Well, it's been about six months, but my coworker the Hooterhumper's Nintendo commercial is finally up. It's at Eternal Darkness Films. Click on the picture of the screaming guy at the bottom of the page that says "view the trailer that was made to inspire the filmmakers". That's him. It's a pretty funny commercial.

Many moons ago, the Pope mentioned that he would stop by for a weekend, and made it clear that he didn't want a big bru-ha-ha, so don't invite anybody. Well, many people found out he was coming and just decided to show up. So if you're wondering why you didn't get an invitation this weekend, it's because noone did- everyone who did come just showed up.

Singular put a ton of effort into arranging the event, taking off work to clean the place, planning the weekend (a very successful tactic: "Do your own thing, meet us at 4" rather than planning out the whole day), arranging the party, even placing a catering order that had to be cancelled due to an unfortunate car repair bill. I was the designated drinker. We were full of whiskey when we got into town, and within an hour of our arrival, everyone was over at our place with a drink in hand. Katan had originally been denied permission to come, his mother citing the potential for dismemberment, but I managed on the phone to convince her (by extolling the virtues of our group to Katan, which were then relayed to mom) to simply send Katan over with a chaperone. A good idea whenever minors are involved. It worked out great, and Katan turned out to be a really funny guy. Shadrock, however, was a little quieter, perhaps because with me and Nosuch and Perkusi and the Pope around, you really gotta yell to get a word in edgewise.

A funny thing happened while I was sitting on the porch waiting for strangers to show up from all over town- my "guy" called and said he'd stop by with a delivery. I was praying- "please don't show up at the same time, please don't show up at the same time" because I couldn't imagine trying to pass it off as anything else but the illegal transaction it was:

"Uh, that's a, uh, business associate of mine, and I'm just gonna go sit in his car for a few minutes..."

Fortunately, he arrived in between guest arrivals. Whew!

Off we went to Bandera. Again, picked, reserved, and arranged by Singular. She couldn't have done a better job- our long table was right by the window overlooking the Magnificent Mile. The food was toe-curlingly good. The bill came to about $40 a person, which I think shocked some folks, sorry- wasn't it worth it? There were 15 of us, but a $600 check will cause a heart to leap no matter how many ways you split it. Kinda like when I got my hotel bill on Saturday, and the totals were given in the far right column, and I about had a heart attack- each line was successively more! Dumbass. That's the CUMULATIVE total, idiot, not the line total! Can't ya read a chart?

After dinner, back ta home, and drink until the wee hours. More to come.

Ahhh.... kickin' back on the train from Ann Arbor to Chicago, about two hours to go, and I thought I'd put down a record of the last few days as a way to pass the time.

Pretty much the only disadvantage to traveling by train is the schedule. As long as you're not too constrained by time limits, rail is THE way to travel. The choice is obvious- cram yourself into a turbulent airplane flight, subjecting to cavity searches and food so bad that they provide a neat baggie at each seat that screams "if yer gonna spew, spew in this," cram yourself into a car that one of you has to drive and the other can't even drink to pass the time, or sit drinking in a diner booth watching the countryside roll by as you sip martinis or sample from the full-service restaurant menu? Plus, Amtrak is subsidized by the U.S. Government and has never made a profit, which explains the ridiculously low fares, especially with their rail sale- $5.70 Chicago to Detroit, for example, and once they were offering Chicago to L.A. for $15. If you can handle the schedule, I recommend traveling by train.

Unfortunately, our train left at 7am, which means getting up earlier than anyone should on their vacation. Back in the day my parents would always start our family road trips at 4am, carrying us out to the car one by one so we'd sleep until 9 or so and thus crop five hours off of their "are we there yet" test of patience. So I have this learned ability to sleep on command in a moving vehicle, which makes me a poor road trip companion, but once I took a bus to Maine and it came in handy as I simply slept for 22 hours of the 24 hour trip.

When I awoke, I didn't really feel like drinking, just yet. Maybe if they had Bloody Marys, but the bar car suffers from a somewhat limited selection, though the prices are actually cheaper than in a Chicago bar. If they really wanted to fill the train they would offer more booze, as the train is the best way to get from point A to point B without an interruption in one's drunkenness, present company being an excellent example. What is it the old man said to the doctor when the doctor told him he'd have to give up his whiskey or lose his sight? "I reckon I've seen just about everything worth seein'."

At one point, I was coming back from the bar with another drink when I passed a rather large and hairy fellow who had fallen asleep across two seats in a sort of fetal position, which had hiked his pants down quite a bit and gave me much more of a view of his ass than I wanted. Ack! I thought I ordered a no-ass ticket!

Ass-glimpse aside, it was a pleasant trip, and we arrived to find the Pope waiting for us. I'd never been to Ann Arbor. It's a college town, and school was out, and college towns when school is not in session are particularly pleasant. They have all the amenities that a fellow like me needs, but- uh oh, last call. Be right back.

Ah, here we are. So a college town has all the nice bars and entertainment, but when America's Adult Day Care is out of session, its patrons headed off to Florida to lose their dignity on MTV, the town itself becomes a quiet and uncrowded utopia. I liked the architecture in Ann Arbor particularly.

