Skaters

Look at all the gleeful, happy skaters down at Millennium park.

I was going to take a late lunch hour and get some skating in. Then my Outlook Calendar chimed, reminding me that I had to attend a webinar.

Sigh . . .

My Generation

While in Effingham, I gave a presentation to a group of business owners about employing people with disabilities. It was complete with cutting-edge technology, graphics, and high-tech media devices -- that is, I showed a Pepsi commercial.) At one point, there was a chart indicating that the baby-boomers were those people born between 1947 and 1964.

I’m a baby-boomer?

I always thought baby-boomers resulted from World War II soldiers coming home and having lots of sex. My parents were little kids during that time and barely remember The War. (Hell, they were practically children when they had me in 1959).

I always thought baby-boomers were the Hippies in the late Sixties. They wore flowers in their hair, sang on hillsides about giving the world a Coke, protested the war in Vietnam and dropped enough acid to kill a yak.

Meanwhile, I was watching Lost in Space in my PJs while dropping Coco-Puffs.

The baby-boomers had super-cool music to listen to: The Beatles, Janis Joplin, Jefferson Airplane, The Doors. . .

When I was a teenager, we had Captain and Tennille, John Denver, and The Partridge Family. How can that possibly qualify me as a baby-boomer?

They had far-out clothes and hair down to their knees.

We had feathered, Breck-smelling hair and wore leisure suits.

They came of age during the race-riots, assassinations, civil rights marches during the tumultuous Johnston administration.

We came of age during the Ford and Carter years. Remember those?

I didn’t think so.

Me, a baby-boomer?

Hardly.

This-n-That

I returned from a rather exhausting work-related trip to Effingham last night. You gotta watch out for Effingham – that town will just eat you up and spit you out if you’re not careful.

The day before, we were accommodated in a brand new hotel and it was really impressive. The bathroom was almost a religious experience:
Anyway, I’ve been looking forward to the outdoor ice rink opening at Millennium Park as I am wont to do every year. I knew that it would be opening for the season on November 18, but alas, I would be away in Effingham and would miss the grand opening.

So today, I brought my skates with me to work, hoping to get some skating in during an extended lunch hour. I’ve had my nose up to the window all morning waiting to see skaters down there. But alas, it’s raining today and the rink is closed.

So sad . . .
But, tonight I have choir rehearsal to look forward to (which I really do) and – even more exciting – the ingredients to make my laundry detergent should be arriving any day now! Isn’t that just the most exciting ever??

It takes so little to make me happy. . .

Off to Effingham

I’m off to Effingham, Illinois for a couple of days. More work-related travel ensues.

Normally, I’m not required to travel this much for work. It’s just that we’ve got this project going on and most of my staff is involved in it some way or another, so I have to be there.

Back to Effingham. . . .

Yes that is a funny name for a town now that “effing” has come to mean something completely different in modern vernacular.

Case in point.

When I first moved to Chicago from Toronto back in 2001, I got a temp job while I was looking for a Real Job. I ended up working in an accounting department at a non-profit agency and my supervisor was this likeable-enough young woman with whom I shared an office.

Every so often, she’d get a phone call from someone else in the company trying to account for some donation or something, and after listening a bit, she would suddenly exclaim, “It’s an effin' mess!”

This went on for about three times that day. “It’s an effin' mess!” seemed to be her answer for everything. I thought it was kind of strange, and frankly, not very professional.

Finally, she came to me and said, “Okay, I need to train you on our accounting system called FMS.”

Right then it dawned on me. All this time she was saying,
“It’s in FMS,”
rather than
“It’s an effin' mess.”

Oh.

By the way, that woman was none other than Miss Healthypants. That’s how we met. She was actually my supervisor for those three months when I worked in her accounting department over eight years ago. (I subsequently got a Real Job with the same company and our friendship ensued now that she wasn’t my supervisor.)

For the next three years, she would come up to my department, laugh, and say, “Dude, I am still finding mistakes you made while you were a temp!”

It was an effing mess.

I Hope This Works

I’m excited because I’m about to embark on a new endeavor that could rock your world.

I’m going to make laundry detergent.

The laundry room where I live recently installed these new, modern front-loading machines that require a special low-suds laundry detergent. I went to the store to get this special detergent and was appalled at the exorbitant cost -- appalled, I tell you!

I didn’t want to pay that much for laundry detergent. Was this special detergent really necessary?

Upon researching it, I found out that, no, it’s not.

The Expensive Laundry Detergent People are in cahoots with the Front-Loading Laundry Machine People – it’s all just an evil, manipulative capitalist racket. Can you believe something like that would happen in this country?

Just use less of your regular detergent so that it doesn’t make too many suds.

Well, in doing my research, I found a way to make your own low-suds detergent for just pennies -- pennies, I tell you!

