My journey into Scala begins

This year I'll be learning Scala, a hybrid functional/object-oriented computer language which executes on top of the Java Virtual Machine. Lately I've been reading the book Programming in Scala by Martin Odersky, Lex Spoon, and Bill Venners. It's a big, long read, not for someone who's never coded before. Luckily, I've got lots of Java experience under my belt, as well as an MS in Computer Science, so it should be fun! I'm hoping to use Scala to write some kind of interesting application, hopefully before the year is out. I also want to get back in to game programming, so I'm leaning toward some kind of multi-player game engine...