Category Archives: gay games

Sleepless in Chicago

When last we left our intrepid heroes, they were prepping for a big weekend. Well, sort of. Takaza wasn’t feeling well when he got home on Friday night, so we had a quiet night in. On Saturday I was up bright and early, ready to enjoy a beautiful day. Dan was feeling better, so we headed down to the Cadillac Room at Soldier Field for the event of the day, Night of 100 Champions, a fundraiser for Gay Games Chicago. Considering that there were over 80 tables, with ten seats each, and seats were $75 each, this was going to be quite a fundraiser. Over the course of the weeks leading up to it, we had been told that we would have a variety of jobs, but ultimately they all collapsed down to “Setup”. We started at about 11:30 AM and worked pretty much continuously until the event started at 5:30 PM. We did a quick change into more dressy clothes and assumed our roles as facilitators for the silent auction – checking that bids were following the proper increments, answering any questions anyone might have, that sort of thing. the auction was pretty impressive, too – stuff like flights anywhere in the US, cruises, extravagant dinner and theater packages, artwork, and even a signed, framed tennis racket from Billie Jean King. The auction was supposed to end at 8 PM, then it got pushed back to 8:15, then 8:30, then finally 10 PM. This wasn’t too big of a deal – the object was to raise the most money possible, of course, but communications were poor at best, and there was a lot of confusion.

I should say that the volunteers and almost all of the organizers that we worked with were great, and we had a lot of fun with them; the only downer, and it was a BIG downer, was one of the organizers who was completely and obviously incompetent. She had a tendency to rush in and micromanage, pull you away from the tasks that you were working on to do stuff that was important to her, change her mind on how things should be done and snap at you when you didn’t read her mind, and generally being completely annoying and difficult. When she changed the (previously arranged, sensible and organized) plans for assembling the winning bids and accepting payment for winning items for the auction right as we were trying to close the auction – that was when Dan and I decided we’d had enough. We packed up our stuff and went home.

Initially, I think we were both pretty pissed off and really doubting what our participation with Gay Games might be for the next few months, I’ve come to realize that we were having problems with one person and one person only (though someone should have seen the problems and told her to knock it off). We also learned that if you’re competent, you’ll find yourself in a leadership role pretty darned quickly.

I was tired and sore Sunday morning and Dan was even worse off, suffering a dual curse of respiratory nastiness and a flare-up of the pinched nerve problems from earlier. He elected to stay home and I attended the MFF meeting. I was still in a pretty grumpy mood from the night before so I probably wasn’t the most pleasant to be around, but the meeting passed quickly. We spent Sunday night hanging out and being laptop geeks, as usual 🙂

Last night Dan was facing a recurrence of the god-awful all-nighter from last week. faced with dinner alone, I opted to walk up to Tom Yum, the sushi/Thai place around the corner from us, and had a tasty and inexpensive sushi dinner. The walk back was pleasant and perfect after a good meal. Dan didn’t leave work until after 11 PM, and didn’t come to bed until after 1 AM. We talked a little about the silliness that had kept him so late, and that got me more and more irritated until i couldn’t get back to sleep. I finally got to sleep again at about 3 AM, so you understand why I’m dragging a good bit today. Bleah. I’ll still hit the gym today, though, and we have a nice dinner of fettuccine carbonara lined up for dinner. Pasta makes everything better 🙂

Time to head home!

Do the Friday Dance!

Don’t know what the Friday Dance is? Just jump up and dance around because the next two days won’t be spent stuck at a desk all day. YAY!

Last night was lots of fun. After pulling an all-nighter, Takaza was told that a sizeable bonus is in the pipeline for him. This, coupled with the nice chunk of change I’m getting back on my federal and state taxes will help to pay down some of our debt that much faster, which makes us very happy. To celebrate, Dan informed me (as I was relaxing, exhausted from the gym) that we were going out to celebrate! We stopped first at Martin’s Big and Tall, a nice little shop in Lincoln Square. I had thought that they were a bit expensive in the past, but since Dan and I both needed shirts, we stopped by to see what they had. It turns out that they had some great shirts at reasonable prices (MUCH better than Casual Male’s shoddy crap), so we bought several, including the spiffy shirt I have on today.

From there we decided to explore Lincoln Park a bit (and hang out with trixies and chads) and took the Brown Line down to Armitage. Dan was in the mood for steak and while we were looking around we stumbled onto Select Cut Steak House at the corner of Armitage and Halsted. The steaks were good. We both got combos; Dan had a strip steak and chicken breasts (“it’d be good on a chicken sandwich, not so much by itself”), I had the strip steak and ribs. It’s telling that as I dipped my fries, Dan pointed out that it was probably barbecue sauce I was dipping into and not ketchup. It took me a couple of fries to tell the difference. We also felt a bit rushed by the waitron, which was silly since the place wasn’t busy at all. All in all, it was an OK meal but I don’t see us going back. We finished off the night by stopping by my new favorite place for desserts, Bobtail, just off the Southport El stop. I {heart} the Brown Line!

