Category Archives: Uncategorized

Housekeeping, life updates and other bits without a natural fit

No one waits in line at Hot Doug’s for a hot dog

October 2, 2014Chicago, Uncategorizedeverything great about chicago, hot doug'sScott Smith

One of the worst things about Internet culture in the last five years is its tendency to mock the unfettered joy of others. Someone’s always there to remind you there is some atrocity you should be rending your garments over instead of just…being…in-between the decisions that keep you up at night.

All this brings me to the line at Hot Doug’s.

Let me make this clear because it seems to have escaped notice: Hot Doug’s is not, at its core, about hot dogs. And people do not wait in line at Hot Doug’s because they are interested solely in consuming a hot dog.

Hot Doug’s is both simple and complex. Simply, they are encased meats. Here’s where it gets complicated: I have never, during a visit, spent more time dining inside Hot Doug’s than I have waiting outside in its line. I would argue this is true for most people. So what happens in the line is as important as what happens when you sit down to eat.

This is why people who are selling their spots on Craigslist for hundreds of dollars are missing the point entirely.

I don’t blame people who have never been to Hot Doug’s for thinking a long wait in line for a place is bullshit. In any other case, I’d agree with them. But I’ve waited in line at Hot Doug’s for an hour in ten degree weather and been happy to do it.

We live in a world that is trying to eliminate any shared physical experience. The movies, the theater and the line at Hot Doug’s feel like the last semblances of humanity’s group project. (There is no line at Kuma’s. You put your name in and find a space of your own to wait.)

I’ve never had a bad experience in a Hot Doug’s line. Every time I expected someone would, for example, ignore the signs about keeping the doors in the vestibule closed on a winter’s day? Never happened. People want to be in that line so there’s a shared sense of responsibility.

Here’s why people waite in line at Hot Doug’s:

– Because the guy that owns the place has been standing longer than you (until this week, anyway). And he’s standing there to take your order. With a smile. And a warm greeting. And a reminder that you should just get the small drink instead of the large because it’s free refills.

– Have you ever had to wait for a table at Hot Doug’s? I haven’t. Do you know why? Because Doug Sohn and his team are wizards. I placed my order and miraculously – every time! – there’s a table waiting for me and however many friends I came in with. Doug knows exactly how long to make small talk with you and everyone else in line to make things run smoothly.

– Doug Sohn is the only person in Chicago to incur a fine for selling foie gras. Not Charlie Trotter who made it a thing. The little guy who owns the sausage stand on the corner of Roscoe and California. However you feel about foie gras aside, here is an example of an average guy telling grandstanding politicians to take a flying leap and getting pasted on the chin for it.

– If you are in line at closing time, you get a seat.

– The specials this week include salsa verde wild boar sausage with chipotle dijonaise, jalapeno bacon and smoked gouda and escargot and guanciale sausage with parsley-garlic butter and camebert cheese for nine bucks each and if you want gourmet food on that level anyplace else in Chicago it will cost you three times as much.

– This:

People waited in line at Hot Doug’s because all of this matters. And they voted with their feet. They said they wanted this to remain and were willing to put in the time necessary to make it happen.

So you, guardian of the free time of others, who mocked those folks who were waiting in line at Hot Doug’s?

They had more fun than you.

Reacting to life: Essay Fiesta – 07.21.14

July 22, 2014UncategorizedEpictetus, essay fiesta, grandparents, robberyScott Smith

I haven’t read at Essay Fiesta in three years so it was great to be back at The Book Cellar in Lincoln Square last night. It’s now hosted by Willy Nast and Karen Shimmin and benefits 826Chi, a non-profit organization dedicated to helping youth get excited about reading and creativity. Their next event is August 18th at 7pm. You should go.

Or: Come see me read at Tuesday Funk on September 2nd at the Hopleaf.

