Dear IBM,
Very little is calming to me these days, and the few moments of respite I find are those of my evening neighborhood walks. Last time I took a stroll, I saw your lame-ass graffiti ad campaign.
Peace, love, and Linux, my foot. Where do you get off spray-painting your silly advertisements in MY fair Chicago neighborhood? How would you like it if I spray-painted the hell out of your precious Mies Van der Rohe headquarters downtown? I'm sure you wouldn't like it, and so I hope you understand how much I dislike your intrusion into my sidewalks.
I'll never buy IBM products again, and I will encourage my friends and coworkers to do the same until I see you trolls cleaning the sidewalk. Ogilvy and Mather can kiss my ass, too.
Honestly,
AT
Very little is calming to me these days, and the few moments of respite I find are those of my evening neighborhood walks. Last time I took a stroll, I saw your lame-ass graffiti ad campaign.
Peace, love, and Linux, my foot. Where do you get off spray-painting your silly advertisements in MY fair Chicago neighborhood? How would you like it if I spray-painted the hell out of your precious Mies Van der Rohe headquarters downtown? I'm sure you wouldn't like it, and so I hope you understand how much I dislike your intrusion into my sidewalks.
I'll never buy IBM products again, and I will encourage my friends and coworkers to do the same until I see you trolls cleaning the sidewalk. Ogilvy and Mather can kiss my ass, too.
Honestly,
AT
Labels: crabbiness
There's a small woman who walks around my neighborhood. She's usually somewhere on Clark, asking passers-by for change. "Oh please, can I have some money for the bus?" she says. If the person gives her some money, she asks for more. If the person declines, she stands close and says, "Please? Oh come on, please?" until she's handed some change. She moves to the next person, repeating the process. When the bus comes barreling down the street and stops near her, she then boards the bus and begs the bus driver to let her ride the bus for free. On Saturday, she was leaving the 7-Eleven on Clark and Belmont, a dozen instant lottery tickets clutched in her hands.
Also on Clark, down by Armitage, a kind-hearted mentally disabled man takes long walks. He's missing most, if not all of his teeth. A few months ago, my parents and I were on a Sunday stroll, and we saw him approaching. "Hello," he said with a big smile. "Hello! How are you?" replied my father. Big grin. After we passed the man, my father explained that he'd seen the man decades ago, doing the same thing.
I live in my parents' old neighborhood. The church where they married is a block away, and their first apartment is around the corner, down a couple of blocks. In a few weeks, I'll move to a new nest in a nearby neighborhood. Oddly enough, my apartment is two houses down from the bed and breakfast where Evan and I stayed on our first vacation to Chicago together. Actually, the bed and breakfast has been demolished to make way for condominiums.
Also on Clark, down by Armitage, a kind-hearted mentally disabled man takes long walks. He's missing most, if not all of his teeth. A few months ago, my parents and I were on a Sunday stroll, and we saw him approaching. "Hello," he said with a big smile. "Hello! How are you?" replied my father. Big grin. After we passed the man, my father explained that he'd seen the man decades ago, doing the same thing.
I live in my parents' old neighborhood. The church where they married is a block away, and their first apartment is around the corner, down a couple of blocks. In a few weeks, I'll move to a new nest in a nearby neighborhood. Oddly enough, my apartment is two houses down from the bed and breakfast where Evan and I stayed on our first vacation to Chicago together. Actually, the bed and breakfast has been demolished to make way for condominiums.
Television is a lie! You know how on Buffy, our fearless heroine easily kicks down doors with nearly no effort? Well, in real life, it's difficult to break down a door. I know this because this morning, I locked myself out of my bedroom. Truman had been meowing all night, so around midnight I had sleepily shut him out of my room by locking the door. Unfortunately, I forgot to unlock the door after I woke up, and then I shut the door, and on and on.
First I tried shoving the door with my shoulder, but that hurt a lot. Next, I swung my hips at it, but that hurt, too. I tried slamming against the door with my hands, but I hadn't removed my new slippery-soled shoes, and I fell to the carpet. Truman chortled. Finally, I took off my shoes and kicked the door as hard as I could. Still nothing. How frustrating.
Chicago is humid and grey today. It's beautiful and welcome.
First I tried shoving the door with my shoulder, but that hurt a lot. Next, I swung my hips at it, but that hurt, too. I tried slamming against the door with my hands, but I hadn't removed my new slippery-soled shoes, and I fell to the carpet. Truman chortled. Finally, I took off my shoes and kicked the door as hard as I could. Still nothing. How frustrating.
Chicago is humid and grey today. It's beautiful and welcome.
Does anybody watch PBS? It's hip for twenty-something indie kids to listen to NPR, but do they (you?) watch PBS, too? If not, boy, is it time to start! Allow me to further bury any chances of being cool by saying that PBS programming hasn't been this enjoyable since the days of 3-2-1 Contact. During the last week, they've aired shows about Picasso, a woman revisiting Auschwitz, Elizabeth Taylor, and feminist adventure travel. The drawback of PBS programming is the lack of commercial breaks (no time to make nachos or hit the bathroom).
Dream: My second-to-the-back-bottom-right (a molar?) was sore and loose. I picked at it with my index fingernail, digging past the gumline and popping the tooth out of its socket. I tasted blood, but when I removed the tooth from my mouth, it was clean and white. Optic white. The underside of the tooth was nubby, and the bumps broke off like meringue.
None of my pants fit anymore, not even the quasi-booty pants that used to make me feel like Jennifer Lopez. They just slip down to my hipbones, which are beginning to jut out like tiny shoulderblades. I'm going to start writing down everything I eat for a while. The problem is that my new prescription, while highly effective, has made my appetite disappear. You know the feeling of having eaten a ton of pie, cookies, ice cream, and chocolate, and then someone puts a giant piece of cake in front of you? And you just feel like that's the last thing in the world you want? That's how I feel all the time these days.
Dream: My second-to-the-back-bottom-right (a molar?) was sore and loose. I picked at it with my index fingernail, digging past the gumline and popping the tooth out of its socket. I tasted blood, but when I removed the tooth from my mouth, it was clean and white. Optic white. The underside of the tooth was nubby, and the bumps broke off like meringue.
None of my pants fit anymore, not even the quasi-booty pants that used to make me feel like Jennifer Lopez. They just slip down to my hipbones, which are beginning to jut out like tiny shoulderblades. I'm going to start writing down everything I eat for a while. The problem is that my new prescription, while highly effective, has made my appetite disappear. You know the feeling of having eaten a ton of pie, cookies, ice cream, and chocolate, and then someone puts a giant piece of cake in front of you? And you just feel like that's the last thing in the world you want? That's how I feel all the time these days.
Labels: sleep
