Thankful for Chicago

Things in Chicago for which I am thankful
(and while I love them, I’m staying away from the obvious things like the Lake and the Cubs)

The CTA

It’s like dating a bad boy or having that friend. Unpredictable, frequently late, crowded, frustrating. But it serves a purpose. And it’s worth it for those moments. Like on the brown line when you cross the Chicago river or on the 145 or 146 on Lake Shore Drive and you get that view of the Lake Front. For those moments of “Wow” I’m grateful.




Two sided.

If you get a card from me, 99% of the time I purchased it at Two Sided. They have the best selection of cards and wacky unique gifts. Plus it usually smells nice because of all the different candles in there. And they have dog biscuits outside the store. That’s just cuteness all around.


Large Intelligentsia skim lattes with three packets of Splenda.

The foam is crack. My crack. When I take that first sip I have to resist moaning out loud. Public displays of java orgasms are just not cool.


Matilda’s and it’s bartenders.

My local. My home away from home to drink. I like it best during the week when it’s quieter, a little older. Less drunk horny twenty-somethings and more grown ups getting tipsy on a Monday night. I crave the fish tacos and I think the best deal ever is Fish Taco Tuesdays. They have my favorite juke box in the city. But really my favorite thing about Matilda’s is that they always make me feel at home and totally welcome. Like I’m their favorite regular. I have no delusions about this. I have bartended and waited tables but still I eat it up. And my favorite bartender is Calvin. He’s adorable, funny and always engaging to talk to. He’s flirty in the right way. (but sorry girls, he does have a girlfriend) Still, I like some innocent flirting with my vodka. And he’s an amazing musician. sigh.

Sweet Mandy B’s cupcakes.

I miss Magnolia Bakery. I do. And I wanted to love Cupcakes (since it is on my corner) but really, really, my absolutely favorite cupcakes in Chicago are Sweet Mandy B’s. The icing is sugary and the sprinkles pastel. I don’t know what it is with me and cupcakes, but I love LOVE love them. And Sweet Mandy B’s are my favorite. Just. Simply. YUM.

I am not Helvetica

Following is an essay I wrote this summer and read at a reading:

I am not Helvetica. But my laptop thinks I am. My Macbook, if I’m being precise. It’s new. Semi new. Well, it’s five months old. But it doesn’t know me yet. It knows me a bit. The desktop picture is mine. The alert sounds are the sounds I chose. It tells me when I have new mail and knows to open my gmail with firefox. It knows what songs I play the most in iTunes. Tied for first are Colin Hay and The Postal Service. Second place is Neil Diamond. Only my Macbook knows this.
It knows my passwords, my online bank account, my web search history. When I begin to type in C - A - L, it offers up Calvin Marty. My new favorite musician and not so secret crush. It knows these things. And yet, when I open a document and begin to type, it starts in Helvetica.

I don’t know why Helvetica. Helvetica is a close suburb of Arial. It has the same shape to it’s A’s. The contemporary lack of pageantry with a stiffness. The letters straight, tight. Less foolishness, more content.

At one time I used Arial. Only Arial. Always. For everything. But somehow, at some point, I became Georgia. I don’t remember why or what prompted the change. But I do remember actively making the choice at some middle point of graduate school. A story had survived most of a semester and countless drafts in Arial. Then between advising appointments or before a workshop, it evolved into Georgia. And continued on as such through more drafts until my thesis.

Georgia, at times, was problematic. It was not as ubiquitous as other fonts. Not quite Mac compatible. Many of my professors and classmates had Macs and all the computers in the writing lounge (save one sad neglected PC) were Macs. When emailing something to my advisor, I would have to save a different draft in a different font. Usually Times New Roman, which is similar to Georgia. But Georgia is fuller, less ordinary. My copy was always Georgia.

My old laptop was an IBM. A thinkpad. It didn’t do much thinking, towards the end it did more crashing than anything. I’d had it for four years. Compared to the rapid shrinking of newer laptops, it felt heavier and clunkier over time. One day it just gave up. It simply never turned on again. Not even an attempted whirl from the fan, no blink of light. Just coldness. A black brick sitting on my coffee table.

I now have a Macbook. Light. Girly. A clean fresh white color. Hipster and cool. Fun. I like it. A lot. Friendly, easier. Modern. A Mac. But still, it doesn’t know me yet.

When I open new documents, it starts out in Helvetica. I type a sentence, maybe two. An inspired, I’m a writer-on-the-cusp-of-greatness feeling buzzing at my fingertips, except the letters in front of me are tall, straight, tight letters. Helvetica. I try to keep writing. The words don’t look like my words. My brilliance has to pause. My creative writerly flow halted when I have to change the font to Georgia.

