It just doesn't matter

I had the best dream last night. I’m really trying to figure out why it was so refreshing. It went like this…I was sitting on a hillside (I think) with my children. We were all just hanging around. I think it was evening, late afternoon, still light out. Then much like in Built To Spill’s “Randy Described Eternity” a sphere came into view on the horizon. It looked like a planet that had come into our atmosphere. It looked like another earth. IT was only a few hundred feet off the ground. As it got closer I could make out more of the details. It’s hard to say if it was supposed to look like a planet, or if that was just the most efficient way for it to be, hence it looked that way. I think it was green, or it was reflecting the green from the Earth, it had a river looking design that looked like a large river breaking off into little rivers. In the upper left hand corner it had a sort of camera that looked like a ball-in-socket configuration. The camera was swiveling in the socket and looking at us on Earth. Then the ship sent out reconnaissance (spelled right first try) spheres that were just metal with the ball-in-socket camera in them. I think my kids and I understood the enormity of what was going on, we were being visited by aliens, but we weren’t scared. It was good. I think after a while we did get scared though, or other people were panicking and that caused us to panic. We got in the car and started driving, things turned weird and that’s all I remember. When I woke up, I felt really good about it though. I don’t know why.

I was probably dreaming about aliens because I saw a movie about aliens over the weekend. I pretty much spent the weekend doing 2 things. Well I guess 4 things. Working out, laying around, watching movies, and updating itunes. By far, the best thing I did was watch the movie District 9. I’m not a movie recommender, ask people who know me, I’m very very critical of movies and rarely do I see one that moves me. District 9, maybe it didn’t move me (I was just quoting PE), but it definitely sucked me in, which is not easy to do. As I look back on it, I can shoot some holes in the premise, there are things that happen that defy logic. What I mean by that is people react in ways that I don’t think people would actually react. For me, this is the toughest hurdle to get over, and a movie has to suck me in to get me to ignore the inconsistencies, most movies don’t succeed. This one did.

I don’t feel comfortable talking about the other 2 movies I watched in the same paragraph. Zach and Miri (make a porno) and Year One. Z and M was pretty ok. It was interesting to see how Jason Mewes has changed since Clerks, not necessary to see his full frontal though. Kind of a disappointment that Katie Morgan was the porn star in it, well the one who was naked the most. She has an HBO show where she’s pretty much naked the whole time, which kinda makes her nudity in the film a non-factor. Def have to mention that she has one of the weirdest boob jobs I’ve ever seen, they’re huge, but they sort of square off at the bottom, or diagonal off. I don’t know what you call that, it’s not bad, she has a great body, it’s just very different. My main problem with Z and M is that it wasn’t funny. I thought the jokes were lame. I have to break down and admit that I did kind of like the story. I liked the characters and the performances by Seth Rogan and Elizabeth Banks were solid enough to draw me into the story. One element that was present in both Z and M and Year One, that I think can go right back where it came from (???) is the scat humor. For those of you that don’t know what scat is, it’s humor (or whatever) that involves fecal matter (poo). I really don’t want to get into it. I don’t find it funny and I do find it revolting.

Year One. I have to admit that Year One had its moments. It definitely made me laugh out loud a couple of times. Jack Black and Michael Cera were decent foils and a good bit of their exchanges were humorous. The woman who played the princess was absolutely drop dead gorgeous. I have no idea what her name is. The guy that played Cain (Cain and Abel) was really funny. I can’t recommend the film, but it had some funny parts and if you happen to catch it part way through and you have nothing else to do, then watch it.

I would be remiss if I didn’t comment on the joys of itunes. Oh how I love being inextricably tied to software as unyielding as itunes, oh how I do. Well normally you’d be able to simply drag and drop the files from one folder to another to transfer music. Not so with itunes. I can’t find the files on the computer to drag and drop. I did manage to get all my emusic downloads and transfer them to my new computer. Then I transferred my itunes folder, but there was a ton of stuff missing. Like 10 gb of music. I really, really, did not want to have to reburn all these cds. I started to do it and I was getting like maybe 10 an hour, if I had the wherewithal to sit there for an hour. I had to get the files off of the other computer. So I hooked my hard drive to the other computer and all I could think of doing was to highlight the songs right in itunes and drag and drop them into a folder on the hard drive. This is a fairly long and annoying process, but not nearly as long and annoying as reburning all my cds. It took about an hour, but I got all the music into a folder on the hard drive. The next question was whether this would work. I had a sneaking suspicion that although the files were dropped onto the hard drive, they would still map to the original computer making them useless on another computer. Par for the course with Apple. To my surprise, the files actually transferred and I managed to get them onto my laptop. Score. I think all my music is going to be successfully transferred to my new computer by the end of the week. Not too bad. I also spent a ton of time removing bad files from itunes and basically cleaning up the repeats and everything. So I’m just about fully functional for all my music needs. One bonus that was unexpected. A lot of the music that I transferred was stuff that I never listen to. I just have it for a rainy day. Well I ended up accidently dumping all my transfers into my ipod. I just went with it and I’m rediscovering a bunch of awesome stuff. A few names…The Stone Roses, Black Flag, Sludgeworth, Naked Raygun, Guided By Voices, and Archers of Loaf.

Sorry this is so long and boring. This blog is sort of a microcosm of my weekend. Although I did get out to Taste of Lincoln last night. I met a bunch of people over at Lillys. Lillys brings back a lot of memories…sort of. Memories of not having any memory. It didn’t seem like Lilly’s is still the hotspot it used to be. Back in the day people would hang there. It would be stupid packed and everyone would be drinking long island Iced Teas. The bar says there are 10 shots in every glass. Not likely. But these things are a one way trip to blackoutsville, that’s for sure. I used to tangle with them. In fact, back in the day, we would get pitchers of long islands and after two, you’d be drinking and completely lose track of how many you had until everything went black and you woke up the next day. I’m a parent now, I work, I have obligations, I have no desire to tangle with the Long Islands anymore, but my friends did tangle. I think they got fairly messed up as we lost contact and couldn’t regain said contact even though we all thought we were in the same place. Some thoughts on the night. Perfect weather. Great band at Lillys, I could’ve (and should’ve) stayed there and just listened to them. It was nice and cool, we had way comfy seats and a short trip to the bar for egregiously overpriced beers. I think the band was called TAXI. They were good. I’d check them again. Alas we left the soft bosom of Lillys for the harsh reality of the Soul Asylum show. The reality of Soul Asylum was that the bass player must’ve blown the sound guy, cuz all you could hear was bass. I think if you interviewed the bass player after the show he would have said “That’s the way the music is supposed to be.” It’s not. The bass was overpowering everything else.

As I stood there unable to meet up with my other buddys, I got into a conversation with my buddy’s brother. It was very interesting. I told him that I was exchanging e-mails with this woman who went to Michigan, blah blah, and he said you’re not following Dr. Love. I was like, “what?” He said that Dr. Love tells you not to text or e-mail ever, unless it’s to get the girl’s phone number. Once you have the phone number, you only call her to set up a date. I know the point, and I get it, that quite often, women lose interest in a guy that seems too eager. I could go on for days, this is not a new concept by any stretch of the imagination. Woody Allen put it best when he said, “I would not want to belong to a club that would accept me for a member.” It’s a self esteem thing. This is a crazy can of worms, and I’m not Dr. Love and I don’t follow what he is teaching. The one thing that I can’t change, and I don’t want to change, is who I am. The thing is, that I want a woman to accept me for who I am (that sounded lame). I’m not a cast member from the Jersey shore. I don’t get a girl’s number at the bar and then laugh about it with my friends and rip it up. I’m not a player. Dr. Love is teaching men how to be players. He is giving them the attitude, or at least showing them how to make women think that they have the attitude. That’s all well and good. I’m sure a lot of men buy into it. I just don’t want a woman to like me because I come off as being something I’m not, and I don’t want a woman who doesn’t want me for who I am. It’s like, I don’t want a woman to be into me because she thinks I can get another woman who is hotter than her. Who thinks like that? It’s a game that I don’t want to be a part of. Once again, it’s a self esteem boost for the other party, and that’s it. She’s not into me, she’s into stroking her own ego by saying she got me away from the other woman. That’s lame. I def agree that you don’t want to come off as desperate, but if you want a good match, you have to present yourself honestly.