Check in, and then a nap, and then we got to meet the Pope's wife, who was absolutely wonderful. She had all the good humor and grace you would expect from someone who had to put up with the Pope on a daily basis. I could quite sympathize with the Pope, for I know what it's like to be a big goofy nerd put to shame by a classy and beautiful companion.

Soon after we headed deep into the Michigan countryside to visit a couple of old bandmates of the Pope who wanted him to lay down a fiddle track for a song for their upcoming album. I mean DEEP in the countryside, as we left the paved road at one point, and finally found their very quaint log cabin with its rustic old barn. As our host prepared for the recording session in his basement studio, we sat in rocking chairs on their wraparound porch, listening to the silence and drinking beers in the cool night air. I couldn't have been happier doing nothing.

The experience was marred, and only slightly, by a neighbor's peacock, my least favorite bird. The peacock's cry sounds very much like my real name, so that whenever one is within earshot I find myself perking up every few seconds because I think I hear someone calling my name. You've probably heard how similar the peacock sounds to a human cry, and there are plenty of stories of people rushing through the woods to help someone in distress only to find one of those cursed birds. Just imagine me trying to relax while some bird cries out "Johnny Payphone! Johnny Payphone! Johnny Payphone!" This became a running gag for the weekend, as anytime one of my companions wanted to get my attention they would imitate that frickenfracken bird, much to my chagrin. For your annoyance, I have provided three examples: Here, here, and here.

But once we went inside, I had a blast. The bandmates were very warm and friendly people, and it was great to hear the Pope fiddle, as he is very good but would never play a tune unless the situation was just right, with the right acoustics and either an audience or a studio there to properly appreciate his art. He'll play a guitar for anyone, sure, but oh no, the fiddle is a sacred thing... never mind the fact that he'll whore himself out to any country band that pays him to play songs that he hates, like "Thank God I'm A Country Boy" or (as he put it), "The Devil Went Down To Fucking Georgia".

the author, with his banjo-uke

After the recording session was over, we had some more beers and I asked to see our host's "Banjo-Uke", which I had heard on one of their albums but had never seen. This is, as you can imagine, the ukulele equivalent of the banjo, a teeny tiny banjo that's played in that strummy dink-a-dink style of the uke and sounds exactly like you would imagine a cross between a ukulele and a banjo would sound. I fell in love with it, as the Pope rolled his eyes and bitched about it combining the worst qualities of both instruments. Then one of our hosts pulled out his brand-new zydeco accordion, and with the Pope on guitar we jammed out a shaky version of "When The Saints Go Marching In" with me dinka-dinking along on the banjo-uke to the best of my abilities. I'm sure the Pope would say it's not like I could have made it sound any worse.

The next day, we met for lunch, and then went thrifting while the Pope did his math conference stuff. Then we met him and his wife for dinner (I told the waitress it was the Pope's birthday, and he got an Italian song sung to him, and I managed to color with crayons on the tablecloth), and he invited along a fellow in town from Berlin for the conference who had nothing to do, and we managed to convince them all to go dancing afterwards, which we did at a club described in the town entertainment guide as "New-York Style" which meant "gay". It's a wonder New York City has the population it does, if it's all gay. They must all adopt.

The German math nerd didn't seem to be put off at all by being dragged to a gay club (you know math nerds, they hardly get out at all, much less to such a hip locale- we certainly didn't run into any of their colleagues in there) and the Pope and his wife danced far more lively than a married couple should. Married couples are supposed to be fuddy-duddy and boring, you know. Especially ones with kids. They're certainly not allowed to enjoy themselves out on the town.

Present at the bar was also a fellow handing out condoms and demonstrating how one puts one on without using one's hands, a procedure that involved him deepthroating a dildo. I hope our nerdy friends didn't find going to that club to be biting off more than they could chew, ha ha.

The next morning, we didn't have time for much more than a breakfast coffee before it was time to wait for the train. A couple of meatheads were guffawing loudly in the train station, and when the train arrived they asked for the "so-and-so party", which should have been forwarning for the ride to come.

These meatheads had a good idea: Everybody come to the nearest train station, and the party will grow as the trip progresses, no doubt to end in some bash in Chicago. There were about twelve of them in the diner car when we arrived, playing cards, drinking, waving porno mags about, and generally making asses of themselves. At one point, one guy yelled out "Man, this is a PARTY" and another said wisely, "No, man. It's not a party unless there's some hoochie."

Classy.

Speaking of male asses, I was thinking to myself as I boarded the train, "Gee, I hope this is an ass-free trip." But not fifteen minutes into the ride, we passed three large fellows giving the train a triple-browneye as it passed. Ack! Three times the ass of the last trip! I can't escape it!

At one point, the meatheads called a town down the line, ordered pizza to the station, and hopped off and bought it when the train stopped to pick up passengers. That took skill! They also got a pair of eighteen-year-old girls drunk. That didn't take skill. The girls gushed as the train neared the station that their dads would be waiting for them, and that they'd have to pretend they weren't drunk. Heh. Serves 'em right.

And now we're heading through the industrial hell that leads up to Chicago. Time to meet the other nerds!

