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Welcome to the wonderful world of Hooky. Of the 26 children who should be in classes today, three are off playing hooky. It is morning before school starts, and in the chaos, your job as a homeroom teacher is to figure out which three are missing. There are some children off in the playground who are late getting to their homerooms, and you will learn their identities as they straggle in. Hooky https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/377480/hooky Light Refreshments are provided. Limited Guest Parking is available for Free if notified 24hrs in advance. We are right on the NOMA Red Line Metro Stop. Please RSVP so we can account for Snacks.

Welcome to our new home at the historic Tivoli Theater! Please check our details for access to the space on [our website](https://www.hacdc.org/visit/). Join the discord for questions / help getting in (use channel #let-me-in) [https://discord.gg/dNjuNhNmeT](https://discord.gg/dNjuNhNmeT)

This our weekly game night event! We start at 6pm so that we can get dinner from Aslin Taproom. Come join us and maybe meet some new friends as we play games ranging from Fluxx to Ricochet Robots to Ticket to Ride to Saboteur to Cards Against Humanity (and many others). Bring your games or try the games that our regulars bring! That pesky covid thing is still around. Feel free to wear a mask. I have extra masks if you don't feel comfortable without one.

Join Lisa and your DTs friends for a special Amazon Prime early screening of *Project Hail Mary*! Be among the first to see this highly anticipated sci-fi adventure on the big screen. We will meet in the Food Court outside of the theater starting at **5:30 PM**. Feel free to grab a meal and sit with us — it’s a great chance to chat and connect before the show. At **6:30 PM**, we’ll head toward the theater to grab snacks and get settled before the **7:00 PM showtime**. **Important:** Seating is assigned for this screening. Lisa has already purchased seats **Q14 through Q17**, and those seats are taken. When purchasing your ticket, please choose seats near that row so we can sit together as a group. **Tickets:** Purchase through Fandango using this Amazon Prime early screening link: [https://www.activaterewards.com/PrimeEarlyScreeningProjectHailMary?ref=prime_US_GTM__PRM_LandingPage_UP_P_PHM_PES](https://www.activaterewards.com/PrimeEarlyScreeningProjectHailMary?ref=prime_US_GTM__PRM_LandingPage_UP_P_PHM_PES) You must log in with your Amazon Prime account to access tickets. No Amazon Prime? No problem. Contact Lisa directly and she will help secure a ticket for you. Grab some popcorn, settle in, and enjoy a night of sci-fi adventure and community. Finding your tribe sometimes means saving the universe together.

Join us between 6:00 and 9:30 to play nontraditional board games at Brew Belly restaurant in Olney, MD. Some games will be provided but please do bring along games you are interested in playing! The start time is now 6:00, giving you the chance, if you would like, to come and grab some food and drink and settle in before gaming starts at 630. RSVPs let us know who to look out for, and if you will be arriving much after 6:30, shoot us a message in the event chat. That will let us know to start with a quicker game so you can get gaming sooner when you arrive!

