the ocean

A Gala Affair

So as I believe I mentioned, I was involved in a benefit concert for my high school music department over the holiday break. This was certainly one of the more questionable decisions I have ever made, but it turned out to be kind of fun.


I was asked to wear a "forties costume" for my number, but since I had no time to go to the store and didn't exactly pack a fedora for the holidays, I wore this cardigan instead. I believe the expressions on my friends' faces indicate that they are embarrassed to be seen with me.

My sister played several important roles in this production as well, but none so important as designated driver. Here she is not drinking at the afterparty, which was held at a bar named "Backwaters." I guess "Daterapers" was already taken.

Triumphant Returns

Before I go any further, I want to say a few words about the Met-Rx World's Strongest Man Competition. It is on every year around the holidays, and it is one of the greatest things in the world. The contestants all have names like Lars and Magnus and weigh approximately 3000 pounds. They have to do things like lift an actual car or pull an airplane. There are overstressed tendons as far as the eye can see. And it's all edited at a breakneck pace so there's barely any waiting between events. Just enough time so that you can start to tell the difference between Mariusz and Vasyl. Don't miss it next year, trust me. For one thing, the contestants could put a serious hurt on you if you do.

Anyway, I have returned to Chicago after my holiday sojourn with my parents. The week went by surprisingly quickly. For one thing, I agreed to be in a benefit variety show for my high school music department that more or less took up two days of that week. (Yes, I realize that anyone with a discernible IQ could tell that trouble was coming just from the phrase "benefit variety show." The whole premise is that things that were cute when you did them at 16 will still be cute at 30. Big mistake.) And I'm not entirely sure, but I think I sort of got in trouble with my parents for staying out too late on Saturday night. Although there were $3 Long Island iced teas involved, so it was totally worth it.

How Are We Celebrating Christmas This Year?

-- Making small talk about the weather.
-- Giving that Ped-Egg infomercial some serious thought.
-- Training for Circus of the Stars, just in case.
-- Trying to avoid being trampled at Best Buy.
-- Praying that the children's choir avoids "O Holy Night" this year.
-- Blogging 4 Jesus.
-- Baking a ham, some shrinky dinks.
-- Trying to remember which church it was we decided we belong to last year.
-- Explaining to our distant relatives that we're not really all that into Mickey Mouse any more, but that we of course love the new sweatshirt, anyway.
-- Firing up the ol' hot glue gun.
-- Tolerating our friends and loved ones.
-- Crafting post-feminist, racially-neutral versions of our favorite Christmas carols.
-- Playing Sheep #4 in the living nativity.
-- Shaking when we laugh like a bowl full of jello.

Merry Christmas!

Have you ever noticed how the holiday season makes people lie? Ordinarily level-headed people send out Christmas letters in which they recast their spouses’ securities fraud convictions as "getting involved in judicial process" and their daughters’ work at Baby GAP as "early childhood education." They happily fleece their young ones into believing that a corpulently fat old man dressed only in long underwear and a cap is going to break into their homes while they sleep and that they should absolutely allow him to give them candy. They open package after package of handmade toaster cozies and Angela Lansbury workout videos and The L Word action figures with the most perfectly fraudulent expressions of glee. In many ways, the holidays are, for lack of a better word, a total sham, just like Madonna’s British accent or American Capitalism from the 1950s through the present.

Not, of course, that there’s anything wrong with that. The whole reason we lie around the holidays is because we want to make the people we care about happy. (Also because we’ve stopped taking our medication, but that’s a whole other story.) If we told our crazy aunts that we have rather limited needs for bedazzled t-shirts or, for that matter, any clothing prominently featuring the Smurfs, we would probably hurt their feelings. If we explained to our parents that we didn’t so much leave our jobs at the Hobby Lobby to "pursue other opportunities" as get fired for stealing yarn, we would likely break their little hearts. And if we told our nieces and nephews that the little people they see at the salad bar at the Shoney’s are not in fact elves but just ordinary folks who are very tired of being asked for Bratz dolls, well, that would actually probably be a good idea. Don and Charlene just want to get their bacon bits in peace.

So in that spirit of harmless self deception, this holiday message should probably read about as truthfully as the "casual encounters" section of Craigslist. Beginning with a litany of dubious professional accomplishments like being named Best Dressed by the 41st floor secretarial pool and winning the Long John Silvers popcorn shrimp essay contest, I should segue into a series of highly questionable personal anecdotes about my life-changing experience getting thrown out of the Big Brothers/Big Sisters program and how I once made out with a certain supporting cast member from TV’s Becker. It would not be unwise to make up a child, preferably named Jennifer or Moesha, whose awkward adolescence and starring role in the sixth grade production of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf would teach us all wonderful lessons about life and the American Dream. If possible, I should include some sort of reference to having a twelve-inch penis. That’s the sort of holiday message everyone can enjoy.