After thousands of clicks at Whatsbetter?com, I came across a choice that stopped me dead in my tracks. Carrot Top or 1-800-COLLECT? Damn. What's worse is that they're practically combined with his commercials, the only redeemable part being the one where he's used as a curling stone. I couldn't choose, I ended up reloading the page. I've never done that before.

FINALLY, I put up some pictures of Noam Chopsky Phase 2.

To be honest, I haven't posted about last Saturday and Sunday because I can't remember them, for obvious reasons. I know we got rip-roarin and went to the aquarium, where we stared at jellyfish for a long time and derived much amusement from the whales scolding the onlookers. There was also a trip to Dave & Busters involved. That's all I can recall. I guess the purpose of this blog as a life-recorder is kinda negated when you're shaking the brain cells that contain the memories out your ears at the end of the night.

Am I Chop Or Not?

Last Friday's evening of Mexican music has got something rattling around in my head that I can't quite get down. I've started this post three times but gave up twice, not knowing how to express the issue. That night, we heard a lot of that salsa/techno music that the gueys play when there's a mixed crowd, and it was a stark contrast to the soundtrack to the rest of the weekend, which was Tenacious D, the Best Band That Ever Existed, Ever (shown at right). What I'm trying to figure out is why the rest of the world seems incapable of producing quality rock'n'roll. And I'm not talking about this rap-rock fusion that's been going around- hip-hop has its own place, and imitation hip-hop is particularly sad, especially when clowns are involved (I met ICP back when my momma was a baby, and they were a buncha dorks- Eminem was right to whup their giant honking Sir Widebottom asses). I'm talking power ballads, Skynryd and Ozzy and Led Zep- the music that makes life livable for the mulleted masses that ARE America, as much as the coasts would like to pretend otherwise- and the few, rare bands that still carry that torch, such as the D here.
I DO NOT want to come across as saying that the rest of the world has no rythym. Europe is far ahead of us in electronica. Japan has the market cornered on lounge. US death metal has a significant threat to the south, as every Mexican under 30 is in a death metal band (not to mention that every Mexican over 30 likes polka, and likes to blast it from their cars, believe it or not). England had it down pat, at least at one point- but I can't think of any brits of late who can rock and roll all night and party ever-y day. It's just that there's something about America that enables us to rock out like no other country.

I honestly think it's hubris. Why else do you think they call it "cock rock"? America's flag should have a giant foam finger on it, and the proof is in Detroit steel behemoths, in our imperialism, our anti-environmental policies saying "fuck you, eat our industrial poo" to the rest of the world, our sprawl, our butt implants, our Super Size, our this, our that, our alla the above. America is the land of excess. Everybody knows that a country based on growth while its resources are finite is doomed to crash- we're just all gambling that it will be after we're dead. Just like how Saturday night you're drunk and stoned and you have a lighter in one hand and your other hand raised, pinkie and index finger extended, and you think that the band is God but in the back of your head you know that Sunday you're going to wake up at noon and fart around the house and then Monday it's back to the coining plant to stamp out compressor mounts and watch that clock crawl backwards. Other countries have a sense of responsibility, a sense of community, and a deep connection to the past. All we've got is excess, and it's one of the things that fuels the love/hate relationship I have with my motherland. I think this is the greatest country on Earth. I think this is the worst country on Earth. I never wanna leave, but we're circling the drain, and when the shit comes down it will be fight or flight, no doubt about it.

If I ever were to leave this country, I would become an ambassador of all that is good about America. I'll wear a cowboy outfit and get one of those backpacks that has a ghetto-blaster built into it, and I'll blast the D whereever I go and beseech all who I meet to "be excellent to each other". Sure, Europeans hate Americans- but look who we've given em! They've only met the rich brats who've got nothing better to do than mooch their way around Europe and try to get laid and occasionally look at some statues and stuff- of course they're hated, because any American who thinks Europe is cooler than the U.S. deserves to be hated, by Americans for their treachery and by Europeans because they could never get it, they could never be European, not in a million years. So I'll avoid Europe, or at least the snootlands- after all, every single one of my ancestors found the place so unbearable that they left! I'll travel the rest of the world and try to model myself after what the rest of the world sees of America, as in Quentin Crisp's statement that "it's just like in the movies, only more so." And my message will be that of the D's song of exalt and joy:

We only came to kick some ass.
rockthefuckinhouse, and kick some ass.
What we gonna do with all the cash? Smoke hash!
And then we'll thrash...
and throw a big ol' bash y'all!
And everyone is invited to the bash...

On my lunch break, I saw James Earl Jones going into a Starbucks. I wanted to go in after him, just to hear him say, "Vente double mocha half-caf latte" in that voice, but then I realized that I'd be stuck in there, not wanting coffee and hating biscotti and not knowing what else they sell. Then I'd get to hear that voice say "Get out of my face, you pathetic loser."

Diaspora

My sister has returned to Quito from a trip to the Galapagos, and she says she has had an epiphany. I can't wait to hear about it.

My brother and his girlfriend just got accepted to the Forest Service Team in the Mt. Adams Wilderness area of Pinchot National Forest in WA for his year's service with Americorps. If you knew him, you'd know that this is like R. Kelly getting paid to pee on minors. This guy rarely comes indoors. I can't wait to go visit him.

