the ocean

How I Spent My Secretary's Summer Vacation

My secretary is on vacation for two weeks. In the meantime, I have possibly the most terrifying floater secretary of all time. We'll call him Terry, to protect the innocent, by which I mean me.

My introduction to Terry came when I emerged from my office one morning to find him standing at Lisa's desk in a pair of rubber gloves, disinfecting everything in sight. As I've never known Lisa to lick her keyboard, I was slightly surprised, but decided to roll with it. As the day progressed, however, I found that Terry likes to ask me for permission to do everything. I mean everything. He knocks on my door to ask if it's okay for him to go get a cup of coffee. He phones me before he heads to the bathroom. I know way more about Terry's digestive schedule than anyone really should.

Terry also calls me Steve, for some reason, and refers to my colleague Erinn as "sir."

Yesterday at 9:30 Terry came into my office unannounced and asked, simply, "Didja hear about the Bennigans?" I had not. But you can be he filled me in. And also shared some of his unconventional economic theory. I can't help but think there's a cabinet post in his future.

Hide and Seek

Sometimes I become obsessed with finding things that I don't really need that much but KNOW I HAVE somewhere in this mess. Tonight, apparently, is one of those nights. I have spent most of my evening looking for a paper I wrote in law school. In the process, I have found about a hundred old holiday cards, including those from my insurer and my tax guy, several very informative syllabi, perhaps a dozen ads for various products I would never consider buying, and what appears to be the mutilated remains of a Captain Crunch box. But no paper. Anywhere.

I also went down to my storage locker, dragged out my old (dead) laptop, and brought it upstairs in hopes that it would somehow miraculously revive itself and bring forth this paper. Perhaps unsurprisingly, it just beeped at me and told me to "enter the command function," whatever that means. I tried typing in words at random, but that somehow failed to produce results. I also tried shaking it and blowing on it, but then I realized it wasn't a Nintendo. So no luck there.

The really sad thing is that I know I'm going to lie awake at night wondering where the hell this paper is now. Despite the fact that my actual need for a paper on criminal trials in the Reconstruction-era South is admittedly somewhat low.

True Terror, Thy Name is Brandi C.

I know I've said it before, but it bears repeating that Comcast On Demand is a truly wonderful thing. Besides allowing me to have my weekly Gladiator fix whenever I want it (welcome back at long last, Atlasphere!) it also helps me enjoy the cheesy movies of the 1970s at the drop of a hat (likely a fedora). Last night we watched The Amityville Horror. The special effects were terrible -- mainly flashing lights followed by an exceedingly intense reaction and heavy soundtrack -- and Margot Kidder inexplicably wore an Ace bandage much of the time. The acting was frequently downright hilarious, with many sudden shifts from joy to rage to what appeared to be digestive distress. My sister, who had told me it was scary, later disclaimed that she really just mean that "she thought it would be scary to me." Mitt Romney is scary. This was just kind of unpleasant.

Speaking of which, I have to admit that I don't completely love VH1's I Love Money. I thought it would be fun to see some of my favorite VH1 fame whores again without the pretense of wanting to date an unattractive former celebrity, but it turns out it's mainly just a lot of yelling. For the most part they barely even bother to have challenges. I guess Mr. Boston just wasn't ready to carry his own series yet. Who knew?

To the Max

I finally saw The Dark Knight Tuesday. We got our tickets a week in advance and we still had to sit in the third row on the left side. And it was a 10 PM show, which meant I had to drink two Diet Cokes before going there and sneak a box of Mike & Ikes in just to stay awake. Plus we saw it at the Navy Pier IMAX, where I thought there was going to be a riot on the way in even though the seating was reserved. But cooler heads prevailed and Maggie Gyllenhaal's Greatest Work safely unspooled.

I have to say that I thought it was pretty durned good. There was a bit less of the random Important Philosophizing that almost killed the first movie, and much less Katie Holmes, which makes everything better. My office building played a major role, which was kind of fun, because it made me feel like I work with Batman, who would make an excellent securities litigator. I also found the IMAX to be far more enjoyable than it was for the last feature I attended at one, which I believe had something to do with space. The only thing I would say is that they really need to turn down the bass on Batman's voice, because it is likely to send folks with weaker constitutions into shock. Also no movie needs to be two and a half hours long. I got places to be, people.

Summer Fun 2000!

