Got to get to work…

I’ve been dealing with a certain level of ignorance I am completely unfamiliar with this morning. It’s a whole new level of self-centered ignorance that I didn’t even know existed. This self involved tripe has left me completely astonished and basically in shock. I’m baffled at the greed. I really am. 

The thing that really gets me is that my company has already admitted their fault and has indicated they would cover the loss. This is apparently not good enough for some people and they want more than they are entitled to. I especially hate it when it’s a husband/wife tag team going back and forth at me. It’s really just annoying and they should just stop it. The important thing is everyone was okay. No one was seriously injured. A car can be fixed; time is already lost so there’s no sense crying over it, you can’t get it back. It’s time to move forward and get on with your lives.

So as much as I would love writing more about it, it’s put me well behind for today’s planned activities and I can’t devote the time I need dear reader. I hope to have more soon.

Over a barrel

Hello again true believers. Thank Stan Lee for the intro. About two weeks ago I wrote about the City of Chicago being a pimp and how it was treating me like its number one whore. Well, the City, “Pimpcago”, has now decided I’m not worth it and stabbed me in the neck several times and left me in some prairie to be found by some random neighbor.

I’ll not go into too much detail but let’s just say the City and I have some “unfinished business” and I’m considering a Patrick Swayze type Next of Kin revolt. That and I want my wallet back. 

It’s very difficult to own a car in the city these days, what with parking restrictions, stickers, plate stickers, potholes, vandals, thefts, minor damages that occur over time. Not to mention jerk hole neighbors that decide where your car is parked is somehow their business. It’s pretty infuriating.

So I’m starting to lean toward a carless existence in the city. We’ve got an amazing public transportation system and it’s rather inexpensive considering the cost of gas these days. But then, I’m an American and I love the freedom having a car provides. Yeah, on second thought, I think I will be getting a new car eventually. Well, a new used car. Who the hell can afford a new car these days? I mean seriously, where do they expect people to come up with this money?

And why are cars so expensive anyway? I mean sure, a new car has more technology on board than the Apollo space missions combined, but that can’t be the only cost motivator, can it? When I see those new car commercials on TV I get a little ill. I just can’t imagine any truth to the ads at all. Not even the “hidden camera” Hyundai commercials. I think those are all crap. I mean, if a car costs more than $12,000 I think it’s a rip off. What could possibly be worth $60,000 in a damn car? Throw in a jetpack/helicopter/hot tub and I might consider $60,000 for new car. But in reality, most of us can’t afford that and probably will never be able to afford that. The best I can hope for is a decent used car that doesn’t have any dead prostitutes in the trunk.  Or if it did, then I hope the price can be easily negotiated.

My 9/11 piece

As I won’t be writing on the actual 10 year anniversary of 9/11 I thought I’d write about it today. Also, just for those playing along, I won’t be writing tomorrow either as I’ll be at the second wedding of the three I’ve to attend.

Ten years ago and three weeks prior to the tragedies of 9/11, I was in New York City. I was there for work for a training seminar. It was a three week long seminar so on the weekends me and other colleagues would hop on the train and go into New York to catch the sights and sounds. It was my first time in New York and I loved it.  

On the last weekend of this long trip I went on a full on site-seeing bonanza. We went to Battery Park and saw the monument to the Merchant Marines. We tried to get to The Statute of Liberty but that line was blocks and blocks long. It did make me very proud that so many people were there to see that wonderful gift from France. I took a picture with a woman dressed like Lady Liberty, she gave me a nice peck on the check and it’s one of my favorite photos.

My traveling companion and I decided to go and check out the World Trade Center. It was breathtaking. It was really a beautiful building. I’m from Chicago, the birthplace of the skyscraper and even I was impressed with the tower. We rode the elevator up to the observation deck on the top of the South Tower and it was an incredible view. In Chicago, the Sear’s tower’s observation area was all glassed in and you couldn’t get onto the actual top of the building. The tower though, you were in the open air and could look out in all directions. It was just amazing. I took tons of photos from the top and was in a bunch as well, pointing out over the city, playing the new God.

My friend and I went back down to the Tower plaza and I took more photos. I have a favorite one of the old globe and fountain that was in the plaza square. The sun shone behind it as it was setting and there was a real magic in the air that whole day. On the train ride back to New Jersey I fell asleep like a small child all tuckered out from the days adventure. That and I was a little drunk from all the drinking on Bleeker Street.

Fast forward to 9/11/01 and I had just got out of the shower when I heard on the radio that a plane had hit the Tower. The way the initial details came in over the radio they made it sound like a small Cessna had hit the building. I thought it was strange since I had just been there. I went downstairs and turned the little TV on by the ironing board and started ironing my pants for the work day ahead.

As the TV warmed up I could see that there was a little more damage than what a Cessna could cause and that’s when I saw the second plane, live, crash into the second Tower. I stopped breathing. I stopped moving. All I could think was, “I was just there, I was JUST there”.