My parents are planning a trip to France this summer. They're going to stay at the home of a French exchange student who they hosted here. My dad decided he'd try and look up his long lost French cousins- my grandma's cousin fell in love with a French serviceman during WWII and they lost touch sometime in the 50's. My dad's never met his second cousins because at one point my grandma's cousin moved and my grandma's letters were returned from their new address. So he showed the name & address to the French exchange student- it turns out it was just jumbled up... and that my dad's second cousin was the exchange student's professor back home. Heh. Here he is looking for a Frenchman in France, and the first French person he asks KNOWS the guy. And I bet the student was sick of being asked, "You're from France? Say, do you know Mssr. So-and-so?"

The Roommate number 25 is out. This is the first time a roommate has been horrible enough to get in twice, although it will happen again, I've already got the stories stockpiled.

Friday

I went through the motions of going to work on Friday, but soon found myself free. I was awaiting the arrival of two very special friends, who I'll call SlimLuddite and WeirdMirror. These guys are the cream of the wacky crop in terms of my alums. They are low-maint friends, which means that I can not see 'em for four years and pick up right where I left off, and I can trust them to remain friendly in all situations, rather than demanding that I jump through hoops to be their friends, as so many people who wonder why I don't call anymore have required me to do. Diaspora had settled one in Minneapolis, and another in Cincinnati, so Chicago was the perfect place to meet.

WeirdMirror showed up first, craving some greasy Chicago-style food. It turned out that the less-patient members of the household were about to order in, not wanting to wait for the party to come. We got WM a nice big park sassidge. Not long after, Slim drove in.

It was very, very good to see those guys again. WM would come up to my hometown whenever I visited, but it had been a solid four years since I'd seen Slim. Five mintues after he arrived, it was like he'd never left. It's great to have friends like that.

No time for dilly-dallying, as the party awaited. We hopped two stops down on the train to Bamboo, a Mexican Tiki restaurant/bar owned by Cabuto's parents. In this case, Piloto was throwing a party for no reason, although now that I think about it, Piloto exists in a constant state of party, and this time he was just inviting some friends along.

We arrived to find that Piloto has a lot of friends. I'd say there were 50-some people there at 9, and the party started at 8, which means that it would get going at 11 Mexican time. A good amount for a party but nowhere near enough to fill up a club. Many were Poles etc. from Piloto's ESL class. The rest were mostly Mexicans from the usual crowd (E-D, Lun, Tejas, Machetes, Lisa, etc). Some burly guys from Cabuto's job at Casa dePot showed up, invited by Cabuto even though he had no intention of showing up himself, that bastard. It didn't matter, though- I've never been to Europe, for example, but the idea that you have to know someone to be their friend seems to be limited in my experience to the U.S. non-south. The theme of this crowd is friendliness, acceptance, and fun. If you ever wonder why I don't hang out with too many Americans my age, it's cuz they're just too cool for me. I'd rather hang with grownups with nothing to prove or Mexicans with nothing but friendship to give.

To the bar! Everyone got a drink? Good! A round of tequila shots! Thomas was our bartender, Cabuto's brother, and the drinks were "cheaper than in Mexico". We all knew we were just supporting the party itself and weren't complaining about the $2.50 for a mixed drink, especially since most of Chicago will getcha in the $7-$10 range. I'm always willing to support a party, having hosted many. Once The Roommate had a party and one of his scummy friends stole the beer fund, which sucked extra hard because it was being kept in my prized bank-tube-cannister. The Roommate taught me a valuable lesson- if you are so accepting that you'll hang out with anyone, you'll attract those with such social deficiencies that noone else can stand them, and all of your non-sociopathic friends will abandon you. His crowd of friends looked like a goddam ride on the Greyhound.

Piloto was making his rounds like a good host, so it took him three or four minutes to get to us. I've been jetting off on tangents, but picture this- we stroll in, make our way through the dance floor to the bar, order drinks, do some introductions, order a round of shots, scream and dance in place from the tequila, and shortly afterwards Piloto shows up. Elapsed time maybe five minutes. He says, "Hey, how's it going, thanks for coming, here you go," and hands me a blunt. In what appears to Slim and Weirdmirror to be a bar, as they didn't understand yet that we were there for a private party with the owners. Slim turns to WeirdMirror and says, "He's the coolest guy, ever." Hey- these guys wanted to party, we'll party.

Then came a blur of tequila, dancing, a huge Mexican-food buffet, more tequila, laughing, screaming, talking about old times, meeting new people. Slim later complained that he kept having to push away offered tequila, and that "every five minutes some Mexican was coming up to me with a blunt he wanted to smoke". HA! I got 'em. These guys used to party the heartiest of all back in school, and all it took was Mexicans to out-party 'em. Success!

We stumbled back home around beer-thirty (thank Ditka for the train) and engaged in a rousing game of Crash Bash, one of those four-player party-games that consists of 28 little mini-games. At one point, WM and Slim had tried to leave for smokes, and found the door locked (as this was a bar serving likker after hours) and asked Piloto to be let out for smokes but he just gave them a pack of filterless Mexican cigarettes. So those crazy guys stayed up and smoked Mexican smokes while I passed out, my reserves of heartiness spent.