So tomorrow is Night of 100 Champions. We’re supposed to be showing up at around 11 AM at Soldier Field and help set up the raffle and silent auction, then (tentatively) will be helping to sell tickets and pimp the auction items. Theoretically, we’re also supposed to be helping out with the brunch at the same location on Sunday, but that’s even more loosely-organized. I think I’ve been spoiled by the conventions I’ve worked on, because volunteer organization for this event is a bit lackluster and disorganized; I’ve always followed the guidelines that volunteers want to know what they’re going to do, where they’re going to do it, and when they are going to be there. There’s a few gaps in these facts for this event. This is a shame because there’s plenty of people willing to help, but I fear that by the end of the night it’s going to be a valiant few who have stuck around through the chaos who have to clean up. I hope I’m wrong.

I had a few other items to touch on, but work calls. More stuff to come!

Wherein Our Hero Eats Out a Lot and Has a Really Fun Weekend

Goodness – one public post in the last week? Honestly, last week just wasn’t that interesting. The weekend, however…

On Friday, I got home and just felt generally tired. I skipped the gym and was even thinking about grabbing a nap when takaza called on his way home and suggested we go out and do a bit of shoe shopping. He needed my help because he has been dealing with a nasty pinched nerve in his back which limited his mobility somewhat (he’s very much on the mend now, fortunately). After some shoe shopping we decided to grab dinner out. We opted to investigate Lincoln Square. We grabbed a good parking spot and had a brief browse through The Chopping Block, a neat kitchenware store, and enjoyed a bit of music from the busker in the square. Our first choice, though it looked quite tasty, didn’t really tickle Dan’s fancy, so we walked a bit further down to La Bocca della Verita’. Dan had a very tasty (though somewhat plain) gnocchi pomodoro, and I opted for the ravioli Anatra, which had a duck breast, sage, and shallot filling. Rather good, I’ll say. Alas, the atmosphere was a bit too bustling and loud, and I doubt we’ll return.

On Saturday, Dan had to go in to work. I spent the morning and part of the afternoon hanging out with datahawk (who had spent the night) and filing my taxes (hey last-minute folks: Taxact will e-file your state and federal taxes for $16!). After some false starts (I fumbled some employer ID numbers on my W-2’s), I submitted my taxes and had notification back within a few hours. The nice refund of $900 will go…well, it’ll all go towards credit cards, which is pretty boring. Yay for debt reduction, though!

At about 4 PM Dan, Data, Linnaeus and I headed out on the El down to River North for a truly wonderful early dinner at Heaven on Seven. We were joined by emrldgirrl, wiktowasichu, siriuswolfstar, simbalion, lisagems, Moryssa, Dan’s cow-orker nymphara, Data’s mom, and Data’s brother R.C. Dan had the extremely tasty country fried steak (again), and I splurged a bit and got the “Jimmy Jr. Feed Me!” a four-course meal of whatever the chef decides to give you (the larger “Jimmy Feed Me!” is seven courses). This was truly amazing. I started off with two demitasses, one with their delicious gumbo and the other with a delicious turtle soup. This was followed by a jalapeno-cheddar corn muffin and Cajun-seasoned halibut that was nothing short of astonishing – flaky, tender, and perfectly-cooked. Not too spicy either! After this was beef tenderloin served on a bed of garlic mashed potatoes. Yum! (By this point I was sharing the dishes all around because there was no way I could finish all of it myself!) They finished things off with my choice of dessert from their dinner menu; I opted for the chocolate pecan pie, which everyone agreed was tasty, but the crust was a bit too tough (Lisa guessed, and I agree, that they probably let the dough get too warm as they were rolling out). Regrettably, we were a bit rushed by the end to make our next appointment, but I would absolutely order this again when I have time to savor things a bit more. It’s a hell of a deal at only $24.

After dinner we stumbled downstairs and stuffed an insane number of people into a cab and headed over to the Cadillac Palace Theater for the evening’s main event: the final Chicago performance (this time) of the musical Rent. Dan and I both went in cold, not having seen the movie or listened to (much) of the soundtrack. The performances were solid (although the actress playing Mimi was rather dreadful and in the first act wandered off-key several times) but the experience was marred by an incompetent sound mix that rendered the vocals into mush. When you have a performance where all of the exposition is sung, this meant that I spent a lot of the time trying to guess what was going on, who was who, and what each character’s motivations were. As a result the play really fell flat for me, because I was unable to connect with the characters or really care what happened to them. The songs were pretty good, though, so the evening wasn’t completely wasted. I hope to watch the movie sometime soon and hopefully will maybe get a bit more out of that. After the play we dispersed (slowly – inertia being what it is), but made a stop by the truly tasty Bobtail Soda Fountain for some ice cream with Lisa, Sirius, Simba, and Data. Then it was on to home and collapsing into bed.

