The weather this morning is so autumn! I love fall -- it is my favorite time of the year. I woke up under the comforter this morning. Dave gave me a kiss as he got up and asked me if I wanted some coffee. Do I want some coffee. Please. I snoozed for a little while and was awakened by my marvelous husband who had returned with coffee cup in hand (and saying "Ow, ow, ow. Take it. Take it, it's hot!"). I sat up in bed and fluffed the pillows so that I could sip my French vanilla coffee and flip through my latest Real Simple magazine which is, of course, full of autumn-oriented stuff.
Fall has introduced itself and I love it. I just started making a head wreath of autumn flowers to wear to Oktoberfest. The colors are a lot like my wedding bouquet. I wasn't really feeling it when I started making it a couple of days ago while sitting in front of the open porch door to stay cool – maybe today is the day to finish it off in the right weather setting.
And just now it has started to drizzle outside. Time to put another pot (this one decaf) on.
I wanted to add a couple of things about my little car, my Wagenschen, today. I remembered another story about my car. We once traveled together from Champaign to Ypsilanti, Michigan to go to a conference on English for Business Purposes. It was the only time the car and I were paid for our miles. I don't really remember the conference or what my paper was about, but I vividly remember the drive home. It was spring. It had rained the whole two days I was there. The weather was changing as a front moved in. The front brought tremendous wind with it – and I was driving into it to get home. My Wagenschen's mileage was not as good as usual that day.
At one point I stopped at a rest area to give my car and my bladder a break. As I pulled in, I was still driving into the wind, and then pulled into a diagonal spot according to the construction of most rest areas. Which means that now the wind was blowing against the driver-side door. I pulled into the spot, turned off the car, unlocked the door, pulled the handle, and pushed. I nearly broke my foot on the car door that I had expected would effortlessly swing open as usual. I could not get out of my car! I felt embarrassment before panic. Maybe I had neglected to unlock the door. Clearly, it was not an electrical failure as everything on my little car (save the transmission) is manual. I checked the lock – it was open. I was disappointed in my little car door. I contemplated a Dukes of Hazzard move through the window – I contemplated climbing to the passenger side.
And then I looked around and noticed that the rest area was experiencing an epidemic of driver-side doors refusing to open. I looked around and saw that a few cars had actually pulled out and then backed in so that they would be able to exit the car from the driver's side. One lady parked behind a van – but then had to crawl through the passenger side of her car when she returned to her car because the protective van had left.
I knew now that the wind was the culprit. I briefly thought that I might be able to out muscle the wind, but then pictured myself being crushed in the gap by so many pounds of metal and fiberglass as the door closed on me. As Dave will willingly tell you, I hate breaking the painted rules of parking lots – I could not bring myself to back into a pull into spot. So, I locked the driver-side door, gingerly climbed over the gear shift, and casually exited my little car on the passenger side.
That was a weird driving day. My little car did a great job – she may be light-weight, but she sits low enough to the pavement that we did just fine.
Mom and Dad protested that I did not reminisce about trips my little car and I have taken to St. Louis. My Wagenschen and I have traveled together to St. Louis from Champaign and from Chicago. The trip from Champaign is not too bad, but it is about 45 minutes longer than the trip from Champaign to Chicago. Therefore, you start to get that "Are we there yet?" feeling long before you are there yet, and the math required to avoid having to fill the tank must be more accurate than usual. The trip from Chicago to St. Louis starts out nice enough, but becomes a nightmare after the first couple of hours on Interstate 55. My little car and I love to spend time together – but 5 1/2 hours? Hypothetically, it's kind of like loving your sisters who are spread out all over the country. And then you all arrive at home and have such a great time together catching up, playing games, etc. And then you've been together for a week and you all begin to get frustrated and annoyed. It doesn't mean that I don't love spending time in my little car (or with my sisters), but quality over quantity can make a big difference.
Sunday, August 31, 2003
Saturday, August 30, 2003
My Little Car
So Dave drove himself to work on Friday. He claimed that I was "more passed out than usual," so he let me sleep. As is typical on days when he does that, I woke up about 15 minutes after he had left. Friday was beautiful. I had some Oktoberfest work to do – as usual, but then wanted to run some errands. Which means I had to take my Geo Metro.
The Metro (aka little car, Wagenschen) has been parked on the street since the first week of August. It was covered with a fine sheen of tree sap and decorated with leaves and cobwebs. It wasn't very hot inside the car, which is good since the only downside to my little car is that the air conditioning died a couple of years ago. I would get it fixed – if it weren't the compressor that needs fixing. I think the cost of a new compressor is somewhere around the Blue Book value of the whole car.
As I drove my little car around I was reminded how great a car it really is. This car and I have spent a lot of time together. I bought it in September 1996 when Dave was leaving Champaign for the big city to work – and taking his 1993 Geo Metro with him. [Note: My Geo Metro is not as little as his was – mine has 4 cylinders, his had 3.]
After several bad car shopping trip experiences, I headed 20 minutes north of Urbana to Rantoul to look for a car at Rogers in Rantoul. Their main business was trucks, but they had a selection of regular cars made by Chevy and Pontiac. Our salesperson was a woman. The second time we were there she let us take a Geo Metro "sedan" out for a test drive by ourselves (lots of people were at the dealership buying trucks). Dave had gotten information from the credit union about what price the car should be – what the dealership probably paid, what price they would shoot for, what price we should be able to get, etc. We then calculated that out to monthly payments after figuring my college graduate and first-time buyer incentives. We were ready.
We sat down with Brenda fully prepared. We talked about the picture of her kids' heads poking through a large corn cob painted on a piece of plywood at the Sweet Corn Festival in Hoopestown (pronounced "huhpsten," not "hoopsten"). We were familiar with the photo op from our own visit to the Sweet Corn Festival that year with our friend Chris Wonders. I was not able to convince those guys to have our picture taken amid the corn kernels.
Brenda wrote down the price they were offering on a piece of paper along with what the monthly payment would be. She handed it to me (Dave was being nice and continuing to allow me to think that I was doing this all by myself.) I handed it to Dave. Brenda noticed the look we gave each other and said she would be happy to give us a chance to talk about it. She left us alone. Dave got out his notes, I grabbed the calculator. How could this be? Her first offer was lower than the number we were going to try to get her down to?!
We went through the math. Everything seemed correct. Brenda came back and we all shook hands. Because I was buying a 1996 car at the end of the 1996 model year, they didn't have what I wanted on the lot. They were going to trade for it. So, I had to give Brenda the specifics on what I wanted – or really, what I did not want. We agreed on the purchase of a 1996 Geo Metro "three door" hatch with automatic transmission, a/c, stereo/cassette, and "cargo cover" for the tiny space behind the back seat visible through the back window, and rear defrost. I gave her my top choice for color: silver sage metallic, and a list of colors I couldn't do: super black, cool white, super grape. We finalized the list. She told me it could take between seven and ten days to find the car, make the trade, and get the car delivered. Though I was let down after writing a big check and not getting a car, I was excited about finally being close to having my very own new car.
Around the time that I was car shopping, Saturn was running a commercial that featured a young woman with brown, shoulder-length hair who was buying her first new car. The first time I saw it I almost cried. The salesman gathered the people in the dealership around to announce that this woman had just bought her first new car. The camera zooms in on the new car keys dangling from his hand just as you see her shaking, nervous hand grasp them from him. How exciting!
About four days after I signed the initial paperwork, Dave and I were at home making lemon chicken at about 6:30. The chicken chunks were about half-cooked and awaiting their lemon bath when the phone rang. It was Brenda at Rogers in Rantoul. She said they had made the trade, got all of my first choices, and that the car had just pulled up. All they had to do was clean it and put their name on it and I could have it! She asked if I wanted to come up and get it that night. I looked at Dave – he said he would be willing to dump dinner and go! I looked at the clock. It would take us 20 minutes to get there and the dealership closed at 7:00. I told Brenda it would be just before 7:00 when we go there. She said that was no problem – she and her manager would stick around so I could take delivery.
She and her manager were going to stay late to finish the paperwork on a car that cost as much the tires and bed lining on their pickup trucks?! Dave and I turned off the stove and jumped in his Metro. When we got to the dealership, I couldn't see the car. Brenda said they were finishing the cleaning after its drive from Kentucky. We did the paperwork with Brenda and her manager in her manager's office. He was a very nice guy in a very bad green suit. After everything was signed, we walked back out to the showroom floor. And there it was. My new car.
Rogers in Rantoul has a red carpet that leads from the middle of the showroom to a big glass door that opens to let cars in and out. The pavement outside the glass door is painted red also. You drive out on the red carpet into downtown Rantoul. Before I left, Brenda apologized that it didn't have a full tank of gas. The garage guys had already left and couldn't take it over to the gas station that they used to fill it up. She handed me an envelope and explained that her manager had given her ten dollars to give me to fill it up (ten dollars was more than enough to fill my Metro back then).
