Leave it to Evanston to take a pile of trash, make it into something useful, and then take every step possible to ensure no one uses it.

We used it anyway.

Hmm.  Don’t you think Mount Trashmore deserves a Wikipedia entry?  I do too.  There.  Now it has one.  

A little over a year ago, Dave got a card game called Munchkin.  We played it and it was fun.  Then he got an expansion pack and it was even more fun.  Thirteen expansions later, the game has gotten a little complicated.  We had to create an elaborate system of bottlecaps just to organize the discard pile. 

While I was writing this, I remembered writing a very similar post about the Order of the Stick game – another humorous, complicated, card-based game that pokes fun at Dungeons and Dragons.  What is with these games?

The game pictured above took over 5 hours.  Good grief!

Shama’s off to Ireland for 5 months.  

When Arnie’s girlfriend movied to Boston, I suggested that they should play World of Warcraft so they could still do things together, even if those things involve beheading orcs. 

I made the same suggestion to Shama and she seemed up for it, but after some research it turned out the game wouldn’t run on her computer.

Shama: Thank God.

Maybe we’ll play Puzzle Pirates instead.

I suppose we should be thankful that we had Dax in Chicago for as long as we did.  He consistently entertained us with free shows, street games, and other surprises.  

To raise money for his move back to San Francisco, Dax did a painting a day for two and a half months and then had a silent auction at his house.  The bids, he said, didn’t have to be money.  They could be anything.  As a result, one piece was sold for 27 high fives and another was sold for “a telephone conversaion with my Russain father.”

I paid cash money for mine — the blue cloud at the top of the photo.

I don’t really know much about painting and I have lots of friends who are really good at it so it’s kind of intimidating to try, but I had a free day so I tried to paint a bear.

Several years ago Andy moved from Chicago to Michigan, but he’s so darn good at his job, Jellyvision didn’t want to let him go.  Instead we spent a bit of money on a video conferencing system, put a TV by Andy’s old desk and figured it would be like he was there.  

I was very skeptical.

I was also very wrong.  

Sure, he’s not all too pleased when he can’t come to lunch with us or we bring cupcakes into the office (although sometimes we make up for it) but in more ways than not, it’s like he’s actually there.  Maybe that means we’re all a bunch of stiffs.  I don’t know.

So when I saw this Cisco ad  I had a, “Why didn’t I think of that?!” moment. 

This should be a permanent installation somewhere — preferably in Chicago.  People could form friendships, practice speaking a foreign language, perform concerts, or whatever.  What a curiosity it would be.  

I happen to have a great list of potential cities.

It’s been a way-long time since I’ve had a chance to play at the old Uncommon Ground on Grace and Clark and dangit if I’m not gonna take advantage of that. So, come get 2009 started with me and macaroni and cheese.

New Year! Old Songs!