Goodbye Pat Hayden, Lord of Intrigue

Pat moved out yesterday, which is sad. We'll miss him a lot, he's been a great roommate for the past four years. Damn, four years, when are we getting married, right? It sounds like Chicago will be graced by many visits from him, though, and possibly a more permanent stay in a few months, we'll see. Here's to Pat.

The one upside to Pat moving out is that I got my den. Pat helped me move everything in before he left, and I really like the way it feels in there now. The patio doors right there give you a cool breeze, and you can hear the outside world, which is nice. It's also the first time I've ever had my surround system setup properly. It's fun to have all the good equipment finally setup nicely, it's a great place to watch a movie or play video games. Maria painted the room earlier and hung up some pictures and whatnot, so it looks good outside of the electronics too. She also did a good job filling in the holes in the kitchen, though it's unavoidably a huge, empty kitchen. I only have one weekend trip planned in the next two months (Jess' bachelor party in Madison), so I'm looking forward to spending more weekends around here, enjoying our place.

Legos

This is pretty cool - build models online with legos, then send them to lego.com and buy the blocks you need to build your model in real life.

http://www.lego.com/eng/create/digitaldesigner/tracker.asp?os=pc

Are You at Work?

Settlers of Catan online, vs. other people or computer opponents
(also a couple of other games)
http://games.asobrain.com/index.html

Advance Wars By Web, play Advance Wars against friends, very much like chess by mail. Works best if you set up games just with friends.
http://www.amarriner.com/awbw/

From the Wisconsin Judge: 6/10

I've been living in Chicago for almost three months now, and I must say it is slowly growing on me. I definately did not like it at first, all I wanted to do was move back to Madison (and do so when traffic wasn't too bad). But now that I've settled in here and have met some new friends it's getting pretty good. Our apartment is very nice, and in a good little neighborhood. My job is also proving to be a good fit, so things are looking up. (Though every time I visit Madison I still want to stay).

Improv in Chicago is nuts. There are so many theaters, and everybody plays everywhere. People who are good become minor celebrities within the improv circle - I can say "Joe" or "Matt" and people know who I'm talking about. I've just started my first class at a place called Annoyance, it's very laid back and fun. They don't have a theater right now (they're building this kick-ass space pretty close to where I live). I can't wait until they're up and running, I think I might want to play here in the future, especially since most other troupes are either all about getting on SNL or too self-important for my tastes.

Maria starts school in just a couple of weeks, and I'm very excited for her. I hope she meets some good people and falls into a rythm. She hasn't found her spot yet, but I really think the Arts Institute might be just what she wants. I always forget that she can draw - I've never actually seen her draw anything, but I've seen things she drew long ago, and they're really impressive. She's going to school for creative writing, but I think she can take some art classess too, which is pretty awesome.

I'll be interested to see how it is here in about six months. Who I'll be haning out with here, what I'll be doing, etc. It could be really good.