I realize I've been way short on pictures lately. And from what I hear, they're worth some ridiculous number of words. So here are some shots from this summer. For some reason, I think they're uploading ridiculously tiny.

This is from the Minnesota trip, which was obviously very fancy. It's nice that the driver decided to pose for the photo, too.

This is from when my friend Katie came back to town. We're dancing, in a bar where there is no dancing. Also, I look like Fat Albert.
I don't know what's going on here (and I didn't at the time, either), but I need to make that face more often. It's good for any occasion.
Apparently, I am a vampire.

Injuries

Well, I am once again an invalid. Coming up the steps from the Red Line the other day, I managed to somehow catch my flip flop and take a phenomenal dive past someone carrying a baby carriage down the steps and into the cold hard concrete. The result is a series of rather attractive cuts and bruises across my arms and legs. And a lovely little limp when I walk. I don't know if it's necessarily possible to die of clumsiness, but I am certainly giving it my best shot.

But the good news is that I finally saw College Road Trip starring the effervescent Raven Symone and the incomparable Martin Lawrence. You know how some times you watch things thinking they'll be amusingly bad? Well, sometimes they're just bad. Raven delivered her trademark enormous facial expressions and constantly exclamatory line readings, but the rest of the cast just couldn't keep up, excepting the trained pig. There were probably as many deleted scenes on the DVD as there were actual scenes in the movie, which I think demonstrates the problem: they left some scenes in the movie. On the plus side, there was a Raven music video. I'm sure it'll be tearing up the Billboard charts any day now.

Evening News

Apparently I got bitten up by some mosquitoes this weekend. Either that or my legs are going through puberty. The odd thing to me is that I didn't even notice until I got back from the trip, and then all of the sudden my legs felt like the braille edition of Danielle Steele's Star. It's all gloriously sexy, I assure you.

Project Runway debuted tonight. It's early to have much to say about the contestants, or even in fact to know their names, but there were a few I hated right of the bat. And seriously, why so many tablecloths? They told you that the challenge was about innovation, so stable some arugula to a bag of Funyons and let's call it a day.

Yesterday my trainer had me do some exercise for my obliques that has left me largely paralyzed from the waist up. But I am going to be one hardass paraplegic, I assure you.

Beaches

This weekend we went to my friend's beach house in Michigan. Well, before I get too glamorous sounding, let me clarify that it is my friend's parents' beach house and that they just rent it for a week every year. Also that the beach in question is on the shores of Lake Michigan, so there is always the possibility of a syringe washing up alongside your beach volleyball game. But regardless, it was totally fun and awesome and made me feel like Diddy heading to the Hamptons or something. Although again, to be clear, I did not found Dannity Kane and I rarely if ever pack heat.

The forecast for the weekend was really terrible -- a 100% chance of thunderstorms predicted for parts of Saturday, in fact -- so it was especially thrilling when it did not rain at all. In fact, it was just about perfect weather, although the water was cold enough to make me draw back in an amusingly wussy fashion each time I wandered a bit deeper. Of course, as a veteran overpacker, I had prepared for the alleged rain by filling my trunk with board games, none of which ever saw the light of day. A very sad day for Taboo, I must say.

And in case you are wondering, the traffic was blessedly light. Although I am still smarting over the fact that I paid $3.00 to cross a bridge into Indiana. Paying to get out of Indiana I can see.

Le Cirque

I saw Cirque du Soleil on Wednesday night. I was a little disappointed to discover that it didn't have anything to do with TV's Punky Brewster, Soleil Moon Frye, but it was generally pretty enjoyable. They had these crazy bendy chicks who could tie themselves into a whole variety of boy-scout-approved knots, and a guy who stacked a whole lot of chairs on top of each other and then needlessly did headstands and stuff on them. There was also a juggler with a blindingly sparkly suit and an assistant who really didn't do much of anything the whole time, and a high wire act that seemed to involve more irony than most. It really was a lot like your classic circus, only with better production values and without the rampant abuse of animals and freaks.

Of course, they also had clowns. French Canadian clowns. Who did a lot of aggressive pantomiming. And made fart jokes. That was about where I hit my whimsy limit. Clowns of any kind are disturbing, but clowns who seem to express a certain existential ennui are more than I need.

Also, soft drinks were like six dollars and they sold something called a "two hot dog combo" for $24. Unless the hot dogs were combined with, say, a string of diamonds, I'm not really sure that's such a great value.