I’ve had a couple things knocking around in my head recently and writing this piece really helped bring them all together. Saying more about that spoils a couple bits in the below so…

—

Last week, my grandfather and I were sitting in a steakhouse in the northwest suburbs drinking dry Rob Roys on the rocks, with a twist. It has always been his drink and so in his presence it is mine as well.

We were waiting for our food to arrive and he was telling me the story of how he and my grandmother met. I’ve heard this story at least ten times before but something about the way he told it that night – or maybe it was the second Rob Roy – made me realize how close I came to never being born.

I’ve always been fascinated by the story of how my grandparents met because it seemed really complicated but that night it seemed moreso.

Here’s the gist: This guy from another school (which is all I’m ever told about him) asks my grandfather, who is then just a 17 year old Norwegian kid named Edgar, if he knows a certain girl named Jean, a 14 year old Polish girl. This guy asks Edgar if he knows Jean because he’s trying to find out whether she was in Holstein Park some recent evening. (The reasons why he’s asking have never been made clear to me.) My grandfather says no, he doesn’t know her, but he thinks Jean is in class with his brother, my uncle Hal. Edgar says he’ll ask him. Either Edgar has Hal ask Jean or the two of them ask her together – again, the details are less than clear – but what is made very clear is her emphatic no: She was not in Holstein Park that night because her mother – my great-grandmother Martha – would never allow her to be in Holstein Park at night. But Edgar takes a liking to Jean and so they begin dating and then a few years later they marry, then have my mom and et cetera, et cetera.

So I’m sitting there sipping on that Rob Roy, listening to this story and I suddenly realize after all these years that this story makes no sense.

Continue reading Reacting to life: Essay Fiesta – 07.21.14 →

The latest on the armed robbery

June 23, 2014Uncategorizedarmed robbery, BeverlyScott Smith

Some news today about the armed robbery I experienced:

I’ll second what the alderman says above. The men and women of the 22nd District were incredibly thorough and supportive throughout this. In particular, Detective Donnelly kept me on an even keel as he moved the investigation forward. When I grow up, I want his professionalism and attention to detail.

Obviously, I’m choosing not to reveal much about the what happened that night because there’s still a long way to go from here. It’s also why I’m not going into detail about my feelings about the two men who did this. It’s not worth it in the short-term and I’d rather focus on end goals.

But I’m very relieved that this is all happening.

Also, today Red Eye ran an excerpt of my blog post. I rewrote a few things in light of some recent criticism of the original post. This seems most relevant and keeps pointing the way forward for me:

We have to stop thinking of neighborhood boundaries as the limit of our interest. When crime happens anywhere in the city, it affects all of us. We have to be willing to help be a part of the solution, however we’re able.

I got robbed at gunpoint in my really nice Chicago neighborhood. What do I do now?

June 19, 2014UncategorizedScott Smith

I’ve lived in the Chicago area my whole life. I’ve lived in the city proper since 1998. I’ve never been robbed at gunpoint.

There’s a first time for everything and last night was my first time. I want it to be my last.

I was walking home from the Metra at 107th St. It’s an eight-minute walk for me. I was on my block, steps from my house when two guys in their late teens/early 20s robbed me. One had a gun. It was big. And it was sticking in my chest.

The whole time I’m thinking “Of course they have a gun. That’s what you do when you want to rob someone. You scare them with a gun so they give up anything of value. A gun turns a struggle into an obvious outcome.” It seemed so typical. Here’s my mugging!

I tried to use a few seconds to stall so I could get my bearings. How much danger am I in? (Quite a bit.) Is there anyone around? (Nope.) Do I have a choice in how this ends? (Hope so.)

They got my wallet, my phone and my work laptop. Physically, I’m fine and safe because I didn’t prize my possessions over my future. And because these guys hoped the long-established storyline would play out exactly as it did.