Thursday

I went for a little bike ride after work on Thursday. Singular's job required that she do some field work that day, namely Wrigley Field, and so I knew she would be at the game for a while. I cruised around my neighborhood and tested out my new Pollution Emission Emulation Unit (PEE-U), which was a stunning success.

Ran into a crazy guy (you can love bikes, but just don't... LOVE bikes) who identified my frame as a Sears Free Spirit. Sears has been producing Free Spirits in both bike and bra form for decades, so I believe it, though a preliminary google search doesn't turn up any pictures of my model year.

I was cruising by the famed Congress Theatre when I remembered that I'd been invited to this Logan Square neighborhood bike association meeting that took place on Thursdays "by the theater". I'm always up for beers, and fortune had found me near a place where I had been invited for beer. Perhaps my subconscious was what led me there. I peered in the windows but the place was abandoned. Next door was nothing but a block full of locked-up storefronts. Then a guy approached on one of those bikes that you can tell the owner is serious about it- stripped down of everything uneccessary, well-worn handlebar tape, and in this case, a smaller front wheel on a road bike for the super-dooper ass-in-the-air position. This guy is a serious biker, I thought, I'll bet he's going the same place as I am. I turned to peer into the theater again, and when I turned back, the guy's bike was locked up but he had disappeared. What the?!?!

I cruised around some more and happened back by the place when I saw someone coming out of one of the (seemingly) locked and abandoned storefronts. I went inside. A sign proclaimed that I had entered the A-zone.

Apparently, the A-zone is a sort of base for various activist operations, mostly centered around the big A, Anarchy. It looked as if it had been a coffee-shop at one time, or maybe they were just going for that feel. There were mountains of flyers, tables and chairs, and various tacklebox-faced freaks hanging around. They had a kitchen that said ABSOLUTELY NO ANIMAL PRODUCTS ARE ALLOWED IN THIS KITCHEN... EVER! on the door. It was clear that many different organizations used this place, from the artist space in the basement, to the stage where shows were obviously held, to the bike corner where my buddies were drinking beer and putting together bikes.

At this point the organization is pretty much a bunch of guys putting together bikes to give to neighborhood kids. They (and by my attendance, we) have plans for some community rides and such, but things are pretty loose at this stage. At the very least it's an excuse to have beersday, and at the most, who knows?

On my way out I put the two leftover beers in the fridge. I have no idea if beer is vegan or not. Uh oh. I could tell that this was not the type of atmosphere that would be very forgiving or understanding about that sort of thing. Fucking humorless Identiopaths. I giggled at the thought of there being a vegan riot upon the discovery of some beer in the fridge.

I headed home with Bikefreeek, who happens to live two blocks from me. Sure enough, the potholes of Milwaukee Avenue proved to be too much for Noam Chopsky's weakened state. The metal on the fork tore, and I took another dive, and had to do the Walk of Shame again. Bikefreeek understood, he's a big-time rat-biker (the Rat Patrol being a loose association of locals dedicated to building crap bikes out of junk and riding them into the ground) and has a chopper so untrustworthy that he won't ride it further than he can carry it. This point marked the end of a steady decline in fork durability that started the day I took Noam off that drop by the aquarium, although my previous wreck was unrelated to this particular weakness. Since so little weight is ever put on that front wheel, I think I can get by with buying another fork, replacing it, and NOT jumping, dropping, stair-riding, and standing up to crank my way up hills. If I'd never done any of those things it never would have bent at all. What does not kill Noam makes him stronger.

Walking the bike back, we ran into other dork-bikers who were excited about an upcoming geek-bike rally in Minneapolis on Memorial Day. Too bad I'm busy that day. I'm finding that there's a large population of choppers, tallbikes, funnybikes, and various mutants in the city, though most people ride something sensible and save their projects for the parades. The nice thing about this community is that it's wholly non-competitive, and there's no sense of who's cooler than whom. It's all about what you do. I have instant credibility with any of them because my chopping ability is right there in front of them, and anyone who got into chopping after me would receive only encouragement from me and the rest of 'em. These bikes are so dorky there's no room for cool. There's also no room for trash talking about what you're GONNA do. You just do it, put your metal where your mouth is, and you're automatically accepted. I have found a small pocket of anti-cool. I like this.

Here's a 1971 Sears catalog that somebody scanned. Scary stuff!

Bikefreeek: "Yeah, Alan Ginsberg stayed with a friend of mine once. He was one crazy, wacky guy. I tell you something... he was on the *prowl*, too!"
Johnny: "Oh really? He was the mack daddy?"
Bikefreeek: "Yeah, he was one nasty old man."
Johnny: "So... did you do 'im?"
Bikefreeek: "NO! I didn't do Alan Ginsberg! I'd probably get some disease!"
Johnny: "Yeah, but it would be a POET disease!"

