Last month we attended a Cbusr meetup as our sister company, GroovyDoodle Photography. Our friend and fellow blogger Cheryl Harrison pulled the event together at Woodland’s Tavern, where GroovyDoodle had also recently shot a few ringlight headshots for the SXSW Bon Voyage party. The Cbusr event was much larger, and resulted in us taking over the main stage where we captured about 150 unique professional headshots, which we then posted for everyone to tag and enjoy via Facebook. (For the record, 150 headshots in a single evening is a LOT!)

So if we attended the event as GroovyDoodle, then why are we talking about it here? Well, for those of you not familiar with it, Cbusr is a free site dedicated to helping Columbus residents meet people who live nearby with similar interests, and their meetups are filled with fantastic networking opportunities for up-and-coming professionals and artists. We met some really great people, and wanted to share them with our business audience in case you’d like to meet them too…

Keith Speers

Keith is a master connector and facilitator. His company Consulting Without Limits partners with educators and business leaders to develop innovative, cost effective and practical solutions. They’re committed to adding value through honesty, respect, and the development of professional intellect and human capital. Keith is a people person, and truly the hub of the wheel when it comes to bringing the right people together.

Keith tweets @KeithSpeers

Michael Kent

Michael is a comedian and magician who we first met a few years ago at Magic, Comedy & A Cure. Truly a fun guy to hang out with, he received our one and only portrait with “lazerz” (pew, pew!) from the cbusr event. Michael became interested in magic at the age of three when he learned he could make himself disappear by covering his eyes – just the first of his many amazing accomplishments, we can assure you. In a style reminiscent of a late-night talk show, Michael invites the audience to laugh with him at the absurdity of a modern-day magician. He combines his sarcastic and irreverent sense of humor with great magic in a way that seems to let the audience “in on the joke”.

Michael blogs at MichaelKentLive.com and tweets @MichaelKent

“Holy Juan”

“Juan” here, who never gives out his real name (no really, we asked!) runs an awesomely fun site: Fake Dispatch. It offers “Mostly facts. Some hazy recollections. A few downright fabrications.” And as he says, he’s not even a journalist! My favorite bit from his site intro reads, “If you are tired of the real news posting fake news, then come to the Fake Dispatch to get your fill of the fake news posting fake news. I’m not going to lie to you: I’m going to lie to you.” Really, you can’t make this stuff up!

“Juan” tweets @fake_dispatch

Erika Pryor

Erika eats, sleeps, lives and breathes communication, social and traditional media. She’s an independent Digital Communication Consultant who helps business professionals and small businesses enhance their digital footprint. She also offers great content on the digital world in general through interviews with industry experts on her internet radio show, Digital 411.

Erika blogs at ErikaPryor.com and tweets @ErikaPryor and @Digital411.

Courtney Banks

Inspired by her love for Columbus, Courtney co-founded a video review website called ThisIsColumbus.com. Copy, design, business plans, financial planning – this girl does it all! She considers herself an entrepreneur-in-training, but then aren’t we all?

Courtney tweets @CourtneyBanks

Kristen Radu

Kristen spends her days as a sales regeneration specialist and recruiting assistant for Safelite Autoglass and her evenings as a Twitter enthusiast (junkie). She is constantly discovering Columbus, embarking on new adventures and sharing her story, thoughts and passions with anyone listening. She uses social media as an excuse to bring valuable strangers into her life and make connections between friends and acquaintances.

Kristin tweets @kris1010

Obviously, some of these people were tweeps we already follow on twitter. Some of them we’re fortunate enough to actually know in real life. Others were brand new to us as of the Cbusr event, but we’ve since gotten to know them and thought they were interesting enough that you might want to know them too. Regardless, these are just a small handfull of the awesome people we connected with at that event, and we’re really looking forward to getting to know others at the next one.

Have you met some of these folks or had similar experiences through Cbusr or some other local networking event? Drop us a comment, we’d love to hear about your experiences.