But it turns out I can really only lie if the subject is whether those pants make you look fat or where I was until 3 AM the night before taking the SAT. (Sorry, mom, there wasn’t really an emergency meeting of the chess team.) So I’m forced to report the same rather ordinary facts I share every year. I’m still an attorney in Chicago, where I divide my practice pretty evenly between representing Fortune 500 companies and representing guys with unpronounceable names who got the shit kicked out of them by various governments in Africa. I’m still writing and performing occasionally at venues where the "talent" is billed well below the $3 Miller drafts and free popcorn. And I’m still living in Wrigleyville, where Chicago has its highest concentration of flip cup tournaments and lowest concentration of parking spaces per person. It is, as they say, a Wonderful Life. But also a Hard Knock Life. Frankly, it’s hard to know who to believe.

Elder Care

As with most of my visits to Quincy, I've spent a good deal of time over this break attending to my 97-year-old grandmother. On Monday we had our big trip to the hairdresser (Hair Affair, to be exact), which actually required a crew of three to execute. One person had to walk in front, providing balance support, with another behind as a catcher in case there was some sort of fall. The third person served as the driver and, accordingly, as the absorber of all pithy comments about the 1940s. I was relegated to front man status as a result of the incident two years ago when I dropped my grandmother on her front lawn on Christmas Eve. Christmas Eve has been cancelled in my family ever since.

Anyway, we managed to get my grandmother her permanent, which oddly enough lasts only for a week. I discovered that her hairdresser plays Rush Limbaugh at top volume (Caroline Kennedy was the hot topic of the day) and stocks her waiting area with back issues of The Sun and Weekly World News. In light of this, it is frankly pretty surprising that they managed to get me to leave.

Yesterday we were then put to work around her house. I got the task of moving objects from one part of her house to the other, because an item like the box for a chair massager is something you're definitely really going to want to hold on to. Then we worked on filling up her books of the fifty state quarters, which she has now spent more time on than any single actual job during her lifetime. I'm not quite sure why, because she quite frankly admits she detests them. In fact, at the close of our session of pounding coins into a book with a prescription bottle, she tried to force me to take them. And I may well, as I definitely need the parking meter money.

Let's Get Physical

I went to the gym with my mother today. There is, of course, no better way to get a hardcore workout. My mother has a glass hip and has twice fallen off the treadmill while mall walking, so it is always an adventure. She also sometimes wears jean shorts for her sprints, but today she had to opt for the warmer comfort of track pants. Anyway, the college she and my dad work out has a pretty decent fitness center, so I thought it would at least be preferable to riding the '70s exercise bike in our basement. Although there is a collection of highly dated Entertainment Weeklies that accompanies the bike, so I did miss out on the latest on Friends.

Anyway, I did a quick run on the track, where I raced with an old man who was talking to himself, and lifted a bit in the weight room, where there were a bunch of bros spotting each other in the most homoerotic manner possible. I also had a quick pee, during which I learned that locking the door to the bathroom does not, in fact, keep it from opening when someone turns the handle. And of course I slammed my pecs and blasted my delts. It's just what I do.

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

It took me about five and a half hours to drive across the state to my parents' house yesterday. Now, I know what you're thinking -- you didn't even know that there was five and a half hours worth of Illinois available to drive across -- and normally it is true that it would not take quite this long. But I was driving in a wind so strong it slammed the car door in my face at Arby's, which slowed me down a bit. And there was snow blowing everywhere, which meant I couldn't tell if that white Taurus behind me was a cop or just someone with really bad taste in automobiles. Oh, and it was so cold that my windshield wiper fluid actually froze to my windshield in two big Pollockesque blotches and I had to stop at the Stop N Go to clean it off. Winter travel is, in fact, the finest.

I arrived to find my family struggling to assemble our artificial Christmas tree, largely because my father had decided he didn't want to bother with matching the branches by size before inserting them. This had resulted into a bit of a Frankentree, or what you would imagine Christmas must look like on the Island of Dr. Moreau, although without Marlon Brando in a mumu. Once that situation had been remedied, we had a lovely quiet evening, interrupted only periodically by my cries of triumph over my various Facebook Scramble wins.

Overnight, however, the situation transformed dramatically as one of our dogs decided to bark literally all night long. I don't know if it was from the excitement of having everyone back in the house or just generally from hating us, but it was a fairly sleepless night. Or, okay, well, I'm lying. It was a sleepless night for my parents and my sister; up on the second floor I heard almost nothing and got a full eight hours. But everyone was cranky today as a result, so clearly I am a victim, too. For God's sake, why won't you let me be a victim?