Dave pulled his car up in front of the dealership. I got in my new car and as I drove out on the red carpet I felt even more excited than the woman on the Saturn commercial looked. We drove to the gas station first. There was a ten dollar bill in the envelope that Brenda gave me. I filled the tank. We headed south on highway 45 through the corn fields back towards Urbana. Since we had left the lemon chicken to die, Dave suggested we go out to eat. We met at the Steak n' Shake on University Avenue and parked our Metros next to each other. I was in heaven. After we ate, I told Dave I would meet him at home. I had to drive around for a while to enjoy my car and reset all of the preset buttons on the radio. They were full of country stations.
My little car and I have spent over 93,000 miles together – mostly on the trip between Champaign and Chicago. A lot of people have cars with that many miles on them – but I’m betting the miles were accumulated during short trips to work or quick runs to the store, and maybe the occasional road trip. Most of the miles that my little car and I have spent together have been on the two and a half hour trip to Chicago from Champaign. We escaped together almost every Friday (sometimes Thursday) by pulling out from in front of the Foreign Languages Building in Urbana and heading straight for I-57. Sometimes we would stop at the gas station on the edge of Champaign for a fill up, a bottled water, maybe a candy bar, and usually a lotto ticket. We didn't stop until the traffic in Chicago forced us to.
My little car has gotten one new set of tires, and a new muffler. It has may dings and scratches from being parked on Chicago streets. It has hit a box spring and a load of sand on the Dan Ryan Expressway in Chicago. It has been hit by a dingbat in a monstrous SUV who put her SUV in reverse after a fender bender on the Kennedy Expressway in Chicago. It has saved me from countless crashes – including being crushed by a load of scrap metal plummeting from a tractor trailer that overturned on a ramp that crossed over the Dan Ryan Expressway. We spent three hours just sitting on the Dan Ryan and reading and eating M&Ms smartly purchased after a rare stop to hit the bathroom in Peotone. I don't know what made me stop to use the bathroom. The trip had become a commute at that point – I would go when I got to the city. I stopped that time and went to the bathroom and bought a treat. As I reached the city I learned that all lanes of the Dan Ryan were closed because someone in a Pepsi delivery truck decided to tell a police officer that he had a lot of guns and was planning to kill himself.
My little car has afforded me parking spaces that no other car could fit within. I have eaten countless meals and sung countless songs in that car. We have survived major thunderstorms and inches and feet of snow. I even have pictures taken from inside my little car of tornado conditions on Interstate 57. My little car and I got hit by flying debris as we passed a wall cloud that was brightly lit by the setting sun. We headed off at the next exit ramp that then crossed back over the interstate so that we could sit up high and get more pictures. [Note: Dave was not pleased when he learned about this and still does not like to talk about it.] I left the light blue smudge from flying housing insulation on the car for a while like some kind of badge.
As I drove around the north side of Chicago and Skokie running errands yesterday, I found myself falling in love with my little car again. She has been waiting patiently for me. I used to drive her every day – and fill her with gas twice a week – and sing songs with her. She has been sitting alone on the street. I drive Dave's VW a lot and I like it – but I find that I like driving my little car a lot more. Everything is simpler and tighter. No automatic buttons or automatic steering. No Bauhaus interior or big key fobs that open and lock the car with a loud retort from the horn. Just a small engine and little seats and two long keys (I had to have a new ignition put in when the car key broke off in it once) that say GEO on them.
I look forward to having a job someday and making enough money to buy a new car. But I know I will cry when I retire my little car. We have seen a lot together.
The Metro (aka little car, Wagenschen) has been parked on the street since the first week of August. It was covered with a fine sheen of tree sap and decorated with leaves and cobwebs. It wasn't very hot inside the car, which is good since the only downside to my little car is that the air conditioning died a couple of years ago. I would get it fixed – if it weren't the compressor that needs fixing. I think the cost of a new compressor is somewhere around the Blue Book value of the whole car.
As I drove my little car around I was reminded how great a car it really is. This car and I have spent a lot of time together. I bought it in September 1996 when Dave was leaving Champaign for the big city to work – and taking his 1993 Geo Metro with him. [Note: My Geo Metro is not as little as his was – mine has 4 cylinders, his had 3.]
After several bad car shopping trip experiences, I headed 20 minutes north of Urbana to Rantoul to look for a car at Rogers in Rantoul. Their main business was trucks, but they had a selection of regular cars made by Chevy and Pontiac. Our salesperson was a woman. The second time we were there she let us take a Geo Metro "sedan" out for a test drive by ourselves (lots of people were at the dealership buying trucks). Dave had gotten information from the credit union about what price the car should be – what the dealership probably paid, what price they would shoot for, what price we should be able to get, etc. We then calculated that out to monthly payments after figuring my college graduate and first-time buyer incentives. We were ready.
We sat down with Brenda fully prepared. We talked about the picture of her kids' heads poking through a large corn cob painted on a piece of plywood at the Sweet Corn Festival in Hoopestown (pronounced "huhpsten," not "hoopsten"). We were familiar with the photo op from our own visit to the Sweet Corn Festival that year with our friend Chris Wonders. I was not able to convince those guys to have our picture taken amid the corn kernels.
Brenda wrote down the price they were offering on a piece of paper along with what the monthly payment would be. She handed it to me (Dave was being nice and continuing to allow me to think that I was doing this all by myself.) I handed it to Dave. Brenda noticed the look we gave each other and said she would be happy to give us a chance to talk about it. She left us alone. Dave got out his notes, I grabbed the calculator. How could this be? Her first offer was lower than the number we were going to try to get her down to?!
We went through the math. Everything seemed correct. Brenda came back and we all shook hands. Because I was buying a 1996 car at the end of the 1996 model year, they didn't have what I wanted on the lot. They were going to trade for it. So, I had to give Brenda the specifics on what I wanted – or really, what I did not want. We agreed on the purchase of a 1996 Geo Metro "three door" hatch with automatic transmission, a/c, stereo/cassette, and "cargo cover" for the tiny space behind the back seat visible through the back window, and rear defrost. I gave her my top choice for color: silver sage metallic, and a list of colors I couldn't do: super black, cool white, super grape. We finalized the list. She told me it could take between seven and ten days to find the car, make the trade, and get the car delivered. Though I was let down after writing a big check and not getting a car, I was excited about finally being close to having my very own new car.
Around the time that I was car shopping, Saturn was running a commercial that featured a young woman with brown, shoulder-length hair who was buying her first new car. The first time I saw it I almost cried. The salesman gathered the people in the dealership around to announce that this woman had just bought her first new car. The camera zooms in on the new car keys dangling from his hand just as you see her shaking, nervous hand grasp them from him. How exciting!
About four days after I signed the initial paperwork, Dave and I were at home making lemon chicken at about 6:30. The chicken chunks were about half-cooked and awaiting their lemon bath when the phone rang. It was Brenda at Rogers in Rantoul. She said they had made the trade, got all of my first choices, and that the car had just pulled up. All they had to do was clean it and put their name on it and I could have it! She asked if I wanted to come up and get it that night. I looked at Dave – he said he would be willing to dump dinner and go! I looked at the clock. It would take us 20 minutes to get there and the dealership closed at 7:00. I told Brenda it would be just before 7:00 when we go there. She said that was no problem – she and her manager would stick around so I could take delivery.
She and her manager were going to stay late to finish the paperwork on a car that cost as much the tires and bed lining on their pickup trucks?! Dave and I turned off the stove and jumped in his Metro. When we got to the dealership, I couldn't see the car. Brenda said they were finishing the cleaning after its drive from Kentucky. We did the paperwork with Brenda and her manager in her manager's office. He was a very nice guy in a very bad green suit. After everything was signed, we walked back out to the showroom floor. And there it was. My new car.
Rogers in Rantoul has a red carpet that leads from the middle of the showroom to a big glass door that opens to let cars in and out. The pavement outside the glass door is painted red also. You drive out on the red carpet into downtown Rantoul. Before I left, Brenda apologized that it didn't have a full tank of gas. The garage guys had already left and couldn't take it over to the gas station that they used to fill it up. She handed me an envelope and explained that her manager had given her ten dollars to give me to fill it up (ten dollars was more than enough to fill my Metro back then).
Dave pulled his car up in front of the dealership. I got in my new car and as I drove out on the red carpet I felt even more excited than the woman on the Saturn commercial looked. We drove to the gas station first. There was a ten dollar bill in the envelope that Brenda gave me. I filled the tank. We headed south on highway 45 through the corn fields back towards Urbana. Since we had left the lemon chicken to die, Dave suggested we go out to eat. We met at the Steak n' Shake on University Avenue and parked our Metros next to each other. I was in heaven. After we ate, I told Dave I would meet him at home. I had to drive around for a while to enjoy my car and reset all of the preset buttons on the radio. They were full of country stations.
