Kicking Around Madison

Another year, another round of seeing what changes time has wrought on my one-time home of Madison.

The most obvious changes are the completion of construction of the Overture Center with its glass prow overlooking State Street, and the tearing up of the middle third of State Street for... well, I never did find out what, but I presume it's a city infrastructure project. I guess the top third got torn up last year.

The "consolidation" of State Street used bookstores seems to have been completed with Avol's Books and Bookworks merging into the spaceonce occupied by Canterbury Booksellers and Pegasus Games. I think the nifty independent businesses which made downtown Madison so much fun when I lived there have been getting priced out by the ongoing gentrification and upscaling of State Street and the Capitol Square, with many pricey condo buildings going up, and trendy chain stores going in. It's unfortunate. Although to be honest I did buy a new pair of sandals at Heartland Birkenstock on this trip.

My regular haunts from last year - Potbelly Sandwich Works for lunch, and Fair Trade Coffee House for coffee and Internet connectivity - are still around. I also tried out Michaelangelo's Coffee House, whose coffee is about as good as Fair Trade, but it's not as good a venue for people-watching, since you can't really sit and look out the front window like you can at Fair Trade.

Happily the weather cooled off somewhat after the con, so I could walk around without being drenched in sweat. Tuesday saw a few rain showers come through, which was nice. Also, I didn't get hit with post-con depression nearly as badly as last year, which was nice.

I spent the middle days of my vacation trolling around town, or hanging out at my hosts' house, often playing We Love Katamari, the sequel to Katamari Damacy which I spent last year playing. Charlie and I would switch off playing Katamari levels, and generally having a good geeky time.

I also spent a lot of time reading, and hope to get some reviews written soon. Mostly I blasted my way through Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, which is a monstrously large book.

Thursday I got together with Charlie and a host of my former cow-orkers from Epic Systems. About half of the folks are still at the company. I reflected that whatever our opinions of the company, this particular group of people had a good time working together and formed some long-standing bonds, enough that my coming into town is reason enough for us to get together and have lunch, even after all these years. That's not a bad legacy.

Thursday night marked the start of the final third of my vacation: Debbi flew into town for her first look at Madison. Which is the subject of the next entry...