The Empty Gesture

I made myself lunch today, and treated myself to one of my all time favorite sandwiches. It is essentially a veggie burger on whole grain toast, with red chili pepper hummus, Tabasco sauce .. and bacon! I call it 'The Empty Gesture', and should I ever enter the food service industry, I think it will be my signature dish.

You will need:
- one veggie burger patty
- red chili pepper hummus
- Tabasco sauce (or preferred hot sauce substitute, perhaps Sriracha)
- two slices of whole grain bread (toasted)
- two slices of bacon

1. Fry bacon in skillet, set aside
2. Fry veggie burger in bacon grease
3. Assemble sandwich, grill in remaining bacon grease
4. Devour

Holiday Spirit Indeed!

I have long complained about the people on the streets of Chicago in the bright yellow vests. The Traffic Management Authority seems to me a pretty obvious example of graft from City Hall as its employees are seemingly everywhere and don't appear to do anything except wave people through intersections faster than is probably safe. Still, I have viewed them mostly as an easily tolerated nuisance - until a guy TRIED TO KILL ME TODAY!

Lemme 'splain: I dropped the Ladies off at Navy Pier to meet friend Charlie and see the man of the hour himself, Santa. As I was pulling out, I came to a three-way intersection with a flashing red light. Where I come from, a flashing red light gets treated like a stop sign, and if multiple cars approach from different directions, the best policy is to alternate or 'take turns' going through the intersection. This is apparently not the view of the Traffic Management Authority agent working Navy Pier as he felt it was in everyone's best interest to wave me and the driver at the perpendicular into the middle of the road at the same time. Being a reasonable human being with respect toward imminent death, I held back, which seemed to both baffle and enrage the TMA guy, who waved his arms more vigorously and approached my car with a look in his eyes that seemed to me to say nothing but "Hurry! You're missing your chance to be involved in a fiery crash! GO! Go now or you won't be killed!"

And I must tell you, when someone instructs you with that much conviction, it takes a remarkably large amount of willpower to resist, even consciously knowing the stakes. But resist I did, and survive today to share the tale with you.

Beware the Yellow-Vested Harbingers of Doom! They act not in thy interest but that of a darker power! Also they probably get paid more than I do!

Happy Christmas & Drive Safely!

Top Ten Albums of 2009

1. The Decemberists, The Hazards of Love
2. DOOM, Born Like This
3. Grizzly Bear, Veckatimest
π Dinosaur Jr, Farm
4. Neko Case, Middle Cyclone
5. Dark Was The Night
6. Tom Waits, Glitter & Doom
6. Antony & The Johnsons, The Crying Light
7. Booker T, Potato Hole / Patterson Hood, Murdering Oscar (And Other Love Songs)
8. Andrew Bird, Noble Beast
8.5. The Dead Weather, Horehound
9. Sunset Rubdown, Dragonslayer
10. St Vincent, Actor
And also: They Might Be Giants, Here Comes Science!

These are my thirteen picks for the Top Ten Best Albums of 2009. Eagle eyed readers may note that there are, in fact, fourteen albums here, but though Dark Was the Night is a double album, Glitter & Doom only counts as one.

Oh, and also really awesome is Art Brut vs Satan. But seriously, that's enough.

Let the Season Commence!

Luck Be A Lady

I am legendary because of you.

So Next Time Don't Say Yes.

Daisy: Baba, do you know what a star is?

Baba: Yes! A star is formed when gases in space accumulate due to the effects of gravity and are compressed into such a dense package that it sets off nuclear reactions between the atoms inside it, producing tremendous amounts of light and heat, and with such a strong gravitational pull that other celestial bodies, such as planets and asteroids, orbit around it!

Daisy: If you don't know, you should just say "I don't know."

HEY!

Going to the Pixies concert tonight at the Aragon.

Envy me.

A Pair of Pleasant Podcasts

So lately I've been frustrated by the seemingly endless barrage of NPR pledge drives. I'm starting to feel much as Homer did in the great episode that found him so annoyed by Betty White that he falsely pledges to public television, leading to a chase scene involving a set of deadly Teletubbies and a wild, monstrously vulturian Big Bird, and sanctuary with Reverend Lovejoy (one of my favorite third-tier Simpsons characters, I think; see also "Mister Sparkle".)

Thus, my commute to and from work has been filled largely by podcasts, of which I've become immensely fond. There are several to which I've been subscribing and listening for quite some time - This American Life, the AV Club's Hatecast, They Might Be Giants, Bob Boillen's incredible concert series (which has provided me with complete concerts by Tom Waits, Leonard Cohen, Sonic Youth, Neko Case, and a whole host of others), Wait Wait Don't Tell Me and the terrific sci-fi anthology Escape Pod and its fantasy sister series Podcastle. But recently I've found two new series that have brought me tremendous amounts of joy.

