Well, that was an unproductive weekend. Not that I’m complaining – not every weekend needs to involve carving Mount Rushmore or something…

I was feeling pretty good when I got home on Friday. I’ve found that the radio stations I listen to on Sirius on the drive home directly affect my mood. I try to stay away from Alt Nation or Octane (what I usually listen to on the drive in) and instead listen to more mellow, melodic stuff. On days where traffic is beyond stupid, my secret weapon is Jam_ON. This is funny because I’ve never particularly cared much for jam-band music (i.e. Grateful Dead, Leftover Salmon, Phish, etc.) but in this particularly situation it’s good to listen to – doesn’t require too much attention, sets a good beat, but not aggressive or pounding. A lot of the stuff they play has folk and bluegrass influences, and I appreciate that.

So yeah, I was in a pretty good mood when I got home. I tidied up a bit then sat down to play a little of my new addiction, Ratchet and Clank 3: Up Your Arsenal. Dan got home a little after six, and since he wasn’t feeling well he snoozed on the living room sofa. I played a little more…and a little more (gosh, it’s dark in here)…a little more. Finally, linnaeus came in and that’s when I realized it was 8:45 PM. Wowsers! Dan and I conferred, and since neither of us was very hungry, we elected to skip dinner and he headed off to bed. I hung out a bit more and watched some TiVo with Paul, then went to bed around 11.

On Saturday, I got up at around 8:30 and although I was in time to join Paul and Muganga for a bike ride I elected to be a slug and stay in and feed my addiction. Dan got up surprisingly early, and while we contemplated a couple of options for lunch with friends, the reality of my impending job loss set in and we elected to make some brats for lunch at home instead. We watched some TV and admired the impressive storms that came and went over the course of the afternoon. Eventually we headed up to Nickel City, a nifty arcade in Northbrook where everything runs on nickels instead of quarters. Paul joined us shortly thereafter, as did steviemaxwell. It was good, cheap fun – I spent $2 to get in and fr another $3 in nickels I got two hours of entertainment. Not bad! Unfortunately Stevie had to head to work, so we took our leave of him and drove back down to Chicago to experience the neon goodness of Superdawg, a true Chicago landmark. The “Supercheesie” cheese burger wasn’t bad, but the fries were, sadly, a major letdown. The search for the perfect burger-and-fries joint in Chicago continues!

Sunday morning I woke up at 7:30. I remembered that it was supposed to get hot, and I knew if I didn’t get out early going for a bicycle ride was going to be dreadfully uncomfortable. I jumped out of bed, got dressed and grabbed my bike and I was off! Not like I went very far, though – after last weekend’s debacle I’m a little gun-shy on long distance bike rides, so I decided to keep things sane for now. First, I rode down to Lincoln Square to check out Mayfest (which, of course, hadn’t started for the day yet). I rode around the deserted festival area and looked at the posted prices ($7 for a small cup of Maibock beer!) and decided that gee, maybe I really didn’t need to come check this out later. Honestly, it didn’t look like there was much besides beer, food, and a bandstand. Ah well – it’s summer in Chicago, there’s always another festival. I continued my ride down to Damen and decided that was a good place to turn back. In all, maybe it was a 4 – 5 mile ride, but it was a good start.

Back at the apartment, Dan made scrambled eggs when he got up, and eventually Paul and I made a run out to Target for a few things. When we got back we grilled up some chicken breasts on the back porch, which was very nice. There was enough of a breeze that the weather wasn’t excruciatingly hot, and a cold beer always helps matters. I was reminded of two things: 1. You just can’t beat charcoal for grilling, and 2. We really need to get a charcoal chimney, since we spent probably 45 minutes just getting the charcoal started. After dinner we watched a couple of episodes of Scrubs and then it was off to bed.

So what’s up this coming week? Well, I continue my job search, of course. We have tickets in hand to see The Lion King on Broadway on Saturday afternoon with daveqat, jimcyl, perro, darkwolph, and linnaeus – I’m really looking forward to that! And on Sunday we’ll be having brunch with the esteemed Dr. Conway, which should be entertaining. Incidentally (and this is more for my mom 🙂 you can always find our calendar showing where we’ll be when on Yahoo! Calendars.