Crime should not feel inevitable. But it’s felt like that lately in Chicago. For many people, including me. Even though I live in a safe neighborhood. There’s too much of it happening here for it not to affect you, no matter what neighborhood you live in. I’ve been telling anyone who will listen that Chicago’s tribalism, enforced by neighborhood boundaries, contributes to the problem. As long as it happens somewhere else, it’s OK. As long as it involves gangs, it’s OK because you’re not in one so it won’t happen to you. Even though it’s only a matter of time until it hits home. It did for me last night.

I am not special. This exact scenario plays out many times across the city. Similar ones happen often with far more lethal results. As someone who closely follows what happens in this city and this neighborhood, I’m aware of the potential danger.

Mine wasn’t the only recent robbery around here. There was another armed robbery last week near the 107th Metra station. According to reports on local community Facebook groups, there was a robbery four blocks south at the 111th station. And one last week at 96th and Damen. There were recent robberies at businesses near the 103rd St. Metra stop. People in our neighborhood are being targeted because they’re comforted by the safety and are more likely to have something worth taking.

More crime is happening here because we live in a safe neighborhood. Mull that one over for a while.

I did all the things you’re supposed to do right after a robbery: called the police, canceled my credit cards, changed the locks (my keys were in my bag and they had my driver’s license). The cops at the 22nd District – five officers and a detective – could not have been more kind, thoughtful and thorough.

Plenty of people will read the above details and use it to support their own conclusions about the causes of crime in Chicago. I know this because I’ve already read comments from people on our neighborhood Facebook groups who are quick to blame it on a particular demographic group (which is a crock because the actions of a few are not indicative of the many) or use it as evidence of why concealed carry should be allowed on trains (which is also a crock because many people, including me, would still choose not to carry even if they could and a good guy with a gun doesn’t always stop a bad guy with a gun).

I’m a bleeding heart liberal and an avid reader. My opinion has been when you don’t give people economic options and don’t make them feel safe and don’t invest in their neighborhoods they’ll do what they can to survive and use crime as an economic opportunity. I still think that.

But I’m also a realist. And I know some people are just assholes.

The real cause is somewhere in the above three paragraphs. Probably the last two.

When my wife posted to our local Facebook groups about what happened – in an effort to find a locksmith who’d come out this evening – people messaged her saying the recent robberies in our neighborhood are making them put their houses up for sale. This is unusual. Folks live here for decades. People don’t move from Beverly, they move to Beverly. Usually because their parents raised them here. Or they’re looking for what it has to offer. Maybe that’s about to change.

I know what happened to me is minor compared to what has happened to others who don’t have the resources or support I have. Or to people who aren’t targets themselves but are caught between the person who is and the person with a gun. I walked away with an unpleasant experience. Most people who have a gun pointed at them in Chicago don’t walk away.

Chicago’s murder rate gets a lot of attention. But the robbery, assault and other crime rates don’t get as many frequent updates even though they hit people where they live, too. And they’re making people leave where they live.

Not me though. I’m staying to fight. I’ve lived in this neighborhood for five years. We have the best burger and best ice cream in the city. There are many other things to recommend it: the churches, the schools, the people.

I’ve already written the alderman – he’s a good guy and cares about the people who live here – and I plan on talking more about this in the future. I’ve told him I’m willing to help, however I’m able, to deal with our neighborhood’s short term crime problem and the city’s larger problems. If you follow me online, you know I’m not exactly quiet about the problems in Chicago and how our priorities are often out of whack. It’s always been personal for me. I love this city so very much; it is my joy but it is also my sorrow.

Tonight Chicago’s crime problem hit me on the street where I live.

It’s not enough for me to talk about it anymore, it’s time for me to do more. If I’m not doing more, I’m not doing enough.

I hope I motivate others to do the same.

UPDATE: I’m no longer publishing comments made on this post, regardless of tone. I don’t have the time to sift through them and keep the discussion from getting out of hand. Thanks to those who sent along their thoughts.

