How was your weekend? Ours was...well, great. More on that later, after we catch up on our rest. (Damn you, Mike Bridenstine! And those Lincoln Lodge gigantobeers!) First, a bunch of tantalizing tidbits.

Our Big Poppa in New York, the Apiary, has scooped us on exciting news about Chicago's Hannibal Buress by confirming that Hannibal has landed a management deal with 3 Arts. Nice! 100% of the Bastion caught Hannibal last Monday at the Mix, and saw for ourselves why NYC-by-way-of-Chicago comedians were "humbled" when this twenty-three year old skipped to the front of the line and landed a spot in the recent Montreal Comedy Festival.

Second City alum Alan Arkin's 1989 interview on NPR's Fresh Air was replayed a few days ago. Arkin discussed movies, life, and the spirituality behind creativity. He currently stars with fellow Second City alum Steve Carell in the movie Little Miss Sunshine, which our cinemasnobbiest friends have declared to be a fantastic piece of film comedy. In his interview, Arkin calls Second City his "entree into everything...I feel like I got born there" and credits it as the place where he truly found his comedic voice and confidence.

Back to NYC-by-way-of-Chicago comedians, the Bastion's recent interview subject Brad Steuernagel is going to be at the Chicago Comedy Underground show at Gunther Murphy's at 8 on September 5. We're hoping to pop in that night and say hi to yet another comic who has prompted us to have even more discussions with people on the Chicago comedy scene about how we can learn from the wildly creative, increasingly popular (and now widely adopted) format of the Invite Them Up shows, staged by Eugene Mirman and Bobby Tisdale every week at Rififi in the East Village. More on that as things evolve.

Also, thanks to our friends at Gapers Block for giving us a little introduction to their readers this morning! We dig you, too.