My little car and I have spent over 93,000 miles together – mostly on the trip between Champaign and Chicago. A lot of people have cars with that many miles on them – but I’m betting the miles were accumulated during short trips to work or quick runs to the store, and maybe the occasional road trip. Most of the miles that my little car and I have spent together have been on the two and a half hour trip to Chicago from Champaign. We escaped together almost every Friday (sometimes Thursday) by pulling out from in front of the Foreign Languages Building in Urbana and heading straight for I-57. Sometimes we would stop at the gas station on the edge of Champaign for a fill up, a bottled water, maybe a candy bar, and usually a lotto ticket. We didn't stop until the traffic in Chicago forced us to.
My little car has gotten one new set of tires, and a new muffler. It has may dings and scratches from being parked on Chicago streets. It has hit a box spring and a load of sand on the Dan Ryan Expressway in Chicago. It has been hit by a dingbat in a monstrous SUV who put her SUV in reverse after a fender bender on the Kennedy Expressway in Chicago. It has saved me from countless crashes – including being crushed by a load of scrap metal plummeting from a tractor trailer that overturned on a ramp that crossed over the Dan Ryan Expressway. We spent three hours just sitting on the Dan Ryan and reading and eating M&Ms smartly purchased after a rare stop to hit the bathroom in Peotone. I don't know what made me stop to use the bathroom. The trip had become a commute at that point – I would go when I got to the city. I stopped that time and went to the bathroom and bought a treat. As I reached the city I learned that all lanes of the Dan Ryan were closed because someone in a Pepsi delivery truck decided to tell a police officer that he had a lot of guns and was planning to kill himself.
My little car has afforded me parking spaces that no other car could fit within. I have eaten countless meals and sung countless songs in that car. We have survived major thunderstorms and inches and feet of snow. I even have pictures taken from inside my little car of tornado conditions on Interstate 57. My little car and I got hit by flying debris as we passed a wall cloud that was brightly lit by the setting sun. We headed off at the next exit ramp that then crossed back over the interstate so that we could sit up high and get more pictures. [Note: Dave was not pleased when he learned about this and still does not like to talk about it.] I left the light blue smudge from flying housing insulation on the car for a while like some kind of badge.
As I drove around the north side of Chicago and Skokie running errands yesterday, I found myself falling in love with my little car again. She has been waiting patiently for me. I used to drive her every day – and fill her with gas twice a week – and sing songs with her. She has been sitting alone on the street. I drive Dave's VW a lot and I like it – but I find that I like driving my little car a lot more. Everything is simpler and tighter. No automatic buttons or automatic steering. No Bauhaus interior or big key fobs that open and lock the car with a loud retort from the horn. Just a small engine and little seats and two long keys (I had to have a new ignition put in when the car key broke off in it once) that say GEO on them.
I look forward to having a job someday and making enough money to buy a new car. But I know I will cry when I retire my little car. We have seen a lot together.
Thursday, August 28, 2003
Oktoberfest - Rejected Again - and Baseball
Not a good start to today. It's supposed to be warm again, I've got killer cramps, and there was a message on the machine waiting for me when I got back at 8:30am after dropping Dave off at work.
Oktoberfest work is piling up. I know it must be bad because I avoided some of it yesterday by cleaning the entire living room (front room in Chicago-speak) instead of doing Ofest work. And I mean cleaned. Once I had all of the furniture stacked on the area rug like some kind of poltergeist tower in order to mop the remaining border of hardwood floor with Murhpy's Oil Soap, I knew I was possessed. I must have vacuumed, mopped, and dusted up a few pounds of dark red dust from the recent tuckpointing and porch rebuilding on our building. The living room and the bathroom are now sanctuaries of pine-smelling clean. (I won't relate the details of cleaning the bathroom. I will only say that I am amazed that Dave and I are not bald.) The office -- where my work patiently waits for me -- is a sty. The pathways between piles of paper and items removed from the living room are the only spaces left clear for me to walk through -- that is when I am not tripping on the phone cord that shares the space since the office does not have one phone jack. I find myself thinking of the phone cord that trails out the office door and through the dining room to the the odd jack just past the bathroom door as my tether to salvation from this mess.
So the phone message was from a man who works on one of the Oktoberfest committees -- his company (he) donated $1000 to the Oktoberfest. Which is outstanding. Except that the deadline to get logos on tshirts was yesterday. I spent the morning on the phone with him, a woman in his office, and the woman who is doing the tshirts for us. I really have nothing to complain about. The tshirt woman was outstanding and helped me to make it happen. I had a Barbara Ann moment (or 30 of them) when I ended up chatting with the tshirt woman about life for a half hour. She is also a parishioner and a 37-year-old first time mom! We talked about having babies in our 30s, raising babies in the city, becoming a stay-at-home mom but maintaining a work life with at-home work projects (she started a greeting card company), etc. It was great. So actually, I should not be complaining at all, but rather be thankful for the opportunity to get to know the tshirt lady.
While I was online to send company names and info to various Ofest committees, I got an email from The Chronicle. The Chronicle is a weekly publication about life in academe. They also have a job section that publishes available positions and articles on getting jobs, writing CVs, etc. One of their regular columns is called First Person and is columns written by people out in the job market. They write about their failures and occasional successes in finding a job or changing jobs or dealing with family and work. They are often funny and usually informative, if not supportive/sympathetic articles. The Chronicle recently advertised a call for submissions for this coming academic year for people to write about their job hunt experiences. Ten people are picked to write about four columns each. And they get paid for it. I decided to give it a shot. I wrote an article according to the guidelines they stated. I rewrote the article, I made Dave read it, I deleted huge portions, I changed the jokes, I glossed over details to protect the innocent, I made final edits. I got the rejection this morning. I got rejected from a project that would have me write about getting rejected. How am I supposed to feel about this? The email was nice enough -- which is nice since I have had many other colder rejections from "real" jobs. I didn't realize how badly I wanted that gig. I may post my article later just to set it free.
At least I'm alive. Yesterday was not a good day in Chicago for people planning on staying alive. Six people and the gunman were killed in a warehouse shooting on the south side, two people were killed and several others seriously wounded in a terrible crash on the Eisenhower (causing one of the warehouse workers to be late for work and thus saved from a violent death), and a truck driver died after his tractor trailer crossed opposite lanes of traffic and plowed into some rowhouses setting them on fire.
And then there's baseball. Dave's Cubs are playing my Cards in St. Louis. We saw the end of Tuesday night's game. We went to the bar after my Ofest meeting. The pitcher for the Cubs that night -- Mark Prior -- is amazing. Though he is a Cub, I often find myself rooting for him. He is a super pitcher. He didn't pitch a complete game that night -- which he has been doing lately. The Cards lost the game, but got to see some of the Cubs' pen that night after Prior got pulled. I told Dave and Sean the bartender that the few runs the Cards scored at the end of the game were a positive in an otherwise negative outcome for losing the game. I acknowledged that the Cubs have some great pitchers, but said that my team just needs to get to the guys in the pen for a shot. They both said "Yeah, okay, but you lost." So last night the Cards had to face Wood. He got pulled in the 7th due to the number of pitches. Long 8th inning short -- the Cards ripped through the Cubs pen and came from behind to tie and then go ahead two runs. Dave came home from an alumni meeting when the Cards were up in the 8th. He didn't know. The last time I had talked to him I told him that his team was winning 1-0. He couldn't see the TV. He asked about the game. I said,
"Do you want the good news or the bad news first?"
"The bad news."
"Your team is losing 4-3 in the 8th."
"What's the good news then?"
"I was right about your bull pen."
I had to explain to him why that was good news.
Oktoberfest work is piling up. I know it must be bad because I avoided some of it yesterday by cleaning the entire living room (front room in Chicago-speak) instead of doing Ofest work. And I mean cleaned. Once I had all of the furniture stacked on the area rug like some kind of poltergeist tower in order to mop the remaining border of hardwood floor with Murhpy's Oil Soap, I knew I was possessed. I must have vacuumed, mopped, and dusted up a few pounds of dark red dust from the recent tuckpointing and porch rebuilding on our building. The living room and the bathroom are now sanctuaries of pine-smelling clean. (I won't relate the details of cleaning the bathroom. I will only say that I am amazed that Dave and I are not bald.) The office -- where my work patiently waits for me -- is a sty. The pathways between piles of paper and items removed from the living room are the only spaces left clear for me to walk through -- that is when I am not tripping on the phone cord that shares the space since the office does not have one phone jack. I find myself thinking of the phone cord that trails out the office door and through the dining room to the the odd jack just past the bathroom door as my tether to salvation from this mess.
So the phone message was from a man who works on one of the Oktoberfest committees -- his company (he) donated $1000 to the Oktoberfest. Which is outstanding. Except that the deadline to get logos on tshirts was yesterday. I spent the morning on the phone with him, a woman in his office, and the woman who is doing the tshirts for us. I really have nothing to complain about. The tshirt woman was outstanding and helped me to make it happen. I had a Barbara Ann moment (or 30 of them) when I ended up chatting with the tshirt woman about life for a half hour. She is also a parishioner and a 37-year-old first time mom! We talked about having babies in our 30s, raising babies in the city, becoming a stay-at-home mom but maintaining a work life with at-home work projects (she started a greeting card company), etc. It was great. So actually, I should not be complaining at all, but rather be thankful for the opportunity to get to know the tshirt lady.