Missing Persons

So it's been a while, I suppose. I have lots of great excuses. Wednesday I was digging my car out from the storm. Friday I was again digging my car out from the storm. Tomorrow I will likely again be digging my car out from the storm. It's a truly wonderful world, you know that?

Thursday I went with Former Roommate Liz to her office holiday party. As everyone knows, it is always way better to go to someone else's office party, as there is no need to behave oneself. I had two glasses of red wine on an empty stomach and went sort of crazy. Not in the stabbing people with forks sense or the taking off my pants sense, just in the making a lot of friends from accounting and marketing sense. Also in the attacking the quesadilla buffet like it was my job sense. That was truly good times.

Last night I had a friend in town from college who I only see about once a year. It's honestly pretty surprising how well a year of my life can be summed up in only a couple of hours. Especially with the aid of alcohol. I think when I see people I don't see that often they're primarily interested in seeing if I've gotten fat, anyway, though, so I don't get too terribly worried about being a sparking conversationalist.

Tomorrow I'm heading back to my parents' house for the holidays. Many pet-related anecdotes to follow, no doubt.

Shop 'til You Drop

I am traditionally a terrible gift giver. I once accidentally got my mother a second copy of a book she already had. My sister's gift this year is that I'm paying one of her parking tickets. I have been known to actually purchase people aqua socks. I am apparently insufficiently attuned to the needs of others. My own needs, however, I'm right in touch with. I am constantly buying myself gifts and have received few or no complaints.

But regardless of how awful one is at gift giving, during the holiday season it's pretty hard to opt out. I've tried pretending to be Jewish, and that didn't do it. I thought about claiming some sort of holiday-based Christmas tragedy (mistletoe poisoning, perhaps?). But ultimately I just decided I'd better suck it up and hit the stores on State street. Good lord was that a mistake.

There were children swarming everywhere. One of them vomited in a Sarah Jessica Parker fragrance display. (So at the very least he had taste.) People were darting from counter to counter as though exchanging money for goods and services is going out of style. (And as to my Confederate money, apparently it is.) A sales associate took twenty minutes to wrap one of my presents in blindingly shiny gold paper, telling me the story of her battle with feline baldness the entire time. I was physically menaced by a nun over the last box of Frango mints.

This is what the holidays are all about.

Lesser Known Nefarious Blagojevich Schemes

-- Pitching role for wife on hit Oxygen TV series "The Bad Girls Club."
-- Rerouting Red Line trains to his living room.
-- Accepting cash in exchange for title of Miss Chicago Pork Queen 2007.
-- Pushing for Tina Fay in role of Blagojevich for inevitable SNL parody.
-- Placing personal purchases on wife's Dominicks Fresh Values Card.
-- Attempting to convince the makers of the major motion picture "Hancock" that he had named the John Hancock center for them.
-- Peddling fake nude photos of Oprah.
-- Marketing haircut as possibly the next "Rachel."
-- Selling naming rights to his '98 Grand Am.
-- Cheating in 2006 Wrigleyville flip cup tournament.
-- Putting Debra Messing back on prime time television.
-- Understudying lead role in Lyric Opera production of "Porgy & Bess."
-- Always trying to steal your Lucky Charms.

Many Happy Returns

I am quite frankly surprised that The Mummy Returns has not been the subject of more doctoral dissertations. I watched it one and a half times on FX tonight, and it is truly rich with intellectual content. Although people probably think of it primarily as a careful historical study of the Imhotep dynasty in Egypt, it is also a philosophical treatise well on par with anything by Camus or Sartre. And of course every word is pure poetry; one can't help but mentally diagram the sentences as one watches, and those diagrams dance on the sweetest wings of gossamer.

The greatest thing about The Mummy Returns (and The Mummy, for that matter, though I've not yet seen The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor and thus cannot comment on its content) is that it treats the ancient Egyptian religion as being in fact the one and only true and correct religion. The Egyptian afterlife actually exists and mummies go to and from there with shocking regularity. Prayers to gods like Anubis and Osiris are wholly effective. Old Egyptian religious texts make magic happen. Frankly, I think it's all a bit of a threat to Our Christian Nation. Where was James Dobson on this one, huh?

I have to admit that this is not the first (or first and a half, I guess) time I have seen The Mummy Returns. Once, when I was in college and at my parents' house over break, they went out of town for the weekend. My sister and I had a party, which apparently in our view at the time involved getting chili cheese dogs from the Sonic and watching both Mummy movies back to back. There was no one else on the guest list. But who needs friends when you've got Brendan Fraser in the room, right? He's a complete wiz at Scattergories.

