Subtle Sway

I'm a product of my environment. I've watched plenty of TV and suffered through and enjoyed commercials of different varieties. When I was younger we used to tape movies off TV. Our old VHS of a taped Ghostbusters contains grainy nostalgic doses of old Pillsbury Doughboy commercials, Nestle Tollhouse chocolate chips, Pizza Hut ads spreading word about the Land Before Time puppet giveaways with meals. That tape has been worn to shit. A few years back I watched it and felt just at home with those old commercials as the classic movie itself. 


It had a dream like quality for me, and dreams are the best way to sway me on a product. If a brand can dunk itself far enough into my subconscious to bob as a staple in my dreamland, then I'm pretty close to convinced. 


A few weeks back I had a dream I was driving around back in my hometown of Auburn, ME. It was snowing. Through the blinding white hitting the windshield I hunted for sight of a Dunkin Donuts. In fact, this quest for a Dunkin Donuts; a hot cup of coffee and a few chocolate glazed donuts was the through-line of this REM adventure. When I awoke, I made a stop soon after to the donut destination. It convinced and stirred a hankering better than any commercial. But the dream's successful sway can give credit to the year's of accumulated memories revolving around late night visits to 24 hr Dunkin Donuts for warm cups, glazed indulgences, or something to do at an odd hour.  The experience stays and reinforces. 


A few dreams of KFC have fucked up my arteries in consequence.


The other night I had a dream of a different display of propaganda. Rahm Emmanuel put forth an initiative for Chicago's poor, and wealthy. In a gargantuan, vacant warehouse on the west side he "sought" to fight hunger and paucity by enlisting dozens of food vendors to donate to a pop up grocery store. He invited all of Chicago's residents to stop by over the course of the day, and one cart per household was welcome to fill up with foodstuffs, at the city's expense. Now, when one got to the warehouse to push their cart around for an easy one time break from hunting and gathering, they were also immersed in a pseudo museum showing historical photos from famous casinos, such happy faces playing games! Murals spanned walls with child like renditions of wonderful times at the slots! The initiative to slow hunger was also a campaign to get all the citizens excited about the potential Chicago casino coming our way. And what a perfect demographic to spike the hope of a lucky win; the lower class. And middle and upper class. 


All were invited to fill up their carts. 


All were invited to see the glory of the gamble.

Little Bucharest

My girlfriend has class Tuesday nights so we decided to do our Valentines dinner early. We cruised through Open Table, wanting to try something different. We found Little Bucharest, up the street from us on Elston. It looked fancy, and Romanian food is a different cuisine from our usual Chinese/Thai/Sushi or Mexican dine out excursions. I arrived on time for our 7pm reservation but snow decided to hit Chicago for a change this winter season, delaying my girlfriend in traffic. I was chilled from the windy, precipitating walk. As I sat at the table alone, I got the feeling the waitstaff thought I was being stood up. When she arrived, all was a good time. I had shrimp wrapped in a leaf, on a bed of garlic couscous, tasty, complex, filling! The owner was making the rounds, he saw my clean plate and tried to mess with me "why don't you like my food what's the matter with you...hahahaha!" Then he pulled out a bottle of some kind of clear liquor, I think it was ouzo, and asked to bless my girlfriend. She politely passed as she was driving and we already had some wine. I was feeling adventurous. So he drained a considerable splash of it into my mouth, wrapped his arm around to hold a cloth to close my mouth until I swallowed it all. It burned. But it was good. He made the rounds to do this to others.

Before we left he mentioned they have free limo service for groups of six or me. So we'll be lining up a triple date. I enjoyed the ambiance of the place, very jovial. Not only was it a meal, it was an experience. It made me think of a lingering urge I've had to spend some time in a European village, where there perhaps was only one eatery. And the townsfolk gather there to feast, and drink, and have a splendid time. Elation. No worrying. Spirits in the darkened light above protein and fermented beverage.

CPS Flaw

This morning I read an article in the Huffington Post about how CPS has been losing millions to teachers that are cashing out at retirement on unused sick and vacation days. Now, my girlfriend is a hard working teacher, and I'm usually quick to defend against any suspicion of teacher perks, however this seems like a gaping flaw. I understand the idea of rewarding teachers that don't take advantage of days off, but let's remember sick days and personal days are designed to protect teachers (or any worker for that matter) against losing salary when unexpected life things come up. If they have to use them, they're protected, they get paid. If they don't use them, well, then they still get paid. In no other industry can one cash out on unused sick or vacation days. And as a result, CPS is paying out millions when that money can be used to not lay off teachers. Or to hire more teachers. Or to pay teachers more when they start teaching an extra 90 minutes a day. Award teachers for doing more! Not for just fulfilling expectations of showing up to work when they can. 