While I was online to send company names and info to various Ofest committees, I got an email from The Chronicle. The Chronicle is a weekly publication about life in academe. They also have a job section that publishes available positions and articles on getting jobs, writing CVs, etc. One of their regular columns is called First Person and is columns written by people out in the job market. They write about their failures and occasional successes in finding a job or changing jobs or dealing with family and work. They are often funny and usually informative, if not supportive/sympathetic articles. The Chronicle recently advertised a call for submissions for this coming academic year for people to write about their job hunt experiences. Ten people are picked to write about four columns each. And they get paid for it. I decided to give it a shot. I wrote an article according to the guidelines they stated. I rewrote the article, I made Dave read it, I deleted huge portions, I changed the jokes, I glossed over details to protect the innocent, I made final edits. I got the rejection this morning. I got rejected from a project that would have me write about getting rejected. How am I supposed to feel about this? The email was nice enough -- which is nice since I have had many other colder rejections from "real" jobs. I didn't realize how badly I wanted that gig. I may post my article later just to set it free.
At least I'm alive. Yesterday was not a good day in Chicago for people planning on staying alive. Six people and the gunman were killed in a warehouse shooting on the south side, two people were killed and several others seriously wounded in a terrible crash on the Eisenhower (causing one of the warehouse workers to be late for work and thus saved from a violent death), and a truck driver died after his tractor trailer crossed opposite lanes of traffic and plowed into some rowhouses setting them on fire.
And then there's baseball. Dave's Cubs are playing my Cards in St. Louis. We saw the end of Tuesday night's game. We went to the bar after my Ofest meeting. The pitcher for the Cubs that night -- Mark Prior -- is amazing. Though he is a Cub, I often find myself rooting for him. He is a super pitcher. He didn't pitch a complete game that night -- which he has been doing lately. The Cards lost the game, but got to see some of the Cubs' pen that night after Prior got pulled. I told Dave and Sean the bartender that the few runs the Cards scored at the end of the game were a positive in an otherwise negative outcome for losing the game. I acknowledged that the Cubs have some great pitchers, but said that my team just needs to get to the guys in the pen for a shot. They both said "Yeah, okay, but you lost." So last night the Cards had to face Wood. He got pulled in the 7th due to the number of pitches. Long 8th inning short -- the Cards ripped through the Cubs pen and came from behind to tie and then go ahead two runs. Dave came home from an alumni meeting when the Cards were up in the 8th. He didn't know. The last time I had talked to him I told him that his team was winning 1-0. He couldn't see the TV. He asked about the game. I said,
"Do you want the good news or the bad news first?"
"The bad news."
"Your team is losing 4-3 in the 8th."
"What's the good news then?"
"I was right about your bull pen."
I had to explain to him why that was good news.
Tuesday, August 26, 2003
More Thoughts
There are a few things I would like to blog -- but today is a crazy day. I have an Oktoberfest meeting tonight and much to do.
I regret my earlier posting on "The Heat Day." Yesterday it was 95. Today we will do the same. The computer and I can't take it. Luckily, the humidity is lower than it was last week. But still. I know it is hot when I tell myself at 9:30 am that I should wait until I have to leave for the meeting to take a shower since the better-smelling benefits of taking one now will be lost by then.
I have been thinking about hot dogs again. How is it that my hometown is not a hot dog city? Click here to read the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council's history on the dog in the US. St. Louis is linked to the history in at least two different possible ways (selling dogs at baseball games -- definitely, the invention of the hot dog bun in 1904, debatable). I'm going to have to look into this. I've done a little investigating so far. I read part of a (suburban) St. Louisan's blog about buying her nephew a hot dog in downtown St. Louis from a "bona fide hot dog stand." Really? How have I missed those?
I talked to Lucy about her Christmas outfit streak. She tried to claim that it was due to having to wear the dresses that belonged to older sisters when Mom dressed us alike, causing the youngest girl -- Lucy -- to enjoy some fashions for many consecutive years. No dice. The outfit in question was a Mom one-of-a-kind, light blue, corduroy jumper. I was looking through some of the pictures while we talked. A future blog may include a survey of all of the repeated Christmas outfits over time. I hadn't seen the patterns before. There are also a couple of good examples of 'the slippers I got this year' in there. Lucy mentioned having to wear navy blue Capezio's that had ribbon bows on them for many years due to the hand-me-down policy. I'm thinking now that maybe Lucy does not have feet as large as she claims, but rather used the excuse of having size 9 feet to avoid wearing black patent leather Mary Janes and navy blue Capezio's to this very day.
I regret my earlier posting on "The Heat Day." Yesterday it was 95. Today we will do the same. The computer and I can't take it. Luckily, the humidity is lower than it was last week. But still. I know it is hot when I tell myself at 9:30 am that I should wait until I have to leave for the meeting to take a shower since the better-smelling benefits of taking one now will be lost by then.
I have been thinking about hot dogs again. How is it that my hometown is not a hot dog city? Click here to read the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council's history on the dog in the US. St. Louis is linked to the history in at least two different possible ways (selling dogs at baseball games -- definitely, the invention of the hot dog bun in 1904, debatable). I'm going to have to look into this. I've done a little investigating so far. I read part of a (suburban) St. Louisan's blog about buying her nephew a hot dog in downtown St. Louis from a "bona fide hot dog stand." Really? How have I missed those?
I talked to Lucy about her Christmas outfit streak. She tried to claim that it was due to having to wear the dresses that belonged to older sisters when Mom dressed us alike, causing the youngest girl -- Lucy -- to enjoy some fashions for many consecutive years. No dice. The outfit in question was a Mom one-of-a-kind, light blue, corduroy jumper. I was looking through some of the pictures while we talked. A future blog may include a survey of all of the repeated Christmas outfits over time. I hadn't seen the patterns before. There are also a couple of good examples of 'the slippers I got this year' in there. Lucy mentioned having to wear navy blue Capezio's that had ribbon bows on them for many years due to the hand-me-down policy. I'm thinking now that maybe Lucy does not have feet as large as she claims, but rather used the excuse of having size 9 feet to avoid wearing black patent leather Mary Janes and navy blue Capezio's to this very day.
Monday, August 25, 2003
Some Thoughts
Dave and I splurged at Sam's and about an assortment pack of individual serving-size cereals. The assortment could be named "All the Cereals Your Mom Never Let You Buy." Somehow some Frosted Mini-Wheats slipped in between the Fruit Loops and Frosted Flakes, though. Anyway, I had a bowl of Frosted Flakes this morning. Are the boxes smaller now? Wow. Clearly, the usual serving size of cereal that I measure out for myself is way out of control. I thought about putting two boxes in one bowl. Then inspiration hit -- what if I mixed two different kinds of sugar-coated cereal in *one* bowl? No, the milk did not become the cool color I predicted.
I have been scanning my family's traditional Christmas pictures for preservation. Interesting to note that my sister Lucy wore the identical outfit in 1986, 1987, and 1988. My sister Rachael wore the outfit before her in 1985.
I spent part of last night looking through blog directories. I found a directory for St. Louis and one for Chicago. Common themes: most bloggers are male and (often) under the age of 30. Many bloggers are under the age of 22. Their interests include movies, anything sci fi, and all things technology. Blogging themes in Chicago include the Cubs, food, and on the occasional female blog, dating. Blogging themes in St. Louis include Christianity (?) and the Cardinals.
The Cardinals, Cubs, and Astros are all within a half game of each other at the top of the central division. This level of competition at this late date in the baseball season could create not-seen-before levels of stress for Dave and me as we cheer on (and occasionally curse at) our favorite teams. Dave is quietly optimistic about the Cubs, I am worried about the Cardinals' pitching. The really interesting thing is that neither of our teams would be worth squat were they competing in most other divisions in baseball. Go Cards!
Finally, our friend Frank loaned us the book Moneyball by Michael Lewis. Dave has already finished it and wants to buy it so that we can own it and he can read it again. I am halfway through it. It has changed our lives. We have become converts. We see baseball in a whole new way.
I have been scanning my family's traditional Christmas pictures for preservation. Interesting to note that my sister Lucy wore the identical outfit in 1986, 1987, and 1988. My sister Rachael wore the outfit before her in 1985.
I spent part of last night looking through blog directories. I found a directory for St. Louis and one for Chicago. Common themes: most bloggers are male and (often) under the age of 30. Many bloggers are under the age of 22. Their interests include movies, anything sci fi, and all things technology. Blogging themes in Chicago include the Cubs, food, and on the occasional female blog, dating. Blogging themes in St. Louis include Christianity (?) and the Cardinals.
