A Weekend in Madison

Jeff and I spend last weekend in Madison--a sojourn we couldn't really afford given the insanity of our work of late and the fact that both Christmas and orthodontia are looming. And, most likely, a new refrigerator. Ours is making weird noises. We just hope and pray it doesnt' give up the ghost until AFTER Thanksgiving. But we have never let small considerations such as time or money keep us from spending time in Wisconsin in general, and in Madison in particular.

For those not in the know, Madison is the capital of Wisconsin. The state capitol sits atop a hill on an honest-to-god isthmus between two lakes--Lake Mendota and Lake Monona. It's an impressive capitol:



We usually stay at the Inn on the Square, which is right across from the capitol and less than a block from State Street, which is a thorofare of shops, restaurants, and bars that extends from the capitol to the University of Wisconsin. State Street is hopping at all hours of the day and night, as long as its fine establishments are open:



This time, though, the Inn on the Park did not have any vacancies, so we stayed at The Edgewater, which is situated (just as the name would suggest) on the shore of Lake Mendota. It was begun in 1941, but the war intervened and it wasn't completed until 1948. It's a little worn here and there, but we were very happy with our room--well, our rooms. We were upgraded to a suite and ended up with two full baths, a living room, a decent-sized bedroom, and an enormous closet. The place had a piano bar with a blazing gas fireplace--and the piano player was not half bad. He even managed to remain cordial when a big lug of a guy asked him if he knew any Joe Cocker. Although the hotel is a bit farther from the action than our usual, it is still within easy walking distance of State Street. The hotel proper is a tower just out of sight to the left; the low-slung wing in the picture houses the lobby, restaurant, piano bar, etc. We would certainly stay here again.



We spent the weekend strolling up and down State Street, shopping--mostly for books, CDs, and Christmas presents. While we were in the midst of our strolling, we managed to catch the Veteran's Day parade, which included veterans dressed up as Continental Army soldiers through Civil War soldiers through to modern day. I think they needed more marching bands, though. Too many hummers with sirens. Not enough music. And speaking of music, we went to Spruce Tree Music, one of Jeff's favorite places in the world. Now he has his eye on an ancient tenor banjo that he played and fell in love with... we may be headed up to Madison sooner rather than later for him to pick it up.

On Saturday evening, we had dinner at Brocach Irish Pub on the capitol square, and then went pub crawling around the area. On our way back to The Edgewater, we ran across a puzzling sign spray-painted on the sidewalk. Jeff was first to notice.



What could it be? Only a sign after our own hearts...



I'm just sayin', any town whose residents spray-paint dinosaurs on the sidewalks is a town I wouldn't mind living in. There's the eensy-weensy problem of where to work, as Madison, like Austin and Berkeley and Boulder and any other very cool university town tends to retain a lot of the folks who went to school there. But at least it's close enough to visit now and again.



And now... for the novel update. One thing I didn't do while in Madison was write. Jeff brought his laptop and I brought the novel on a thumb drive, but, alas. Other activities beckoned. That put me a little behind schedule, but I had a bit of a cushion, and I have caught myself back up and then some:



So... I'm 2/3rds of the way there--and the last few days have been like pulling teeth! I've managed to write more than my allotted 1,000 words, but I can't attest to the quality. Part of the problem is that I've been trying to write chronologically, and I'm finding that what I really need to do is write the scenes I'm most interested in writing. Then I'll find a way to string them together afterwards, rather than trying to lead myself there in order--which was resulting in rather strained prose. Let's see if the new approach works.