It's gotta end sometime

Happy thoughts for a Friday. Well people were all wound up waiting for the European Union to release their findings from the bank stress tests they conducted. It seemed like a big non-event, and the market is basically going sideways on the news. This got me to thinking about the depression that a lot of people seem to be calling for. Not that they’re calling for it, but they are predicting it. The third great depression (did you know there was one in the 1870s? I didn’t either). I don’t know why I started to think about Hitler, I’m trying to connect that dot. Maybe it’s because I was reading about Iran and their nuclear ambitions. Not much of a connection there. Anyway, I was thinking about how Hitler rose to power during the aftermath of the great depression, or whatever they called it in Germany. I guess that helps to answer the questions of how someone like Hitler could achieve so much power and seemingly have the support of the people. I say seemingly, because I think Hitler ruled by fear, and I’m gonna guarantee that people were afraid to oppose him or the third reich in any way. So, that’s not really a people’s mandate so much as everyone is scared shitless to come out and say “this guy is wacko, what are we thinking? Somebody has to stop him!” But it was the economy that allowed Hitler to springboard into power. Now, I have to admit that I know absolutely nothing about Hitler’s rise to power, I don’t know if he was popular cuz he gave out bread or made big promises, or just worked the fear thing mentioned earlier. It just doesn’t matter, the point is that he rose to power in a severe economic climate, and if another severe economic climate develops as many are predicting that one is developing, we may have another Hitler come to power.

Ok. I don’t want to talk about Hitler. I would, if I knew anything about him. I really don’t want to know anything about him though. It’s like, I would like to have known about him enough to maybe comment further on this idea, but I have no desire to do the actual research required to make said observations. A conundrum for sure. Anyhoo, the thing I really wanted to say is that when the whole world economy goes into the shitter as it very well might in the next 3 years, someone, somewhere, is gonna launch a nuke. When things get dire, when people aren’t eating, when people are pissed off, someone is gonna push the button. Okay, this was an easy google, the countries that currently have nukes are USA, Russia, UK, France, and China. There are some other nations claiming nuclear capabilities that I’m a little skeptical of: India (very likely to have them), Pakistan (who the fuck knows what they’re doing), North Korea (yeah, and they also have anti gravity boots, Spanish fly that works, and telepathic telephones, these guys couldn’t blow up a lemonade stand with their ‘weapons’), and Israel (very likely). Safe to say if things turn bad, there are enough nukes out there, that somebody is gonna push the button. I really don’t think we will see the eradication of the human race. I guess that’s a good place to start. I think there could be some mass devastation, probably in the US, because it’s safe to say that we’re a prime target. If someone launches a nuke at us, chances are we will return the favor. Pakistan? Wasn’t that blown off the map? Yep. I’m not the WOPR, so I can’t foresee all the possible attacks and retaliations, but that little scenario I threw out there kinda undermines the idea that the US will be a target, just cuz everyone knows how that would end. You bomb us with some piece of junk that might not work, we eradicate you. Not good odds for the other guys. More likely, someone like Iran lobs something at Israel. Who knows? It’s just food for thought. No doubt if things get ugly, we will all see things that we’d never thought we’d see and go through things we prayed we’d never have to.

On to lighter subjects. I stumbled upon a website that I haven’t thought about in years. Well it’s still around and it’s still pretty darn acerbically funny. I’m talking about Buddyhead. I was just reading their best/worst album reviews for 2009 and it got me laughing out loud a number of times. I didn’t know Dashboard Confessional had a new album last year, buddyhead’s take: “These guys redefined sucking back in 2001.” I dunno, I laughed. Check it out. No need to read the likes, I think I’ve heard of like 2 of the 30 albums that they like. Go straight to the albums they don’t like. Good stuff. They are pretty good at blowing the bands they like, but it’s not nearly as funny as the bands they attack. While I’m on this subject. I’m having a hard time getting motivated to write those record reviews for Pitchfork. I just don’t have any desire to fit into that crowd. I’d have to buy a pair of adidas sambas, roll up my jeans to my knees, buy some plaid short-sleeve oxfords, grow a mustache, and grow out my hair and slick it down. I’m just not there. Whatever I review is just gonna be dismissed by them cuz it’s not Santogold or Andrew Bird. I’m sorta down on the whole idea of record reviews. I mean, who reads them? Do you seriously need someone to review a record before you go check it out? Nowadays you can listen to most records, or parts of them, for free. So if you hear of a band, you can just go listen to it, you don’t need some dildo that’s dressed like a serial killer telling you whether it’s good or not, you can just decide for yourself. That’s how I do it, it seems to be working.

Rock and roll this weekend. Taste of Lincoln ave. They are calling for rain. We shall see. Soul Asylum. Should be good. They rock. And amazingly, I’ve never seen them. Good times are expected.

Yep

I totally blew my wad yesterday. I dunno what to talk about today.

I was thinking about my profile on OKC last night. It def needs some work. It’s hard for a guy on a dating site because you really have to keep it simple and walk softly. If you are way cute for a dude, you can get away with being a little weird and saying some weird stuff. If you are not just drop dead adorable, then you better not push it. The problem with this notion is that your profile can be a real snoozer. So I try to spice up my profile where I can. On OKC they ask you a lot of stupid questions and it gets old pretty quick. One of the hardest questions is “The First Thing People Notice About Me Is…” I really honestly have no idea. I should probably put “that I’m a lot better looking than my pictures.” That might sound like an excuse for not looking good and a blatant lie in an attempt to get someone to look past whether my pix appeal to them or not; rather pathetic. I try to avoid looking like a puss, meek, dork (although some dorkiness is cool nowadays). As you can see there is a lot of thought that must go into these profiles. Back to the question. The first thing people notice about me is… The first time around, I just thought I would put something funny and at least self flattering, I put “My guns, they’re hard to hide.” I know 90% of the population knows what I’m talking about, but when women see the word “gun” they might get the wrong image. It doesn’t matter if it’s a joke, or whatever, it’s the idea of it that scares them, and I don’t think it takes much to scare them. I messaged some woman and she replied, “By guns, do you mean actual guns? Or Muscles?” I guess that isn’t obvious from my pix…bummer. Although you would like to think that everyone gets it, they don’t, some people picture me walking around town like Wyatt Earp with two six shooters strapped to my sides. Which would def get me some chix back in the day. I think using the word gun is a bad idea, so I decided to switch my answer. I changed it to “The first thing people notice about me is…” “That I’m not there.” I really like this answer. I think it might be a little more off-putting than guns, but I’m gonna stick with it for at least a while. The right person should really think this is an awesome answer. It’s like looking into a mirror with a mirror in your hand and the reflection goes on forever, that’s what thinking about that question and answer is. And I like that.

While we are on the topic of Faux pas. Getting back into dating has just magnified my ability to commit a faux pas at every opportunity. It’s like every little thing can be a deal breaker. It’s tough. Sometimes you have to take a chance though. Like last night. I messaged a bunch of women. One of them may have been named Lenore, it was in her profile name. The first thing I think of when I see Lenore, is “Quoth the Raven, Nevermore.” So I sent her a message and started with that line. I haven’t read the raven in a long time. I read it today. It’s pretty dark. I don’t know if it’s the repetition or the subject matter, but it’s creepy and off-putting to say the least. The subject matter is so bleak. The guy is pining for his lost love and basically the only thing that gets him by is the notion that his love, Lenore, is in heaven or whatever. He asks the raven if Lenore is in heaven and the raven says “Nevermore.” How bleak and hopeless of a message. You can just picture how this guy would be crushed and driven to madness from the loss not only of his love, but of his hope. So…yeah it might not have been the best opener. You live and learn. You have to take the good with the bad, and the bonus is that I read the Raven again, and it’s a really good poem.

I’m thinking about trying to become a writer at Pitchfork.com. I’m torn about it. I would like to write about music, but I don’t want to have to write positive reviews about bands like: Blitzen Trapper, Vampire Weekend, Beach House, Deerhunter, Yeasayer, Fiery Furnaces, you get the idea. Some of these bands I’ve only had a cursory exposure to, but I can safely say that they all suck. I like the fact that Pitchfork represents indie, but indie is becoming mainstream and that is annoying to me. Luckily there is punk rock, which I think has had its moment in the sun, and is now back where it belongs, in the gutters. I might still try out for PF though. They want 4 writing samples, all from a blog, which I’ll have to make up, and they all have to be album reviews as far as I can tell. I don’t know what albums to review. I don’t think Changes 2 by Bowie would go over well. I think Hockey would be up their alley and maybe The soft pack. I dunno who else, Green Day. That would prolly go over like a lead turd. I should review The Statler Brothers, Oh Baby Mine. That would probably get me the job right there. I said job, but I think it’s more of you get a T-shirt to pick up chix with by saying you write for pitchfork and you met Vampire Weekend. I think I have to submit (interesting choice of words, multiple meanings) by July 25, which would mean that I have to listen to 4 albums and write 4 reviews by then. Maybe they would take a 2 word review, simply…Shit Sandwich.

That’s it. I’m sure I have no readers left after the tome I threw out there yesterday. Go read the Raven if you’re bored.

