2 August 1998: Cruising Around Chicago

Sunday, 2 August 1998:

Cruising Around Chicago

My long weekend got off to an iffy start, as I had another minor row with the individual at work that I've been having intermittent problems with. After responding to the immediate issue, I fired off a message to my boss asking if we can somehow resolve these difficulties. I've been trying to avoid situations where I can come into conflict with this individual, but that's clearly not enough, when random out-of-the-blue things can pop up like this at any time.

I have some trepidation about writing more than that in my journal (even though hardly anyone from work ever reads it), so that's enough description for now.

Thursday after work I drove to Chicago to visit my friends Jim Rittenhouse and his wife Susan, as well as to visit my friend John whom I stayed with on my trip to California in June. Jim and Susan took me to a Mongolian barbecue restaurant (where you fill a bowl with meat and various other goodies, add some sauce, and then the cooks fry it on a hot grill until it's done). It was pretty tasty, and was the first meal in my latest food-fest weekend.

Friday I took the Metra into Chicago to see John. The Metra is basically the commuter rail from the suburbs to downtown Chicago. It's been quite a while since I've ridden a train which actually had tickets and a conductor - my last memory of one was my trip to Canada to visit some friends in Kingston, Ontario; Matt and I took the train down to Toronto and spent the day there before I hopped my plane home. Train travel is quite nice, actually. If Madison had a local rail system that went close by my home and workplace, I'd use it more often. In the winter, anyway!

I met up with John at his hotel, the Chicago Hilton and Towers. He and his friend Ben were there for a big bridge tournament, and after lunch John dragged me to play in a match of duplicate bridge.

A match basically consists of a number of teams - 24 in our case (12 north-south pairs, who stay at a table, and 12 east-west pairs who rotate among tables) - and an equal number of pre-dealt hands. Each table assembles two hands, so each table plays 22 hands, against 11 of the possible opponents. It's rather clever, really. The games are played normally (the hands also include an indication of the "dealer" and of the vulnerabilities of each side), and points are scored for each side depending on the outcome. Then the results for each hand player are fed into a computer, and teams are ranked based on how well they did against equivalent sides playing the same hand, and at the end pairs are ranked on a percentage basis.

This was my first bridge tournament, so we played in a fairly easy match (people with zero-to-twenty master points; 300 points is a life master). Although I blew a few of our conventions (I treated John's takeout double as a penalty double, and his penalty double as a takeout double; at least I'm consistent!) we also had a couple of triumphs, such as one perfect bidding sequence, and one sequence where I bid a little daringly, ending up in a contract John thought was quite high, and then I made the contract. It all balanced out, as we ended up just short of 50%, which struck me as rather good for my first tournament.

As I said to John, I felt that the very fact that we had any triumphant moments was itself a triumphant moment. Moreover, I was just happy not to have made many procedural gaffes (such as making a bid and then going "d'oh!" when I realized I'd screwed up; I only did that once). And our opponents were generally quite friendly; indeed, they made more gaffes than we did (such as one opponent failing to follow suit in a play).

I'd be willing to try this again. Indeed, depending on how my ability to set up a regular bridge group among my friends works out (not so well, so far), I may just see about going to a local bridge club and seeing if I can join a pick-up game.

After the bridge match, we went up to the north end of town and had a pretty yummy Indian meal (Madison is not a good place for Indian food; we have only one restaurant, and I don't find it to be very good, though they do try), and then went to a cafe where I had a rum ball for dessert. We also walked about four miles in the midst of all this - actually a welcome thing, since Friday is normally my biking day.

We finally made it back to the hotel, where I hopped a cab and went to Union Station to catch my train back.

Y'know, I always wondered what it would feel like to run up to your gate and see your train or plane heading down the track, having just pulled out of the station, and being just too far away to catch. Now I know, as that's just what happened to me here. So I called Jim and Susan and left a message regarding my plans, hung around the station for an hour until the next train at 11:30, and got back to Lisle at 12:20, where Jim was waiting to pick me up. It was not a big deal, it turns out, since they were out late at a movie.

Saturday I slept in, and we all rose slowly. Then Jim and I drive into the city (braving some really horrible traffic, not entirely due to road construction, it seemed) and did some shopping. We hit a couple of comics stores, where I didn't find anything I wanted. To be fair, since I go to a comics shop every week, and since I have a fairly detailed and specific list of what I want, and since the back issue market crashed earlier this decade and few shops have a good stock of back issues anymore, it's not too surprising I didn't find anything. Most likely, I'll either hit a gold mine, or not find anything at all. So, that's life.

(I was hoping to find volumes 3 through 6 of Fantagraphics' Prince Valiant reprints, but those seem to be just-plain-out-of-print, so I may have to hit USENET to get them.)

We also hit The Stars Our Destination, a very good SF bookstore which I hadn't been to in several years (since I visited Jim when he lived in Rogers Park on Chicago's north side, in fact), where I found quite a few things. More than I wanted to afford just now, in fact. So I picked up three Sandman comics hardcover collections (the first three, in fact, which are not easily available), and left the stuff I knew I could find elsewhere for the future.

For dinner we went with Susan to a very yummy italian restaurant, where I was introduced to a bread dip of olive oil, garlic, and grated parmesian cheese (cold, of course), which was very tasty and which I may have to make at home. The main course was also tasty, but that bread dip was really delicious. Guess I have simple tastes!

Sunday we pretty much sat around Jim and Susan's apartment (still filled with many of the boxes from their recent move), and I introduced them to The Settlers of Catan, which turned out to be a good game, and which Susan won (but nearly didn't, since she hadn't realized you needed only 10 victory points to win; she thought you needed 20!). Susan also cooked a yummy lunch of boneless ribs, couscous and green beans.

The drive home was uneventful, although I'm still a little concerned about my car's radiator, specifically it's ability to dissipate its heat. When I turn on my interior heat, it cools off fairly quickly to a more normal level, so I dunno. Maybe I'll get it looked at, although it only gives me problems on long-distance highway driving during the day (when it's warm). So maybe not 'til next year.

When I got home, I petted the cats for a while, went through my mail, did a little cleaning, and checked my e-mail. I received the unhappy news that a longtime Madison and Milwaukee SF fan passed away last week after a long illness in the hospital. I didn't really know her very well personally, but many people I do know were good friends of hers, so I'm sure I'll see the impact of it soon enough. Sigh.

And on that unhappy note, I will sign off for the evening. Tomorrow, as Scarlett O'Hara said, is another day...

Michael Rawdon (Contact)