Oh Say Can You See

I somehow inexplicably forgot to mention the hilarious consequences of my visit to the optometrist on Friday. No, they did not replace the eye chart with suggestive photos of George H.W. Bush or make funny noises during the glaucoma test, although both of those are quite frankly sterling ideas. After three full years of making the false claim that I would "come back on a Saturday" to have my pupils dilated, I finally got my bluff called. So I lost my close vision for a couple of hours, although on the plus side it turns out I do not in fact have large tumors in my eyes. I'm always thankful for the little blessings.

As a result of my temporary blindness, however, I had to have the ladies at the front desk help me pick out my new glasses, which was a primer in questionable taste. I did have to inform them that men do not wear teal-colored frames and that transitions lenses are not the height of youthful fashion. I nearly got in a fight with them over a pair of exceedingly round frames that, to be completely truthful, sort of made me look like Mr. Moneybags. The words "I'm the one who has to wear them, you know" were actually uttered.

Then, upon my return to the office, I had to ask my secretary to come in and read my e-mails to me. I wouldn't want to miss any funny forwards, you know.

Mistakes Were Made

Let me just come right out and admit that I had a bit too much to drink last night. Long story short, I went to a party where the vodka was high quality and plentiful. I put a lot of that vodka inside of me. This led to an evening of exceptional and uncomfortable frankness. For instance, I shared my controversial views of which co-workers smelled like Roseanne Arnold's digestive tract or dressed like Austin Powers. I also regaled the assembled crows at length with the story of the time I invented the beer and coke and the natural and necessary consequences of its consumption. After the party, our plan was to go out, but we somehow accidentally ended up at my house instead, where we made toast and drank large glasses of water. We ended up lying on the floor in my kitchen, where my friend Ashley proceeded to leave colorful voicemail messages for essentially every single person in her phone book. I also threw my gym bag into the fireplace and drew a rather unflattering sketch of Nicole Kidman getting botox injections on a piece of junk mail. I went to sleep in my clothes with Telemundo inexplicably playing in the background.

I must remind you at this point that I am a person of exceptional class and dignity.

"O" my God

Oxygen is for some reason showing back-to-back episodes of Tyra. And I am for some reason watching them.

First, there was an episode featuring Beyonce. Tyra forced her to make small talk with an adoring fan who somehow credited Beyonce's first album with changing her life. Beyonce tried to claim that the fan had changed her life in return, which made no sense. Also, they seemed to not have a chair for Beyonce, which made things deliciously awkward. Were they not expecting her?

Tyra claimed that her show had brought out "a different side" of Beyonce. Which side was that, exactly? The Nobel prize winning physicist?

Now they're showing one of Tyra's famous "social experiment" episodes. But no, there is no fat suit involved. She is simply forcing people to do the unthinkable and go without their weaves or their fake tans. We just found out the weave girl gives all of her weaves names and named one of them Tyra. There's also a girl who won't ever go without makeup and started sobbing while telling a story about how she once tried to reapply makeup in a pool. Really classic stuff.

This is possibly one of the most ridiculous entries I have ever written. And it's all just reportage, folks. I'm a regular Campbell Brown.

Snow Job

Mother Nature has apparently decided to fuck with me. After four days of perfectly decent weather in Quincy, it suddenly began snowing fiercely for my drive back across the state. Five and a half hours of cornfields isn't exactly the most thrilling trip to begin with, but once you take away the sun and add driving snow, it becomes even less engrossing. I was struggling just to stay awake for the first hour or so, despite my best efforts to remain awake by singing along with Solange Knowles. (It hasn't worked for Solange, either, judging by her general "tired seahorse" expression.) I did a bit better after stopping for cheese fries and six cokes with my sister in Champaign, but then I had to contend with the approximately sixteen hundred drivers in northeast Illinois who do not understand that the passing lane is not for parking. Oh, and truck drivers who seem to believe that swerving wildly is the best way to say "hello." God bless them, every one.

Then today I awoke to Chicago's first real snowfall of the season which, for some reason, annually causes everyone to lose it even though we have about five months of snow every year. Although it primarily runs underground, the Red Line does its best Trans-Siberian Express and moves rather literally at a glacier's pace, while all the cab drivers of the greater metro area careen around like Courtney Love at the Icecapades. Anticipating a commute something along the lines of To Build A Fire, I bundled myself up and headed out into the streets, only to discover upon arrival at work that my secretary and I had chosen the same outfit -- khakis and sneakers. Luckily, I keep several pairs of dress shoes at the office for just such a situation.

It is going to be another long winter.