Better than nyquil

Phew. That was sad stuff yesterday talking about my buddy’s dad, my friend, Jack. I guess I’m still melancholy today, I dunno why. I was just thinking about stuff, like going to taste of Lincoln ave this weekend. My buddy Worm is gonna go. So that is cool. I haven’t hung out with him in a while. Thinking about Worm got me thinking about college and the band we used to play in, and all the fun shit we used to do. Not just the fun shit, but my attitude back then was different. I had more enthusiasm back then for sure. I had a lot more confidence, or just youthful exuberance. Now I find myself brooding about stuff a lot. Sometimes I feel that same exuberance and I’m just on top of the world, and other times, I just don’t. I don’t know. I guess you get older, you get more introspective, you def get out of touch with young people. I was eating lunch yesterday with young people and they were all chatting about stuff, going out, getting hammered. I didn’t have anything to add. Oh well. This weekend should be a good time, and it will be nice to hang with Worm and anyone else who comes out to taste of Lincoln Ave.

I had a roller coaster weekend, and it all started on Thursday. I had the day off on Friday, so I could let loose on Thurs. A woman contacted me on OKC and wanted to meet. I’m always good with that. I could tell by her profile, that we might not be the best match. I didn’t find her very attractive. Some people don’t photograph well, so I thought that she might be one of those, so what the heck. She wanted to meet at a coffee shop. I don’t drink coffee. I don’t like coffee shops. It was Thursday, which was like Friday to me, so I suggested the Gage, an upscale bar off of Millennium Park. I got held up, and she was there when I got there. It was good. It might have been one of the best dates I’ve ever had. It just worked. It was a little stilted at first, but some good conversation started flowing after the beer kicked in. She is really an interesting person, she acts, she’s into music, and she’s a new Catholic. I was floored by this one. She recently became a Catholic. I’m a Catholic, and I like it, it’s tough, and there’s a guilt thing. I haven’t met too many people that became Catholic later in life, it was fascinating to me. She went into how Catholicism made her feel freer, I forget her reasoning, but it was working for her. Listening to her enthusiasm for the faith sort of inspired me to look at my faith a bit differently. Good talk Russ. So after we got a bit jingled, we decided to take a walk. We went up to Mill Park and we both hit the rest rooms. Then we cruised up to Pritzker Pavilion. There was a really groovy latin ensemble playing and the place was pretty crowded. We found a spot on the lawn and just sat there listening to the music. I have to say, it sounded really good coming out of those speakers suspended above the field, the music definitely surrounds you at that place. I had some foodstuffs from work, and I hadn’t eaten, so I offered her a granola bar which she graciously accepted. I busted into a banana. I only had one water, so we shared it (vicarious spit swapping.) It was a nice moment, and it shows how nice a date can be. The problem was, for how interesting she was and everything; I just wasn’t feeling the sparks. I had to run to catch the train, and she was ready to roll. We walked a ways. She had to catch the el. We hugged and that was it. I’m not the type to just blow somebody off, especially someone that I met in person. I just wasn’t feeling it though. So I manned up and sent her a message saying I had a great time and she is a special person, but I’m not feeling any sparks. She said thanks for the message and good luck.

I think I mentioned before that I planned to take my kids to Wisconsin Dells. The more I thought about it, the more I didn’t want to go. If I had the money, it would’ve been different. I just figured, why go to Wisconsin to do a bunch of stuff I can do right here. So I decided to have an adventure weekend with the kids, just get out and do a lot of stuff, just like if we were in Wisconsin Dells. WD has a lot of water parks, so on Friday, we hit the biggest water park in Illinois. It’s about an hour from my house, not too bad. The place was big. It was crowded, but I’m sure it’s worse on Sat and Sun. The rides were pretty fun. My personal faves were the giant slide that just goes straight down, although the water wedgie is an unfavorable byproduct of that ride. Next I have to go with the boomerang, which was basically a giant funnel. It would rock to actually go down a funnel, but that would probably be too dangerous. The way this thing worked is that you get 4 people on a raft and you basically go down around a corner and then you just drop straight down. The drop is pretty awesome, much better facing forward than backward though. The speed from the drop sends you shooting up the far side of the funnel, then you come down and go back and forth til you come out of the funnel and into the pool. It doesn’t sound that sweet, but the first drop is a doozy. I think I’ve mentioned before that I’m a huge, huge fan of lazy rivers. That is def my favorite ride. Sometimes when I feel crappy and just need to chill, I’ll close my eyes and just picture myself floating down a river lying on my back. The lazy river is a realization of this dream! The only difference is when random kids biff you in the head as they go by and fight with their friends, or the kids jump on me when my eyes are closed, that’s not part of the dream. Anyway, I did some sweet floating down the Lazy River. The place was huge, they also had a wave pool and like 5 other waterslides that were just tubes. We stayed there til it closed, 7pm. When we got home, we were all pretty beat. The kids wanted to watch a movie, so I went looking through the free flicks on On Demand. We ended up watching The Sure Thing. I guess that movie is only PG-13. It’s borderline for sure. I’m not sure if it was kid appropriate, but they liked it. They had a lot of questions about shotgunning beers. I told them to ask again when they are 21.

On Saturday, we caught the train to Chicago. I’m never a fan of taking the train on the weekend. I’d rather just drive. The train is a real pain in the ass, but the kids wanted to do it, so we went to the train station. We got there about 10 minutes early, and the train was 21 minutes late. Bad start. Finally we got downtown, and our first stop was my work. We were planning on going to Dues for Pizza later, so I didn’t want to feed them too much, although we were all starving. So we made the mile trek to my office before we ate. When we got there, we made a mad dash for the kitchen. The kids pigged out on cookies and Dr. Pepper, I grabbed some cereal. That was a good stop, we got our grub on and cruised. The kids really liked the office, it was nice, it’s nice for them to see where I work and get an idea of what I do. Next the kids wanted to hit the Lego Store. I was letting them choose the itinerary. I wanted to hit Millennium Park, they had no interest in that. Off to the lego store we went. I knew that they were filming Transformers 3 on Michigan Avenue, so I knew this would be a pain, and it was. I couldn’t get over how many people were standing around looking at basically a bunch of trucks and cars with covers on them. There was nothing to see there, no cameras, no stars, no decepticons, nothing. But people were lining the block trying to catch a glimpse of something. It was fairly annoying. We made it to the lego store, and after about an hour of deliberation, everyone decided on a purchase, and with minimal pain, we got this part of the trip handled. Well sort of. We had to go back and exchange something, because one of my children had buyer’s remorse on the escalator. I’m used to it.

By this point it was around 430, and we were all pretty famished. The kids were really not in the mood for Pizza, so I let them choose. They all wanted burgers, and they wanted to get them at Boston Blackies. Well BB had closed down, but the BB by Michigan Avenue had reopened under new ownership. The burgers were the same, very tasty. You just can’t beat the kid’s meal there. For 4.99, you get a burger, fries, and a drink. The burger is an adult size, like a half pound. They don’t let adults get the kids meal, unfortunately. Next time, I’m just going to graze off of my kids. My burger was 8.99, no fries, just burger. They probably have a rule that you can’t order a kids meal without ordering an adult meal. If they don’t, they should. So after BB, we were trying to figure out what to do. The kids wanted to go to the top of the Sears (aka Willis) tower. I was good with that. I figured it would be an easy do cuz the loop is usually a ghost town on the weekend. Wrong. Hour and a half wait. Eff that. It was like 540, and I wanted to catch the 640 train. I didn’t want the kids to have to sit around for an hour, so we went over to the water taxi stand. I figured I would take them on a quick round trip boat ride. I didn’t think it would take more than a half hour. Wrong. The boat ride was to Navy Pier and it was about 630 when we got there, no way we could get back for the train. Not much choice but to check out Navy Pier and catch the 840 train. We grabbed some Ice Cream, played some miniature golf, made friends with some people on the mini golf course. At mini golf, we had to skip around, so we jumped in front of a group of 10 people golfing together (who were basically the reason that the whole course was backed up). The other reason the course was backed up, everybody, pretty much, was playing one player at a time. Do these people have no inkling of the etiquette of mini golf? I guess not. You play as a foursome, just like golf, you each putt, then the farthest out putts until everyone holes out. It’s not science. If each person plays the hole solo, it makes for a much longer round. Anyway, we had to high tail it out of there cuz I didn’t want our new friends to follow us. So we bolted for the boat. We got on around 8 and I was a little nervous about catching the train. I have no idea why, but the train was off the wall crowded. WE lucked out and got seats. A lot of people had to stand, and the train ride took longer than usual. We made it home though. We were all pretty beat, so we just crashed.

On Sunday, I tried to keep the rock rolling. The kids did not find church to be that rocking, especially the hour and 15 minute mass. That’s ok though, cuz it rocked after that. I took the kids go karting. Go karting is fun, I think it’s funner when you are a kid. When you get to be oh…about…16, go karts lose some of their luster. I think the kids liked it though and everyone got to ride. My daughter had to ride as a passenger, but the boys got to drive their own cars, which they loved. WE also played some mini golf, and since we got the family package, we got to hit the batting cages. The kids didn’t want to bat, so I decided to use up the tokens. I went into the 70 mph cage and I wasn’t sure if I could even make contact with 70. Well I was using some miniature bat, and I was fouling most of them off. Some dipshit in a goofy fedora starts talking to his buddy, “he’s just fighting em off.” It’s like, “You get in here and try this, dumbass, I’m using a little league bat.” I saw some other dude get into the 70 cage, he brought his own bat. I dunno if he was testing switch hitting, but he was whiffing left and right. So it wasn’t easy. I never saw Fedora boy in the cage, I guess he’s just a critic.

