could increase our attendance for sure.

Once we boarded the Twitter Train (yes, we had one all to ourselves) the real fun began.  Since there were about 20-25 of us, we just kind of wandered off in our own little groups.  The bulk of the group was able to stay together and rode back to the main farm.  We made a quick pit stop through the pumpkin patch first though so we could make our evaluation on coming back for another trip in a few weeks.  There were plenty of apples eaten out in the fields but a bunch of us were still hungry.  We made our way to the Country Store for dinner.  I had heard good things about their food here and felt it was worth a trip. Boy oh boy was it worth it.  Some had the bottomless fried chicken, while the kids stuck to more mainstream classics like Macaroni & Cheese and hot dogs.  FYI, the fried biscuits were certainly a treat.

By 7:00, it was time to head on out of the corral and get back to the city.  I for one had an excellent time as did my kids.  It would be advantageous for the social media community to certainly mindful that some of us have kids, and family friendly events would allow a much larger attendance at events planned.

Thank you once again to Eckert Farms for having us.  If you’re planning a big group event, they’ll be more than happy to talk with you.  Be sure to follow them on Twitter as well @eckertfarms.

On Sunday, October 4th, 2009, I will be taking my girls to Eckert’s Farm in Belleville, IL for some good ole country fun. Everyone is invited to join us as this will be a peak time for picking Golden Delicious and Red Delicious apples. Eckert’s charges $1.59/lb for their apples but it’s worth every penny!

We’ll meet at 2:00pm at the country store.  The weather is slated to be beautiful so I hope to see all my friends there.

Be sure to follow Eckert’s on Twitter and let them know you’re coming and supporting our local economy.  If you decide to retweet this event, be sure to use the hashtag #STLAppleTweetup.

Eckert’s Farm is located at:
951 S. Green Mount Road
Belleville, IL 62220
Google Maps