You will need:

½ cup of Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda. (Order here)
½ cup of Borax Laundry Booster (Order here)
One bar of soap
(they suggest Ivory Soap but I'm going to use my Old Spice Fresh Scent because it smells really nice.)

Shave the bar of soap, (a microplane grater would probably work well for this) mix together with the other ingredients and store in a plastic container.

And you only need 1 tablespoon per load.
1 Tbs.

That’s it!

I just did the math. If you order the boxes of washing soda and borax, along with the Ivory Soap it will yield 112 loads of laundry at 23 cents per load.

Basically, my laundry only consists of towels, underpants, socks and sheets. So it's not like I need Super Mega Tide XQ with Aloe-Verbena Stain Fighters and Pomegranate Gentle-Glide Softeners. Have we become that spoiled? For crying out loud, our great grandmothers made their own laundry soap from leftover pig fat and lye. From what I hear, it was pretty powerful stuff.

I really hope this works well. Laundry detergent is so awfully heavy to carry back from the grocery store. Also, I'm basically cheap and would love to stick it to the Nasty Capitalist Laundry Detergent People.

I’ll keep you posted.

No Lifeguard on Duty

I’m in yet another hotel this week. Two different hotels and it’s only Wednesday.

I’m getting really good at operating the remote controls on the hotel TVs. I dread the day I get home and automatically press the power-menu-asterisk sequence on my Tivo.

I cancelled my gym membership the other day. Three reasons:

First, I’m never home anymore.
(2) my apartment building just opened a really nice gym and
c. All the hotels I’ve been staying in have ‘fitness centers’.

Yeah, like I’m going to remember to bring my work-out clothes on a business trip. I’ve been running around the state of Illinois with my underpants in a laptop case.

And what’s with all these indoor pools in hotels? I never see anyone in them but squirmy, squealy little kids. Watch out kids – the sign says ‘No Lifeguard on Duty.’
So don’t even think about drowning.

I never see any adult-type persons swimming in there. Probably because we wouldn’t know what to do with a wet swim suit. Like I’m going to bring a swimsuit and then drive three hundred miles with a wet swimsuit stuffed in my laptop case.

I have learned that one of God’s greatest creations was probably these two words:

Room Service

Oh my goodness, I cherish and adore Room Service.

After a long day of business meetings and ‘networking’ and putting out fires by remote-access, there’s nothing better than having a meal brought to my door on a nice tray.

After ten hours of feigning interest, the last think I want to do is to talk to anyone -- even a server at Applebee's.

(My per diem doesn't quite cover a room service meal, but I don't care. It's an expense I gladly cover on my own.)

Tomorrow, I will be back in Chicago, will get to go to choir rehearsal with eccentric musicians and then sleep on my own sofa.

I just hope I remember how to work the Tivo.

Portia

For those of you who don't know, Portia is a chocolate Lab owned by my dear friends, Jack and Steve.

Portia is the most wonderful dog ever. A more friendly, loving dog than Portia, I cannot imagine. I've had the pleasure of doggy sitting her quite a bit over the years.

I've even taught her to play the piano.

But Portia has been getting on in years. Over twelve of them in fact. This past year, she'd been experiencing some really nasty problems with her front leg and she's had increasing trouble getting around.

One of her favorite activities has been to visit Doggie Beach on Lake Michigan here in Chicago. However, because of her increasingly bad condition, she's been unable to go at all.

Things looked pretty grim for this delightful creature. Her quality of life was going downhill.

But Steve happens to be a very talented veterinarian and was able to obtain stem cell treatment for dear Portia a few months ago.

And you know what? It's working!

Our Portia was even able to return to her beloved Doggie Beach the other day.

Click here for the video of her and Jack. And get out your hankies.

I've used all mine.

The Break-Out Session

I’m at a two-day conference and it’s one I have to go to every year. There are lots of training sessions one can attend, some of them useful, some of them, not so much.

One thing I have realized is that I truly despise “break-out sessions.” That’s when the instructor gleefully announces, “Okay, let’s break up into groups of five and come up with some ideas on how to build a better weasel trap.”

I hate those “break-out sessions.”

First of all, we’ve paid good money to hear the expertise of the expert regarding weasel traps. Since we’ve pain the money, we’re obviously the ones that don’t know beans about weasel traps. Why do these instructors think we can learn from each other? Why are they so enthusiastic about us breaking up into groups?

I hate that.

I’ve been the seminar instructor before. (I attended a seminar on giving seminars.)
I know full well that “breaking up into groups” is just a code for “I didn’t prepare enough material to teach you and I need to fill up thirty minutes.”

I hate that.

So, now that I’m middle age and have lots of experience under my belt, I’ve realized that I don’t have to take it anymore. So I don’t.

When the instructor says to break up into groups, I simply leave and go get some coffee. Thirty minutes later when all the break-out nonsense is done, I quietly slip back in.

It’s not like I’ve missed anything.