We pretty much just lased around the rest of the day on Sunday. Awesome weekend though. Party packed action. Hopefully this weekend will be packed with some adult action. Taste of Lincoln.

Jack

I don’t think I’m very good at eulogies, but I’m going to give it a shot. My good friend’s father died yesterday. It wasn’t sudden, he was on hospice, but it’s still sad and leaves a big hole in a lot of people’s lives. His name was Jack. When you talked about Jack amongst people who have had more than just a cursory introduction to him, they knew who you were talking about. Jack is a common name, but somehow Jack transcended it and became The Jack. I don’t think people are going to be calling me The Jim anytime soon (I hope), so you have to be a larger than life person to leave that type of impression on people. Well Jack certainly was larger than life. He had his own philosophy on things and it usually involved him being right and everyone contradicting him being wrong. I think he thought the world revolved around him, and I don’t have any problem with that. When you were around Jack, you were in Jack’s world, and he made the rules. Well most of them. He wasn’t completely intractable; he was open to reason at times.

I think it’s safe to say that the one thing Jack loved above almost everything else on Earth, was Michigan Football. Jack grew up in Michigan. He was born and bred on Maize and Blue. The first time I met him was at a Michigan Tailgater. He used some of his pull at GM to hook up a perfect spot just a stone’s throw from the stadium, and that’s where he set up shop on Saturdays in the Fall, for Michigan Football. My buddy and I would always stop by the tailgater on the way to the game. Jack would meet us with a beer and a smile. We’d throw the football around, and Jack would pull out the jam box. He would play the Michigan band, Bambalance (don’t ask), and one of the single best things I’ve ever heard in my life, The best of Bob Ufer. A lot of people outside of the state of Michigan have no idea who Bob Ufer is. Well he is one of the most awesome biased announcers to ever hit the airwaves. Nowadays, in the era of political correctness, most of the announcers try to call an even game; they don’t let their affinity for one team or the other leak out. Not Ufer, he was Maize and Blue through and through. Jack had a best of Bob Ufer tape that he compiled himself and it included all the classics, from Tommy Darden, to Supertoe, to Darth Vader Woody Hayes roaming the sidelines at Ohio State. There was/is nothing like listening to that Ufer tape to get you amped up to attend a Michigan Football game.

Late in the Season one year, we were playing Northwestern. My Buddy and I drove in and met Jack at the game. We tailgated, and had a few beers. Well we managed to sneak a few beers into the stadium. We had an extra ticket, so at halftime, somebody left the stadium, went back to the car, and snuck in a bunch more beer. By the end of the game, there were like 25 beer cans in front of our seats. Luckily the tight security at the Big House didn’t catch onto our shenanigans. Jack liked to tip a few back in the day, he was fun to hang with. He wasn’t always a fan of the Michigan coaching staff and would get into arguments with the other patrons at the stadium on this and other subjects. The arguments usually ended with Jack handing out “tongue lashings” to those foolish enough to confront him. Jack got to see some good Michigan Football in his day and at least he got to watch us win the whole enchilada in 97. We all went to the Rose Bowl in 2005. That was a blast. What an awesome game. We gave Texas everything we had, there was just no answer for Vince Young; a lesson that the mighty USC Trojans learned the next year in the National Championship at the same stadium.

I could go on for days about Jack. He got a little football crazy one day and decided to go at my buddy out of a three point stance. My bud deftly dodged the block and Jack went face first into the stove. The stove was the worse for the wear with a dent in the handle. Jack came out of it with two black eyes. So he put his M jersey on and sent out a picture captioned “You don’t want none of this.” No doubt about that one. Another time my bud and I were down in Bloomington where Jack moved for work. Jack had been invited to a wedding, but wasn’t up for going. So Jack sent my buddy and me as his envoys. It was a pretty good time. I believe it was held at the Motel 6. We grabbed a few beers, listened to sweet home Alabama get played out of a boombox, and then bolted. This became affectionately known as…The Hillbilly Wedding. Good times. Jack used to take us to the Indy 500. We saw one of the last races there that was open. We also saw the first Indy Racing League Indy 500. I think Arie Luyendyk won that one. All I remember was that each person could bring in a cooler. So we all packed a full cooler each. We didn’t realize we had to walk like 2 miles to get to our seats. That’s a long walk with 30 pounds of cooler hanging off your arm. Those coolers were quite a bit lighter on the way home. At one of the Indy 500 weekends, we had another buddy along with us. Jack kept calling him newt. None of us could figure out what the heck he was talking about. Finally, someone got the nerve up to ask him. He said, “You know…Knute. Like Knute Rockne.” Our buddy went to Notre Dame.

Jack was a piece of Americana and he loved American stories like The Natural and The Rocky Saga. He would quote Rocky 2, “Hey Father Carmine, can you send down a blessing, y’know, in case I get beat up tonight.” Well hopefully Father Carmine is looking after Jack now. Rest in Peace Jack, We’ll miss you, and we’ll definitely be thinking of you every time the Football team runs out of the tunnel under the “Go Blue M Club Supports You” banner, every time we crack a brew or chomp on a #11 at the tailgater, every time 112 well-schooled well-disciplined Michigan bandsmen hit the field to what John Philip Sousa called the greatest college fight song ever written “The Michigan Victors,” and especially when the Michigan drum major leans back and mashes his tassel into the ground. Jack, we know you’re up there in Football Valhalla next to Bob Ufer, enjoy the view.

the usual

Ever since I was a high school idiot, I’ve had a lot of crazy thoughts and viewpoints. The one that I’ll stick by to this day, is that Rover is the best name for a dog. It’s cute, it’s descriptive, and it’s classic. Dogs rove, that’s what they do. Rover has a nice ring to it. I’m pretty sure if the kids beat me down and I cave and buy a dog, I’ll name it rover, or insist that it be named rover. I assumed that although Rover is a bit old school, that it was still a popular dog name. I thought wrong. It’s not in the top 60 according to some made up statistic I found on the net. That is shocking to me. Scooter was ahead of rover. Have you ever seen a dog scoot? I would think that if a dog scooted, it would need some salve and a trip to the vet. If you must know, Max was number 1, and Buddy was number 3. Buddy, chalk one up for the lazyasses that don’t have the wherewithal to name their pet, great job guys, you made it to 3. So anyway. Yesterday, I was thinking about what the best cat name would be. I was thinking about cats because my boss sent out an e-mail that was titled “The SEC’s CAT.” I was like, wow, the SEC got a Cat? Mary Schapiro is really making herself at home over there. So I was trying to guess what the SEC would name their cat. I came up with…drumroll please…Boots. I think boots is the best name for a cat much like Rover is the quintessential name for a dog. Now I know you’re saying that a cat has to have different colored paws to be named boots. I disagree. That’s cat stereotyping and it’s wrong! Any cat can be named boots. All you have to do is buy some inappropriate rubber rainboots and put them on the cat. Boots. If you must know, boots was 18 on the list of cat names.



WARNING: MAJOR GEAR CHANGE.



Speaking of things that are wrong, I am really torn about something that I saw yesterday. I was walking to the train on Adams, which is a very crowded street at 5pm every day. The sidewalks are crowded with commuters like me cruising to the train. Well yesterday, they had some protesters out there. They were protesting abortion. I don’t like abortion. I love babies and I don’t like the idea of babies being killed. I’m not going to get into it any more than that. That is my personal opinion, it’s not the current law, and obviously women have the right to choose under the current law. Ok. So the Pro Life people were holding up huge 6 foot placards and on the placards was a picture of a dismembered baby. It said something like “An abortion after the first Trimester.” I really had to avert my eyes, because I can’t look at it. There were other pictures that looked equally gruesome. I’m just not sure about that tactic. I know it’s offputting and makes the point, but why not go the completely opposite route? Why not show cute babies and say, Abortion is bad. I just think that when you get out there with a very polarizing image, it undermines your objective. It’s very easy to attack the campaign if it is as extreme as the one I witnessed yesterday. I think people like myself who are otherwise pro life might say, I don’t agree with abortion, but I also don’t agree with the pro life campaign I saw yesterday. The thing that really weirded me out was that the people holding up the signs were like 16 year old girls. Pretty much all of them. I really, really wanted to interview one of them. I would’ve, but I had to get to the train. I really wanted to know what I always want to know…what their deal is. This cute, regular looking, 15-16 yr old girl is holding up a giant placard depicting a dismembered baby. What is her deal? Why is she doing it? Because her mom told her, or her church, or her pastor? Is it because she really feels that abortion is so horrendous, that any means necessary to shake the public consciousness awake is acceptable. Somehow, I don’t think it’s the latter. I’m thinking her mom, or other mentor has dragged her into the cause. I doubt she would admit it in an interview, and I doubt she would’ve said anything other than “get out of here.” Still, it was weird.