An endorsement: Putting to-do list items in your calendar

November 3, 2013UncategorizedendorsementsScott Smith

I love to-do lists. They keep my head organized and clear. Even better is the feeling of knocking completed to-do list items off your list.

Parenting and agency life lend themselves well to the making of lists, but not so much to the doing of those items unless they have a hard-and-fast deadline. In both cases, unexpected situations often arise and must be dealt with quickly, if not immediately. So those short and long-term goals often take a back seat. Parenting adds another layer to this which is anytime you get 30 minutes to yourself you’re really taken with the notion of doing nothing.

I’ve found the best way to make something a priority is to give it the distinction of a calendar entry.
Without a digital represenation of the activity during the day, it’s way too easy to put it off and think ‘I’ll make time for it somewhere else in the week.”

In my personal life, I’ve recently been trying to make more time for reading, writing, running and listening to new music. None of these has a real deadline. If I don’t run three times a week or listen to music at all, nobody cares. There are consequences (poor circulatory health and an underdeveloped knowledge of culture) but nothing falls down.

But when you see a calendar appointent that says you have to write a little on Tuesday night, not Monday night, because if you can see that if you stay up late writing on Monday you won’t be able to get up early for that scheduled run on Tuesday and listening to music should happen on your way to work on Monday mornings because everyone needs quality tunes before starting their work week…things start to create their own deadlines. And the way to enforce this is to actually write in in your calendar.

As a workplace tactic, I definitely recommend doing this for anything you have to get done on a certain day as well as any of those ephemeral tasks you should be doing but are easily pushed aside, like industry research or diving into analytics. Since other people will see your time marked as “busy” it ensures it won’t get pushed aside for a meeting. Plus, a standing hour of right brain thinking makes it easier to tackle left brain work.

There are productivity gurus who will tell you this is a terrible idea – I think there’s a portion of Getting Things Done that specifically says not to do this. But anytime I follow this rule, I get more done and feel more relaxed and in control. I even go so far as to use this tactic to remind myself to eat oatmeal three times a week. (My blood pressure isn’t going to reduce itself.)

Image via ironybelle

Five years

October 25, 2013Uncategorizedawesome, marriage, WeddingScott Smith

Erin and I are in Vermont this weekend, celebrating our fifth wedding anniversary. We got married out here then and we’re staying at the same B&B we did then. A few things have changed but not much.

Yesterday we spent our afternoon in a bar/restaurant called Bentley’s, which five years ago was the first place we landed when we arrived and the last place we spent time at before leaving for the airport. As we sat there, we dug back into this Glamour.com article about how we were going to live-blog and “Twitter” our wedding. (We weren’t, really, but nevermind.)

Reading it five years later, it seems adorably quaint – both the tone of wonder and surprise and the idea that such a thing would be worth writing about at all. At the time, I suppose it was. Twitter was only a year and a half old and had yet to become the celeb-filled and influential communications tool it is today. And the extra spin that we were eloping but people could follow along as it happened – again, not really what we were doing – gave it a societal change element.

The biggest jolt the article – and our accompanying website – provides is how long ago it seems while feeling as if the time has flown by. For example, I barely remember what iMeem was but apparently we used it to build our wedding playlist. Also, we had enough time on our hands to build a playlist and write a bunch of pages for a whole other website. The jobs we had then are four jobs ago in both our cases. We were still living in a small apartment in Roscoe Village and there was just Glin, no Abigail yet.

Somehow though, it doesn’t feel as if that much time has passed and everything seems new still. I’m still ridiculously in love with Erin. She remains my greatest champion and between her and Abigail they are the people with whom I prefer to spend the most time.

Erin’s sleeping next to me as I write this (typed out on my iPhone because I can’t get the WiFi to work on my iPad for some reason so forgive me my typos). We found a new restaurant here that instantly became a favorite last night. In a few minutes, we’ll go down to breakfast and then later revisit the farm where we got married five years ago. This weekend will be like that: old favorites and new discoveries we didn’t have time for then because of all the wedding hijinx. Exactly how you’d like it to be.

