Yet another whirlwind weekend. And things went really well, I think!

As I mentioned on Friday, Takaza flew in early to meet with the manager hiring for an accounts receivable position at the Siemens office in Mount Prospect (that’s about 5 miles due north of O’Hare Airport, in case you’re wondering). They talked for about an hour and really seemed to hit it off, which is cool. Dan can provide more specifics there. Chouette gave Dan a lift from Mount Prospect, and as they were driving to get a bite to eat, Dan got a call on his cell phone – it was the manager he had spoken with, wanting to check that it was OK for him to call Dan’s boss this week to check references and such. I’m going to take that as a Very Good Sign. Now, they’re saying that we might hear something as early as this week, but knowing how hiring for large corporations goes, I would be astonished if things moved that quickly. I would think it might be more on the order of weeks before we’ll know one way or another, but hey – this is the best possibility we’ve seen in a long time.

I picked up datahawk after work and we drove down to meet Dan, Chouette, and linnaeus at The Hopleaf (gee, what a surprise that I would end up there again so soon…). We put away a couple of large bottles of cider, as well as numerous tasty Belgian beers. I will have to admit, reluctantly, that while the potables are excellent and their appetizers are tasty, the entrees on their limited menu don’t quite measure up. Next time I go, I’ll probably seek dinner elsewhere. After a fine night of chatting (capped off by some yummy almond-chocolate shortbread cookies at Cafe Boost), we headed home in a vain attempt at an early evening.

We got up at a godforsaken hour on Saturday morning so that we could be at the luxurious Holiday Inn Willowbrook at 8:30 AM for NoCoasterCon. This is a one-day gathering of the American Coaster Enthusiasts in which you sit in a room for 10+ hours while representatives from various amusement parks across the country give presentations about what they have that is new and exciting. As usual, Paramount King’s Island had the best presentation and the best swag (a free pass to any Paramount park and a DVD of the very silly promo films they have made for NoCoasterCon). Cedar Point was also impressive, and they gave everyone a powerful enticement to the park: one free walk up the exit ramp to any roller coaster int he park. Of course it’s only once, but hey, I ain’t gonna wait three hours to ride Top Thrill Dragster, either! There were some interesting presentations by many of the smaller parks as well, including Kennywood, Holiday World, and Indiana Beach. As usual, the presentation by Six Flags Great America was disappointing, and their PR flackery tiresome and annoying. Swag from Great America? Nothing. How sad is that?

Anyway, after ten and a half hours of this, I think Linnaeus and I were ready to kill ourselves, or perhaps strangle anyone within arm’s reach. Instead, we high-tailed it out and broke into Feren‘s house (well, he knew we were coming and was out at the moment). The Gin-Fueled Panfah joined us shortly thereafter and we had a tasty dinner at Cheddar’s, followed by general relaxing around Z’Ha’Dum, as Feren calls it (I’m still partial to Ra’s House of Harf, but he doesn’t seem to care for that).

On Sunday we rousted ourselves and I followed Feren up the North-South Tollway (at near-supersonic speeds) and we met up with Roho, Genet, and Neowolf2 (and eventually hightensile) for tasty burgers at Red Robin. From there it was over to the Midwest FurFest staff meeting, the first for MFF 2005. We’ve had a minimum of staff churn, which I think is a good thing since I think we’ve hit on a really good combination of competent staff members. I’m hoping for a little more sanity in my life since I’m taking Neowolf on as Registration Second, and I hope to move some of the tasks for Registration over to him. There will be some rearrangement of what events are where within the hotel this year, and it’s becoming clear that we’re really outgrowing the Hyatt. It will be interesting to see what 2006 holds for MFF, but we won’t know about that ’til summer at the earliest.

We hung out and chatted for a while after the meeting was over, then Dan, Linnaeus, Datahawk, and I went over to Oberweis and got our evil ice cream fix. From there it was over to O’Hare Airport, where we dropped Dan off for his flight back to North Carolina. Man, those goodbyes are always hard. I’m hoping there’s only a few of those left, though, and we can get Dan up here where he belongs.

Data spent the night at Linnaeus’ place last night and I took her into work this morning. It was a pleasure to have someone to talk to on the ride in, I must admit. It sounds like she’s been having kind of a rough day at work, though. I certainly hope things have improved for her. Also, Linnaeus had a family member go in for surgery today. My thoughts are with them, and I hope that their recovery will be as swift and as painless as possible.

And so this week. Not a whole lot planned, really. LAFF Coffee Night on Wednesday, and then…not a lot. I guess I’ll need to remedy that!

Oh, and an added announcement. I’d like to announce the creation of a new community, by popular demand: , a community open to all for discussion of all things Midwest FurFest! I’ll be posting announcements about this tonight, but if folks would help spread the word, I’d appreciate it!