Took another two weeks off from the blog without even noticing it.

It’s funny how busy life gets without you even really noticing it. Kat and I moved into a new place last week, which derailed things a bit, and I’m up in Indianapolis since last Thursday, which derailed things further. I’ve been doing my best to keep my head above water on my various deadlines and obligations – which included a fun piece for AV Club Twin Cities  about Brett Favre which almost got totally fucked by that douchebag un-unretiring, but which is set to run tomorrow – and now I’m on a weird little kinda-vacation.

The ostensible justification for the trip is that I was assigned a story on the opening of the Bears training camp for the AV Club Chicago, and so I flew into Indy to drive with my mom – the biggest Bears fan I know – to Bourbonnais, Illinois to check out camp. Which was fun. I got a good feel for what it’s like there, got to catch a handful of things that the team is up to, and I think it’ll turn into a fun piece. I made pals with a photographer who was taking pictures for his website and got him to agree to let me use them for the article, which is excellent because The Onion has no photo budget for the feature. I also bought a Mike Brown jersey in the gift shop for $5, since he’s off the team, because I am much more of a fan than I am a journalist, and Mike Brown is the sort of ex-Bear who is really a Bear for life. It’s not like sporting #8. I have never owned a football jersey before, but I will wear it with pride to Click’s Billiards on N. Lamar and Rundberg on Sundays during the season, where the Midwestern accents are thick even deep in the heart of Texas.

And now we’re back in Indy and I am Uncle Dan. I have two nephews – Griffin and Cooper – and they’re 4 and 2, respectively. Cooper was toddling, but not really walking, when I saw him last over Christmas, but Griffin had started to get fun over the past year. Cooper’s doing things now – walking, screaming with either anger or glee at the slightest provocation, standing in front of you at the zoo and lifting his arms to the sky to indicate that he’d like to be picked up to get a better look at the rhinos – and Griffin was apparently overwhelmed with excitement to know that Uncle Dan was coming to town, so the first twenty minutes I saw him, he was alternately bashful and hyper. He settled down after that, and introduced me to his dinosaurs, of which he has very many. I brought the two of them toys, to ensure that future visits by Uncle Dan are greeted with the same enthusiasm, and found that the three dollar Matchbox plane and helicopters I picked up for Cooper were a giant hit with both of them, while the more expensive set of X-Men figures were kind of a loser. Which I ought to have figured – if the little brother likes it, big brother wants to take it.

We’re off to Chuck E. Cheese’s in a little while, and then it’s back to my parents’ house, where I’ll probably spend at least some of the evening working on the interview I did with the guy responsible for the Texas Testosterone Festival, which comes to Austin in about two weeks. I lead a fairly ridiculous life, but it’s hardly started to get seriously busy – when I get back, then it’s time for the 4-a-week rehearsals in anticipation of No One Else Will Ever Love You. As the Beastie Boys – and, more recently, Jay-Z – said: No! Sleep! Till Brooklyn!

Or, in this case, October.