When I got up from the table at Bentley’s to use the bathroom, I started to wander around and remember the circuitous route it takes to get there: around the bar, through the hallway, up the stairs, around the corner. I remembered it exactly. Five years ago and it was like no time had passed at all.

On our wedding site, I said this:

Without Erin, there is no story, you see. There is no “us.” There is no “rest of my life.”

I hope that feeling never goes away.

Happy anniversary, Erin.

Working again

June 27, 2013Uncategorizedcramer-krasselt, employmentScott Smith

I’ll keep this short: This Monday I start a new job at Cramer-Krasselt, the second largest independent agency in the country. At C-K, I’ll be leading content strategy for clients and developing content for Web, mobile, social, video and other channels. The really exciting thing about this job is I’ll be doing a fair amount of writing again, which is something I’ve missed in my last few positions. It will be good to have that discipline on a regular basis and in a professional context. Through the interview process, I’ve met a bunch of really great people at C-K. Really looking forward to working with all of them.

During my time off, I spoke to some really great people and made a bunch of new connections. Many people helped me with introductions, coffee, lunch and other types of networking. A big thank you to everyone who read e-mails from me, listened to me explain what I was looking for and tried to help me find it or just sent a supportive message or two.

A new opportunity, presented as a challenge

June 7, 2013Uncategorizedcontent marketing, content strategy, ogilvy, playboyScott Smith

I was laid off from Ogilvy yesterday. It wasn’t completely unexpected as there were some layoffs last week and I was new on the team. Plus, the position wasn’t a particularly good fit for me. I know that sounds like spin and maybe it is but it also has the benefit of being true.

I still believe what I said when I started at Ogilvy:

To those paying attention, it’s become obvious: Anyone or anything can be a publisher, including consumer brands.

[SNIP]

Behind all of that content are methods and practices that tell us how long people view that content, who’s doing the viewing and how that information can be used to build a sustainable business. It’s something that traditional media publishers need to know more about and do more of in the future.

If I want to have a complete view of the mass media ecosystem and truly understand how content is created, consumed, tracked and paid for across all platforms, then the work I’ll be doing at Ogilvy is the next logical step.

I spent years at news publishers and loved it. But ultimately I’m a content strategist. Whether it’s on behalf of a brand or a traditional media publisher isn’t as important to me as the opportunity to create it, measure it, and motivate someone to take action as a result of it: seeking out more information, participating in the conversation and sharing it with others, taking action in a community, or becoming a new customer. It can be done in print, on the Web, via an app, at events or in many other channels.

While Ogilvy didn’t quite work out the way I expected, I learned a great deal there in a short time. I’m better at what I do now than when I started. The experience didn’t sour me on agency life but it has given me more perspective on it. My boss and the rest of the team were a great group and I’m looking forward to seeing what they do next.

As for me, this situation is not wholly unfamiliar; something similar happened to me when I was at Playboy.com. After I left there, I got the chance to talk to a bunch of interesting people about their projects before landing at Chicago magazine, which was a great opportunity. I’m looking forward to the next great opportunity this time as well.

Roger Ebert’s greatness

April 4, 2013Uncategorizedchicago sun-times, Chicago Tribune, Roger Ebert, Time Out ChicagoScott Smith

The number of people who can speak authoritatively about what it’s like to be a Chicagoan has dropped by one.

ebert_orourkes — Roger Ebert at O’Rourke’s talking with Tom Wolfe (© Jack Lane)

Roger Ebert’s death is on par with the passing of Studs Terkel for both Chicago and the world. Studs told the stories of the men and women who made Chicago live and breathe. Roger Ebert told the stories of film and, by extension, humanity writ large. But just as no critic’s view is entirely objective, Ebert’s outlook was informed by a life lived in Illinois, a career steeped in Chicago newspapers and a personality that lept off the page. Many before me have noted how he turned his forced physical silence into a digital journal equal to all his work that came before.

