As is obvious, I’m not always able to throw down substantial posts daily. But I was inspired by Whitney’s Lolla updates at Pop Candy and Matt’s recent addition at Wood-Tang to add Twitter updates to the OMIC blog. You’ll see them in the right rail under “I just thought of something…” which is a quite accurate way of describing those mini-brain explosions. Hopefully, it will give you daily readers of this blog (Hi, Marg Hicks!) a reason to continue checking in.
You know, I’ve long since come to grips with the knowledge that I will never have a job/career that allows me to rake in mad scads of cash. So this isn’t about jealousy and more about functionality: who keeps 22 grand in their checking account?
I also like how there are a bunch of question marks for “current balance.” Like the ATM was able to calculate how much he/she could take out presently, but this person has so much friggin’ money in an account not made for such things that it was running into a problem placing a decimal point.
Imagine me being so busy that I haven’t had time for self-promotion. The mind reels, but it’s true. Here’s what I’ve been working on lately:
As alluded to yesterday, TOC‘s beer issue is out. TOC editors can deliver on the bon mots, so the the story about the non-alcoholic beer came out pretty well. Also, check out our quiz on Chicago beer. You can win some fabulous TOC-related prizes including our Eating and Drinking 2008 guide, which hits the streets next month.
In addition, we’ve been running a Chicago sex survey online. We’re going to publish the results in an upcoming issue, but the survey expires on Monday so spill your secrets now. You may also notice a certain familiar brand of humor with some of the answers.
You know, the American Episcopalian Church has been going through a bit of troubles with the larger Anglican communion due to the openly gay bishop it ordained a couple years ago. Much has been made about an approaching schism, but the EC is dealing with the situation through prayer, love and consideration, which I know is confusing the hell out of the people who expect anger and conflict to follow any religious matters.
I’ve been holding out hope for the larger church to remain in communion with itself, but there’s probably room to trim a little chaff from the wheat. So John McCain? Don’t let the door hit you where the good Lord split you. I don’t even know who that guy is anymore. He’s taken on more positions lately than a copy of the Kama Sutra.
My Craigslist ad for free beer led to a surprisingly number of inquiries. Twenty-seven, to be exact. They ranged from one guy who seemed angry that I was criticizing dirt to a few people who told unexpectedly touching stories about friends who, for one medical reason or another, could not enjoy the sweet, sweet taste of real beer and would gladly settle for the non-alcoholic version.
So yesterday I met up with a really nice guy named Shon, and handed off the 12 remaining bottles of beer after he told me about his friend with pancreatitis. What had started out as a minor joke had turned into something a bit more profound: taking something worth very little to me and giving it to someone for whom it meant much more.
Look on Craiglist next week for my collection of Jewel plastic bags.
At the risk of sounding redundant, work’s been a rather consuming force as of late. Today I put in a full workday, and left only because I knew I’d be doing another few hours of work at home. And yet still I won’t get done everything I want to do. While I’m able to have a sense of accomplishment, I tend to dwell on that which remains unfinished, or lacking. It’s one of those things I pull out in job interviews when they ask you to “three negative traits about yourself” because I’m able to turn it around and demonstrate what a hard worker I am, although thinking about it now, I could see how it might come off as obsessive-compulsive.
It is in moments like these that I try to remind myself why I love my job, and that other people (and those “people” include “me-a-year-ago”) would kill to have this gig.
So here are five things I did today, all of which were absolutely essential to me doing my job well.
1. Had two conversations with two different colleagues (it seems important to note here that they were both female), about the phrase “Standing, face-down, ass-up” and whether it was A) physically possible to arrange oneself in this manner; B) confusing for the reader to read this phrase and therefore C) necessary to change the copy to the less-confusing “standing” and, if so, D) too far away from the intended meaning. All of this was done while trying to pretend as if I was having a conversation about staples, lint, or something similarly innocuous so as to not do anything that we were told not to do during the sexual harassment seminar a few months ago.
2. Borrowed a third colleague’s action figures in order to resolve Part A of the above quandary. (Answer: Yes, thereby requiring the resolution of Parts B, C, and D, the answers to which were yes, yes, and no, respectively.)
3. Asked a superior whether “Tell us how you do it, you know you want to” was appropriate language for an e-mail that will eventually go out to over 20,000 people, only to have her reply “Sure, that’s cute.”
