Abandoning my Groove for a Better One

There comes a point in life when you realize the fine line between a healthy amount of lounging and a 30 year-old single, anime-geek gamer, single, overweight, still living with his parents, and covered with so much Ax body spray he's now sweating the stuff. I got up from crocheting and watching old Simpsons episodes yesterday only to find that my desk chair had a definitive ass groove. I desperately needed to get out.

One of the bloggers around here does photos of her walks around Canadaland*, so I thought I'd join in with my own photos of Madtown on a Saturday morning.

Madtown on a glorious summer day (Today marks the end of seven straight days of overcast skies.). Madison isn't actually this crowded. I love that even though it's a downtown area, there's actually plenty of green space.

Madison has always had a strong hippie presence. This kind of made me nostalgic for the bathrooms in the University's psychology department. I really should go back there with my camera to see if the stalls are still covered top to bottom with political debates. It's amazing the length and depth to which some stall artists will go. Makes you wonder what would happen if we replaced all the seats in Congress with toilets.

Ah, Monona Terrace. Beautiful to look at, but not much else. It was built to pretty up the lakefront and provide more convention space. The problem is, we kind of had convention space already. Aside from being the broadcasting headquarters for the Whatdoya Know? Public Radio show, the Monona Terrace has been added to the list of buildings whose most common uses are: wedding photos, heated short cuts in the winter and clean bathrooms.

The observation deck at the capitol is finally open again. These statues adorn the top right before the dome starts. I have a hard time with being patient in amigurumi. I can't even imagine the time and concentration it took to do these.

I think she's my favorite. Maybe because she's the only one up there that looks completely content in every way.

There is a height law in Madison that no structure within a mile of the capital may be taller than the capitol building. The Belmont Hotel built in 1924, now replaced with a YWCA and condos, was what prompted the law to be proposed in the first place. It makes giving people directions to downtown very easy. "You need to get to State Street? No problem. See that big white building. Drive towards the big white building. If at any point you can't see the big white building, you're either going the wrong way, or you're underground - at which point I can't help you."

*Despite the fact that I won my elementary school's National Geography Bee in 5th grade, I am by no means good at geography. In fact, should you ever require quick directions to a river, do not ask me or either of the other NGB finalists from the class of '95, as we only advanced due to our excellent memorization of the following rivers: the Nile, Amazon and Mississippi, and nothing else. I decided that after my correct yet clueless yelling out of, "Mississippi!" (and desperately hoping the teacher would ask me to spell it), I was knowledgeable enough regarding the earth's layout that I wouldn't have to pay much attention after that. This explains why for a long time I thought Puerto Rico was off the coast of New York, Hawaii was about level with Northern California, and Canada is a big outline of a country north of the U.S. with a massive black hole of little skewed information bits floating around inside. I call this last geographical anomaly, Canadaland - home to Francophiles, and ...trees? So please, do not confuse Canadaland with Canada. Remember that Canadaland is north of the U.S., while Canada actually borders Mexico and Argentina.