Remember when I got slammed by AT&Totallyfuckingasswipes, and they kept harassing me about $14 that I owed them or else they were going to shut off the LD service that I didn't order, and I called the Slam Line and she said basically "Tell it to the FCC"? Well, I sent them a check for $14 (and then put a pick freeze on my account to make sure I was not a customer of theirs ever again), and what do I get? A letter saying "You have overpaid your balance by $14, which will be credited towards your next ATT long distance bill."
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH
HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Man, life seems to come in spurts...
I finished Phase 2 of Noam Chopsky yesterday. It's no longer squirrelier than redneck stew. My Walk of Shame was caused by instability around the front wheel, which has been completely eliminated. It looks pretty shweet. However, the front fork is bent so much at the top that the two sides of the (former) tube are pressing against each other now, meaning if it bends any more it'll have to actually tear the metal. I'm hoping this means that it holds out for a while, even if the pedals do scrape the ground when I turn. But, as it's one thing after another, the post-reinforcement test ride resulted in superb handling until the sissy bar broke. Grr. I don't mind so much, as I needed to make a new one anyway to get the seat up to the correct height. Most of my new mods will be featured in upcoming photos, and in the meantime, I've received the parts I need for a SUPER TOP SECRET modification. Tune in regularly for more...
College buds Jorge and Humes are coming this weekend, which should mean lots of fun and stupor. Friday night we're going to a party Piloto is holding at his aunt's (Cabuto's mom) restaurant. It should be interesting- a handful of gringos drinking with a pinche shitload of gueys at a church that has been converted to a Mexican Tiki Bar. They don't even open up this restaurant to the public, for some reason- I'm beginning to suspect that all Mexicans open restaurants as side projects similar to the way all southerners have fireworks stands in their front yards....
Monkey Boy has invited us to come drink & grill on his 38th-floor Marina Towers balcony on Saturday, to watch them move this 125-foot bridge into place across the Chicago River. They've already got it set up on the bank, to replace the old one that was built in the 1890s, and I have no clue how they're moving this thing across the river. It should be a sight to see, and when I'm old, I can tell young whippersnappers that I watched them put that thing there back in aught-dickity, and back in my day we didn't have antigrav....
Chicago cops were forced to shoot a man who charged into a police station, yelling, and cornered a cop while weilding a survival knife in one hand and his pants in the other.... assault with deadly pants, I guess....
I've been summoned by the Court of Crook County for Jury Duty. I've always wanted to serve on a jury, even though everybody says it's boring. Everybody skips it. I say, I'd rather have a guy like me on my jury than twelve jobless losers. Eh, at the very worst it will give me something to post about....
I've discovered that in one of the restrooms at work, the mens and womens toilets are back-to-back on either sides of a wall, and connected by plumbing that causes them to rock, teeter-totter-style, whenever someone sits on the other toilet while you're doing your bidness. This is more unnerving that it sounds...
Speaking of work, my boss dropped about a million points in my book when she described a particular reference I had set up in the database as "nigger-rigged". My jaw hit the fucking desk. I started yelling at her, and mentioned that I'd actually never heard that term before, probably because of all the black folk in my family. She gave me this blank look and said, "Why are there black people in your family?" WHAT THE FUCK? HOW THE FUCK SHOULD I KNOW?!?!? Because my aunts and uncles fell in love with them? Oh, I was hot. I was steamin' like demon-semen. If she had said that to anyone else in this company, she would have been fired faster than Solo's laser pistol. I'm still torn as to what to do about it, because I thought she was a good person, and she's done me a lot of favors, and I essentially work a part-time job full-time by doing HER job full-time. She gets sacked and they get someone who does their job, I lose my benefits. She says it's a bad habit she picked up from her ex, she doesn't really think that about "those people"... but I've always suspected she was racist because of her hiring patterns, and now I know. Anybody know the law/standard practice regarding this sort of thing?

I have a new favorite blog. Amblyopia.

www.whatsbetter?com is in its seventh day or so and already bombed with traffic. I love this site. From now on, all debates on what is better will be resolved by this, the sum of all (nerd) opinion. Unfortunately, their search feature is down for now (it's up at the new test site), but as soon as it's up, all flamewars will be instantly solved a la the Guinness Book of World Records.

I don't know why people submit themselves to this site. Obviously you, a geek loser, cannot compete against The A-Team Van, Ultimate Power, Pee Wee's Big Adventure, and the planet Mars. Nobody knows who you are and why you are better. Thus, you're going to end up in that grey zone between really bad things, like Dog Crap (the worst thing in the Universe) and Hitler (not as bad as Eisner), and okay things, like Alexander the Grape and the color brown. Prepare to be disappointed.

I've had some tough choices to make, though. Adam Ant or Wallace & Grommit? The Sun or Shrooms? Cheez Whiz or Gin? This site really pushes you to evaluate What's Better.

Rathole Update

Yesterday, I saw pigeons going into the ratholes. I bet they were after the stray rat poison pellets. I have no problem with pigeons eating rat poison.

I suspect that the rathole may be an outpost of the king of rats.

More Boring Bike Crap

First off, I wanted to show this pic from Metrodigital, called "Pick a Bike". I really like this picture, for some reason. Probably cuz it's of me with other dork-bikers.