IMPORTANT: for this event please make sure you've RSVP'd at [https://luma.com/4usyy9d7](https://luma.com/4usyy9d7) to see the address and additional information. # Spring is Coming! ​Some winters are for hibernating, but this isn’t one of them. ​ [Station Alpha](https://stationalpha.org/) and [Founder Institute](https://fi.co/), in collaboration with Startup DC, are partnering on this public meetup celebrating fresh ideas, new beginnings, and the unstoppable energy of the startup ecosystem in the National Capital Region. With generous support from [Unstuck Labs](https://unstucklabs.com/), this event brings together founders, builders, investors, operators, and the startup-curious for an evening that feels like the first warm day after a long winter - optimistic, electric, and full of possibility. \* ​Expect great connections with people who are actually building things, not just talking about them. \* Expect lightning pitches from awesome startups moving fast and thinking big. \* Expect conversations that start casually and turn into collaborations, partnerships, or maybe even the next breakout company. ​Spring is when things grow, and startups are no different. Come meet the people shaping what’s next in the National Capital Region - and maybe plant a few seeds of your own. ## ​**Agenda** * ​5:30 – 6:45 \| Networking * ​6:45 – 7:15 \| Quick welcome\, announcements and lightning pitches * ​7:15 \- 8:30 \| More networking ## ​**​​Food&Bev** ​Food and beverages will be provided, thanks to our generous partners [Founder Institute](https://fi.co/) and [Unstuck Labs](https://www.unstucklabs.com/)! ## ​Parking and Transportation * ​Street parking is limited * ​There is a lot of garage parking nearby, e.g. 1200n N Garfield St, Arlington, VA 22201 **for <$10/day** * ​Unstuck Labs’ office is located across the street from the Clarendon Metro station on the Silver and Orange Lines (two stops from the Blue Line and three stops from DC). There is also a separate entrance to the building directly from the Metro station. ## ​About Station Alpha ​[Station Alpha](https://stationalpha.org/) is an angel group built for founders and investors who believe the best outcomes are engineered - together. We source standout opportunities, educate our members, and convene in-person to help great companies become inevitable. ​We are global and industry agnostic — evaluating every opportunity on its own merits. We back differentiated companies with defensible advantages and a credible path to scale. ## ​**About Founder Institute** ​The **[Founder Institute](https://fi.co/)** is the world’s most proven network to turn ideas into fundable startups, and startups into global businesses. Since 2009, our structured accelerator programs have helped over 8,900 entrepreneurs raise over 2BN in funding. Based in Silicon Valley and with chapters across 100 countries, our mission is to empower communities of talented and motivated people to build impactful technology companies worldwide. ## ​**​Huge thanks to our sponsors, partners, and organizers!** * ​[Unstuck Labs](https://www.unstucklabs.com/)! * ​[Station Alpha](https://stationalpha.org/) * ​[Founder Institute](https://fi.co/) * ​[Craftus](https://craftus.com/)

\*\* Tickets are $71.50 ($65 + tax) and can be purchased [here.](https://www.exploretock.com/barcelona-wine-bar-14th-street/event/594770/terroir-uncorked) \*\* UNCORKED is a walk-around tasting where we open 30 different bottles from our list—a chance to try the cellar of our award-winning wine program. The wines are paired with seasonal paella and passed tapas. Each time we host, we dive into a different theme. This time, we’re uncorking terroir. Terroir is a French term that refers to the natural environment in which a wine is made. This includes everything– but most often focuses on soil, topography and climate, ultimately producing a bottled sense of place. Our 400+ bottle program deeply focuses on terroir, becoming a collection of places that can be experienced through a pour. For this UNCORKED, we’re opening 30 wines that we think are some of the clearest expressions of place out there. We can’t wait to share these truly transportive bottles with you.

**NEW GAME LOCATION at The Board Room** Let's play board games. Not the ones your ancestors played but the really cool ones of the new millennium. We play everything from fun, social games to light to heavy strategy games. Don't know how to play? Not a problem - we're happy to teach. It's a great chance to learn new games or play your favorites with non-competitive people who like to laugh. You can build a railroad, eradicate a plague, or explore the far reaches of the galaxy in one evening. While many will bring their own games, you can show up gameless and still play. We play at the Board Room in Clarendon on Wednesday from 6:30-10:00. It's within walking distance from the Clarendon metro. **Find us in the far left by the fermentation tanks.** If that area is reserved for a private event, look for us in the middle. Look for a group that has containers and carrying bags with multiple games. We're very fortunate to have this great venue for our game nights and they take care of us for 3-1/2 hours, so please spend a minimum of $10 on food or drink and tip generously (at the very least $2, even if 20% of your bill would be $1). Thanks!