My generation had seen tragedy on TV before. In 1985 were bore witness to the Challenger disaster, but that was so far away and I had never been on a space shuttle so it was hard to really relate to it. When those planes hit the Towers though I couldn’t help but think about all those employees I had seen when I visited. The elevator workers, the security guards, the business people just going about their daily activities, there was a real possibility that some of them, that all of them were dead. So I felt something with this tragedy I hadn’t felt with any other, a real connection to a place.

As the day’s events unfolded and all our eyes were glued to TV’s and all our prayers were being silently muttered I imagined myself in a fox hole somewhere in the world, drafted into a war without end. I had gone into work that morning because I really didn’t know what else to do. I was in a state of mild shock and disbelief. I used to work kitty-corner from the Sears Tower and as soon as I got to work my boss told me to go back home as the offices were closing. There was a mass exodus from Downtown Chicago the likes of which I had never seen and will probably never see again in my life time.

While waiting in Union Station for the next train home I was sitting in the Snuggery, no booze was being served of course, watching the TV’s along with the rest of the travelers and I started speaking to the guy next to me. I don’t remember his name, but we were talking about the fact that America was now at war with someone and we didn’t even know who. He had to catch his train and I remember shaking his hand and saying, “I hope we don’t meet again in some dirty foxhole”. He laughed and off he went while I continued to watch the aftermath on TV.

Here it is, ten years later and I’m happy to say that I’m not in a foxhole. (Although I can’t imagine that a cubicle is much better) I’ve had a lot of fortune and troubles in the last ten years, when the world we knew it changed forever. I’m happy to be here and I am happy to have experienced all of life’s trials and tribulations when so many didn’t.

It’s my proud honor to remember all of those that are no longer with us. I am more proud of us for how we pulled through and I hope this dark anniversary will remind us that we’re not as different as we think and compromise is always an option.

Never Forget.

Little pink houses

Cherry and Luke walked up the stairs from Union Station and headed toward Michigan Avenue. Cherry had her Walkman on, blasting her Cindy Lauper tape and wasn’t really paying attention to anything around them. Luke was trying to light his cigarette. He thought it was weird they wouldn’t let him light it right after he got off the train. It was never an issue before. The conductor started yelling at him not to smoke on the platform. Who cared about smoking on the platform? Then he saw the signs banning smoking and guessed it was a new policy. Which totally, like, sucked.

Luke took a long drag on his cigarette and looked toward the bridge over the river. He saw all these people with things up to their ears, like little portable transistor radios. But not. They were like, not radios. He nudged Cherry who continued to insist that girls just wanted to have fun. He nudged her again and she scowled at him and took her headphones off.

“What”, she demanded.

“Does something seem, like, not right to you?”

“Like no. A-dohy. It’s Downtown. So like, no.”

“What do those, like, people by the bridge have by their ears?”

Cherry looked to where Luke was pointing and she saw the same odd little boxes everyone was holding to their ear. She then saw a man in a dark suit push past and he was just talking out loud into a little wire by his neck. She looked at Luke and shrugged.  It was the big city and things were always a little different.

“So that doesn’t look, like, weird to you at all”, asked Luke.

“Don’t have a cow, its cool. Let’s go. I’m hungry.”

Cherry and Luke started walking up Adams toward Michigan Ave. and it was all the honking that caught his attention. All the cars, all the cars were like, futuristic or something. They were all low profiled and had all kinds of cool line. Luke was a car guy and this stuff was right out of popular mechanics. He stopped walking and Cherry bumped into him.

“Is the Auto-show this week baby”, he asked.

“No. A-dohy. You’re being weird”, replied a snotty Cherry.

Cheery snapped her gum and something slowly dawned on her. All the girls walking around her had the flattest hair. Like, none of them had even bothered to tease up their bangs. Everyone looked so bad in her opinion. And all the clothes were so drab, too many grays and browns. These girls were no match for her bright pink neon tights. She snapped her gum again. She looked at Luke to tell him about how all these skanks were ugly. She didn’t say anything though and followed Luke’s gaze up to the window of a store.

There was a TV in the window, but it was super small. Like it was thin but the screen was so big. It was just about the biggest TV screen Cherry had ever seen. That was when she started to think that maybe something was wrong.

“What the hell”, asked Luke.

“Um, maybe there is something a little, like, wrong”, said Cherry.

They both backed away from the window and into a guy in a business suit. He dropped his iPad. He grabbed after it and grabbed it before it hit the ground. He yelled at Luke.

“Watch it you dumb ass. You know how much these things cost!”

Luke could see something on the screen; it was like a movie playing or something. He mumbled an apology and grabbed Cherry by the hand.

“Let’s get the hell out of here”.

They ran back toward Union Station and back down the stairs and back to 1986.

That’s unfortunate, really

So I’ve caught another cold, already. My immune system has gotten pretty weak is would seem. I’m always catching a damn cold these days. I was good all summer, but as soon as the weather cooled off, BAM! A new cold.

