The Table
The name given to a daily gathering of Redbrick members in the Canteen. At lunchtime Redbrick members would agree to all meet for lunch and in doing so take a table to sit together. Over the day Redbrick members would come and go from the table, some staying there all day, some joining for a bite to eat or a chat.
The numbers at the Table would vary throughout the day but there would always be some there. Noted table regulars included munchkin, Silk, Wishkah, the people of the House of Jam, and too many others to mention formed the backbone of the 'clique' which ran the Table.
In recent times The Table has died out as a regular thing in the canteen though efforts are being made to revive it by Sares and others.
--Cain
The Table has been in existance for at least four years. Although it probably has a rich and interesting history which stretches back before 1995, I can only talk (reasonably) accurately about it since then, and make guesses as to the rest.
The Table may have originally been established by a group of APs. This seems likely given that Samurai and Jelly (APs of yore) spent a lot of time there. In 1995, Fatwa and Barftud (who was then Listy/Spanners on VAX) had just changed courses from AP to CA and this would have brought together the two courses. Barftud and Pint (EE) were going out from about the beginning of the year, which was another connection, and lots of all three courses were gamers which was yet another. Silk (AP at the time) and Toaster (CA) were together as of January 1996. There were lots of other people-going-out-together things which also added to the numbers. The main connector though was the VAX, Redbrick's predecessor in many ways, and equally skilled at bringing people together.
The Table people of back then included (please let me know if I've left anyone out - it's been a long time, and I'm straining my brain to remember who I knew back then):
Jelly, Samurai, Silk, Thayl, Duke, Usal, Dungeon Master (Gandalf), Spooky, Fatwa, Barftud, Toaster, Raz, Soma, Cammy, Lecter, Andy, Pint, Moki, Rusty, Yoyo, Pablo, Cosmic, Pat (Partyman, Pink Shirt, Shirt), Stinger, Ducky, Doozer, Warren.
The whole point of the Table used to be that it was always there. It wasn't a specific table (though it was always in the main part of the canteen), and there wasn't always somebody at it, but it was very rare that a member of the Table could sit down in the canteen and be alone for any length of time. New people could sit at the table and be welcome, because it was likely that not everybody knew everybody else already.
The first person to the canteen in the morning would choose the Table. After that, it wouldn't be unlikely that the same table'd be occupied for the rest of the day, with a steady flow of people ensuring that the conversation never really stopped. The canteen was there for a meal, or for drinking coffee, or for somewhere to do the Times crossword, or just somewhere to go while that Statistics lecture was on. People went there whether they were hungry or not.
As Redbrick was formed, and personalities were ported from VAX, the table expanded quickly and changed a lot. A group of the original table people went off on their own, but many remained, and were added to every year by a number of first years who either got to know someone on Redbrick, or weren't too shy to sit down and introduce themselves.
In recent years the Table community appears to have dissipated. Perhaps it's due to the number of people who've left DCU, or to the fact that it just got too big not to split into smaller groups. However, the fact that it reappeared often when Redbrick was going through that shaky up-and-down period of its life may give a hint. Maybe Redbrick's just become too good to leave.
Sares is trying to get the Table going again. All you have to do to join in is to go to the canteen at the same time as other Redbrick types. Mail sares and ask to be added to the canteeners list - not all the table people are on this, and not all those on it are really table people, but it's a good start.
Apologies for wallowy bouts of nostalgia in the above.
--Toaster
Originally from the Encyclopedia