Waiting for Gouda

Figuring for some reason that we’ll soon need to be purchasing sundries in bulk, The Lovely Wife’s™ Moms bought us a gift Costco membership.
So we headed in to activate the membership and find out just why everyone goes crazy for the “shopping in a military hangar” experience.
We headed straight to the customer service counter, which [...]

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I’ve got problems with public restrooms.
I don’t think that’s so unreasonable. They are almost always unattractive, they often smell, and you never quite know what you’re going to find when you open the stall door. Plus, many times they are full of strangers with their naughty bits out.
They keep the bathroom in my [...]

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We had a bit of excitement in the neighborhood this last week, as we were invaded by the production crew for the new Johnny Depp / Michael Mann film, called Public Enemies. The movie is about John Dillinger and other gangster types in 1930’s Chicago, and they’ve decided to get authentic by shooting much [...]

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I was pleased today to see that the CTA has instituted a slogan in honor of their finally beginning to get their infrastructure back up to near-third world standards:
Putting the Rapid Back in Transit
I certainly find it a more effective bit of marketing than the last one:
Keeping the Crappy in ‘Oh My God Could the [...]

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(A semi-intentional homage to George Carlin.)
For approximately the last six years, five months, and nine days, the Chicago Transportation Authority has incorporated a security message into their customer notification system.
So, as you’re standing in The Coldest Location In The Midwest (Blue Line platform at Irving Park) and the blinky red message boards are scrolling the [...]

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Today is horrifically cold. The sort of cold that makes you want to kill the next person you see and bathe in their warm blood before it freezes. It makes waiting for the bus that much more pleasant.
Apparently, the next phase in the Chicago Transit Authority’s grand scheme to make it impossible [...]

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I hope everyone had a delightful holiday season, with the exception of the residents of PA (pronounced “puh”) whom I’m sure suffered through their usual misery in that pathetic excuse for a hellhole that some, apparently without irony, call a state of this great union. PA is sometimes referred to as the Keystone State [...]

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It seems like only yesterday when, in the course of retrieving the usual pile of garbage that the inept tools at the US Postal Service so kindly thrust into my house every day, that I noticed a rather official looking envelope addressed to yours truly. It appeared to be from the Cook County Court [...]

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Escalators really are a trouble area for me. Well, not the escalators themselves, but rather ninety-nine percent of the people who I encounter on, near, or around escalators. This is something that I have discovered about myself relatively recently, as escalators were a rather rare experience for me in all the other places [...]

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My teeth have been slightly achy lately, and so I finally broke down and did what any respectable adult would do about it. I whined and cried and stomped my feet until some reached down and gave me a piece of Melba toast. Okay, actually, I went to the dentist. I was [...]

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