Sunday started out slowly, as might be expected given the late night Saturday. Dan had to tend to a few work items, though he fortunately could do that from home. Later in the afternoon we drove up to McHenry to Dan’s mom’s place to drop off her taxes (which Dan had filled out) and visited with her for a bit. We drove back to the city through the pouring rain and arrived just in time to meet Simba and Sirius for dinner at Calo Ristorante. Much pizza was eaten, and it’s always fun hanging out with friends. We trundled off to bed shortly after we got home.

So then we have this week. We have the final volunteers meeting tonight for Night of 100 Champions. This will pretty much be eating up our time next weekend, both the gala on Saturday and the brunch on Sunday, so we’ll probably miss the MFF staff meeting on Sunday. Other than that, I have a couple of MFF registration projects I’m working on that I would like to finish this week. Right now, though, there’s work here I need to do so I’m off. Hope everyone has a great week!

Wednesday? What happened to Monday and Tuesday?

Man, am I getting slack at updating or what? I do try to make up for it in comments in other people’s journals, though.

Not a whole lot happened last week, so it’s not really worth mentioning. We were going to try to do some scouting for FRAC but takaza was feeling a bit under the weather so we got a late start. We were able to drive around and nail down a few locations, though. This edition is going to be a real hoot, I think, and folks are going to have a lot of fun. Look for some announcements on this very soon.

On Sunday we took things kind of slow, though we did eventually get out to make the rounds of shopping. The Suncoast Video store at Randhurst Mall is closing so we stopped by there to look at the store fixtures and see what was left in the picked-over DVD inventory. I got a copy of Passion in the Desert and we picked up a copy of Escanaba in da Moonlight for Linnaeus, both for about four bucks. We also picked up a nice shelving unit that will be helpful for MFF, possibly for holding stuff on the freebie table, and some small plastic sign holders (that they threw in for free) that will be handy at Anthrocon. Dan’s going to go back on Friday to see if he can get a deal on the registers – the main units are crap, and beat all to hell, but the cash drawers aren’t bad and could be useful for a future POS system at Anthrocon. They’ll have to be extremely cheap, though.

Dan and I broke our usual after-work routine on Monday by going to the volunteers meeting for Night of 100 Champions, a fundraiser for Gay Games Chicago. It was amusing that, while they were expecting two, maybe three hours out of their volunteers, we pretty much said we’d be available all day and into the evening, plus we’d help out at the brunch the following day. It sounds like we’ll be helping with setup, “entertainment assistance” (still to be determined, but helping out with the evening’s musical entertainment somehow), and possibly even welcoming people into the Soldier Field parking lots on “Segway patrol” (though that depends on whether they’ll waive the 260-pound Segway limit). It’s going to be a really impressive event, and the raffle and silent auction items are quite impressive (15 round trip airline tickets donated by Orbitz, complete cruises for eight donated by Olivia, and a lot of other cool stuff). Dan is trying to get his employer (a certain large German multinational corporation) involved as a sponsor for the Gay Games, and thinks that there’s a good chance of that. Incidentally, if anyone is interested in helping out, they still need volunteers! There will be a last-minute planning meeting on Monday, April 17 (at DeVry at Belmont and Western, I think?) where you can show up. We’ll be there, and it would be great to see some of our other friends involved.

As an aside, a nice bit of Gay-Games-related news: The Crystal Lake City Council voted 6-1 last night to allow Gay Games Chicago to use Crystal Lake for their rowing competition. I especially liked this quote: “This issue, for some reason, has become quite an emotional issue in our community,” [Crystal Lake Mayor Aaron] Shepley told residents before the public comment. “We will treat each other with the respect we owe each other as human beings.” Awesome! The next step is that the request has to go before the Lakewood Village Board next week (hopefully) for approval.

Yesterday Paul and I both had our annual physical exams (we go to the same doctor), so we decided to meet up for dinner with datahawk (Dan opted for a quiet night in). We wound up going to Froggy’s, a fabulous French restaurant in Highwood. Unfortunately, compared to the previous two times that we’ve been, the chef’s choice menu wasn’t quite up to snuff. While the rabbit casserole was tasty, the venison (though tender) was prepared in a way that gave it an acidic taste (not unlike sauerbraten) and the pheasant mousse stuffed with spinach wasn’t particularly flavorful or exciting. It wasn’t a bad mean, mind you, and it may just be that it was a Tuesday and the chef was off, or some such. Nevertheless this has spurred me into seeking out more restaurants in the area that have nifty (and inexpensive) tasting menus, and also to investigate other French restaurants on the North Side.

