5/30/05, 8:55 p.m. --
1121.9.
... is how many miles I have driven in the past 2 1/2 days, and represents well over 20 hours
in the car =| I can't really complain, however, as it was a really fun (if a bit crazy) trip, and the
detour through IC to pick up my brother tacked on a few extra hours of driving.
I really hope that this will be the last time I ever head to a place without taking care of sleeping arrangements first -- after we found out that there would be too many of us to sleep at Jafar's, we really had no place to stay once we got to Chicago. And, being Memorial Day weekend, all the hotels were booked. Thus we intended to have a fun day at the soccer game and enjoy the evening before just sleeping in our cars for a couple hours and heading to the 'burbs to find a hotel. As it turned out, that scenario didn't QUITE pan out...
The game itself was awesome, even if we did get there 30 minutes late (took longer to get to Soldier Field from Jafar's than we had originally thought.) We looked pretty awful, and if it wasn't bad enough being beaten by England's scrubs 2-1, they had way more fans there, too. But it was a decently close game and a lot of fun to see live.
After the game we got some food and beer (of course) and hung out for awhile. Just a sidenote: food is really awesome in Chicago ("you won't find a bad restaurant here" said Jafar.) Then at midnight Brian and I decided to leave to go find my car and head out to Naperville to get a hotel (leaving the rest of the guys to sleep at a friend's place in Lincoln Park, a last-minute find.) I was greeted with a $50 parking ticket and a 2-hour drive out of the city as we got lost a couple times... It has never felt so good to sleep in a cheap hotel as it did Saturday night. Was a really fun trip, though. Hope everyone had a good weekend, because tomorrow it's back to the grind =|
I really hope that this will be the last time I ever head to a place without taking care of sleeping arrangements first -- after we found out that there would be too many of us to sleep at Jafar's, we really had no place to stay once we got to Chicago. And, being Memorial Day weekend, all the hotels were booked. Thus we intended to have a fun day at the soccer game and enjoy the evening before just sleeping in our cars for a couple hours and heading to the 'burbs to find a hotel. As it turned out, that scenario didn't QUITE pan out...
The game itself was awesome, even if we did get there 30 minutes late (took longer to get to Soldier Field from Jafar's than we had originally thought.) We looked pretty awful, and if it wasn't bad enough being beaten by England's scrubs 2-1, they had way more fans there, too. But it was a decently close game and a lot of fun to see live.
After the game we got some food and beer (of course) and hung out for awhile. Just a sidenote: food is really awesome in Chicago ("you won't find a bad restaurant here" said Jafar.) Then at midnight Brian and I decided to leave to go find my car and head out to Naperville to get a hotel (leaving the rest of the guys to sleep at a friend's place in Lincoln Park, a last-minute find.) I was greeted with a $50 parking ticket and a 2-hour drive out of the city as we got lost a couple times... It has never felt so good to sleep in a cheap hotel as it did Saturday night. Was a really fun trip, though. Hope everyone had a good weekend, because tomorrow it's back to the grind =|
5/27/05, 12:24 p.m. --
Woo.
My Memorial Day weekend has already started, as I am home eating lunch quick before I
head off to Iowa City to pick up Brian en route to Chicago for the US vs England
friendly at Soldier Field on Saturday. We'll be meeting Kiwhoon and his crew in either
IC or Chicago tnoight, although the housing situation in Chicago now appears to be
in limbo. But I'm sure we'll figure something out ... I'm pretty pumped
to go see a real soccer game in person, especially after watching Liverpool's
amazing comeback victory over Milan in the Champion's League final (which I watched at
the tavern across from the lab on Wednesday afternoon, instead of working...) I had
forgotten how much fun it is to watch soccer; I'll definitely have to be paying more
attention to when these big games are on TV here.
At any rate, have a great weekend!
5/18/05, 7:05 p.m. --
Futbol, etc.