Topics of Discussion for A Nine Hour Car Ride

-- Whether the traffic will, in fact, ever move.
-- The virtues of Perkin's versus Applebees.
-- Potential locations for pulling over to pee in the woods.
-- How terrible Mamma Mia! is possibly going to be.
-- Which rest stops look the least likely to end in one's tragic and senseless murder.
-- Things one would rather be doing than sitting in traffic in the Wisconsin Dells.
-- How kind of disturbing it was that ALF always wanted to eat cats.
-- How kind of disturbing it was that one actually watched ALF.
-- Why Nicole Kidman's face never moves.
-- Whether Nicole Kidman's baby will be born with an immobile face.
-- Methods of avoiding falling asleep while driving.
-- Oprah.
-- Which other motorists are most deserving of a good sideswiping.
-- Why on Earth a person would pay $1.80 for the privilege of driving twenty miles on a lousy Illinois highway.
-- The sweet release of death.

On Wisconsin

So the drive up to the twin cities took six hours, but the trip back took nine. Apparently so many Chicago-area families felt the need to spend America's Birthday watersliding in the Waterpark Capital of the World that the highway through the Dells became a two-lane parking lot. We decided to stop for a chicken strip melt at the Perkins (in a most tempting proposition, they were accepting applications), but the traffic was still absurd when we emerged. And the food coma my meal put me in almost forced me off the road on more than one occasion. My heroic efforts to sing along to the Dreamgirls soundtrack were pretty much all that kept me awake.

Takeaways from the trip? Minnesota accents are mad awesome. Mike & Ikes should not be consumed in mass quantities. Couples ought not to have long pauses in their weddings where they listen to a song that's meaningful to them and stare at each other. And there has never been a good wedding DJ, unless it's a dead wedding DJ.

It's nice to be back on my native soil.

Drunkblogging my Trip to Minneapolis

I am in Minneapolis this weekend for a wedding. I have not been to Minneapolis since I was a child, so all I really remember about it is that the science museum had some awesome dinosaurs. I have not yet seen any dinosaurs this time around. But those velociraptors are pretty crafty, so they may be hiding under the credenza or something.

Today was the wedding. I was just the guest so I didn't know anyone there. The ceremony was outside and a wild cat wandered into the middle of it. Also I accidentally walked in on the grandmother of the groom in the restroom. So completely hot you have no idea.

I drank a good deal of red wine at the reception and am now fairly weepy. I am afraid I will cause the keyboard to short circuit with my many needless tears. There are worse ways to go, I suppose. For instance sharks.

Tomorrow we are heading back. I hope we stop at Arby's again for lunch. You know I love my Big Beef and Cheddar.

Liveblogging the Latest Edition of Time Out Chicago

Front cover -- The hard hitting cover story? Hot dog stands. Although the illustration on the cover does appear to depict an exploding hot dog, so perhaps there is terrorist involvement.

Page 2 -- It turns out that there are actually people who take the time to write letters to this magazine. Or at least people on their staff who take the time to write fake letters.

Page5 -- There is a scary picture of a man with blue face paint and some kind of fuzzy hoodie on. I must turn the page quickly.

Page 8 -- Has there ever been a week when the "heard on the street" column wasn't completely made up?

Pages 13 to 24 -- Yes, they really did devote eleven pages to hot dogs.

Page 28 --I'm boycotting the restaurant reviews until they give Arby's its due.

Page 41 -- Finally, a visitor's guide to Evanston! It's a perfect companion to my guide to suicide and other forms of self mutilation.

Page 57 -- This advertisement is a godsend, as I always choose my allergists from second-rate infotainment publications.

Page 73 -- You can always tell the comedy section because there are people making crazy faces. Also because it is labelled "comedy" along the side, but mainly because of the crazy faces. Although I think Maya Angelou did some for the book section once.

Page 85 and 86 -- I love that they always put the gay and lesbian section next to the kids section. It's like they're trying to get angry letters from fundamentalists.

Page 90 -- George Michael is touring? Moreover, George Michael is still alive?

Page 107 -- There's some sort of weird formatting thing going on here. Maybe it's the gutters. Or the kerning. Yes, I am just using random publishing terms.

Page 119 -- Ah, the sex column. Never has sex seemed less appealing. Except on The Golden Girls.