Phew. Let’s change gears again. PDA couple. So today, I got the gumption to stand right next to the PDA couple on the platform. They were touching as they practically always are. Man had his hand around woman’s waist and he was talking. He was telling a story and I couldn’t make it all out. It involved dude rummaging through some woman’s closet, was it his daughter and he was looking for drugs? Was it his wife? Was it his sister, mother, aunt, or other female? I dunno. The train came and I was so bummed cuz I wanted more info. The other wonderful thing that I heard was…I’m pretty sure I heard her call him “bunny.” I’m pretty sure. The other thing I garnered, not that this is at all revelatory, was that they are definitely in their own world. I know this is obvious from their excessive PDA, but even their speech, their mannerisms, you name it, they don’t notice anyone else around when they are together. I’m feeling a little like a puss cuz I should approach them and find out what their deal is, I should’ve asked that protester girl what her deal is, and then the physically challenged dude. I can’t decide if it’s better drama to drag it out like I am, and give little snippets of information, or just ask all the questions and move on. I’m thinking it’s the former. We’re all voyeurs on this one, and I think we like it that way (meaning you, the reader, and me, not me and my imaginary friends, although they’re in on it too). I don’t think we want all the answers in one lump, we want little snippets, little lights flashed into the empty room. I could be wrong. But if I get all the answers, that will be it, and I can’t talk about the PDA couple anymore, or it wouldn’t be nearly as fun, or interesting.



That’s it. You can go about your business. Me and my imaginary friends are gonna play parcheezi.

Death and records

Wow. George Steinbrenner died. I didn’t realize he was 80. Time keeps moving on. Steinbrenner was a nut, but he seemed to be able to laugh at himself, which is always a good way to have a positive public opinion. I don’t know much about him, other than that he owned the Yankees and had some kind of weird love/hate thing with Billy Martin (RIP) in the 70s; but he will be missed. We lost Harvey Pekar yesterday, who’s next? Dom Deluise? Oops I guess he already died. Maybe Hugh Hefner? I didn’t realize Hugh was 84; he’s still out there moving and shaking, he’s trying to buy the rest of the outstanding playboy stock and take it private. Pretty cool that he actually gives a crap, let alone has the mental faculties to pull it off. Don’t even get me started on his bedroom antics, jeez he’s getting more action at 84, than I got at 24. There’s still hope though. On a side note I guess he picks the cover and reviews every page for every issue of playboy that goes out. Maybe that’s why it sucks. Sorry Hugh, you’re still the man.



I figured out why I was bummed all weekend. I thought it was cuz that girl dissed me and that was on my mind. Well the mind is a funny thing, that was just a projection; I missed my kids. That makes perfect sense. I was going to the track, they would’ve loved that. Then on Sunday I went to the Sox game, it was family day. I should’ve figured it out, it’s weird though. You think as an adult you know yourself and you know what’s bothering you, and you don’t. Adults can plan ahead and prepare themselves for what’s coming. I knew I didn’t have the kids, I tried to make arrangements to stay busy and get out of the house. Sometimes the best laid plans oft gang agley. You think you have mentally prepared yourself for what is coming, i.e. last weekend, no kids, you can’t force yourself to feel a certain way (let’s not argue this one), you can try to take your mind off of it, but sometimes that doesn’t work. So yesterday I had my kids over and it was so nice. It’s like that piece that was missing all weekend was back. I got out and played Tennis with my son. Ran around a bit. We all sat around and watched pawn stars together. It was really nice just being around them. I’ve got them this weekend and I’m hoping to take them on a road trip, I’m thinking of hitting Wisconsin dells. I’ve never been there.



I’m starting to get amped for Lolla. Against me got added on Saturday. If I only had one day at Lolla, Saturday would be it. That day is gonna rock from like 11am on. I’m thinking about bringing the kids. I’d like to. They’d really love to see Green Day, but I just don’t know if they can hang all day like that. It’s gonna be a game-time decision. I’m prolly gonna hit Sunday too. My new fave band Hockey is playing along with Soundgarden and some others. I was driving to the train today and a song came on my ipod, I was like “who is this!?” It was Hockey. More on Lolla later.



Yesterday I talked about a cool record store I happened into. The place was called Permanent Records. It was jamming. I was a little jealous cuz it was the kind of record store I want to own. So last night I was thumbing through Chicago Social and I saw a blurb about another record store called Saki (I think). It is owned by some dude who owns a popular restaurant. I’m not sure if we are at the point where all these record stores can survive. Look at the stores from back in the day, wax trax, that place on Lincoln by lounge ax, that place on Belmont, Rock records downtown, Tower records, Virgin records, that record store in depaul’s loop campus, Rose records, that heavy metal record store, all of these places are gone. I don’t think their business models were significantly different than let’s say Permanent Records. PR was cultivating the DIY décor, they had an area where you can listen to stuff before you buy, they had a lounge area with magazines; I don’t think they had a stage for in store appearances, but that Saki place does. What about the Merch? I always like the t-shirts and random junk they had at the record store, these stores don’t have it. “It’s all about the music man…the music.” I think I just did them all a favor by saying their business model is doomed, they are gonna owe me big.



I stumbled into another store when I was at West Fest. I don’t know the name of it, but they were selling like 15 different styles of $25 t-shirt that no one has ever heard of, with lame ass patterns and stupid sayings. Then they had like 10 pairs of jeans. And that’s it. I guess they might have had some other random junk. They had a TV and a couch with magazines. It’s like “how does this place stay open?” Is it a front for the mob? Who is shopping here? Who is wearing these stupid t-shirts and just happens to be the right size for 1 of the 10 pairs of pants? When I go into a place like that, I almost immediately have a burning desire to leave. I don’t want to make the owner feel bad though, so I fake look around. Then I bolt. Always a good feeling walking out of one of those doomed establishments.

I dig my tv

I wanted to talk about Angelina Jolie’s new thigh tattoo, but I have some more pressing issues. Seriously though, this was one of the headlines on MSN. I know the average shmoe out there gives a shit about every body adornment Angelina J even remotely considers, especially vajazzling (google it), but seriously, a tattoo on her thigh is front page news? At least Harvey Pekar got a picture next to the news that he passed. RIP Harvey. I never read American Splendor, but I saw the movie. I should read the comic, cuz I really liked the movie. I gotta watch that again.



Ok well I know you’re all buzzing about my weekend cuz I had it all laid out and you know what they say about the best laid plans of mice and men? They oft gang agley. They do. So things didn’t work out quite like I had planned. Friday was easy. I was tired from Thursday, so I just stayed in and crashed. That meant that Saturday was holding all expectations for the weekend. I woke up and worked out, so I got my bs out of the way, then I basically had nothing to do. Well my ps were going to the horse races, kind of on a whim. So, they invited me. And on a whim, I accepted. It was a good time and none on my trifectas came in. The first race had a 35-1 longshot win it. That was a bad miss. I bet a longshot in a later race and you’ll never guess where it came in, dead last as most longshots do. I did pick a winner that paid 9-1. The only race that I didn’t bet across the board was that one. I ended up with a win and a place. $31 on a $4 bet. Not too bad. So my ps decide they want to get some food. Which was good cuz I was starving. My mom, much like moms always do, wanted to eat at the posh spot. Well my dad and I had shorts on and they said no dice. I was on my way down the escalator when my mom says, “let me talk to the manager.” Next thing I know, the maitre’d is handing me a brand new pair of cotton dockers, with tags and everything. So I wore them. With tags and everything. I put them on right over my shorts and I was pleasantly surprised that I could wear 36s over my shorts. Well it was my job to place the bets, so I was traipsing all over the restaurant in my cotton dockers with the tags. People must’ve thought I was brain damaged. Which is fine. I thought it was funny. My dad basically refused to button his pants or zip the fly, so he was walking around like…well you can draw your own conclusion. The best part about it though, is instead of just letting us wear our shorts, they ended up with much more of a spectacle. I guess that’s justice.