Details Location: Crimson Whiskey Bar (Either the downstairs whiskey bar, or main floor bar, TBD) The purpose of Thinkers and Drinkers is to facilitate casual but meaningful and interesting conversations with other people in a face-to-face setting. The topics cover a wide variety of issues and are different for every meeting. While conversations may get heated at times, we ask that all members be respectful of each other and refrain from personal insults. Here's the updated version: *** **Topic: Reasons to Be Excited (A Technology Optimism Round)** It's easy to doom-scroll your way into thinking the world is falling apart. And honestly, some of our recent meetings haven't helped. So this time, we're flipping the script: what technology are you actually *excited* about? This isn't a request for blind techno-utopianism. Skepticism is welcome. But the goal is to spend some time on the genuine wins and promising horizons, because there are more of them than the headlines suggest. Here's a quick tour of some things worth being optimistic about: * **AI in everyday life** — Love it or hate it, AI tools are genuinely saving people hours of tedious work. From coding assistants to writing tools to writing this very event descriptin you're reading now to AI that sits inside your spreadsheets and email, the practical applications are moving faster than most people expected even two years ago. The question is less "will this be useful?" and more "who actually benefits, and when?" * **Clean energy's quiet boom** — Solar and battery storage have had a decade of jaw-dropping cost reductions. The U.S. added more renewable capacity last year than any year on record. It's not fast enough for some, but the trajectory is real. * **CRISPR and gene editing** — In late 2023, the FDA approved the first CRISPR-based treatment for sickle cell disease — a condition that has caused lifelong suffering for millions of people with very few good options. It's the first of what could be a long list of genetic diseases that are now, for the first time, actually curable rather than just manageable. * **Lab-grown meat** — Chicken and beef grown directly from animal cells, no slaughter required. It's real, it's been approved for sale in the US, and while it's still expensive and not yet on your grocery shelf, the cost curves are dropping fast. Whether you care about animal welfare, climate, or just think it's cool, this one is quietly wild. * **SpaceX and the new space economy** — Reusable rockets went from fantasy to routine. Launch costs have dropped by an order of magnitude in 15 years, opening the door to satellite internet in remote areas, new science missions, and yes, eventually humans on Mars (whether or not that excites you). * **Brain-computer interfaces** — Still early, still expensive, but Neuralink and others are giving paralyzed patients the ability to control devices with their thoughts. The sci-fi shelf life on this one is getting shorter. **Questions to Consider:** * Is there a technology you were skeptical about that has actually won you over? What changed your mind? * Which of these feels most overhyped — and which feels *under*hyped? * Are the benefits of new technology reaching people broadly, or mostly concentrating among the already-fortunate? * Is optimism about technology a luxury? Does it depend on where you live, how much money you have, or what you do for work? * What's something small and unglamorous — not AI, not space — that has genuinely made your life better recently?

Want to mess with some electronics? Or perhaps contribute to HacDC's main group project? HacDC's latest event brings hardware projects to the community. We will focus primarily on the main project (Space Blimp!) but please feel free to bring some of your own projects to show off and work on!

Come out to [Third Hill Brewing Company](https://www.thirdhillbrewing.com/) and play some board games! Serving food with their variety of drinks so come and fuel up for the games. Learn about new games, play games, meet new friends, and have a good time! All ages and levels of experience/knowledge of games are welcome as long as you have a willingness to learn and/or teach your games. Host will provide some games but as always, you are welcome/encouraged to bring your own (recommended you know them and/or ready to teach them). Please be aware that there is no direct parking but there is nearby parking garages. **NTBG** is a safe environment for all to have fun. Bullying/harassment is not tolerated.

*Root* is a game of woodland might and right. Stalk the woods as one of the Vagabonds, seize the initiative with the Eyrie birds of prey, rule over your subjects as the Marquise de Cat, or command the Woodland Alliance to create a new order. With creatures and cunning, you'll rule a fantastic forest kingdom in the ultimate asymmetric board game of adventure and war.

