The Trap Door Spiders Club (a working title only)

Martin belonged to the 'Trap Door Spiders' supper club. The group met monthly on a Friday, eight or nine times a year.

Here is all Martin wrote about the group in Undiluted Hocus-Pocus:

The following appears on the Wikipedia article, under History and Practices:

As of 1976, the club met roughly one Friday a month, eight or nine times a year, and maintained a membership of thirteen, among whom the privilege of hosting the meetings rotated.

The get-togethers of the Trap Door Spiders followed a set format, which remained consistent through the years; a dinner, given by the host for the evening, to which he would invite a guest who would be grilled by the others and form the focus of conversation for the evening. The grilling was traditionally begun by the host for the evening enquiring of the guest How do you justify your existence? or some variation, such as Why do you exist?

Could G4G Consider a monthly Zoom show (google hangout or whatever) loosely modeled after the TDS? The format might work via Zoom or YouTube with 'episodes' archived.. but producing and supporting TDS episodes would be way more work than just "showing up" and could suck time away from other G4G events.

Therefore, maybe it would suffice to do ONE such episode as a stage play at some future Gathering.

A kind of Variety Show?

A Supper Club

• Lively discussion of a current book, movie, math problem, science theory, ...

A Salon

• Hot Seat format - invite somebody to attend for a friendly grilling?

A Theater

• Theater - Playful.
• Magic Show between segments.

Black Widowers

In Asimov's Black Widowers stories, the diners discussed something, perhaps who committed a particular crime. These stories ended with the Butler (who had been listening the whole evening) weighed in at the end with the answer and explanation, which eluded the guests. LoL