Saturday started out pretty good. I was pretty beat when I got back from the track though. I wanted to get downtown and hit the World’s largest block party. Spoon was playing. I got into the car around 548, and I was hoping to be at the blockparty by 645. I figured I’d hit traffic. I called my buddy and said meet me at the block party at 7. The next thing I know I’m driving into Chicago and it’s 615. So I call my buddy to offer to pick him up. So he answers and he sounds groggy. I’m like, “I’ll pick you up.” He’s like, “I’m sleepin.” I said, “I’m coming over.” His response, “Why, to watch me sleep?” So now I’m in a quandary. I don’t have anywhere to go. I don’t want to go to the block party alone, I’m hosed. Plan change. I’m like, “Yeah, I guess I’ll watch tv til you get up.” I get to his place, watch a little tv, then run out and get some beer. Sometime around 7, I figured Block party is toast, so I had a beer. It wasn’t all bad. I spun some tunes, watched the white Sox, drank some beer, could be worse. The thing about block party is…it’s expensive. I guess tickets are $50 now. That’s steep. It includes 5 beers, but only bud products. I don’t like bud products, they basically give me an instant headache, and that’s all they serve at BP, along with barefoot wine, which tastes like it got poured over bare feet. So I wasn’t way broken up about not hitting block party. Once we got moving, it was around 10. We ended up at some dive (I guess, it was new though, is that a dive, I’m still torn on this whole dive bar thing, does a dive bar have to be old and dirty?) The place was called Late Nite. This guy does kind of a traveling 80s dj thing and he was there spinning. My bud’s brother met us, and that was cool. It was a good time. Heard some good songs. It was cool hanging out with the guys, I guess I was a little bit of a curmudgeon because there weren’t any hot women there…at all. I think I got a little tired around 2, and we hung there til like 3. It was cool. I gotta get better at just rolling with things, I just wasn’t in a roll with it mood. I was just in a sorta state of uneasiness like, I don’t want to drink, I don’t not want to drink. I wanna go to bed, I wanna go somewhere else. I dunno how to describe it. Anyway, that sorta carried over into Sunday.



On Sunday my brother, his kids, and my other brother were all going to the Sox game. I went. It was fun. The Sox are kicking serious ass, which is fun. They scored 15 runs. That’s nuts. I kept sneaking away to go down to the little sports bar at Sox park to catch the World Cup final. I watched some of it, seemed like a pretty good match, although the guy in the journal didn’t think so. After the Sox game, I busted down to the bar cuz I thought the game was gonna go into penalty kicks. Well no such luck for the Dutch, Spain scored like right when I got there. I watched the end and my bro came down which was cool. We hung out and I drove him home.



It’s always a cool realization when you come to find that you have no friends. Well not that, it’s just that I don’t have enough, or something. I was thinking I should go out and make some more friends. I guess that would require me being friendlier though, and that’s not gonna happen. The point is that, I decided to go see The Life and Times at this fest in Chicago, and I had no one to go with. I don’t know if I’m agoraphobic, or what, but when I go to a fest or a concert alone, I get a weird kind of nervous. I don’t care though. I just wanted to see the band. My plan was to hit the fest, walk around, drink a Gatorade, watch the band, and leave. That’s basically how it happened too. I did slip into a record store called Permanent Records. Clever name. I was wondering if the name is pulled from the Violent Femmes song “Kiss off.” That was probably on my mind cuz I listened to all of Violent Femmes s/t when I was hanging at my bud’s. Maybe it’s just cuz I was feeling blah, or cuz I was alone, or cuz I can’t really spend money on anything, but I wasn’t as geeked as I should’ve been going into a record store. I love record stores, I always wanted to own my own record store, maybe that has something to do with it. I dunno. I just wasn’t that geeked. It also kinda bummed me out that every card for every band I looked at did not have that band there. The Melvins, Motorhead, the misfits, nothing. It was like someone was trying to mess with me, so I looked around the place, and bailed. I would’ve done some damage if I had some money, well if any of the music I wanted was actually where it was supposed to be. I hung around like a wallflower for like a half hour until the band came on. They were really kick ass. I’m glad I went to the show. They didn’t play “A chorus of crickets.” But they did play some other stuff off of Urban Hymns that rocked. Right at the end of their set it started raining, so I didn’t feel bad about bailing, that was a plus.



It was Sunday, and I hadn’t been to church, so I slid over to Old St. Michaels in old town. I was married in that church. It might seem like I’m a glutton for punishment, but I was glad to be at Old St. Mikes. For one, it’s usually packed with cute women. There were definitely some cuties there, there’s also a lack of air conditioning in there. It got a little steamy. No worries. If you haven’t been to Old St. Mikes you should go. There’s this really cool sculpture at the top of the Altar, it’s of St. Michael and some other Angels basically kicking the devil’s butt. There are lights and stuff behind it and it looks pretty dramatic. Worth checking for sure.



Looking back, I didn’t have a bad weekend. I def should’ve been in better spirits, I feel pretty good right now. I think sometimes you get the summer blahs and they kind of suck much worse than the winter blahs. When you’re bummed in Summer, you’re still outside, in the heat, doing things. In the Winter, you can just get in bed or watch TV and there’s nothing wrong with just riding it out alone. Whatever, lots of good stuff on the horizon, Lolla, Taste of Lincoln Ave. And tons of shows.

Punk is bad

I have all day to write this blog. It’s so damn quiet. I’m the only one in Compliance. I’m holding down the fort. It’s funny, there were a bunch of us in Compliance a few months ago when I started. One day everyone was going to be out but me and the woman who is out today. All the other people were in such an uproar, and were considering juggling their schedules and stuff because they thought that myself and this other woman couldn’t handle it. It’s like really? You think you are just that important, and if you are out one day, the whole company is gonna go to shit? Whatever. I was the only equity compliance officer on the trading floor for Wachovia (before the company imploded, I swear I had nothing to do with it.) I’ve put out fires before, a lot bigger than what can come up in a prop shop. I better not jinx myself, otherwise I’ll have some kind of major error and be on the phone with the exchange for the rest of the day.



First things first, news. They finallllyyyy announced the lineup for Riot Fest. Bad Religion is headlining and I will def be at that show. Some other notables: The Lawrence Arms, Smoking Popes, Circle Jerks, Mighty Mighty Bosstones, Less than Jake, Articles of Faith, riverboat Gamblers, off with their heads and many others. The flyer says that more headliners will be added soon. Ticket prices have gone up and I’m kinda chaffed about it. Last year, the first round of 5 day passes were going for $80. That’s a crazy bargain considering there are 21 shows (although it is impossible to be at all 21 unless you can bilocate). The passes that I ended up buying last year were 110 each and I’m not sure we got our money’s worth. This year, I’m thinking I might just buy tix for the individual shows. I gotta see who is playing when. I’m thinking that the Methadones will be added to the bill at some point cuz this would be a good way for them to go out to a huge audience. Either that or Noise by Numbers will play. Both options are good. Oops. Lost my focus there, so this year, the 5 day pass is 115 bux right out of the box and will prolly go up as they add more headliners. I can’t say I’m disappointed, but I was hoping that they could get the Descendants to reform for the show. I’d also like to see Archers of Loaf, Superchunk, The Melvins, bad brains, fugazi, or any of my other favorite punk bands added to the bill. Check out the rest of the lineup here http://www.riotfest.org/lineup/

On second blush, the lineup looks pretty good. I gotta get up to speed on some of the other bands. How could I forget THE MEATMEN. I’ve never seen them. No doubt I will be catching that act.



I really don’t like to talk about the divorce, but since I’m on the subject of punk music, I just feel like sharing a little bit. The divorce has been contentious and both sides have filed multiple petitions that discuss questionable activities of the other side. Well they filed a petition that mentioned my interest in Punk music extensively. It was pretty dumb, and imho absolutely irrelevant, but it just reminded me of like a Methodist Minister damning the heinous and vile Punk music and all it represents. It will be the bane of man, and poison our youth. That kind of stuff. It mentioned that I wear steel toed boots to shows. You go to enough shows in sandals, eventually you wise up. It mentioned that I like to mosh, and I seriously have not been in a real mosh pit for 8 years or something. I dunno I thought it was silly, but at the same time, I can’t run from it. It also mentioned that I kicked Alkaline Trio’s tour bus until they opened the door. Which I did, but my hands were filled with stuff and I couldn’t knock. They let me on the bus and signed my orange copy of Maybe I’ll catch fire. I may have to call them in to testify. The petition reminded me of the Quincy (old TV show) episode where there is a punk rock gang or something. I think it was this very show that got me into punk rock. It was way over the top about how the music is violent and that people who listen to it are depraved. I was prolly like 10 when I saw the show, and I prolly thought punk was a very bad thing at the time. After time went by, it sorta became the forbidden fruit, and I got into it more and more. I was into alternative music at a young age, bands like The cure, The cult, U2, REM, The Smiths. Pretty tame stuff, then I started listening to the Dead Milkmen. The songs were so irreverent, so short and catchy, I loved it. I still like The Smiths etc, or Smith torchbearers like Interpol, but there will always be a soft spot for punk.



Switch gears. I met some buddies last night for a couple of beers. One of them is 44 and still single. He has been around the online dating block and around and around again. He has some sweet stories. He never had someone send him naked pictures, but he has some stories. I asked him if he ever had someone just cut off contact without a word or explanation. He said it was fairly common, and he’s done it to people. I’ve done it too, but not to people I’ve met, not to people who had reason to believe I would be in contact with them in the future. Those people get explanations, they get a phone call or e-mail that says I’m not interested. I think that’s common courtesy. I’m new to this dating thing though. He said that maybe you contact 50 women and boil it down to like 5, meet them and work from there. I don’t think I’ve contacted 50 women, my ratio of contact to response is pretty good. I mean I only contact people who I think I have a chance of getting a response from, so that works in my favor. Sure I see some smoking 26 year olds that I’d love to contact in more ways than one, but I dunno, I guess I just don’t think I have a chance with them. I guess that’s a bad attitude. I have contacted some women under 30 that have similar interests, but I really don’t think I have much of a chance with a woman under 30, or it makes sense to try to have a relationship with a woman under 30. I’m open though. I’ll talk to pretty much anyone that contacts me. Pretty much.