A Public Service Announcement

This morning as I was walking to church, I was approached by a disheveled-looking man who asked me for money. He had the most typical story.

His wallet had just been stolen and he needed seven dollars so he could take the Metra train to his home in the suburbs. (The “Metra” is a local commuter train system that serves the suburbs.)

I moaned.

I’ve heard this story, or a variation of it, at least a dozen times. I guess these panhandlers think it’s a good way to make some quick money. Instead of requesting some change “for a cup of coffee,” they have developed this sad tale of being stranded in the city. If I can, then, provide them with the train fare, they will soon be within the loving bosom of their family.

It’s a quick way of making seven bucks a pop as opposed to 25 cents at a time.

Like I said, I’ve heard this story many times. Three times, they have just gotten off the bus from Mississippi and need train fare to get home to the suburbs. For some strange reason, it’s always Mississippi. I guess the good folks from down there don’t have lots of money for travel.

I was approached by the same guy twice within a six month period. He had a twist: He wore a security guard’s uniform to give himself an air of legitimacy. The second time he approached me saying that his wallet had been stolen, I remarked that perhaps he should re-think his choice of occupation as a security guard.

The thing is, when these guys launch into their story of a wallet being stolen and needing seven dollars for the Metra train, they’re never anywhere near the Metra train station. Or the bus station that had just deposited them from Mississippi for that matter.

Like I said, I groaned when he started in on this tired story.

I have all the compassion in the world for those who are less fortunate. I make a nice living, so I make sizeable donations to United Way and PBS. These panhandlers should be thanking me for making vegetarian cooking programs available to them.

I started to tell him that he should really think of something more original that needing seven bucks for the Metra train. Instead, I just mumbled a “sorry” and went on to get my latte at Starbucks.

Can't these guys come up with a different story?

Like I said, I have all the compassion in the world. But a lack of creativity is something that I cannot support, much less, tolerate.

The Sears Tower

Today was a beautiful autumn Saturday. Not wanting to waste it, I decided to walk across downtown to the Sears Tower in order to visit the new glass skyboxes on the 103rd floor. I figured that with Summer being long gone, there wouldn’t be many tourists crowding the place.

I’ve really been wanting to visit this new exhibit called “The Ledge” which consists of a glass box that hangs out from the observation deck that you can stand in. I also wanted to take some videos and photos of the experience.

I charged up my camera, got up early wanting to beat the crowds, walked all the way across downtown, (after stopping at Starbucks for a cafe Americano -- I'm not an animal, after all) only to discover there was a huge, long line of folks waiting to get through security.

This was an incredibly long line and it was moving about as fast as a glacier.
There were Cro-Magnons at the front of it.

That was just to get through security. Then you had to purchase your tickets. Then you had to take the elevator to the top. I could only imagine how impossible it would be to try and get into one of the few skyboxes.

I went home.

Stupid tourists. They ruined my plans.

I think that there should be an express line to the top of the Sears Tower for the residents of Chicago. Let the tourists be tourists -- but they shouldn’t impinge on our ability to visit our city when we want to.

On second thought, I’ll go visit the Sears Tower on a cold, Chicago wintery day when it’s ten below zero -- like a REAL Chicagoan.

Coconut & Lime Verbena Shampoo

While in Peoria for the umpteenth time the other day, I actually used the little bitty bottle of hotel shampoo. Normally, I bring my own shampoo in a little 3 oz. bottle because, that way, I know what I’m getting and my hair doesn’t end up smelling like Essence of Kiwi & Weasel Extract.

Also, during all my many business trips, I collect all the little bitty bottles of shampoo, conditioner, soap, facial creams until I have a giant box of them and then I donate them to a women’s shelter.

Well, that is my intention anyway. Right now, I just have a giant box of the stuff and it's getting gianter with every trip.

Anyway, my own little bottle of shampoo was empty and so I used the hotel’s shampoo which turned out to be Coconut & Lime Verbena Volumizing Shampoo.

Oh my goodness, my hair loved it.

Normally, I have really oily hair -- like an otter – but this shampoo made it so very soft and fluffy. All this time, I’ve been using plain ol’ Suave Clarifying Shampoo that costs something like $1.49 for a two-liter bottle at Walgreen’s. I wanted this Fancy Hotel Shampoo now.

But I only had the little bitty 1 oz bottle of the stuff. Whatever shall I do?

I googled it.

I think that whatever the problem, googling it solves everything.

Can’t think of words to a song?

Google it.

Does Olestra really cause anal seepage?

Google it.

Want a photo of Alanis Morrisette during the Toronto years when she looked like an orangutan?

Google it.

Just googling “coconut lime verbena shampoo” got me to the website that sells it. (Bath and Body Works.)

I have six bottles on the way.

My gosh, we are so spoiled these days.

Oh, and here is Alanis Morrisette during the Toronto years.