metrocake

R and I had a most bodacious weekend. :)

Friends:

We hung out with friends on both Saturday and Sunday. On Saturday, F and K came over (let me know if you want linkage, guys) and we totally GEEKED OUT. =D

We played a board game called Arkham Horror that lasted for about…eight hours. Six if you count the two-hour dinner and fondue break. (The game site claims you can play the game in two-three hours….they fib!) Basically, you pick a character that has to investigage monsters running around a small town in Massachusetts. As you get further into the game, more and more monsters come out of portals. If you don’t get the portals sealed up, everyone dies. I thought it was really fun, if a bit long — but now that we know the rules and have some strategy (GET BLESSED FIRST) we might be able to play it in three-four hours, rather than six.

As for the fondue…we received a fondue pot from R’s aunt and uncle for our wedding. R had the brilliant idea of trying it out! (I do love that man.) We were going to do a cheese fondue, but when we called F and K, and asked about fondues, all we could hear was K screaming, “Marshmallows!” in the background. We wound up serving chocolate fondue, and dipped pineapple, strawberries, rice krispie treats, pound cake, AND marshmallows into it. MMMMMMmmmmm. :D

On Sunday, we saw the Waterfalls with R’s friend and her family. We took the Circle Line around New York Harbor, which was pretty neat — I’d never been on one before. :) The waterfalls themselves were nice…but I was a little underwhelmed. I understand that the artist was trying to make a public statement, and give folks something to discuss — but aesthetically, something like the Gates made a much bigger visual splash to me. I have not seen them lit up at night — they might appeal to me more then. (We’re planning to get to Spiegelworld soon; that’s right by the Brooklyn Bridge waterfall — hopefully I’ll see it lit up then.)

After the waterfalls, we went out to dinner and then had dessert at Chikalicious (love love love). Some friends of ours had participated — or TRIED TO — in Nike’s Human Race. They had a really, REALLY bad race experience — it was totally disorganized, and at one point, the entire section they were in bottlenecked and had to halt for seven minutes, destroying everyone’s time — so they were having some beers and food at the 79th street Boat Basin. We wound up meeting up with them on the way home, and then had them over for MORE fondue. At midnight. :D Yuuummm.

On Monday, R and I went to Coney Island. I’d wanted to take pictures, since I’d never been there and I’ve heard that Astroland will be torn down soon. I remember my grandparents talking about Steeplechase Park, and the fun they had there…but as R had feared, I found it more depressing than fun. :/ They’re trying to revitalize Coney Island, but it’s going to be a haul — even the new baseball and soccer fields that were put in were totally empty on Labor Day. Didn’t make much sense to me.

Unfortunately, I was an ass and didn’t bring a hat and there’s very little shade there. I wound up getting totalled by the sun after two hours. We didn’t see a McDonald’s, Starbucks, or anywhere else that would typically have air conditioning, so we had to go home. :( Once I was on the air-conditioned subway for a little while, I was fine — there was just nowhere for us to go at Coney Island itself, which was too bad.

geekery

Gotta confess, I’m a little underwhelmed by Google’s new browser, Chrome. I understand that they’re trying to compete with Internet Explorer, and since IE’s new version 8 beta has come out — to pretty good reviews! — I’m wondering if they didn’t rush this out to stave them off.

I know it’s a beta, and yet even for a beta, it doesn’t feel as finished as I’d prefer. I’ve been playing with it, and the “most visited” page still doesn’t have anything loading up (how long does it take for that to happen?). Since I didn’t want to see gray boxes all the time, I opted to have a home page instead — but had to find the home page option under “options.” Less-savvy folks may not think to do that. (I know, less-savvy folks wouldn’t be using a beta, but still.)

Maybe there’s too much change in this browser, but it doesn’t feel intuitive (yet). Things aren’t positioned in a good spot. Sometimes, I’ll see a link I want to read, and open it in a new tab or window so I can check it later. In Chrome, when I open a new window, it’s not staggered; it’s positioned on top of and just to the right of the previous window, making it hard to get back to my original page. To compare, in Firefox I can stay on my original page when opening a new tab or window.

I’m interested to see how things will proceed from here and how Chrome will “grow up” — for now, though, Firefox is still my default.