And here we are at Monday again. I’m sure you’re all waiting with bated breath to hear about my weekend, so who am I to leave you in suspense?

Takaza was feeling under the weather when he got home from work on Friday. He hung out a bit, then went to bed early in the evening. We had some chicken that needed to be cooked up or frozen, one of the two, so I went ahead and cooked it up for use in chicken burritos, then refrigerated it. I was feeling like I wanted to get out, so I thought I’d check out Midsommarfest. I took the Foster bus down to Andersonville only to find that, um, Midsommarfest didn’t start until Friday. Oops. Oh well, it was Friday night in Andersonville and that’s always kind of fun anyway. I walked up Clark, did some window shopping, and eventually stopped by Café Kopi for a tasty garden burger and a strawberry smoothie. Delicious! I walked around a bit more afterwards then headed home.

A side note – I don’t know what was in that garden burger, but I had the worst attack of acid reflux I’ve ever had at about 3 AM. Just awful. As good as it tasted, if it affects me like that even while I’m taking not one but two different proton pump inhibitors, I think I’ll lay off the garden burgers for a while. Pity. I stayed up for about an hour to give things time to settle and to give me time to start feeling sleepy again.

Saturday was understandably slow to get started. We hung out and Linnaeus and I fed our video game addictions in the morning, then after lunch we drove down to the Cadillac Palace Theater to join Daveqat, Jimcyl, Perro, and Darkwolph to see The Lion King on Broadway. There was a little bit of stress when Jim and Dave ran late (and showed up at 1:59 PM for a 2:00 PM show, with our tickets in hand) but we made it in. The show was everything I hoped it would be: amazing, innovative, touching, and thrilling. As Dan mentions there was a minor annoyance during the show, but it was excellent even in spite of that. The tickets were pricey, but worth it. I would go back and see it again, too!

After the show we adjourned up to Evanston and met Mariner42 and Siriuswolfstar at Flat Top Grill for dinner. The company was good, the food was…well, the food wasn’t bad. I think I’ll still be going to BD’s for my Mongolian BBQ fixes, though. We walked around a bit afterwards, then Paul and Dan and I took our leave and spent the rest of the evening relaxing at home.

Dan and I were up early on Sunday so we could drive out to Naperville to have brunch with Unclekage, who was in town for Duckon. The meal was tasty, and we talked over some pressing Anthrocon-related business, ironing out last-minute details for Artists Alley and the newsletter for me and Dan, respectively. Unfortunately, Kage was notified that he was late to a panel he didn’t know he was scheduled for and we had to cut things short. We wandered around the hotel a bit and found the Halloween/furry costuming panel that was, um, lacking in attendance. On the bright side, it was a pleasure to chat with Rcking, Cloverr, Aeto, Innerwolf, and Butterscotchvix. Afterwards, I saw Awfulhorrid and Bookwurm briefly and ducked my head into the Firefly panel. I had to leave early, though, so we could meet up with Datahawk, who was just getting vertical and moving at the crack of 12:30. We chatted a bit, then Dan and I headed home.

When we got home we found that Rustitobuck and Muganga were over visiting, and we spent the rest of the afternoon chatting and socializing, eventually joined by Datahawk. It was a pleasant afternoon and evening, though I got tired way too early.

A new week brings…not much, really. I need to do some grocery shopping on the way home tonight. We don’t have much planned, though with the news that Carbon Leaf is playing at Lincoln Park Fest, we’re going to be skipping LAFF Softball this month to go see them and enjoy the fest. Sunday night there’s the MFF Staff Meeting, but that’s online and should be mostly painless.

I’ve got a few things I still need to post – I may get to them today, or tomorrow at the latest. I haven’t forgotten, though!