I have tried to make Georgia the default font. But this laptop, this Macbook, it loves itself some Helvetica. Maybe it will always feel new. Maybe it will never completely know me. Or maybe it will some day. But, by then, will I have switched again? No longer Arial, no longer Georgia, could I possible become Palatino?

Any minute now, I"m waiting for my real life to begin

now what?

I can't stop listening to Colin Hay.

It hit me on the el today ...this is it. I am no longer a student. It feels different this time. Maybe because I've already been out there in the real world. I already have a two page resume and have paid rent and done the 9 to 5 shuffle, subway to cubicle to happy hour, five days a week. and now, after a two year detour, I have to go back.

but this time ... it's different.

and sentimental me keeps playing Colin Hay over and over again...

Any minute now, my ship is coming in

I'll keep checking the horizon

I'll stand on the bow, feel the waves come crashing

Come crashing down down down, on me

And you say, be still my love

Open up your heart

Let the light shine in

But don't you understand

I already have a plan

I'm waiting for my real life to begin

When I awoke today, suddenly nothing happened

But in my dreams, I slew the dragon

And down this beaten path, and up this cobbled lane

I'm walking in my old footsteps, once again

And you say, just be here now

Forget about the past, your mask is wearing thin

Let me throw one more dice

I know that I can win

I'm waiting for my real life to begin

Any minute now, my ship is coming in

I’ll keep checking the horizon

And I'll check my machine, there's sure to be that call

It's gonna happen soon, soon, soon

It's just that times are lean

And you say, be still my love

Open up your heart, let the light shine in

Don't you understand

I already have a plan

I'm waiting for my real life to begin

A virtual Musical world

This site was recommended to me by a friend. I have only just signed up. So my testimonial is by proxy. But I trust her. Apparently this is set up kind of like netflix, it reads the music you listen to and compares your music preferences to other users prefrences and makes recommendations. You can also link to friends and it shows you what your neighbors are listening to ... it's another virtual community.

Happy Listening ...

if you do try it out, let me know and we can be last.fm friends.

iPod ennui no more

Apparently this happens to quite a few people, but my love for my iPod (and my music) is cyclical. When it was new and unscratched and ready for downloads, I was a like a crack addict, always on the hunt for new songs. It was during my move from New York to Chicago, and while I was surrounded by half packed boxes, I would spend more time than I had to waste downloading music. I was obsessed. There are songs on my iPod that I have no memory of downloading and no idea where I found the song or why I paid $0.99 for the song. My ears were never without headphones, and I made playlists for everything.

Then it happened.

I got tired of my music. Who knew that thousands of songs could get tiring? And my iPod sat lonely and forgotten on my desk.

Then I discovered Limewire. And it was back. My love, my obsession. I clogged Internet time with searching songs and downloading.

And of course, again I got bored.

iPod ennui is so sad.

but .... part of my christmas loot was an iTunes gift card.

I was once again in a musical haze of downloading. Now when I walk down the street, headphones cradled into my ear drums (definitely doing permanent and dangerous damage to my hearing) I can't help but smile ... it's new again...

here's some of the music i have downloaded in the past week:

Dead Man, Undertaker, Poison Cup by M. Ward
A Man/Me/Then Jim, Capturing Moods by Rilo Kiley
Grand Canyon, Epitaph for My Heart, My Only Home, Long-Forgotten
Fairytale, I Think I Need a New Heart, Absolutely Cuckoo, It's Only
Time by The Magnetic Fields
Step Into My Office Baby, I'm a Cuckoo, If She Wants Me by Belle and Sebastian
Undecided, Love's A Game by The Magic Numbers
Secret Heart by Feist
Ode to Divorce, Chemo Limo by Regina Spektor
Usual Way by Super XX Man
Sunken Treasure, Jesus Etc..., Poor Places by Wilco
Hands in Pockets by Laura Gibson
Play that funky music white boy by wild cherry
Bittersweet symphony by the verve
PPale blue eyes, Take a Walk on, Stephanie Says by The Velvet Underground
It's not Unusual by Tom Jones
Bang a Gong Get It on by T- Rex
Give a Little Bit by Super Tramp
Mr. Roboto, Come Sail Away by the Styx
The Joker, Take the Money and Run, Gangster of Love, Fly like an Eagle by the Eagles
When I goosestep, Pressed in a book, Your Algebra, Girl Inform me, Kissing the Lipless by the Shins
What Do I do, Holding on to the Earth, Same Changes, I need love, I could write by Sam Phillips
What a Wonderful World, Tainted Love, Rock N Roll High School, I wanna be Sedated, Hey Ho, Let's Go, Do you wanna dance? What I like about you by the Ramones
She hates me by Puddle of Mud
Kiss, Purple Rain, Rasberry Beret by Prince
Lucky Star, Hey Mr. DJ by Madonna
Sexy Back by Justin Timberlake
Fins, If You like Pina Colada, Cheeseburger in Paradise by Jimmy buffett
Afterglow by INXS
Forever Young, Say Hello to Angels, Direction by Interpol
Mona Lisa, Lily-a-passion by Grant Lee Phillips
Jubilee by Grant Lee Buffalo
Whip it by Devo
Brimful of Asha by Cornershop
Opps I did it Again by Britney Spears
Brass Monkey by the Beastie Boys
Starcrossed by Ash
Hey Jack Kerouac by the 10,000 Maniacs.