**If you have registered for Early Access via Patreon you do not need to sign up via Meetup** Heart Stealers is a community engagement-focused, “King of the Hill” challenge that will introduce guests to new people and new games, and encourage folks to play with purpose. **To celebrate Women's History Month, this month's causes are fem-focused!!** This month the non-profits to champion are: DC [Coalition Against Domestic Violence (DCCADV)](https://dccadv.org/), The[ Women’s Foundation](https://thewomensfoundation.org/our-history/), and the [DC Abortion Fund](https://dcabortionfund.org/). How well you and your team do at stealing necklaces from the other teams will determine what portion of the prize pool your nonprofit will receive. Every nonprofit goes home with something! **To participate, guests will be requested to contribute a $10 donation at the door. This will go to the donation pool for the event.** Folks may also purchase tokens from DCGG or tokens can be purchased with cash. Tokens are 25¢ each and games are typically 2-4 tokens. Upon arrival, each player will get three heart necklaces to represent their lives. Lives can be won or lost by challenging other players to one of GameOn's amazing arcade games. **Schedule** 7:00pm – 7:15pm: Mingle Time 7:15pm: Welcome and Game Start 7:20pm – 9:30pm: Heart Stealers Gameplay BUT WAIT THERES MORE: **To support DCGG programming and get sweet perks like early access to events** visit [https://www.patreon.com/DCGamingGroup](https://www.patreon.com/DCGamingGroup) Interested in wearing your support? We have fundraiser shirts designed by local artists. [https://dcgaminggroup.printful.me/](https://dcgaminggroup.printful.me/) Feel free to join the DC Gaming Community in pickup games and game discussion by hopping into the Discord: [https://discord.gg/NP7v7VF](https://discord.gg/NP7v7VF) **Disclaimer and Community Code of Conduct:** The DC Gaming Group is dedicated to creating a safe and inclusive space for participants. To learn more about our code of conduct, you can read more here. Events may be recorded for promotional material.

♠️😲♠️ W.O.W. Spades Night ♠️😲♠️ Washington on Wednesday (W.O.W.) - 3rd Wednesday Spades in DC 🌟Spades in DC! 😀 Hang out with a friendly and welcoming group. Meet new people and have a great time! ✅️ No partner needed! Find one onsite. All skill levels are welcome. 📌 Nando's Peri-Peri Chicken - Navy Yard 300 Tingey St SE #150, Washington, DC 20003 ❤️ **Posted in multiple groups. So, expect a nice crowd.** 🚌 One block from Navy Yard Metro Station 🚗 Street and Garage Parking available. 🍷 Alcoholic beverages are available! 🍗 Please support the business by purchasing food/drinks. 🌟 The fun starts at 5:30pm! RSVP today.

Discover Kiro, AWS’s innovative development environment that adapts to your workflow. Whether you prefer specification-driven development or a more intuitive, vibe-based approach, Kiro empowers you to build applications your way. In this session, speakers will explore Kiro’s core functionality and its evolution through re:Invent 2025, along with demonstrations of prompts used to create APIs, hooks, and steering documents. In the latter part of the session, watch as we build a complete example from scratch, showcasing Kiro’s agentic AI workflow in action for spec-driven development and vibe coding. What You'll Learn - Core Kiro concepts and development philosophy Feature evolution: pre and post re:Invent 2025 Practical examples: API creation, hooks, and steering docs Live coding demonstration with real-time problem solving Who Should Attend - Developers, solutions architects, and technical leaders interested in modern AWS development tools and AI-assisted coding workflows. **Speakers Bio:** Matthew Jorat: Matthew Jorat is a Customer Solutions Manager at AWS with nearly three decades of expertise in AI, cloud transformation, migration, modernization, IT, technology, and business. His career spans infrastructure engineer, solutions architect, security auditor, customer success director, support and services director, and operations officer. He was an early adopter of AWS services as a customer, and his current role at AWS uniquely blends his technical and business skills as he partners with executive teams to translate strategic priorities into measurable business outcomes through cloud adoption, AI implementation, and operational excellence. Matt leads end-to-end AI initiatives for enterprise customers, identifying high-impact use cases and maintaining relentless focus on measurable ROI. He holds eight AWS certifications and serves as Adjunct Professor at Franklin University teaching cloud computing and AWS architecture. His expertise encompasses GenAI, agentic AI systems, migration, modernization, and optimization strategies that drive transformation at scale. [https://www.linkedin.com/in/mattjorat/](https://www.linkedin.com/in/mattjorat/) Girish Bhatia: Girish Bhatia is a seasoned technology delivery leader with deep expertise in cross-domain program management. He holds multiple AWS certifications, including AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Associate, AWS Certified Developer – Associate, and AWS Generative AI Practitioner, and is also an AWS Community Builder. Girish brings over two decades of experience in the information technology industry. Throughout his career, Girish has led major technology-driven business transformation from modernizing on-premises applications to driving large-scale cloud migrations. His work includes API-based integration platforms, data-center and mainframe modernization, and enterprise cloud adoption initiatives. Based in Columbus, Ohio, Girish works at a tech-forward fintech company. He is passionate about AWS serverless architectures, Generative AI and emerging cloud technologies. An avid learner and builder, he continues to explore and apply the latest innovations in AWS to help organizations accelerate their digital transformation. https://www.linkedin.com/in/girishbhatia/[https://www.linkedin.com/in/girishbhatia/](https://www.linkedin.com/in/girishbhatia/) **THANK YOU** *Franklin University* for hosting our meetup! To learn more about *Franklin University*, please visit their website: https://www.franklin.edu/ **DIRECTIONS** Franklin University Fisher Hall 300 E. Main St, Columbus, OH 43215 Map: https://maps.app.goo.gl/jxjBA2hUmS5qrvhq8 Parking is FREE! Please park in Lot C in front of Fisher Hall. See attached map. NOTE: Map the address only. When mapping with Google Maps it may use the Fisher Hall at OSU, which is NOT correct. **Want to sponsor the pizza and/or bar tab?** Please contact me if you would like to sponsor this meetup's pizza and/or bar tab: angelo@mandato.com