4. Resized a photo, which required me to spend an inordinate amount of time staring at a 25-year-old woman dressed in nothing more than a sequined bra, sequined hot pants and fishnets. Granted, that woman was Britney Spears, but still.
5. Purchased $17 worth of non-alcoholic beer, of which six dollars worth will be consumed by my colleagues for a work-related purpose. The remaining 12 dollars worth will probably end up getting thrown out, but I’m going to try to give it away on Craigslist first just to see if that’s possible. That last part isn’t job-related, I’m just curious.
I got paid to do all five of those things.
Seriously, my job is pretty cool sometimes.
A comment from the post on My Boys:
Jenny said…
Don’t miss “My Boys” this Monday, August 27! This episode is hands-down the funniest one yet and you’ll be kicking yourself if you miss it! As you know, since Brendan was selected as one of Chicago’s Hottest Bachelor’s, he’s turned into a complete jerk. In an effort to save him, PJ and the guys have a “douchebag intervention.” VERY FUNNY! “My Boys” is every Monday at 10/9c on TBS.
C’mon now, own up.
Although I must say I am intrigued by the idea of a douchebag intervention.
When writing here, I’ve never been particularly coy about who I am or what I’m up to. But I also don’t go out of my way to put myself front and center either, even if I make it a point to self-promote whenever possible. While the Internet now considers me the most famous me in Chicago* (take that, director of the short film Ten and president of Tribune Publishing!), I still like to pretend I have a certain amount of virtual anonymity.
I’ve had my short-term reasons for that, but mostly I like to have control over my world, and how I’m perceived. It’s silly, really, but the impulse is there nonetheless. As such, I’m not one to dwell much on my personal life here. I prefer to let the words and the work be the focus. In my job, you really have to make peace with the notion that you’re leaving quite the footprint for those who want to play technological archaeologist. Even though what I do here is separate from the job, I’m still aware it’s out there for all to see. And while I prefer not to obscure my personality, with great bandwith comes great responsibility. So I prefer to keep a firm grasp on the “me” that’s out there. It’s the difference between uploading pictures of oneself holding a beer…or holding a beer bong.
I’m occasionally jealous of some writers who take their lives and pour them so exquisitely over their blogs. Like this fella, for instance. It’s possible I’ll get to the point where I’ll say “Ah, to hell with it” but not quite yet.
Anyway, that’s about the biggest self-revelation you’re going to get from me here. But I figured since I had such an influx of new readers today, it might be best to let you know what you’re all in for if you stick around. I certainly hope you do.
* Nope, those aren’t my numbers at the top of that page. Told you I’m careful.
(Note: Oblivious Living Chapter 1.15 will appear in this space tomorrow).
I keep hearing that the second season of the TBS show My Boys is supposed to be television’s equivalent of the Most Improved Player, but if last night’s episode is any indication, everyone who is saying this is a huge liar. So here are a few suggestions on how to fix it:
1. Either be set in Chicago, or stop trying to convince everyone you are.
No one would refer to the “Medieval Times in Schaumburg.” On the rare occasion such a reference would be in order, it’d just be “Medieval Times.” There’s one in the entire state. It’s not as if the area’s so overrun with them that you’d need to identify which one you’re describing.
And come on: no one is going to go to Lake Forest to pick up “lonely, rich, beautiful women” at a yoga class, they’re going to go to Evanston. Lake Forest is damn near fucking Wisconsin as far as anyone in this city is concerned.
I realize the writers are trying to show off just how “Chicago” their characters are (and to be fair, the bit where PJ and Stephanie are reading the convoluted parking signs was a nice touch), but it’s failing miserably. And the only people that care, live here. So they might as well lighten up on the references, and focus more on writing people who seem like folks who live here. Speaking of…
2. Give Stephanie a heart, or a brain, or nerve or…something
I’m a little torn here because honestly, there are plenty of women in Chicago – and elsewhere – like PJ’s friend Stephanie. They’re a little shallow, or manage their money poorly, or obsess about one thing in their lives to the detriment of everything else.
But though they may have one fatal flaw, there’s usually one thing they are good at: their job, being a good friend, giving to charity, etc. Stephanie is apparently good at nothing, and a compendium of the worst of all human flaws. Here is a character whose sole purpose is to suggest that pretty women spend lavish amounts of money and only care about getting a guy. Yes, some women do, but they also do much more.