Some have suggested it’s allergies but I am not allergic to anything. That’s one of the odd blessing of genetics I suppose.

The really unfortunate thing is how much work I have to do today and how I really must get to it. I’d much rather write something but duty as they say calls. So I hope to have more time to write something tomorrow.

P.S. Happy 65th birthday to Freddie Mercury. We've come a long way as a society where Google can wish a deceased homosexual singer a happy birthday. Good for us. I'm proud.

Slow blog, take it easy…

At some point I realized that I hadn’t written anything today. I was pretty distracted by my new Russian girlfriend this morning so I just didn’t have a chance to write anything. Excuse me.

Yeah, you read that right. It would seem I have a Russian girlfriend. One of the various dating sites I am on connected me to a very lovely young woman. (No, it is not Russian Mail Order Brides or other derivations therein, jerk) She’s is very pretty and likely looking for a way to escape the doldrums of Russian country life. Why not talk to a desperate American man? She seems nice though. She’s a pharmacist in a little Russian town or so she’s told me. She could be a retired KGB agent looking to take revenge on the capitalists who took away her government job after America won the Cold War. Who can actually know for sure?

I know nothing is going to happen with her. I am not going to send her money to come to America. I am not going to get suckered into giving her my credit card information or anything like that. I am, however, suckered by a pretty woman taking an interest in me. I fall for that every time. We’ve exchanged e-mails now for about two weeks, almost daily, and except for the broken English she seems very genuine.

Every time I get a new e-mail I shake my head and call myself an idiot. It’s ridiculous to feel a little happiness with each new e-mail from a girl I’ll never actually meet in person. It’s so silly and I am honestly embarrassed by it. But if I’m going to write this blog I have to write the truth so I guess that’s why I’m writing about it. (Wow, can’t wait for the comments on this one.) Who can’t relate to having a relationship with a Russian woman living nearly 5000 miles away? I mean, c’mon.

I also think it’s silly because on all of these dating websites I’ve been using, this girl is really the only one to show any actual interest. Even women living three miles away from me haven’t bothered to respond to my simple messages. They are seemingly hung up on superficial things while my little Russian princess just wants to know how my day was.

As you can see, I’m a little torn about it. I know it’s pretty stupid and frankly, sad, for a guy like me to have an e-mail relationship with a Russian woman. But there’s something very sweet about her and I’d feel a little sad to not talk with her. I mean, what would you do? Would you tell this sweet girl that you really think she’s actually a 56 year old Polish man trying to scam a stupid American out of his thousands? Or would you let the silly fantasy play out and enjoy the unreality of it for a while before being slammed back to Earth?

She is really pretty by the way. Sigh. All I can hear in my head is that old Tom & Jerry cartoon, “told you so”, music. Wah-waaah.

Or this - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eR-Ckj5M-jU

I didn’t even notice, my son…

Yesterday I completely forgot to write a blog. This is the first time I just plum forgot to do it. Mind you I was very busy at work and I barely had time to screw around on Facebook even. So I hope those that were anxiously awaiting that Wednesday blog aren’t too disappointed. We’ll see if we can’t fix that now.

At some point this morning I had a dream about my son. I’ve never had a dream about any of my prospective children; ever. It was just one of the things that I don’t seem to dream about; until sometime this morning that is. It was more than just a dream about my son but it was about my whole family, my dream immediate family. I had a wife and a son and both didn’t seem to like me very much.

I could see why of course, my wife was my ex-girlfriend who has a searing and bubbling distaste for me most of the time and the child, who was probably two to three years old in the dream could already talk, just like his mother and he had no problem expressing his feeling that I was, “creeping him out”. Who says that to their Father? Besides Jesus of course and we all know how that story ended.

The child was just adorable though. He was blonde like his mother with bright blue/hazel eyes. He was chubby and happy and I could feel how much I loved him. His mother was with us in the dream and she looked like she had just given birth to him, a little tired but lovely as ever. The whole dream seemed to take place in someone’s apartment while a party was going on. I remember the dream being rather sepia toned. It had a faded photograph picture quality at some points and then other times it seemed vibrantly colored.   I wasn’t scared. I wasn’t sad. I wasn’t upset. I was just there doing the things a dad does.

My boy was barefoot and we were comparing foot size. I was pushing back against his little feet with my big feet and he was laughing and giggling like it was the most fun he’d ever had. I felt like it was the most fun I ever had. I’d look back at my wife and she’d smile at us, looking tired. That was the part that unnerved me most was how tired she looked. I don’t think anything was wrong though; being a mom is tough work. But I didn’t get to find out really because my alarms went off and I was forced into the real world where I’m single and have no wife or child.

In the real world I’m a blogger and work in a cube handling insurance claims. I have a beat up old car that’s a head ache and so many money and emotional issues I can’t decide which is more profitable to explore resolving. But for a few dream minutes I was a dad and a husband and that seemed all right.