On Friday, I took the Chopsky out to visit Al the Pal, a local bike freak who seems to be known by every bicyclist in town. I was checking out his collection of nerd-bikes, including "Big Poppa" (a kid's bike with a 27-inch front wheel and a 12-inch back wheel- my favorite), Wild Child, his kiddie-bike-extended-to-grownup-size (aka a clownbike), and "The Humpsicle", which is absolutely hilarious- it's a regular 10-speed with a 16-inch back wheel and those pedals that you clip your shoes onto- both pointing in the same direction, so riding the bike requires a humping motion. Silly looks aside, the bike can move, because you're stomping on both pedals with your full weight and then pulling them back up. I was rolling on the ground watching him hump his way up and down the street. I tried it, it's hard as hell. Then some neighbor kid wandered over, asked to try it, and got on the thing and tried to pop a wheelie, ending up flat on his ass. It's always hard not to laugh when you see someone do something intentionally that results in their injury (like in college when a woman was waiting for a very important phone call and yanked the receiver off the base so hard that she whacked herself in the eye and gave herself a shiner). Hint: If your feet are attached to the pedals, don't pop wheelies.

Al lives at frickenfracken 6400 west. Y'see, Chicago is unlike cities like NYC. In New York, the boundaries of the city are clear. You're on Manhattan or you're not. In Chicago, the whole city just sort of fades west, south, and north... miles and miles of check cashing places and laundromats, all looking the same. Chicago is like a creamy downtown surrounded by fifteen miles of boring cake-donut. Eight hundred addresses to the mile, so I know that Al is eight miles out. Remember when I went to Cicero (5200 west) and the cabbie was yelling at me "Too far west! You go too far west!"? 6400 is even too further west.

On my way out, I noticed that the cops were towing the cars parked along either side of Belmont. I got to Al's house and he wasn't home yet (turns out one of his homemade bikes broke and he had to take the bus, which was stuck in the parade mentioned below). So I headed to a local Stop-N-Rob for a soda, when I see Al cruising around looking for me. I take off after him when...

"Hey buddy! That's a pretty neat bike you got there!" Shit. A herd of cops, overseeing the clearing of the street. I can't exactly blow off a cop, since they're the gang that controls all territory except the ghetto. So I have to stop and bullshit with this cop about my wheels "Hey, Frankie, check it out, he carries a spare inner tube because of all the broken glass!" "I seen it, I seen it" "Hey buddy, you make that thing yourself?" Meanwhile Al's fading in the distance. Fortunately the cops didn't know about the local statute that prohibits modification of the front fork of a bicycle. Eventually they let me go with a "ride safely" and I went back to Al's.

So afterwards we're coming down Belmont, and it's Polish Constitution Day. Apparently, if you're Polish, this is how you celebrate Polish Constitution Day:

1) Get a Polish Flag.
2) Drive down Belmont.
3) Lay on your horn the entire time
4) Wave to every other Pole in the city, who is doing the same thing.

So coming back we're basically in the Polish Constitution Day parade. The noise is unbearable. Whenever people honk in other languages, I always think they're honking at me ;) We take the lane, our weird bikes getting lots of laughs from the Poles, who aren't exactly as inclusive as the Mexicans, who say that "Cinco de Mayo is the day that everyone is Mexican!" Everyone was not Polish in this parade: Three dorks on bikes are taking up one of the honking lanes.

A moment of distraction causes me to jerk my wheel sharply to the right. This puts tremendous torque on the front drop-outs, and they twist, sending the wheel flying. Forks into the street, and Johnny over the handlebars.

Now, folks who make their own bikes are used to them breaking. This was my first breakage on the Chopsky, and what does not scrap it, makes it stronger. The fact that I wrecked in front of a huge party, who found it very amusing, didn't help, but... such is the price you pay when you ride a bike that is nigh impossible to ride. It was my first Walk of Shame (carrying the two pieces of your bike back to base).

Fortunately, Singular had a good sense of humor about driving out to the boonies to rescue me (Al's mockery: "*sob sob*... I broke my crappy bike that I made, can you come pick me up?"). The reinforcements made to the front fork will result in an even cooler bike. I spent the rest of the weekend in Singular's company, which I will say is much more enjoyable than chewing gravel on Belmont Avenue.

Operation Clambake is number one on a google search for Scientology!!!!!!! Go google bomb, go google bomb, go, go, go, google bomb, go google bomb, go google bomb, go, go, go, google bomb... ::dances the Cabbage Patch::

This is the future. A megacorporation spending thousands on domains cannot beat a legion of wiseass bloggers. While pissing off the Co$ is all fun and games, the application of the web against the suppression of information is a huge deal. How many examples have the past few years provided us of corporations being unwilling to accept that technology has passed them by? The Napster (a teenager), the DVD encryption being cracked (a younger teenager), the stupid CD rip-proofing that can be overcome with a $1 patch cable, "TiVo's commercial-skipping is theft" (as if going to the shitter during the commercial breaks isn't the same thing- who knew that "taking" a dump is theft?), it just keeps happening. When will companies learn that the way to get and keep customers is to provide good products and service, rather than through coersion and suppression? You been smacked by the Invisible Hand, muthafuckaaaaaa!

