Chicago!

Today I got up at 4:30 AM pacific time in order to fly to Chicago. I'm here and it's great! The city--from what I've seen thus far-- is pretty neat. I took the blue line from O'Hare into the city, and I waltzed right in to my company's engineering office and got a visitor's desk. The Chicago engineering office is really cool; it simultaneously reflects the culture of the west coast campus, yet it has a very distinct feel of its own.

I wasn't here more than a few minutes when I discovered a large removable markerboard that I took over and wrote:
HOWDY. MY NAME IS ANDREW AND I AM VISITING FROM THE MOUNTAIN VIEW OFFICE AND AM HERE FOR THE MARATHON. PLEASE SAY HI - I LIKE MEETING NEW PEOPLE!

I didn't even get a chance to catch up on my email before a few people came by and introduced themselves. People are so friendly! Here's another example: I had brought my laptop but I had planned on using a provided desktop machine. The machine wasn't at my desk when I arrived though. One of the guys who came over to say hi gave me a tour of the place, and then when he realized that I didn't have a machine, he invited me to sit in his cube and use one of the spare computers there. It turns out that this guy co-invented the Subversion revision control system. And now, I'm sharing a cube with him and one of the other co-inventors. Wow!!

In other news, I went to a really tasty Italian restaurant tonight called Volare. It was pleasant walking through the city to and from the place. I had a delicious serving of very light gnocci with peas and prosciutto in cream sauce.

It appears now that there's a countdown to race time up on the Chicago Marathon web site. Also on their web site you can track my progress during the race, via SMS or email. Details are here.

Tomorrow night Tim R gets in and we'll go party it up in the city and surrounds. More later...