Back to the idea of a 26 year old. I’ve been thinking about this concept a lot. Especially when I’m walking to the train and there are just hot young women all over the place. They’re head turners, but I ask myself, what would really come of it? Sure, they’re hot, and I’d like to have sex with them, that’s human nature. Other than that though, what is there? They’ll want to talk about twilight movies and Lady Gaga, or television. If there is one subject that I’m not up on it’s TV. Sports, yes, the world cup, yes, trading yes, TV, no. I don’t watch TV shows. They all look stupid. The office is ok, and south park. I was watching Archer, but that kind of wore off. I watch American Pickers and Pawn Stars with my kids, those are good shows, but I just don’t have anything in common with a 26 year old, that I can think of. It’s hard to say though. I don’t judge, so I wouldn’t judge a woman based on her age. I guess at the end of the day it’s like, they should be with some hot young single dude, out partying, having a good time. I’ve got baggage, I’ve got kids, I’m soon to be divorced. I thought I had a nice philosophical discussion to get into on this subject and somehow it slipped through my fingers. Oh well, I’ll have to revisit it.



Wow quantity over quality, always good. I’m gonna be out this weekend, def at the world’s largest block party on Saturday, and maybe at West Fest on Sunday. I should have some more interesting news at that time.

What dreams may come

I had the best dream last night. All I can remember of it is making out with this beautiful woman for a really long time. It was slow, it was lip biting, it was lips for a long time before slight tongue, it was so fucking awesome. I want that in real life, and I know I’ll get it. That is cool. That is hope. Shoot for the simple things you know you’ll get. I know I’ll make out with somebody soon, it won’t be the girl of my dreams, cuz she was perfect, but it will hopefully be close.



Speaking of dream girls, I was thinking about my buddy cuz I’m doing a lot of introspection and extrospection about dating and women. Well let’s start at the beginning. When I walk to work, when I’m not totally spaced-out thinking, I’m looking at women; which is normal, much better to do it now in the summer than in the winter when everyone is so bundled up you don’t know who is who, “Old man!” “I’m not old, I’m 37.” So anyway, there is a woman who is my perfect type, not the girl from my dreams, but close. “She’s my exact…type.” Anyway, she’s really cute, not too thin, perfect shape, nice breasticles, awesome head of crazy sandy blonde hair. I guess I’ll call her walk girl because I usually see her on my walk to work. Our paths cross. So yesterday, I was walking to work and I also usually walk toward my bro’s place cuz that is on the way to work, and sometimes we run into each other and shoot the shit. So I walked by where I usually see walk girl and nothing. Then I’m walking towards my bro’s and even though it’s like 200 yards away I see him. It’s so funny when you know someone, you don’t even need to recognize them, you see the way they walk, how they carry themselves, etc.; and you know. My bro comes up and we start talking. Good chat, talked about the Sox and stuff. Then we part ways. Well I start walking north on Dearborn. I see a cute girl and she’s walking into the bank. It’s her! It’s walk girl! Total bonus. So that was nice. Anyway, the point of the whole thing is that have you ever heard of anyone actually hooking up with their dream girl or someone they see just walking to work? Well I have…



My buddy had a girl on the train that he didn’t know; all he knew is that she was hot, and that he wanted her. They rode the same train and he would see her often. I dunno how often. Well he would tell people about her and she became known as dream girl. My bud didn’t like this, so he would call her train girl. I dunno how it happened, but eventually she sat next to him or something. They struck up a conversation. They got to know each other on the train and eventually went on a date. I think they saw each other a few times, it didn’t pan out. I think she was a little nuts and she had a lot of male “friends” which sometimes is weird. It’s a good story though and maybe there is hope for me and walk girl.



I was going back through my blog because I wanted to see what online dating story I told. I couldn’t remember, there have been a lot of connections, which is cool I guess. It could be worse, I could get absolutely 0 interest. At least I’ve had 5 or 6 women who were interested enough to message back. I’ve met a few women, one sent me naked pictures which were much appreciated. I’ve had some success, I shouldn’t get down about the ones that got away. Oh yeah, update, so a few blogs ago I wrote about how I met this woman out at a fest and we really connected…well I guess I misread that one. Either her texting, cell phone, e-mail, and voice mail are all broken, or she just never wants to talk to me again. Which makes me so want to chuckle. It sucks, cuz she was cool, and I don’t really understand what I did, but it’s funny because life is crazy and when you try to explain it, sometimes it defies explanation. We were sending cute little texts back and forth after the fest and she texted something like “Are you gonna hat yourself tomorrow? :P” I was like “hat?” I was still buzzing even though I switched to Gatorade, it was late, I had no idea what she was talking about. I was surprised she was still awake, so I wrote “Go to Bed!” That’s the last contact I had with her. I think I said it yesterday, there was more to it than that. I don’t think she liked that text, but I don’t think she liked me either, and that was just the last straw. There are so many women out there though. I just gotta keep looking, and in the meantime, if I have a couple more sweet dreams, that’s fine too. Something to tide me over.

Guy who is me

I’m sorta still smarting from this online dating thing. It’s pretty crazy when you think about it. So many factors and so many things can go wrong. I’m def with the guy that said if a girl likes you, she helps you out. It’s like, one thing, one stupid text is gonna derail the whole thing? It could, but in reality, there was more than that. It is a combination of things. Then when you start to let go, and move on, you start your own list of things. I guess that’s a normal coping mechanism. “Well she did have huge boobs, and a great taste in music, but she had dogs and texted during our conversation.” Seriously, I know it’s a bad habit, and I do it, but it is so disrespectful to text when you are hanging out with someone one on one. Sometimes it’s necessary, and if you are good friends with the person, they prolly understand, or they’re in on it, “I’m just letting Charlie know where we’re at.” If that is not the case, and you just start texting when you are talking to someone you don’t know, then that person is def feeling like they are not as important as the person in the text. That sucks. I’m def gonna make a point of not texting when out with people, it’s becoming one of my biggest pet peeves.



Back to the texting thing. I used to think that e-mail was the best way to communicate. I feel that I do well with the written word and that my thoughts will be readily understood. I’m starting to doubt that now. I don’t have the desire to come up with the number, but I did find a statistic that said that 84% of people think their texts are misunderstood. I don’t know how to handle this, other than to keep the texting to a minimum at least until someone has a good understanding of me. The problem is that people are going to infer their own tone. Tone, is probably the easiest way to misunderstand a text. You can say something like “Get outta here.” Some people might take that for what it is, an old way to say, “Aw come on, you’re pulling my leg.” Some people might take it literally that you really want them to leave. Some might see it as disrespectful. It could be read as lame, an old, trite catchphrase. It could be read as uneducated or low class slang. You just don’t know how people are going to run with a simple comment. The person could have other issues in their life. Maybe they are pining for a lost love or going through some other major changes. Texting can be tricky. I’m going to tread lightly going forward.



The boss is out this week. That rocks. I was thinking about it today, and my boss is really cool. The stress level is very low in my job, and my boss does not really raise that level at all (as most bosses do). But today on my way in, I felt less stress. I feel like it’s going to be a less stressful week because the boss is out. I guess that’s just buried in my genetic code. Lotta people wearing orange today, The Netherlands is playing a huge match to make it to the finals of the world cup. It would be cool if they won, cuz there are a bunch of people in my office from the Netherlands. Safe to say the game will be on every TV and productivity will be impacted. I should be getting hooked with a massage today too. I really need it. My rotator cuff is messed and I just don’t feel like giving it a rest. I’m hoping that the thing just figures itself out. My wrist is bugging me too, which sucks. My Nephew started playing lacrosse and I got out there and threw the ball with him. It was really fun, but the impact of the ball hitting the stick took its toll on my wrist. I’m thinking all it needs is a little rest. I threw a little lefty and surprisingly, my left hand is still pretty good, after all these years. I should try to just throw lefty, that would minimize the stress on my wrist. The bummer is that righty, I can put the ball wherever I want, not so much lefty. I guess that’s how you develop the skill though.



My weekend was pretty good. Saw an awesome fireworks show on Sunday. My brother belongs to a country club and they have a private show for the members and their guests. You’d think it would be short and sweet because of the cost. Well the thing lasted like a half hour. They were shooting off all kinds of awesome stuff. It might’ve been the best fireworks show I’ve ever seen. It’s not like there is one show that sticks out from another though. They’re pretty much all the same. I saw the Karate Kid over the weekend. It was ok. It’s really hard to mess with the original on that one, they did take the story in a couple of different directions, but at the end of the day, it was the same thing. If you were wavering between seeing it in the theater and renting it, rent it. Or better yet, rent the original. I took a poll after it, original or new. My oldest and middle children liked the new. My youngest preferred the original, as did I. Even split. Well…sort of.