The Cardinals, Cubs, and Astros are all within a half game of each other at the top of the central division. This level of competition at this late date in the baseball season could create not-seen-before levels of stress for Dave and me as we cheer on (and occasionally curse at) our favorite teams. Dave is quietly optimistic about the Cubs, I am worried about the Cardinals' pitching. The really interesting thing is that neither of our teams would be worth squat were they competing in most other divisions in baseball. Go Cards!
Finally, our friend Frank loaned us the book Moneyball by Michael Lewis. Dave has already finished it and wants to buy it so that we can own it and he can read it again. I am halfway through it. It has changed our lives. We have become converts. We see baseball in a whole new way.
Sunday, August 24, 2003
I'd Like to Supersize That
Dave and I just got back from Sam's Club. Let me just say, God bless Capitalist America.
We haven't been in almost a year. We braced ourselves for the suburban throngs equipped with our club cards, full bellies, and a list. We're a pretty good relay team once we're in the warehouse. Dave always drives the cart, I work as a scout an aisle ahead or in tight squeezes.
We had to laugh at ourselves today. We got so excited about the great deals. People have been asking us how married life is treating us -- I know that ours will always be a happy marriage when I can spend time with my husband shopping for home essentials and share the same giddy excitement about a finding a deal on 36 rolls of (quilted!) toilet paper.
Toilet paper. We were actually enjoying ourselves over the price of toilet paper. We were beside ourselves when we encountered the shampoo quantities that will outlast your hair supply, a poultry-farm's worth of frozen chicken breasts, and enough Sweet n' Low for oceans of coffee. The high point for me personally was finding my brand of tampons at a price I couldn't pass up, though I did hesitate at the size of the box. I'm pretty sure I'm supplied now for the rest of my child-bearing years.
We also got office supplies, some submarine computer game for Dave, a Harry Potter DVD for me, and countless other dry goods that have shelf-lives that may require us to pack them up when we move into a retirement community.
We didn't have to rationalize the the total price when we headed out into the blazing parking lot, we have experienced no buyer's remorse. And -- making the trip all the more enjoyable -- we didn't have to haul our plunder into the apartment in strangely shaped, poorly packed boxes. Sam's now has bags!
We haven't been in almost a year. We braced ourselves for the suburban throngs equipped with our club cards, full bellies, and a list. We're a pretty good relay team once we're in the warehouse. Dave always drives the cart, I work as a scout an aisle ahead or in tight squeezes.
We had to laugh at ourselves today. We got so excited about the great deals. People have been asking us how married life is treating us -- I know that ours will always be a happy marriage when I can spend time with my husband shopping for home essentials and share the same giddy excitement about a finding a deal on 36 rolls of (quilted!) toilet paper.
Toilet paper. We were actually enjoying ourselves over the price of toilet paper. We were beside ourselves when we encountered the shampoo quantities that will outlast your hair supply, a poultry-farm's worth of frozen chicken breasts, and enough Sweet n' Low for oceans of coffee. The high point for me personally was finding my brand of tampons at a price I couldn't pass up, though I did hesitate at the size of the box. I'm pretty sure I'm supplied now for the rest of my child-bearing years.
We also got office supplies, some submarine computer game for Dave, a Harry Potter DVD for me, and countless other dry goods that have shelf-lives that may require us to pack them up when we move into a retirement community.
We didn't have to rationalize the the total price when we headed out into the blazing parking lot, we have experienced no buyer's remorse. And -- making the trip all the more enjoyable -- we didn't have to haul our plunder into the apartment in strangely shaped, poorly packed boxes. Sam's now has bags!
Friday, August 22, 2003
The Heat Day
We were supposed to have a heat wave this week. The summer has been unusually mild this year, so a few days of heat really wouldn't be that horrible. Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday were slated for high 90s with high dew points to make it feel like it was 100 plus.
I don't think we broke 86 here on Tuesday or Wednesday. The humidity made it a little moist, but nothing too horrible. Yesterday was another story.
The heat index hit 110 even close to the lake. It was miserable. I had to create errands to have excuses to get out of our sauna of an apartment and sit in the comfort of an airconditioned car. I haven't been that uncomfortable in a long time.
A front was scheduled to move through last night. The excessive heat advisory was posted until 9:00 pm -- then we had the chance for storms due to the front. The storms formed over the lake, missing us entirely. We went to bed sticking to the sheets -- and woke up with the comforter on us.
I love the Midwest.
Today's high will be 78, then 80 and 82 on Saturday and Sunday respectively. Humidity is under control, and there is no rain predicted until Tuesday. There is a light breeze blowing through the apartment. I actually put on a long sleeved cotton shirt to take Dave to work today!
I apologize to those of you living points south of here where it is still hot. We have an office/guest room with clean sheets for the futon to protect you from the goose bumps...
I am sure I will regret this posting later.
I don't think we broke 86 here on Tuesday or Wednesday. The humidity made it a little moist, but nothing too horrible. Yesterday was another story.
The heat index hit 110 even close to the lake. It was miserable. I had to create errands to have excuses to get out of our sauna of an apartment and sit in the comfort of an airconditioned car. I haven't been that uncomfortable in a long time.
A front was scheduled to move through last night. The excessive heat advisory was posted until 9:00 pm -- then we had the chance for storms due to the front. The storms formed over the lake, missing us entirely. We went to bed sticking to the sheets -- and woke up with the comforter on us.
I love the Midwest.
Today's high will be 78, then 80 and 82 on Saturday and Sunday respectively. Humidity is under control, and there is no rain predicted until Tuesday. There is a light breeze blowing through the apartment. I actually put on a long sleeved cotton shirt to take Dave to work today!
I apologize to those of you living points south of here where it is still hot. We have an office/guest room with clean sheets for the futon to protect you from the goose bumps...
I am sure I will regret this posting later.
Thursday, August 21, 2003
Nervous Breakdown in Aisle Seven
I had to go to the grocery store yesterday. I hate going to the grocery store. I originally planned on using the hot weather as incentive -- we have no AC so a trip to the store would be refreshing, right? It didn't get as hot as they said it would and I remained comfortable until I saw the time and realized I would not be able to get to the store, back home, and then downtown to pick up Dave.
Plan B: We still had the cooler in the back of the car from our road trip and we needed only some essentials, so I planned to hit the store, buy some ice, chuck the perishables in the cooler, and then continue heading south to the loop to get Dave.
The store was strangely quiet for a weekday at 5:30 pm. Excellent. I grabbed the essentials (a few were even on sale!) and also had a nice chat with the lady at the deli counter about how to tame crazy hair on humid days. At the last minute, I decided to grab some Wheat Chex. I hit the aisle, grabbed a box on the fly, and then had to put on the brakes.
An elderly couple had parked their shopping cart on one side of the aisle and was standing in front of it trying to combine the powers of their dimming eyesight to read jelly labels. The woman saw me coming and gently nudged her husband into the shelves in front of them to let me pass.
But I was stymied again. A young woman looking very much like a Lincoln Park Trixie walked toward me and stood exactly between the elderly couple and their cart.
[Note: A Lincoln Park Trixie is a unique breed of 20-something females -- and some 30-somethings who wish they were 20-something -- who see themselves as some sort of Ally McBeal professional, single woman searching for the right (wealthy) man and live in the Lincoln Park neighborhood. They own Kate Spade bags and drive Volkswagens and live six to an apartment if necessary to afford the neighborhood. I can't really describe them. Click here to visit their society website. It started out as a few women making a parody of themselves back in 1990, but has grown to something much more. I'm afraid the typical trixie doesn't even realize she is making fun of herself.]
She stood there with a blank look on her face. The elderly woman didn't see her and was looking at me wondering why I was letting her crush her husband against a thousand jelly jars and wasn't moving. I said "Excuse me" and looked at the trixie so the elderly woman would know what was happening. The trixie looked at me and smiled. And stood there.
I nearly lost it. I took the aggressive approach and just started moving towards her.
Once I cleared that gauntlet I headed for the three out of twenty check out lanes that were open. I found one that had one woman and her 13-year-old-looking son at it. No line!! I moved in behind them. The mom was yelling at the son for not helping her put groceries on the belt. He stayed behind the cart and claimed he couldn't reach any of them. She ended up emptying the three different kinds of chips and four kinds of cookies and two tubs of ice cream et al. onto the belt herself. Then her son said, "Were you looking at the candy? I can get the one you want for you." Nice move.
The check out person scanned everything and then predictably looked at the mom to receive payment. The mom said, "Oh I'm sorry, we need to wait for my husband. He has the debit card."
What? I did not sign up for this. This is not how this works.
We waited. By this point, my blood pressure is higher than usual and I'm getting a vein on my forehead like Dad's. I've noticed that people have stopped making eye contact with me.
The husband showed up in a minute or so. Clearly, he doesn't often buy the groceries. He had never used one of the boxes that you swipe your own card on. He tried -- and failed. And then failed again. The mom and the check out lady tried to show him how it works. Nothing. It turns out that it probably wasn't his fault. Apparently, lots of ATM and debit machines have been devastated by the latest internet virus.