Tonight it’s back to the gym for an extended workout; to make up for the awful schedule I’ve been keeping there I’m going to have to go this Saturday and Sunday mornings to get back into the swing of things. It sounds like Dan’s going to be working late, so the grocery run may be put off one more day. Even though I’m out of milk for my cereal, I’m not missing it much (note to self: don’t ever buy Sugar-Smacks knockoffs again. Ick). I also need to start making lists for the weekend, since it looks like I’m going to be making quite a bit of chicken and dumplings for Saturday. Oh darn.

Well, time to get some work done!

Feeling Happy and Gay!

We went to the volunteer orientation meeting for Gay Games Chicago last night. This is going to be an amazing experience, I think; they’re expecting 12,000 athletes, 80,000 spectators, and are planning for 6,000 volunteers (expecting that only 70% of those will actually show up to work). There’s going to be five athlete villages: University of Chicago, Northwestern University, University of Illinois-Chicago, Oak Park (for soccer) and Crystal Lake (for rowing). Takaza and I both mentioned out convention experience, though the Volunteer Coordinator seized on Dan’s accounting experience, mentioning that they need someone to head up cash management at each athlete village. He’s kind of ambivalent on that, plus it would probably mean we’d have to work separately, which would suck.

One of the interesting things is that with the huge number of people involved and the placed that volunteers will be going (Opening Ceremonies are at Soldier Field, Closing Ceremonies at Wrigley Field), they’re going to be extremely strict about credentials, and once you’ve been assigned a shift you can’t change it. The deadline for signing up to be a volunteer is June 1 (the games run July 15-22) – after that, you’re out of luck. If anyone in the Chicago area is interested, I urge you to get involved; this is going to be a lot of fun and pretty damn exciting, I think. We’ve signed up to help out at the black-tie-optional fundraiser Night of 100 Champions, which is being headlined by Greg Louganis, “plus others”, on April 22. Even if we’re just moving tables around, it’ll be pretty cool since it’s at the Cadillac Club at Soldier Field. We’ll see what other volunteer opportunities pop up between now and July (they said they had 120 events planned that they’ll need volunteers for).

OK, back to work, and to plan fun stuff to do this weekend. W00t!

Cat Weekends Are Good For Dogs

Yesterday was pretty tough. Work was OK, but I tuned in to watch takaza‘s cousin’s funeral (for those who missed it, Jared was a police officer in Colorado Springs who was killed in the line of duty). Dan went home early to watch it, which is a good thing because it was an extremely emotional and draining service. We spent a good part of the afternoon when I got home watching the funeral procession wind through Colorado Springs (thanks to a webcast by KKTV). I skipped going to the gym because, well, it was better I stay there with Dan. Afterwards, Dan cooked a nice dinner and we watched the final episodes of Monster House.

The weekend was much better. March looks like it’s going to be a busy month, so we decided to make last weekend a “cat weekend” – the kind of days where you say to yourself, “Hey, it’s five o’clock. I should really take a shower.” On Sunday we ventured far enough outside to walk around the neighborhood a little. We checked out the Middle Eastern butcher shop near us (good prices, though I need to find a recipe that uses baby lamb shanks, because they looked delicious!). We also stopped by the coffee shop down by the (former) Kedzie El stop. Man, they weren’t kidding around about station renovation; it only took a week for them to completely level the station. There’s nothing there right now except a bunch of construction equipment between the tracks.

As for the coming week, we have the premiere of the new season of The Amazing Race tonight. Yay! (I love their ads: “It’s a new season! It won’t suck as bad as last season! We promise!”) unclevlad, renniefrog, datahawk, and posicat will be joining us, with dinner provided by the taquiera around the corner from our place. Then tomorrow night right after Dan gets home from work we’ll be going to the Gay Games Chicago volunteer orientation meeting. Yes, we looked at the lineup of events and decided that this would be something that would be a lot of fun to be involved in. And hey, with Anthrocon moved back to June for a year, that opens up a nice hole in our schedule for mid July, so this works quite nicely! I’m excited to see what might be in store, but I’m also realistic. Sure, we have experience running Midwest FurFest, but that’s small potatoes to this (they’ve got 8,000 athletes registered already, with a goal of 12,000 by July). You always need people to take tickets and fill water coolers, and if that’s what they need us to do, it’s all good. I’m looking forward to just being a part of the event.

Not a lot planned for this weekend, but I hope to remedy that. We still need to see Eight Below (and Brokeback Mountain!), and it would be fun to hang out with friends some. But for now, it’s back to work!