As the Tribune‘s Mark Caro noted today, Roger Ebert was Chicago, moreso than any other person. His bearing, humor, liberalism and enjoyment of bars – prior to his sobriety – were all aspects of this city that many saw as reflections of themselves. His international renown gave average people aspirations of greatness. Michael Jordan was His Airness. Roger Ebert was one of us.

A few other noteworthy links on and by Roger Ebert:

Neil Steinberg’s obituary for Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times
Rick Kogan’s obituary for him in the Chicago Tribune
Hank Sartin’s 2008 profile of Roger and his wife Chaz in Time Out Chicago, part of its Chicago Heroes package
Carol Felsenthal’s 2005 profile of Roger Ebert in Chicago magazine
Ebert’s essay in the Chicago issue of Granta about legendary journalism drinking spot O’Rourke’s
Siskel and Ebert filming a promo for their TV show and giving each other shit
Chris Jones’s 2010 piece on Roger Ebert for Esquire (“The Essential Man“)
The Playboy Interview with Siskel and Ebert from 1991 (via SFW site longform.org)
Roger Ebert on his love for Twitter
Ebert in Salon in 2011: “I do not fear death I will pass away sooner than most people who read this, but that doesn’t shake my sense of wonder and joy.”

There will never again be someone as influential on the art and business of film as Roger Ebert. Never.

—

Today my former Chicago magazine colleague Jeff Ruby said “Roger Ebert anecdotes are like belly buttons. Everyone’s got one and they’re all great.” Permit me a bit of navel-gazing as I try to make this story live up to that bon mot.

My first professional movie review was for Time Out Chicago, a little more than a year before I’d join the staff as its Web Editor. I’d been writing about movies for Chicagoist and done some other freelance work prior but this was the first time I was paid to cast a critical eye on film. My nervous excitement tempered only a little by my assignment: The Ringer, a Johnny Knoxville movie about…honestly, it’s not important. It was the guy from Jackass so that should tell you everything you need to know.

Versed in Chicago lore, I knew the Lake Street screening room – where I’d be watching the movie – has its own pecking order and seating arrangement. I studied a graphic that appeared as a sidebar in Chicago magazine’s 2005 profile of Ebert but it only covered some of Chicago’s top critics. Not wanting to intrude too far, I chose a seat a couple rows from the back, a few seats from the far right aisle.

And then Roger Ebert sat in the back row and I realized I was sitting directly in front of him. I quickly moved one seat over. But of course I was still in his line of sight.

Behind me, I could hear Ebert talking to his wife and some colleagues. They were discussing an upcoming biopic on Russ Meyer and why he felt Jack Black would not be a good person to play Meyer but a younger James Garner would be. Jokes were made about how radio DJ Steve Dahl should play Ebert; Ebert felt Phillip Seymour Hoffman could play him except Hoffman’s not masculine enough. A streak of his famous humor.

After a few moments, he settled in and I could hear him making the noises of a Midwesterner who’s trying to decide if he’s going to say something or just be nice and suffer through. He leaned forward and asked “Would you mind moving over so you’re not blocking my view of the screen?”

“Oh..was I…er…yes…herrm…ah…yes…I’ll…” I spat out as I gathered my things and moved a couple spots to the side.

“Thank you,” he said to the inarticulate interloper.

I wanted to become a writer because guys like Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert made newspapermen seem larger-than-life. In that one moment, Roger Ebert – merely through his graciousness – gave me the opportunity to elevate my inadvertent rudeness to cocktail chatter. Even in a moment of irritation, he made small human moments seem greater. At least to me.

In health, Roger Ebert taught us how to appreciate art. In sickness, he taught us how to live life to the fullest. In his work, he taught us how to be great.

Our Man In Chicago

Work. In progress.