He found a credit card that worked. Then he signed the receipt. At which time he saw the total. "Does that say one hundred sixty-four?" He glanced at the ten bags, checked the total again and became upset. "What did you buy?"
"Honey, it's okay. We do this all the time." Not a good answer.
"What do you mean 'all the time?' What is so expensive?"
"You're the one who wanted the Boca burgers..."
They continued in this vein while the son helped himself to some variety of chips that were not a natural potato-chip color. Oh, and they didn't leave the check out lane.
So now my groceries are finally being scanned and I can't push my cart forward so that the nice looking (and very calm) young man who was bagging could load it up. The good-looking bagger kept bagging my things and then in one motion pulled their cart out of the way. He was maybe seventeen and had the darkest skin I've ever seen. His eyes were brilliant beacons on his face. He wore a bracelet of bright woven threads. He was tall and lanky. He worked quietly and efficiently.
The family continued fighting, but moved along with their groceries. I finally got my total, gave the checker my cash, and got my car keys ready while waiting for my change. At this grocery store, the change gets shot out of a separate machine near the customer so that the checker only has to deal with the big round numbers on paper money.
Not this time. My thirty-three cents did not shoot down the ramp like some kind of slot machine winnings. The checker gave me my eleven dollars and my receipt and shut the cash drawer. When I explained that I still needed thirty-three cents I got the strangest look. Had I asked for the impossible? Was the vein on my forehead pulsing now?
While the checker tried to figure out how to liberate my thirty-three cents, the bagger walked to the ice freezer, grabbed my bag of ice for me, put it in a shopping bag, put it in my cart, looked me straight in the eye and smiled.
Nervous breakdown averted.
Plan B: We still had the cooler in the back of the car from our road trip and we needed only some essentials, so I planned to hit the store, buy some ice, chuck the perishables in the cooler, and then continue heading south to the loop to get Dave.
The store was strangely quiet for a weekday at 5:30 pm. Excellent. I grabbed the essentials (a few were even on sale!) and also had a nice chat with the lady at the deli counter about how to tame crazy hair on humid days. At the last minute, I decided to grab some Wheat Chex. I hit the aisle, grabbed a box on the fly, and then had to put on the brakes.
An elderly couple had parked their shopping cart on one side of the aisle and was standing in front of it trying to combine the powers of their dimming eyesight to read jelly labels. The woman saw me coming and gently nudged her husband into the shelves in front of them to let me pass.
But I was stymied again. A young woman looking very much like a Lincoln Park Trixie walked toward me and stood exactly between the elderly couple and their cart.
[Note: A Lincoln Park Trixie is a unique breed of 20-something females -- and some 30-somethings who wish they were 20-something -- who see themselves as some sort of Ally McBeal professional, single woman searching for the right (wealthy) man and live in the Lincoln Park neighborhood. They own Kate Spade bags and drive Volkswagens and live six to an apartment if necessary to afford the neighborhood. I can't really describe them. Click here to visit their society website. It started out as a few women making a parody of themselves back in 1990, but has grown to something much more. I'm afraid the typical trixie doesn't even realize she is making fun of herself.]
She stood there with a blank look on her face. The elderly woman didn't see her and was looking at me wondering why I was letting her crush her husband against a thousand jelly jars and wasn't moving. I said "Excuse me" and looked at the trixie so the elderly woman would know what was happening. The trixie looked at me and smiled. And stood there.
I nearly lost it. I took the aggressive approach and just started moving towards her.
Once I cleared that gauntlet I headed for the three out of twenty check out lanes that were open. I found one that had one woman and her 13-year-old-looking son at it. No line!! I moved in behind them. The mom was yelling at the son for not helping her put groceries on the belt. He stayed behind the cart and claimed he couldn't reach any of them. She ended up emptying the three different kinds of chips and four kinds of cookies and two tubs of ice cream et al. onto the belt herself. Then her son said, "Were you looking at the candy? I can get the one you want for you." Nice move.
The check out person scanned everything and then predictably looked at the mom to receive payment. The mom said, "Oh I'm sorry, we need to wait for my husband. He has the debit card."
What? I did not sign up for this. This is not how this works.
We waited. By this point, my blood pressure is higher than usual and I'm getting a vein on my forehead like Dad's. I've noticed that people have stopped making eye contact with me.
The husband showed up in a minute or so. Clearly, he doesn't often buy the groceries. He had never used one of the boxes that you swipe your own card on. He tried -- and failed. And then failed again. The mom and the check out lady tried to show him how it works. Nothing. It turns out that it probably wasn't his fault. Apparently, lots of ATM and debit machines have been devastated by the latest internet virus.
He found a credit card that worked. Then he signed the receipt. At which time he saw the total. "Does that say one hundred sixty-four?" He glanced at the ten bags, checked the total again and became upset. "What did you buy?"
"Honey, it's okay. We do this all the time." Not a good answer.
"What do you mean 'all the time?' What is so expensive?"
"You're the one who wanted the Boca burgers..."
They continued in this vein while the son helped himself to some variety of chips that were not a natural potato-chip color. Oh, and they didn't leave the check out lane.
So now my groceries are finally being scanned and I can't push my cart forward so that the nice looking (and very calm) young man who was bagging could load it up. The good-looking bagger kept bagging my things and then in one motion pulled their cart out of the way. He was maybe seventeen and had the darkest skin I've ever seen. His eyes were brilliant beacons on his face. He wore a bracelet of bright woven threads. He was tall and lanky. He worked quietly and efficiently.
The family continued fighting, but moved along with their groceries. I finally got my total, gave the checker my cash, and got my car keys ready while waiting for my change. At this grocery store, the change gets shot out of a separate machine near the customer so that the checker only has to deal with the big round numbers on paper money.
Not this time. My thirty-three cents did not shoot down the ramp like some kind of slot machine winnings. The checker gave me my eleven dollars and my receipt and shut the cash drawer. When I explained that I still needed thirty-three cents I got the strangest look. Had I asked for the impossible? Was the vein on my forehead pulsing now?
While the checker tried to figure out how to liberate my thirty-three cents, the bagger walked to the ice freezer, grabbed my bag of ice for me, put it in a shopping bag, put it in my cart, looked me straight in the eye and smiled.
Nervous breakdown averted.
Wednesday, August 20, 2003
I'd Like One With Everything
There is nothing better than a good hot dog. I was reminded of this last night when I picked Dave up from work. Since there is no food in the house, I suggested we go get sandwiches or sandwich makings. I left the particular choice and location up to him. A few minutes after leaving downtown, we pulled into the parking lot of Demon Dogs.
I grew up in a dogless culture. Frozen custard? Sure. Toasted raviolis? You betcha. Thin crust pizza? The best there is. A hot dog with everything? Not that I'm aware of.
The only dogs I remember enjoying while growing up were at home (boiled when we were very young, later barbequed, for a time we feasted on the cheese *inside* the dog food fad), or grilled at the school picnic or baseball stadium. I also remember getting a dog at a tavern (girl scout field trip) owned by a family we knew who cooked their dogs on a grill after splitting them open lengthwise. Previous to that experience, I thought dogs were split like that only so that they would fit on orphan hamburger buns. The one thing I can find in common about some of those dogs is that they were cooked on a grill rather than boiled.
When I got older, I met and fell in love with a Chicagoan -- a real one who was born and raised within the city limits, he'll tell you. Chicagoans are a proud people. They are proud of their city, their sports teams, their pizza, and their hot dogs. My first experience with a Chicago hot dog was at Demon Dogs. Demon Dogs is tucked under the el tracks of the Brown (or Ravenswood) Line at the Fullerton el (elevated train) stop. Demon Dogs is on DePaul University's campus and is named for the DePaul Blue Demons. It is a shoebox of a place with paraphernalia from the band Chicago screwed onto every vertical inch of the place. I can never remember the actual connection -- I believe the owner of Demon Dogs is the father of one of the band members. I'll have to check with Dave.
When you walk into Demon Dogs you are immediately accosted by several women behind a long counter who are all wearing Demon Dogs t-shirts and hats who start screaming "Can I help you?" You should not approach the counter and expect to look at a menu. You should not approach the counter and ask any questions. You need to be aggressive and assertive and plainly belt out your order "Yeah, I need a dog with everything, no peppers, no celery salt." [Note: hot dogs in Chicago do not have ketchup on them. Ketchup is not a possibility. Kethcup is only for the very young, and even then it is questioned.]
The woman behind the counter will yell out to a person standing next to a wall of deep fryer baskets "I need one" (or "uno" as the case may be). This means fries. You don't have to order fries, they come with the dog. She'll call this out because every order of fries at Demon Dogs is fried to order -- no soggy ones left under a lamp to die. Someone else might ask you what you want to drink. Dave likes to get a small vanilla shake. I like a small Pepsi. The cups at Demon Dogs often have the name of some other restaurant on them. I haven't figured that one out yet. Your dog, fries, a drink will cost about what you have in your pocket in change.