The first is a pure piece of nostalgia, recommended to me, in fact, by blast-from-the-past best friend of days gone by, Daniel Newman. It's Wil Wheaton's Memories of the Futurecast featuring selections from his new book - wait for it - Memories of the Future. The show (and book) are based on Wheaton's revisiting of Star Trek: The Next Generation on which he played child prodigy Wesley Crusher, a character both revered and, perhaps more often, reviled by a generation of nerds (in which I vigorously include myself.) So far, he's proven himself to be an insightful commentator with a vibrant sense of humor. Side note: I dealt blackjack to Mr Wheaton about five years ago in Lake Tahoe; after I particularly good hand he quipped "You're awesome Sean - when we go on the class trip, you're not taking the bus. You can ride in my mom's car."

The second aural pleasure has fewer personal memories tied up in it but is on the whole more engaging. It's the personal blogcast of actor/author Stephen Fry, best known I think as Jeeves of the PBS Wodehouse series with Hugh Laurie and the most prominent British actor not to have appeared in a Harry Potter film (he'd've been my first choice for Horace Slughorn, but I can't ever fault anyone for casting Jim Broadbent. Also, I just noticed that Fry narrated the British versions of the Potter audio books. In America we get Jim Dale.) I've read a number of Fry's books, including The Liar, Making History, and, what was in retrospect rather inexplicably my favorite book in high school, The Hippopotamus. Fry has a fascination with language (not to mention a florid gift for delivery) which he examines at length in one of the recent episodes of his 'Podgrams'. As I started listening to this episode, I began thinking of an old sketch of his (which he quickly referenced) from A Bit of Fry & Laurie.



What is played for laughs in the sketch, Fry examines with sincerity in the podcast, and while that may sound pretentious (and insufferably dull), the result is in fact pure joy.

So, anyway, that's what I've been listening to.

From the Future!

I found a picture of what I will look like at age 65.

Courtesy of The Sartorialist and Ann Marie Lonsdale via Google Reader.

Great Babas in History

Regarding my relationship with Daisy and Heidi, I am frequently asked a variety of questions - is she your daughter, are the mom and you together, why do you call her Daisy if that is not really her name - but most often of all, I think, is: Why 'Baba'?

'Baba' is a traditional honorific from both Hindi and Urdu that can mean father, grandfather or just 'older man'. It is also a Chinese word for father, and, most appropriately I think, a Slavic word for Grandmother. Heidi spent some time in India years ago and shared with me a story of a young Indian boy who would refer to her friend B.Z. as 'Baba' while attempting to sell him rugs.

It took a while for the three of us to determine what my role in Daisy's life was going to be, whether I was going to continue living with them or move out, be a father or just a friend, so it was difficult to decide what this little baby (who was learning to speak so very, very quickly) should call me. I'd been 'Silly Man' for the early days, but I knew that wasn't going to stick. The more I thought of ideas, the more Baba just seemed to feel comfortable and right.

And to show how appropriate the name really is, please allow me to present some of the finest Babas in history (present company excluded.)

• Baba Yaga: Baba Yaga is perhaps the most terrifying witch in history, and this is including Morgan Le Fay and those bearded broads from MacBeth. She has iron teeth, a rapacious appetite (sometimes for human flesh), and travels around in a giant flying mortar (pestle serves as propulsion.) Instead of a gingerbread house or a castle or anything traditional like that, Baba Yaga lives in a cottage (surrounded by a fence made of bones and skulls) deep in the forest that has two gigantic chicken legs and can walk itself around from place to place. She has various servants, including three horsemen, White, Black, and Red, and may or may not have two older sisters (who are, Foremannishly, also named Baba Yaga.) Baba Yaga is a character of Russian folklore, which means she is what Stalin's parents used to scare him into behaving. Let that be a lesson to you.

• Ali Baba: Ali Baba was the son of a wealthy Persian merchant whose brother screwed him out of his inheritance. One day while out collecting firewood to sell, he overhears a group of forty thieves discussing the secret of a magic cave full of treasure. Needless to say, wackiness ensues, and the scheming brother is murdered by the thieves, all forty of the thieves are killed by a slave girl named Morgiana, and in the end, Ali Baba gets the treasure, his inheritance, and the undoubtedly smoking hot (if moderately homicidal) slave girl Morgiana as his bride. So, you know, he did all right.

• Baba Ganoush: A dip made of roasted eggplant. But we can't all be winners.
  

Why I Love Steve Martin.

Google grew it.

If you have a few moments to spare, you should read Mr Penumbra's Twenty-Four-Hour Book Store by Robin Sloan, a charming little fantasy/science fiction piece about the legacy that can only be achieved through print.

Or, if you don't like your own internal narrative voice, download the podcast from Escape Pod.

Either way, enjoy!

Dedicated to My One True Love: The Ladies

Oh Windy City Rollers, how do I love thee?

Attended my second ever WCR bout this evening and this time I think something stuck. I may just be a roller derby junkie for life now. I don't know if it's the strategy, the talent, the athleticism or the puns that make me love it so, but something about the total package just works for me.