3. Drop the voiceovers or at least drop the sports metaphors.
No one – and I mean no one – who loves sports talks in sports metaphors for more than say, 1/5 of an average week. And I’m including people who are reporters for ESPN and get paid to speak in sports metaphors. Last night’s attempt to tie Bobby’s distancing himself from his rich family to players who only give up big salaries only to play for the love of the game was clunky as hell, and not just because no baseball player actually does this. We’re only about 18 episodes in, and tying in PJ’s career is only going to get harder.
4. Start planning a spinoff called These Dudes.
One of the complaints I made about this show early on was that “this is the only group of close friends that doesn’t constantly share in-jokes or riff off each other.” It’s the one thing that’s improved over last season. The guys are genuinely funny, and have a great interplay. It feels real. There’s bit in last night’s show about a six-foot urinal that was sharp, and witty, and written for actors who knew how to carry it off. I’d be happy to watch an entire show featuring the guy characters, although that brings up problems of its own. Which leads me to my last point…
5. Ditch PJ.
[A brief tangent here so I can admit a bias. From all the ads showcasing actress Jordana Spiro, I keep expecting her to be Amanda Bynes and I’m immediately disappointed when it turns out she isn’t. It’s not that I like Amanda Bynes all that much – in fact, I can honestly say I’ve never seen a full episode of any show she’s ever been on, or an entire film she’s been in. In fact, I had to look her up on IMDB.com to get a list of both, since the only thing I can remember her doing is that one movie where Colin Firth is her Dad and the other one where she plays a guy. I think I walked by a room once where the Colin Firth is My Dad movie was playing. But Bynes looks enough like Spiro that I keep expecting it to be Bynes, and she isn’t and for some reason, this disappoints me. Like when you see someone from behind and then they turn around and it turns out not to be them. I can’t explain why I am disappointed by not seeing someone I care barely identify, but there is is. And it probably colors the rest of this a little, so I thought it was only fair to mention.]
PJ is the weakest part of the whole show, and it’s because she’s ostensibly supposed to be the center of it. I don’t think Spiro’s a bad actress, but she’s either given little to do or is asked to demonstrate that PJ lacks the sense that women who hang around men have about guys. She isn’t particularly tomboyish, and isn’t particularly girly, which is fine. I know lots of women like that. And they’re all strong, smart, and together.
But PJ is none of these things. She’s presented with far less knowledge of the world than her character ought to have as a sports writer for a big city newspaper. As a result, any bit of energy the show musters up is immediately sucked out of the room anytime she’s onscreen because you can’t build a show around a weak character.
I was going through some old posts last night, and discovered this post wherein I predicted that Arcade Fire tickets going for $1000 would be “the straw that broke the camel’s back for scalpers.” Now, ignore for a moment that I meant “nail in the coffin” (I do love a good metaphor and/or cliche) and consider all the Police tickets that were going for face value last month on Ebay, Craigslist and the like thanks to scalpers (both the professional scalpers and the unprofessionals who took advantage of their season ticket privileges and flooded the secondary market). Can I call it or what?
Anyway, I pitched in on TOC‘s gambling issue this week. I spoke to an expert gambler named John Patrick, who gave me some valuable tips on playing mini-baccarat (2nd item), which I immediately squandered at the Harrah’s casino in Joliet (6th item). Still, if I can manage to find a $5 table the next time I’m in Vegas, I’ll give it another go. Click through those links for the full story, and be sure to check out the 2nd page of that “Beginner’s Luck” story, where you can see an illustration that is clearly meant to be me in my sharp-ass blazer.
By the way, if you ever want to have the easiest, most entertaining conversation of your life, ask me for Mr. Patrick’s number. He and I talked for about 45 minutes over the phone, and I am pretty sure I said less than 250 words the whole time, but it was the most fun I’ve ever had interviewing a source. Never was I so sad to have so little room in a piece for quotes.
Speaking of disappointments, I reviewed the TV series Voyagers! in last week’s issue (last item). Holy crap, is that show way better in my memory than in reality. With respect to plot and acting, it’s Knight Rider bad (hey, I love Knight Rider too but come on: there’s more ham in that show that your average slaughterhouse), but it does retain a ridiculous charm, even if it has production values on par with a couple of the short films I was in during college.
Finally, the archive of my appearance on Outside the Loop radio is up. I sound much more coherent here than I did on Rachel’s show last month.
Please keep in mind that I am available for your next birthday party, bar mitzvah or quinceañera.