We like to sit at the counter to eat -- you can also sit at a small collection of tables and chairs, and there is seating outside next to the el tracks. I forgot to mention that the music played at Demon Dogs is from the band Chicago (for example, "Hard Habit To Break") -- all the time, on a loop. I'm often amazed that the people that work there don't go ballistic and smash the gold records and plexiglass-protected horns. If you choose to sit outside, you are not neglected the Chicago experience -- the music is broadcast outside on loudspeakers.
Sitting at the counter inside is advantageous in that it is easy to go up and order your second dog. Unless you're there for snack, you'll need the second dog. Demon Dogs are Vienna Beef hot dogs (another Chicago tradition) that are boiled to perfection. The smallish dog comes on a steamed bun. "Everything" at most dog places in Chicago includes mustard (yellow), relish (sometimes an unnatural-looking bright green), onions (diced), tomato (slices that are cut in half), pickle (long enough to fit on the bun), sometimes celery salt (I don't know what it is, but a little on a dog is good), and sometimes hot peppers -- it depends on the place.
Dave and I have become hot dog connoisseurs. We saw a PBS documentary on hot dogs across the US and became obsessed. We use our "Eat Your Way Across the USA" to find places when we're on the road. We've made notes about other places we've seen or heard about. We've hit three new places in two states in the last couple of weeks.
We've already started plans to bring hot dogs to the city of my youth when we win the lottery. Naturally, they'll be cooked on grill. We will also offer the classic boiled Chicago dog -- oooh! and maybe a variation on the grilled dog on the 'garbage plate' that we saw (but didn't dare try) in Rochester earlier this month.
I'll have to post another time about the hot dog places we've visited.
I grew up in a dogless culture. Frozen custard? Sure. Toasted raviolis? You betcha. Thin crust pizza? The best there is. A hot dog with everything? Not that I'm aware of.
The only dogs I remember enjoying while growing up were at home (boiled when we were very young, later barbequed, for a time we feasted on the cheese *inside* the dog food fad), or grilled at the school picnic or baseball stadium. I also remember getting a dog at a tavern (girl scout field trip) owned by a family we knew who cooked their dogs on a grill after splitting them open lengthwise. Previous to that experience, I thought dogs were split like that only so that they would fit on orphan hamburger buns. The one thing I can find in common about some of those dogs is that they were cooked on a grill rather than boiled.
When I got older, I met and fell in love with a Chicagoan -- a real one who was born and raised within the city limits, he'll tell you. Chicagoans are a proud people. They are proud of their city, their sports teams, their pizza, and their hot dogs. My first experience with a Chicago hot dog was at Demon Dogs. Demon Dogs is tucked under the el tracks of the Brown (or Ravenswood) Line at the Fullerton el (elevated train) stop. Demon Dogs is on DePaul University's campus and is named for the DePaul Blue Demons. It is a shoebox of a place with paraphernalia from the band Chicago screwed onto every vertical inch of the place. I can never remember the actual connection -- I believe the owner of Demon Dogs is the father of one of the band members. I'll have to check with Dave.
When you walk into Demon Dogs you are immediately accosted by several women behind a long counter who are all wearing Demon Dogs t-shirts and hats who start screaming "Can I help you?" You should not approach the counter and expect to look at a menu. You should not approach the counter and ask any questions. You need to be aggressive and assertive and plainly belt out your order "Yeah, I need a dog with everything, no peppers, no celery salt." [Note: hot dogs in Chicago do not have ketchup on them. Ketchup is not a possibility. Kethcup is only for the very young, and even then it is questioned.]
The woman behind the counter will yell out to a person standing next to a wall of deep fryer baskets "I need one" (or "uno" as the case may be). This means fries. You don't have to order fries, they come with the dog. She'll call this out because every order of fries at Demon Dogs is fried to order -- no soggy ones left under a lamp to die. Someone else might ask you what you want to drink. Dave likes to get a small vanilla shake. I like a small Pepsi. The cups at Demon Dogs often have the name of some other restaurant on them. I haven't figured that one out yet. Your dog, fries, a drink will cost about what you have in your pocket in change.
We like to sit at the counter to eat -- you can also sit at a small collection of tables and chairs, and there is seating outside next to the el tracks. I forgot to mention that the music played at Demon Dogs is from the band Chicago (for example, "Hard Habit To Break") -- all the time, on a loop. I'm often amazed that the people that work there don't go ballistic and smash the gold records and plexiglass-protected horns. If you choose to sit outside, you are not neglected the Chicago experience -- the music is broadcast outside on loudspeakers.
Sitting at the counter inside is advantageous in that it is easy to go up and order your second dog. Unless you're there for snack, you'll need the second dog. Demon Dogs are Vienna Beef hot dogs (another Chicago tradition) that are boiled to perfection. The smallish dog comes on a steamed bun. "Everything" at most dog places in Chicago includes mustard (yellow), relish (sometimes an unnatural-looking bright green), onions (diced), tomato (slices that are cut in half), pickle (long enough to fit on the bun), sometimes celery salt (I don't know what it is, but a little on a dog is good), and sometimes hot peppers -- it depends on the place.
Dave and I have become hot dog connoisseurs. We saw a PBS documentary on hot dogs across the US and became obsessed. We use our "Eat Your Way Across the USA" to find places when we're on the road. We've made notes about other places we've seen or heard about. We've hit three new places in two states in the last couple of weeks.
We've already started plans to bring hot dogs to the city of my youth when we win the lottery. Naturally, they'll be cooked on grill. We will also offer the classic boiled Chicago dog -- oooh! and maybe a variation on the grilled dog on the 'garbage plate' that we saw (but didn't dare try) in Rochester earlier this month.
I'll have to post another time about the hot dog places we've visited.
Tuesday, August 19, 2003
Let's Just Be Friends
I recently started sending my resume rife with grad school out to temporary staffing agencies. While I haven't yet attempted to become a "Kelly Girl," I have been doing some investigating of other, smaller companies.
One of them responded the other day. "Are you still going to school?" I know the resume has one theme, but I thought the Degree: PhD, Received: May 2002 was a clue. I'm afraid my nightmares about school calling to say that there's something wrong and I need to take another class and defend the dissertation again will come back now. I told her "I am finished and I am never going back again."
Anyway, they don't "have anything" for me right now. She said it wasn't me. They just don't have a lot of jobs right now. She said they would keep my information but do not need me to come in and register with them. I should also wait "several weeks" before calling back.
I apologize here and now to every guy I ever broke up with.
One of them responded the other day. "Are you still going to school?" I know the resume has one theme, but I thought the Degree: PhD, Received: May 2002 was a clue. I'm afraid my nightmares about school calling to say that there's something wrong and I need to take another class and defend the dissertation again will come back now. I told her "I am finished and I am never going back again."
Anyway, they don't "have anything" for me right now. She said it wasn't me. They just don't have a lot of jobs right now. She said they would keep my information but do not need me to come in and register with them. I should also wait "several weeks" before calling back.
I apologize here and now to every guy I ever broke up with.
Back to School 2004?
My main source for job ads is the Chronicle of Higher Education which comes out weekly. The job section usually gets fat every September/October with postings for jobs that will start the following academic year. Since all hope has been lost on getting employment in academia for this academic year, I have been looking forward to a fat Chronicle in a month or so.
I was on a job website for jobs in my field yesterday just checking things out, getting the bookmark set, etc. Lo and behold -- a professor position in my field for 2004-2005?! I had to read it twice to make sure I didn't have anything confused. So, it appears the hunting season for 04-05 has opened, the trumpet has sounded -- and I need to get on my horse.
I was on a job website for jobs in my field yesterday just checking things out, getting the bookmark set, etc. Lo and behold -- a professor position in my field for 2004-2005?! I had to read it twice to make sure I didn't have anything confused. So, it appears the hunting season for 04-05 has opened, the trumpet has sounded -- and I need to get on my horse.
Sunday, August 17, 2003
Somebody Pulled the Plug
So Dave and I went to Rochester, NY the weekend of August 9th for a wedding. We drove from Chicago, IL to Toledo, OH the first night, then through Cleveland, OH and Buffalo, NY before arriving in Rochester, NY. Lots of fun.
After the super wedding (They had a box of treats waiting for us at the hotel?! Very Martha Stewart. How did they know we love licorice and M&Ms and goldfish and Altoids and water...), we drove back to Buffalo, NY to hit a hot dog place that is in our "Eat Your Way Across the USA" book (see future blog on hot dog places). After that stop we headed to Niagra to cross into Canada. We drove across Canada to Port Huron, MI, then up to Flint, MI, on to Frankenmuth, MI (this one will have to be a future entry also!), up to Bay City, MI and eventually across the state to Ludington, MI to see Dave's parents.