An unforgivable pun from some guy on a listserv I subscribe to who, incidentally, everyone accuses of secretly being da mare just because he lives in da mare's neighborhood:

"Since Le Pen wants to drive all Muslims out of France, if he were to succeed, does that mean Le Pen is mightier than the Saud?"

The execution will be swift and merciful.

I just wanted to show this picture from Cosmiverse, one of my favorite websites. It's from the Hubble infrared camera, and may be the first picture ever taken of a planet outside of our solar system. Cool. Click on the pic for the story.

My crazy friend and occasional phoneblog reader S-dogg had obtained a quantity of very expensive and very high quality mota that he wanted me to sample ere I purchased some for a party Singular & I are having later this month. His sister dates an options trader, and one surprising thing I've learned since moving to this city is that anyone who works on the trading floor is an insane mota fiend. Remember the Scion, who I once waited for outside an alley across the street from the Sears Tower, in an upscale Chicago commercial district, so he could get his mota on with a damn coke can? I mean, he smoked keif, for chrissakes, and you can't get much more fiendish than that. Well, maybe you can if you're my friend Hummer, who once bought what he thought was mota from a bum under an overpass in Cleveland but it turned out to be some sort of plant mixed with wood glue to make it look like nugs... and he smoked it anyway. Called it "unknown loads".

I digress. S-dogg knows an options trader which means he can get the shiznit. We went to the apartment of a guy on his floor who had Jamaican flags hanging on the walls and had just blown himself a big glass 3-footer. You gotta understand- S-dogg has a neurological condition that's actually aided by "vitamin J", and he consumes it at a rate that would make Woody Harrelson hang his head in shame. This means that he associates with other freaky drug addicts- the dominatrix/subway graffitist/spiritual medium Christina, who won't hesitate to discuss loudly in a restaurant her shit-on-someone's-face gig that morning, and Stoned to the Bone, who is apparently too blitzed to realize that he's a white 708 stoner, not the ghettoest thug that ever thugged in a ghetto (he and his roommate call themselves "Gold V" and "D-Money" but look like they belong in the front row of a Guided By Voices concert). So I'm a lightweight compared to this crowd, and usually lag far behind in hits and still end up leaving that place not knowing where the hell I am. Fortunately, yesterday, we were heading to Dave & Buster's, which is caddy-corner to S-dogg's building in Chicago's Gold Coast. If you've never been to D & B, it's simply a Wal-Mart-sized bar, with a restaurant, theater, virtual reality, billiards, shuffleboard, skee-ball, and all the latest video games. Basically a Chuck E. Cheese's for adults, where the animatronic bears have been replaced by bartenders and the ball-pit is now an (electronic) shooting range. The one in Cinci has a bowling alley. This one has a Battletech station that's actually been around for 11 years.

You shut yourself in these pods that contain six monitors and 120 controls and battle it out with giant robots. "The battletech Master must be both pilot and engineer," said the guy who's been paid to play VR games for a decade. You have your main screen, your radar, various smaller monitors displaying weapons systems and heat sinks, a joystick, and a throttle. Fortunately, they can adjust the complexity for Rookies. We're "Standards" (5-25 missions) and the guys working there will give you any variable you want- you just have to know how to ask for it. Fog, different levels, advanced steering (torso twisting, done with foot pedals), if you know about it, you can have it. What usually happens to us is that three or four of us will sign up and end up playing with four super-geeks who are there all the time. The super-geeks derive twisted pleasure in blowing up rookies, usually played by the drunken jocks that are just at D & B for the pop-a-shot and golf simulators, and rarely expect to encounter people like us, who have played before but yet look like we dressed ourselves that morning. We like to team up on the nerds and show them who's all that.

Let's see... what else. I asked for a martini with olives and the waitress brought me three olives on a plate with my drink. Singular and I both won 100 tickets on our first try at one of the gambling games (they have prizes ranging from stickers to jukeboxes... I think 100 tickets would get us a shot glass). S-dogg was extremely entertaining, as usual. At one point he used the phrase, "She had fewer teeth than the front row of a Willie Nelson concert." That's all I can remember. I was rip-roarin. I'm surprised I could tell those games from reality. My decision? I'll buy it!

...the trials and frustrations I've experienced in attempting to obtain broadband internet got so complex and numbered that I stopped recording them here. But I thought I'd just give a little update- I have three DSL modems now. I DON'T have access through the Airport. My phone bill this month was overcharged by $513.

I still use my dialup from the machinist.

...awakened this morning at 5 AM by a smell of varnish or paint so strong that it woke me up. This is the first time I can remember being awakened by a smell. But in your 5 AM stupor, it's not very comforting to be awakened by a strong chemical smell. Had it been 3 PM, I woulda thought, "Oooeee, somebody's painting something!" But at 5 AM, I'm thinking "chemical spill/nerve gas attack/gas leak" and in my dreamy-dream state I dreamed that I found a soldering iron burning on my nightstand.

My best guess is that the basement moved out last night and E. Victor, the landlord, wanted to paint the place before the tenants moved in today, so he had it done overnight. Either that or the folks on the first floor were having a big huffing party. And they didn't invite us! Well, they sorta did. We all had brains oozing out our ears this morning.