I hung out with my old friend and his family over the weekend, and that was very nice. It was a nice break and a good way to get the kids out and active. My bud is married w 3 kids and lives in a nice neighborhood with a community pool. It was a non-stop rock and roll party. We got there and cruised to the pool. Grilled out, swam, played some bags. Then we cruised back to his place. He got a bonfire going, we did the s’mores thing and just generally chilled. They wanted to know how things were going, and it was nice to get some things off my chest and just tell my side of the story. I know the other side is being told and I don’t know how I’m being represented in that story. It was just nice to talk to my friends and hear their stories as well. It was therapeutic for sure. Didn’t do much for my sleep though. My middle child has issues with food, like he overeats and then gets sick. So we were up all night on Saturday running in and out of the bathroom. Nasty business.



I totally forgot to write about what inspired me to open the document in the first place. So I was smarting over this online dating thing. I just started thinking about how it’s still early, I’m not even divorced yet, etc. I got a tinge of hope from this, that tinge that says things will get better. I know they will, but it’s just hard when happiness is always in the future. I want to be happy now. I want things to be simpler now. Oh well, some good stuff coming up this weekend. Good distractions for sure. Old St. Pat’s block party, and this street fest that has The Life and Times and we were promised jetpacks. I’m hoping to hit all of the above. We’ll see. Life is good, no boss.

What do these do?

I think I just consumed about 8,000,000 calories that were like 90% fat. Aka a ham and gruyere croissant. The thing was damn good, but it’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to pork consumption today. I washed it down with 3 slices of bacon as well. And I shit you not, we are having Slavingen for Lunch. I work for a dutch company and due to the Netherlands playing Brazil in the World cup, we are having a dutch lunch. Slavingen, for those who don’t know, (a category that included me about 10 minutes ago) is a pork cutlet wrapped in bacon. That’s right, Bacon, it’s for breakfast and lunch. I’m knocking this blog out early so I can enjoy my weekend. Also so I can turn my attention to the world cup, which will be on every TV in the place.



Speaking of the world cup and sports, I made a crappy attempt at becoming a sports radio announcer last night. It’s the typical scenario, my brother was going to this bar to try out for WSCR the score in an open tryout. I was hanging there with him and my buddy. My brother got up there, and he did a great job, he was prepared, he had funny jokes, he had props, he knocked it out of the park. After a couple of beers and a complimentary watered down drink, I decided to try my hand at it. There were a bunch of people there, and I didn’t want to have to wait. I went up to the guy running the show and asked if I could get in there. He was like, “sure, fill this out.” I filled out the form and brought it back. He’s like, “when do you wanna go on?” I was like, “whenever.” Him, “How about next?” “Sure.” So I got up there and I thought I would do ok cuz I didn’t have a script and I just wanted to try to be a little over the top. I don’t think I did too good. I tried talking about the blackhawks and I sorta messed that up. Then the woman gave me the 30 second sign and I talked about the world cup and sorta just made fun of it. I had my flip camera with me and I filmed it, so I’ll try to post it online. It was fun though. It’s always good to get up in front of a group and make an ass out of yourself.



Speaking of which, I did get some angst out last night on the drums. I practiced for a bit while I was trying to update my ipod. I’m going through the agonizing process of getting my music transferred into itunes on a new computer. It’s so fucking annoying. I think Apple makes it hard on purpose just to protect copyrights and force people to download a song 10 times from itunes. I feel like I’m being held hostage by Apple when it comes to itunes. I wish there was a competing platform that worked with ipods. I should just switch to zune. Anyway, so I transferred a bunch of tunes using a portable hard drive, and then itunes couldn’t locate them anymore so I transferred them to the actual hard drive on the computer. Then I had to reload them into itunes and I didn’t know which files were working and which weren’t, so now my itunes is a complete disaster. I have copies of songs that can’t be located, and multiple copies of some songs from different locations on the hard drive. Good times. Good times. I dled a bunch of stuff that’s gonna be at lolla, and now the computer can’t find that. It’s so fucking frustrating! It’s totally a conspiracy. I figured out who’s trying to get me….it’s Apple!



Big plans for the weekend. Lotsa fireworks is what I’m thinking. We might go to fireworks on Saturday and Sunday. I bet some people are having their fireworks tonight. I think my kids are getting to the age where they’d rather blow off fireworks than watch them. Isn’t that any age though? I think my kids get bored by fireworks. When I was a kid I absolutely loved them. Still do. I have my faves, love to sit out in the field and get bitten by mosquitoes; it should be a good time. This year I’m prepared with glowsticks. I just have to find the damn things. Every year, my kids are the only kids that don’t have a hundred glowsticks each. Then the other kids who do have hundreds just absolutely hoard them. I really don’t get it. Some rich woman last year totally chafed my butt when she wouldn’t sell me any of her glowsticks and all her grandkids or whatever were swimming in them. I’m going to encourage my kids to give them to out to the glowstick challenged, my form of altruism. So yeah, I just gotta find them. See last year I was at Jewel (grocery store) and they were selling the glowsticks for like 50 cents a pack (on July 10 or something), so I bought a bunch. I better make sure they still work and make sure I can find them. I guess that’s on the agenda for tonight. If I’m still alive after eating all this saturated fat.

Peg

I had to run out to the bank and I took a little detour through Millenium park. I heard some music. Hauntingly familiar. I followed the siren’s call and it was a little Jazz band, prolly college age and they were playing Peg by Steely Dan. It sounded really good and the drummer was groovy. I stayed there and listened to the whole song. 2 other people were there with me watching, and then there were probably 20 people within 30 yards that were sitting around enjoying the ambience, chilling on the park benches, etc. When the song stopped, and I must say it stopped abruptly, whereas I believe the Aja version fades out, not one person clapped. I have to admit that I was too much of a puss to be the only one clapping, although my conscience was telling me to clap. I laughed to myself cuz it was fucked up that a 15 piece jazz band should run through a pretty solid rendition of Peg in front of people and not a one of them clapped when they were done. Bizarre.



Lately I’ve been getting kinda down cuz I can’t seem to get one of these online relationships to work. Well I know that that statement right there has a horrible assumption in it, relationship. I know I have to tone it down and just take it one step at a time, not everyone is gonna realize that I’m the bee’s knees and sometimes there’s a language barrier, I’m talking about miscommunication. Well from now on I’m going to temper my expectations and take it slow. I don’t like to generalize, but maybe there is something to be said for the likelihood of insanity among those who go online looking for romance. It’s like, you’re divorced with three kids, your ex must’ve just been a big jerk and you are just dreamy. Oops, that’s me. Seriously though, chances are that the people that seem so appealing when you read their profile, might have some serious mental hang-ups. More than likely, these hang-ups make dating and meeting people the old-fashioned way difficult, so they go online. I’m not ready to say every person who is looking for love online has a mental problem, but I’m just saying that the percentage is probably higher than in the general population. I know I’m in there too, so what does that say about me? I dunno. I guess my point is that you have to take this into account when you meet people online, and adjust your expectations accordingly.



How about a recap of where I’ve been as I’ve waded into the waters of online dating. I guess I just started getting into it around last February. I got out there on match. I went through some profiles, I couldn’t send messages cuz I was not a member. I could wink, which is basically a lame way to express interest without actually reaching out to anybody. Match also sends you e-mails and in one of these e-mails I saw a profile that def caught my eye. That’s the other thing about online dating, you are basically looking through a catalog, and if the picture isn’t good, then there’s no way you are gonna read all the other crap, you just move on. So the pic was good, I checked the profile, but it was kinda spartan, with some stupid shit in there about how she likes to do public service with her kid to teach her to help others or something. It’s like, that’s nice, and altruistic, but it’s not exactly a head turner. Anyway, she was cute, so I winked. What do you know? A few days later she winked back. This was my first online connection. I didn’t want to pay for Match, and I didn’t want to miss out on this girl, and “She was way into me…She winked.” I also had a profile at this time on OK Cupid, so I slipped it into my profile that I was on OKC, I don’t know how it snuck by the censors, but it did. No contact. After about a week, I broke down and joined Match, just so I could contact this girl. I sent her an e-mail. And she never responded. I was a little bummed about it. Not that big of a deal though. I think I’m working my way up the online dating food chain since then. It’s a work in progress.



I have stories, and that’s key. A lot of people don’t. Seriously, if I had been at work 10 years ago and heard some dude talking about how some girl is e-mailing him naked pictures of herself, I would have been green with envy. Well now I’m that guy, and I have to say, if I can do it, anyone can do it. I also have to say, it’s not that big of a deal. Well that’s bullshit, it’s actually kind of a big deal. I mean come on! I’ll share some of my other stories at a later date.