And in knowing a teacher intimately, every teacher knows that missing a day actually creates a lot more catch up work. There doesn't necessarily need to be an incentive to deter teachers from taking a sick day. Last week my girlfriend was out sick on Monday and spent the rest of the week catching up. 


Teachers get bashed enough by politicians, and I hate to add any more criticism to the field, however I felt the urge to throw down my thoughts that this act of cashing out on unused sick days is an inefficient way to reward the hard work of teachers. I'd rather that money be used to help balance the budget so that teachers don't continually face the fear of getting RIFed each spring. 


But we don't have to worry, Rahm Emanuel just found out about this and he's not happy. The King of Chicago will certainly have his way with this. 

Jokesmith Juggernauts

This show is Friday. Chicago Comedy at it's finest. Free show. Brilliance. I will be performing in it. And co-producing. 

More info at WoodSugars.com

Sunken Valley & Journey to the Stall

A couple of weekends ago, a good childhood friend and girl friend were in town to visit. We took a walk downtown after dinner to kill time before an after party for the Chicago Underground Film Festival (his experimental sitcom Dare Double was playing at CUFF). They wanted to see the lake. So we started walking eastbound from Wabash. My original thinking was to make our way through Millennium Park, but I got intrigued by the set up of tents and booths and a blocked off little side street stretching east from Michigan Ave. It the was set up for the art fair. But we kept walking through towards the lake. This took us through a strange little township it seemed of its own origin. We took some stairs down to what seemed like a sunken downtown valley, a park nestled, hidden between a surrounding mountain ridge of condominium towers and luxury hotels. A lush park trickled with fountains and throbbed the color green. I've lived in Chicago for 9 years and had no visual awareness that this little park area existed, as it is tucked away from one's sight-line from other major areas of downtown where you have business to romp around in. It had it's own little cafe and bank branch for the service of these secret like "townsfolk."

At different points each one of us had to go to the bathroom, number 2. My friend's girlfriend went into what we thought was a hotel. She asked "where's the bar?" to the front desk attendant. He responded "there is no bar."

"I thought this was a hotel."

"No, this is a condo."

"Oh, well I need to use the bathroom."

They were nice and accommodated her, taking her and my friend down a spiral stairs while I waited outside for what seemed like a very long time. I wondered about what I would do if they never emerged. They did emerge, having pooped in the employee bathroom at the far of a strange, expansive grocery store in the basement.

As we changed our direction to head back into the city, I had to go number 2. I went inside a hopping luxurious hotel, like I meant business and made my way straight into the bathroom. The floor in front of the check in desk glowed. The bathroom was one of those which had set up each stall like its own little closet room. Leaving the hotel we passed by a homeless man asking for money. His approach was "I got crabs and need to buy some cream." I enjoyed his tactic. If I had change/cash I probably would have lent.

Anyway, my friend suggested I started a blog about places to poop in the city. I thought it was a funny notion and I have plenty of such stories to tell, so I may or may not incorporate such into this Igloo Oven blog here. I did a door to door sales job awhile back for a month and it required you to be strategic about gaining entry into bathrooms. One of my territories was on the edge of Hyde Park. There was medical building which was pretty much vacant except one MD office on the first floor. I walked in like I owned the place and went into the elevator up to six. I explored the creepy, vacant hallway with abandoned boxes of paper work and dust. I thought I heard ghostly noises. I pooped as quickly as I could and went back out into the world.

ITB S2 E8

We have a new episode up of our comedic variety show podcast, Inside the Barrel. In this episode we interview funny gals Ever Mainard and Rasa Gierstikas of The Shit Show, a kickass stand-up open mic here in Chicago. We also feature the band Lola Balatro! We tackle some slightly economic and educational issues in some of our sketches. But why listen to me yak about it, listen to it! -> ITB S2 E8.

8x8

I will be both reading a short story and performing sketch comedy with my group Wood Sugars tonight at this thing!