Please Join GDG Cloud Indy for a live demonstration of latest Google AI Tools for building apps, followed by practical examples of enterprise production. Coming to central Indy. The Lineup: 11:00 AM AI-Assisted Development with Antigravity Google Antigravity is an agent-first IDE. We will move beyond standard code completion to explore how autonomous agents can orchestrate terminal tasks, manage dependencies, and perform UI testing directly within the development environment. This session includes a walkthrough of Antigravity's core interface followed by a live demo building a simple full-stack webapp to show how these agentic workflows function in practice. Speaker : Anil Yanamandra is a Solutions Architect with 17+ years of experience building global, consumer-facing applications. He is currently focused on transforming legacy enterprise processes and systems through the strategic application of Generative AI. A hands-on practitioner in the rapidly evolving AI landscape, Anil constantly explores the latest tools and methodologies to bridge the gap between cutting-edge research and production-ready AI engineering. 11:40 AM Real Life AI Coding Examples Review real-life examples of applications and utilities created with AI code-assist tooling, as well as security and safety considerations pertaining to developing and using AI tools in a large organization. Speaker : Jeff Price is a Senior Technical DevOps Manager at Red Hat, and leads a technical team responsible for Enterprise Resource Planning systems and software delivery pipelines for Go to Market systems. He has a background in IT Infrastructure, Public and Private Cloud, and DevOps. The Perks: 🎁 Exclusive GDG Swag for attendees! 🍕 Pizza & Soft Drinks (for in-person guests). 🤝 Networking & Q&A with local industry leaders. Also, Check our Meetup page at https://www.meetup.com/gdgcloudindy/ See you there! P.S.-> Parking Vouchers instructions will be available to attendees for Free garage parking. This is a hybrid event. Join the event virtually at https://gdg.community.dev/events/details/google-gdg-cloud-indy-presents-build-real-world-ai-apps-with-google-antigravity/ or in person at Lacy School of Business (LSB) , Dugan Hall (DH 118 Classroom) , Butler University - 625 Butler Way Indianapolis, 46208 *** Agenda *** Speakers Anil Yanamandra Anil Yanamandra is a Solutions Architect with 17+ years of experience building global, consumer-facing applications. He is currently focused on transforming legacy enterprise processes and systems through the strategic application of Generative AI. A hands-on practitioner in the rapidly evolving AI landscape, Anil constantly explores the latest tools and methodologies to bridge the gap be… Jeff Price - Red Hat (Senior Technical DevOps Manager) Jeff Price is a Senior Technical DevOps Manager at Red Hat, and leads a technical team responsible for Enterprise Resource Planning systems and software delivery pipelines for Go to Market systems. He has a background in IT Infrastructure, Public and Private Cloud, and DevOps. Host Olga Scrivner - Scrivner Solution Inc. (President) Olga is an Assistant Computer Science and Software Engineering Professor at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. She is also a President and Co-Founder of Scrivner Solution Inc. Olga’s passion is upskilling and mentoring women in STEM. She is a Women TechMakers Ambassador and a member of the Executive Committee for the IEEE Women in Engineering (Central Indiana) chapter. Olga’s current researc… Complete your event RSVP here: https://gdg.community.dev/events/details/google-gdg-cloud-indy-presents-build-real-world-ai-apps-with-google-antigravity/.

