He spells his name Darren. Now you know.

Amy and Darren left yesterday. I just got this e-mail from Darren:

Thanks for hosting us ... it was much appreciated. Couldn't have seen the city nearly as well without the geo-beast, and it's fun having another Jersild to torment.

Hope all is well in editing-land. Speaking of which, I'm going to hack into your blog now and correct my name ;-)

Harumph. Hey, at least I asked ... and didn't buy it when he said he spelled it "Daryn."

That brings us to the torment. Darren is Canadian, and therefore has that national kind, open, trustworthy demeanor thing that Canadians tend to have. He also went to university in Britain, where he picked up and/or perfected the talking shite with a straight face thing. As I don't know him well yet, it's very difficult to tell when he's taking the piss and trying to get a reaction out of me. It's been a while since I've dealt with Brit-types, and I'm out of practice. It's very frustrating. I'm supposed to be the dry snarky one. Not you.

The other thing he did, for which I will probably never forgive him, is pointing out my "pretty much" habit. I had no idea I did this, but apparently, I tend to say "pretty much, yeah" in many, many situations. He started parroting it back to me. Now, I'm acutely conscious of it... about 2 seconds after I start saying it. Drives me NUTS. I'll get you for this, Darren....

Otherwise, the visit went well. Darren and Wendy and I geeked out about sci-fi shows and MUDs and such while Amy looked on in horror; we showed off the Northwestern campus, where I remembered much about my college years and Amy contributed gems like "that's the field where two men fought over me"; Amy trotted Darren out to see a bunch of her friends (apparently they approve); we went to Wishbone for the kick-ass crunchy french toast; and generally life was good. Also, I managed to intercept my copy of the "Best New Restaurants" issue of Chicago Magazine when Amy tried to smuggle it out with her. Why would she do that? Well, she needs to be able to plan her restaurant reservations for the next time she visits. I explained to her that I actually live here and will probably get most use out of it than she will on her biannual visits, but she was unconvinced. We avoided violence and I didn't have to frisk her at the door, but it was a close thing.