They Might Be Giants

Word of the day: Quixotic

adj. Absurdly chivalric, like Don Quixote. An insight into the beauty and excellence of this incomparable adjective is unhappily denied to him who has the misfortune to know that the gentleman's name is pronounced Ke-ho-tay.
richardgingras.com/devilsdictionary/q.html

caught up in the romance of noble deeds and the pursuit of unreachable goals; idealistic without regard to practicality; capricious; impulsive.
users.wpi.edu/~kgagne/vocab/vocab14ab.html

not sensible about practical matters; unrealistic; "as quixotic as a restoration of medieval knighthood"; "a romantic disregard for money"; "a wild-eyed dream of a world state"
wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn

Don Quixote de la Mancha () is a novel by the Spanish author Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra. It is one of the earliest novels in a modern European language and many people consider it the finest book in the Spanish language.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quixotic

~~~

Where does the name "They Might Be Giants" come from?

They Might Be Giants is the name of a film starring George C. Scott, as a classic paranoiac who thinks he's Sherlock Holmes, and Joanne Woodward, as his psychiatrist Dr. Watson.

Fred Wolf adds:

[The] film you cite was previously a broadway play. The play's title . . . comes from a section of Don Quixote da la Mancha by Miguel Cervantes, where Don Quixote's trusted servant Sanch Panza asks the Don why is preparing to attack several windmills (common in Spain) with his lance. Don Quixote replies "Why, because they might be giants."

Russ Josephson writes:

For me, the key dialogue of the movie, where the title comes from, follows:

Holmes: Here, what do you make of it?

Watson: God, you're just like Don Quixote, you think everything's always something else.

Holmes: Heh, heh, heh, well he had a point. Of course, he carried it a bit too far. He thought that every windmill was a giant. That's insane. But, thinking that they might be ... Well, all the best minds used to think the world was flat. But, what if it isn't? It might be round. And bread mold might be medicine. If we never looked at things and thought of what they might be, why, we'd all still be out there in the tall grass with the apes.

John Linnell explains: "It's the name of a movie made in the early seventies. We wanted a name that was outward-looking and paranoid."

(this posting if for you pj)

Speaking of hugging...

I had friends over on Friday night. We drank hot wassail and ate snacks. It was the first time I had seen most of them in three weeks. They hug. Real hugs. The squeeze tight and hold on kind. It was good to see them again and to remember that I do like Chicago, and that I do have some great friends here.

I'm sitting in a coffee shop connected to free wi fi. When I first sat down my computer wasn't connecting. It makes me feel powerless. I have the ip address, but low connectivity. My computer struggles to repair it and tells me over and over again it can't. I'm feeling melancholic today. I wonder, is it a metaphor for my mood?

A women walks around, asking everyone if they have internet problems. I realize, it's not just me. It's everyone. Sometimes I’m too metaphoric for my own good.

A good friend and fellow writing MFA'er once commented that for such a cheery person there is an unspoken sadness in my writing. I think I'm pretty happy. I don't know why my writing tends to be pretty sad. Maybe if my laptop didn't have connectivity issues, I'd write happier stories.

Dave Matthews is playing on the juke box. I can say without irony that I love Dave Matthews. I've loved Dave Matthews since I was twenty one. I saw him play at fraternity parties. Under The Table and Dreaming reminds of my college boyfriend and our tortured messed up love affair, and basically just being young and drunk and in college. I'm happy for his success, but I miss the old Dave Matthews. The play in tiny bars in the south Dave Matthews.

I love my new coffee shop. They are now playing the Cure. It's as if they are playing music from my IPod.