NFT's are here to stay folks! This is a group for like minded people interested in understanding, leveraging, using, creating for, profiting from, trading too i suppose, NFT's.. everything around them, complexity, fear and exploits, best practices and more. **PLUS** This group will talk AI ART tools, techniques, artists, video, audio, prototypes and more in the AI assisted production space- ART specifically, but we can get into any aspect of some of the cooler things happening in AI in general.

The Forge does have a full bar and kitchen. There is no cover charge but they do request all attendees to purchase a minimum of ~$20 per person. Soft drink refills are $1 each. Please support our hosts so we can continue to provide great events for the group! The Forge has a large library of games available for us to enjoy. Hosts and regulars will also provide numerous popular games but please bring any games you would like to teach and/or play. Doors open at 6, and we expect gaming to be rolling by around 630. Please promptly end your games and clear out the space at 10pm when the bar closes. We encourage socializing but do not permit disruptive behavior of any kind. Thank you for your continued commitment to providing a fun and welcoming space to veteran, newbie, and rookie gamers in the Columbus area. Parking can be challenging. There is a parking lot behind the neighboring Mexican restaurant that is free and easy to walk from but it's a bit hidden.

Builders, creators, architects, admins, consultants - come one, come all. This one's for you. We're bringing a little friendly competition to the Columbus ServiceNow community while highlighting the cool things people have built on the platform. Five presenters will take the stage to showcase something they've built, solved, designed, or imagined on the ServiceNow platform - and a panel of judges (plus YOU, our amazing audience) will score them live. So basically, America's Got Talent but make it ServiceNow's Got Talent. Bring a notepad if you'd like 'cause you'll definitely be learning something new. Each presenter gets 10 minutes max to wow the crowd with: • A demo • A real-world business solution • A bold idea • A UX transformation • Or a creative use of the platform Judging Criteria: 🏆 Business Value 🚀 Innovation ✨ User Experience This event is about celebrating ideas, sharing knowledge, and showing how ServiceNow can drive both business impact and meaningful user value. Come learn. Come support. Come get inspired. Refreshments and bites will be provided. And maybe next time… you’ll be on stage.

Welcome to Casual Boardgames, where we enjoy classic tabletop games and social deduction games while bonding over good food, drinks, and great conversations. 
We started this group to meet new people and make new friends, and bonding over games in a relaxed atmosphere is a great way to do that. We currently meet near route 23 and Polaris Parkway, and this is close to areas like Powell, Lewis Center, Worthington, and parts of Westerville and Columbus. 
Feel free to bring your own games or play one of the many games our members bring. If you are inexperienced, we will help you learn. 
Here are just a few examples of the kind of games we play. 
Tabletop/board games: Splendor, Catan, Azul, Dominion, 7 Wonders… 
Social deduction games: Code Names, Chameleon, Werewords… 
IMPORTANT: 
1. While we love playing a variety of games and competing, we are not just about the games. We interact and talk while playing, and this leads to a lot of laughter and fun. If you just want to compete and focus solely on the game, then this is probably not the group you are looking for. 
2. Many people join groups like this and never (or rarely) show up after weeks or months. If you join and never really come, we will eventually remove you from the group as a courtesy to our members. Why? Because limiting group conversations (on the app) to regular members makes communication and planning much easier. Also, while it may be rare, it protects members from people who join because they are interested in following a person instead of having a real interest in our group. If you get removed, it is just because you haven’t come, and we follow this protocol as a courtesy to our regular game players.