Long explanation for the short point that we drove across almost the entire region that was struck by the blackout only 24 hours after we left it. Some friends of ours asked us to check under the car to see if we had snagged some electrical cord and not noticed. Maybe it was caused by setting all of the hotel room air conditioners on 'high cool' while brewing tiny pots of coffee and attempting to dry our hair with those hair dryers attached to the bathroom walls like phones...
We had a great week-long roadtrip in the tradition of our old roadtrips: the Lake Tour (drove around Lake Michigan), the Eastern Excursion (across Canada--from Detroit--to Niagra to Boston to Cooperstown...), and the Ohio River Tour (yep, the entire Ohio River from Pittsburgh, PA to Cairo, IL).
After the super wedding (They had a box of treats waiting for us at the hotel?! Very Martha Stewart. How did they know we love licorice and M&Ms and goldfish and Altoids and water...), we drove back to Buffalo, NY to hit a hot dog place that is in our "Eat Your Way Across the USA" book (see future blog on hot dog places). After that stop we headed to Niagra to cross into Canada. We drove across Canada to Port Huron, MI, then up to Flint, MI, on to Frankenmuth, MI (this one will have to be a future entry also!), up to Bay City, MI and eventually across the state to Ludington, MI to see Dave's parents.
Long explanation for the short point that we drove across almost the entire region that was struck by the blackout only 24 hours after we left it. Some friends of ours asked us to check under the car to see if we had snagged some electrical cord and not noticed. Maybe it was caused by setting all of the hotel room air conditioners on 'high cool' while brewing tiny pots of coffee and attempting to dry our hair with those hair dryers attached to the bathroom walls like phones...
We had a great week-long roadtrip in the tradition of our old roadtrips: the Lake Tour (drove around Lake Michigan), the Eastern Excursion (across Canada--from Detroit--to Niagra to Boston to Cooperstown...), and the Ohio River Tour (yep, the entire Ohio River from Pittsburgh, PA to Cairo, IL).
Wednesday, August 06, 2003
The Umlaut
For some reason, my umlauts won't stay put. The umlaut is the two dots over the 'a' -- well, that should be there. By convention, when the umlaut is not possible, an 'e' is added after the vowel. So, 'kräht' becomes 'kraeht.' Lots of people with Germanic last names have their umlauts preserved with an 'e' in the "American" spelling. I think that's cool.
During World War II in Austria, the resistance used 'O5' as a label. The German word for Austria is österreich (with a capital O), or Oesterreich. Hitler thought it best to strip the name after Anschluß (or Anschluss -- but that's another orthography lesson) in order to help Austrians not think of themselves as Austrians.
Anyway, the resistance took their label from the name of their homeland -- 'O' plus 5 -- 5 being the fifth letter of the alphabet, which is 'e'. Thus, 'oe' or the first letter of their country. A roughly carved 'O5' is still visible in the stone of Stephansdom (St. Stephen's Cathedral) in Vienna, Austria -- or at least was in 1991 when I lived there with a wonderful old man named Arthur Preuss who lost his father and his own youth to the SS just before Anschluss. Arthur was captured by and then escaped from "the best dentists in Europe!" (because they remove all of your teeth) to spend the remainder of the war in the forest surrounding Vienna fighting with the resistance. His apartment almost 50 years later was covered in various stuffed and mounted wildlife. Arthur said he had become a good hunter during the war. He learned to sit in a tree for hours and could tell "from smell and sound what was a deer, what was a man, and what was a Nazi."
Arthur survived the war and was reunited with his love Brigitte. The two of them supplemented their income by having female American students live with them. They always chose women "to keep Brigitte company."
Arthur was an actor (his father had been a famous opera singer) and a drunk. He would come home late and go into the living room -- which was next to my room -- and put opera records on an ancient turntable and sing along. More than a few times, I ventured out of my room -- abondoning my German homework -- to sit in the tiny kitchen and wait for Arthur to finish his most recent aria. He would join me and we would eat ice cream and drink beer and talk. He would call me Bambi (he said my eyes were too big for a person) and we would talk. Sometimes he would tell me stories about the war or about the son who hadn't spoken to him in years. He would tell me about his father. He would become poetic when talking about his love for Brigitte. Most times he would get too drunk and too emotional. He would slip into German or Czech (his father's language) and sometimes get very angry or very sad.
Come to think of it, Arthur showed me a lot and taught me a lot. I haven't thought about him in a long time -- and to think this came up because of a stubborn umlaut...
During World War II in Austria, the resistance used 'O5' as a label. The German word for Austria is österreich (with a capital O), or Oesterreich. Hitler thought it best to strip the name after Anschluß (or Anschluss -- but that's another orthography lesson) in order to help Austrians not think of themselves as Austrians.
Anyway, the resistance took their label from the name of their homeland -- 'O' plus 5 -- 5 being the fifth letter of the alphabet, which is 'e'. Thus, 'oe' or the first letter of their country. A roughly carved 'O5' is still visible in the stone of Stephansdom (St. Stephen's Cathedral) in Vienna, Austria -- or at least was in 1991 when I lived there with a wonderful old man named Arthur Preuss who lost his father and his own youth to the SS just before Anschluss. Arthur was captured by and then escaped from "the best dentists in Europe!" (because they remove all of your teeth) to spend the remainder of the war in the forest surrounding Vienna fighting with the resistance. His apartment almost 50 years later was covered in various stuffed and mounted wildlife. Arthur said he had become a good hunter during the war. He learned to sit in a tree for hours and could tell "from smell and sound what was a deer, what was a man, and what was a Nazi."
Arthur survived the war and was reunited with his love Brigitte. The two of them supplemented their income by having female American students live with them. They always chose women "to keep Brigitte company."
Arthur was an actor (his father had been a famous opera singer) and a drunk. He would come home late and go into the living room -- which was next to my room -- and put opera records on an ancient turntable and sing along. More than a few times, I ventured out of my room -- abondoning my German homework -- to sit in the tiny kitchen and wait for Arthur to finish his most recent aria. He would join me and we would eat ice cream and drink beer and talk. He would call me Bambi (he said my eyes were too big for a person) and we would talk. Sometimes he would tell me stories about the war or about the son who hadn't spoken to him in years. He would tell me about his father. He would become poetic when talking about his love for Brigitte. Most times he would get too drunk and too emotional. He would slip into German or Czech (his father's language) and sometimes get very angry or very sad.
Come to think of it, Arthur showed me a lot and taught me a lot. I haven't thought about him in a long time -- and to think this came up because of a stubborn umlaut...
Tuesday, August 05, 2003
The Economy
If the economy is so tough right now, how come I can't get a parking spot at the mall?
I went to a mall in Skokie (just north of Chicago, still in Cook County) today to get several items needed for a wedding we are going to this weekend. Malls are good for that sort of thing -- various stores in one flower and fountain-filled obstacle course with pretty music playing where one can find the aforementioned several items: dress, underwear for dress, gift, wrapping paper, card, etc.
I couldn't find a spot within sight of the mall on a late Tuesday morning. Everyone there had SUV-sized strollers that were filled with packages more often than with kids. Okay, not everyone -- some older people being pushed around in wheelchairs by other people who also served as pack mules were also there. And some teenagers.
I was amazed at how many people buying so much stuff were there. Either the rich aren't feeling the dip in the economy, or it isn't so bad.
I went to a mall in Skokie (just north of Chicago, still in Cook County) today to get several items needed for a wedding we are going to this weekend. Malls are good for that sort of thing -- various stores in one flower and fountain-filled obstacle course with pretty music playing where one can find the aforementioned several items: dress, underwear for dress, gift, wrapping paper, card, etc.
I couldn't find a spot within sight of the mall on a late Tuesday morning. Everyone there had SUV-sized strollers that were filled with packages more often than with kids. Okay, not everyone -- some older people being pushed around in wheelchairs by other people who also served as pack mules were also there. And some teenagers.
I was amazed at how many people buying so much stuff were there. Either the rich aren't feeling the dip in the economy, or it isn't so bad.
Still Figuring It Out
I've been playing around with the template and my settings and trying to get a list of links posted. I'm frustrated that I can't get the umlaut (the two little dots that should be over the 'a' in 'kraeht' thus forcing me to use 'ae') to show up on the titles. Sometimes it's good, sometimes it isn't. Na ja. I could easily spend the morning trying to make everything happen -- but I'm not going to.
It's a beautiful morning in Chicago and I've got lots to do. I'm sure I'll end up back here later today.
It's a beautiful morning in Chicago and I've got lots to do. I'm sure I'll end up back here later today.
Monday, August 04, 2003
The Beginning
Testing one two three, testing one two three. Are we online?
This is my first attempt ever at blogging. Dave and I have been talking a lot lately about me starting one -- okay, I've been talking about it and Dave has been very supportive and encouraging and so finally tonight I took the plunge.
Who knows how this could grow...
This is my first attempt ever at blogging. Dave and I have been talking a lot lately about me starting one -- okay, I've been talking about it and Dave has been very supportive and encouraging and so finally tonight I took the plunge.
Who knows how this could grow...
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