Yesterday I had the unique opportunity to play a friendly game of soccer against the
German grad students who were visiting from a university in Munich. The game had been
set up at their request a long time ago, and so I was worried that they were going to be hardcore
futballers. However, as it turned out, they were just as laid-back and out of shape
as we were, and we battled to a very diplomatic 3-3 tie. They were a pretty friendly bunch,
so the game was good-natured and a fun time. Wish I could do that every Tuesday. Sadly,
after the match they had to hustle to catch their plane home and were thus unable to join
us for a celebratory beer afterwards. Guess we were the more degenerate grad students...
Also, tomorrow is the release date for the (hopefully) last Star Wars movie. Although Ebert gave it 3.5 stars, after reading his review I don't hold out much hope for it being better than the previous two. Doesn't mean it's not worth seeing on opening night, however; I'll be driving to Rochester tomorrow afternoon to catch the 7pm show with Sam (M). Hope it will be a good time ...
As for tonight, I'll wage Round 2 of the battle against my tibook, with a second replacement dvd drive in my possession. Just for fun, here's a picture from the early stages of Round 1 (sorry it's a bit blurry), which eventually went to the laptop:
Also, tomorrow is the release date for the (hopefully) last Star Wars movie. Although Ebert gave it 3.5 stars, after reading his review I don't hold out much hope for it being better than the previous two. Doesn't mean it's not worth seeing on opening night, however; I'll be driving to Rochester tomorrow afternoon to catch the 7pm show with Sam (M). Hope it will be a good time ...
As for tonight, I'll wage Round 2 of the battle against my tibook, with a second replacement dvd drive in my possession. Just for fun, here's a picture from the early stages of Round 1 (sorry it's a bit blurry), which eventually went to the laptop:
5/16/05, 3:35 p.m. --
OMG LOTR.
Yesterday was a really busy day, but I had the chance to go to Des Moines with my family and (finally)
watch the LOTR Symphony that I had purchased tickets for almost nine months ago. In
spite of Howard Shore not being there to direct in person (he was
too busy working on the King Kong soundtrack or something), it was well worth the wait.
Although I suppose I should mention that ever since I got the soundtracks for the movies,
I had wanted badly to hear it performed live -- so it wouldn't have mattered if it was
the Ames Middle School orchestra up there or the London Philharmonic. So my opinion
of the performance was incredibly biased, being the LOTR geek that I am. At any rate,
I dont think I even blinked or moved a muscle through the first 20 minutes of it
(until I realized my foot was asleep), and was grinning ear-to-ear through every minute
of the two and a half hour symphony =P All the critical instrumentation appeared to be
there, including the wood flute for the Shire themes, the Norwegian fiddle (or
perhaps it was just an ornate viola) for the Rohan theme, plate percussion
for the odd-signatured Isenguard/orc themes, and a contra bassoon for Treebeard's music.
The use of three different choirs was impressive, too. I was pleasantly surprised
by how many songs Shore managed to cram into the six movements (including most of
my favorites), although much to my disappointment, many of them had been shortened
considerably. Some vocal solos were chopped, too, including Billy Boyd's from
the end of The Steward of Gondor, which is really the centerpiece of that song.
He did keep Gollum's Song, however, and the soloist
did a pretty awesome job on that piece, even if she wasn't Emiliana ;) All in all,
it was a great performance, and my only regret is that I hadn't
bought tickets to both shows...
5/13/05, 2:00 p.m. --
And exhale...
Just about officially done with finals week, and although I had no tests, it was still
a lot of work to get all of my homework and projects turned in on time. Got the last
project done last night for my watersheds modeling class, and I will drop it off
at the prof's office as I leave town and head for AMES. Been an odd week, what with
the freezing temperatures and pouring rain (which cancelled soccer last night ... grr),
finals, and working on the tibook project, so I am looking
forward to heading back to Ames for a bit to relax ... and see the (omg) LOTR Symphony
on Sunday -- can't wait!! I'll head back to Mpls on Monday, where the replacement
DVD drive for the tibook will be waiting. Hopefully this one will work (the last one
was a dud, but the guy I ebayed it from kindly sent me another.) Would be nice to
get a working tibook assembled, now that I have found that the 'new' battery works
perfectly. Will keep you posted on the status of the project.