Well it took me a month but I finally got this site up and running again. My old host just went out of business with warning. This wouldn’t have been so bad but I got the domain through them. That made getting it transferred tricky because there was no one there to deal with. Now I’ve taken care of that and gotten a new hosting company. The package includes 500 e-mail addresses and I have no idea what to do with those. If there’s one thing I don’t need it’s another e-mail address.

Last night Nik and I went to see the Comedians of Comedy tour. The Showbox (site, strangely enough, of WotC’s employee Xmas party in 1999) is a pretty shitty venue for comedy, having nearly no seats. I think the Moore Theater would have been better suited for the event. Anyway, other than having to stand up for three plus hours the show was really good. The always funny Patton Oswalt warmed up the crowd, then six other comics performed before he came back to give the final performance. Brian Posehn, who’s easily the best part of the Sarah Silverman Program, put in a great set. He and Patton are like the poster nerds of comedy. They totally need to play some Mutants & Masterminds.

Tomorrow the Green Ronin Summit starts. Once a year we fly everybody out to Seattle so we can spend a few days planning, kibitzing, and organizing. We’ve found that this face time is really valuable for a company that does most of its work virtually. There are GR folks in five states spread all over the country, so we don’t have “water cooler talk” or lunch time gaming. If I have a random idea, I can’t shout over the cube wall to Rob and ask him what he thinks. You can certainly do a lot with phones and e-mail, but it’s hard to replace good old human interaction.

In 1995 I visited Vancouver, BC for the first time. I was only there for a few days but I had a great time. Of the many fun things I did there three stand out. I got to hang out with Nicole outside the convention environment for the first time. We were just friends at the time and she was pregnant with Kate but she graciously put me up and introduced me to some of the cool stuff Vancouver had to offer. On Nik’s recommendation we ate at Tojo’s, a local institutions and what became one of my favorite Japanese restaurants anywhere. Lastly, it so happened that I was there the weekend local punk legends the Subhumans were playing out for the first time since 1982. The show, at the Starfish Room, was sold out and 300 people were turned away. I hung around in the hopes of scoring a ticket and lucked into a guy with an extra. The show was awesome and I left Vancouver a happy punk.

This past weekend Nik and I were in Vancouver together once again. Since 1995 I have been back more times than I can count and it’s always a good time. This trip Nik and I were celebrating our 6 year wedding anniversary. When we heard that Tojo’s had moved to a new and bigger location we just had to go. The new space is swanky and the food is as excellent as it ever was. The tuna tataki nigiri was particularly awesome and the sablefish was like butter. Since we had skipped lunch that day, we ate dinner early and were out of Tojo’s by 7:30 pm. I had seen a listing for a Subhumans show earlier in the week, but I thought it was the English Subhumans, who we just saw a couple of weeks ago. As we were walking down the street, I saw a poster for the show and was surprised to discover that it was the Vancouver Subhumans. It was too perfect, especially when we discovered that the venue (Pub 340) was about six blocks from our hotel. So to the show we went and once again the Subhumans rocked. While not what most folks would consider a romantic anniversary activity, the show completed a weekend that brought me full circle from 1995. Thanks Vancouver!