I went tonight to see the WRC All-Star Team take on the Portland Wheels Of Justice (and emerge victorious, no doubt due to my inspirational cheering.) Good friend Heather joined me for an all-in-all terrific evening. I am head over heels in love with at least half of the roster, and am devastated that my darling rule-breaking blocker extraordinaire Megan Formor is finished with competition in Chicago. As Heather said, it is rare to see "so many women of different body types all exuding so much pure sexuality" as can be found on the roller derby rink. The next event is not until January, but if you like roller skating, competition, or women, I highly recommend you put it on your calendar.

Talk derby to me, indeed.




One note of disappointment - though I whole-heartedly support the move to embrace a younger audience (having a future derby fan at home myself), I have to say, Ludacris's "Move Bitch" doesn't have the same motivating sense of urgency, much less the recontexted gender empowerment, once it has been censored. I suggest a search for a new opening rally theme commence before next season.

The Fellowship is broken!

Well I made it to the end of The Fellowship and am taking a breather before diving into Two Towers. As place filler, I've started Margaret Atwood's The Blind Assassin and also hope to finish The Brief Wondrous Life Of Oscar Wao, my copy of which was stolen from the reading room at work. I also had my copy of Neal Stephenson's Quicksilver swiped, which actually kind of blew my mind - who steals a 900 page novel set largely in Baroque era Europe? I've now taken to hiding my books, no matter how dry and unappealing I assume the subject matter to be.

In other news, I got a haircut, a flu shot, and I've put myself on a diet, which has been progressing very nicely. So far I've lost eight pounds. Mostly I've just been paying attention to what I eat, and how frequently - for a while there I was eating four or five times a day ... a little Hobbit-like actually, with breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner, snack, dinner at home, dessert, etc. I've also picked up my friend Jeremy's habit of drinking a large glass of water before eating. Of course, for me that translates into quite a few glasses of water during the day. Much like when I quit smoking, I'm finding that what works is replacing one bad behavior (smoking, eating) with an innocuous one (chewing gum, drinking a glass of water.) The major downside of this diet is that I drink so much water I find myself running to the bathroom every hour or so. And of course, as I write this, I'm starting to need to go right now. *sigh* The cost of beauty ...

Almost forgot the other thing that's making this diet not unpleasant (other than the satisfaction that comes from stepping on the scale every morning): Edamame. I think that steamed, shelled and salted edamame might be the best snack ever. High in protein, potassium and fiber, low in calories, delicious and filling. When I own my own bar, this will be the signature bar snack.

You're a Wonder!

Halloween approaches and today we started the festivities early by carving pumpkins and acquiring a new costume for the Little Baby. She already has an elaborate fancy Cinderella dress but we have added to the repertoire my personal favorite princess ...

Wonder Woman!

I am, of course, very pleased that Diana of Themyscira has entered the pantheon of princesses role played at our house. We were already fans of the theme song ("Fighting for your rights / In your satin tights ...") and now All Hallow's Eve shall be kept safe for truth, justice and equality. I was briefly very excited when I found out there was a recent direct-to-DVD animated Wonder Woman movie. Unfortunately, though it may present a strong female role model and inspiration, it includes entirely too many scenes of decapitation (which is to say 'one') to watch with a four-year-old. But better that Wonder Woman be an empty page upon which to project anyway.

I couldn't resist watching some clips from the old show with her though - and she's already got the spin down pat!

Tom Bombadil!

Some time in the past year I had a terribly guilt-inducing realization: I am thirty-one-years-old and I have not read The Lord Of The Rings. I am completely uncertain as to how this happened. My entire life I have loved fantasy - dragons, sword play, wizardry, the whole lot of it. I read The Hobbit as a boy and enjoyed it thoroughly. I read the entire Chronicles of Narnia, Lloyd Alexander's Prydain series, Madeline L'Engle, and even plowed through about fifteen of Piers Anthony's Xanth novels. And yet somehow I was never compelled to sit down and read the undisputed masterpiece of the genre.

So now the time has come to correct this egregious oversight. I am currently on page 290 of book one, The Fellowship of The Ring and absolutely loving it.

I have hit some blocks here and there, primarily I am disappointed in my own imagination. So much of what I am attempting to visualize as I read has been tainted by the films. It is very hard to shake the faces of actors, even when I find a great deal of evidence against keeping that particular cast for the version playing out in my particular corner of the astral plane as I read. For instance, Elijah Wood's face was so prominent in the films (not to mention the DVD case I've been looking at the past six years) but the character who sets forth in the novel is a plump little Hobbit of age fifty. For Bilbo Baggins I've managed to replace both Ian Holm and the animated Bilbo of The Hobbit cartoon (a Daisy favorite) with a slightly diminished, furrier version of Prof. David Bevington, renowned Shakespearean scholar and charming neighbor. And the Aragorn of my mind is forever flickering back and forth from Viggo Mortensen to Barack Obama (I'm not 100% sure why.)

But what has been wonderful are all the new discoveries. My chief delight has been the expansion of the Tolkien world. The environment of Middle Earth has become a character in its own right. In addition, all the characters are so much more developed - for the first time I see Gandalf as a person who actually feels at risk on the adventure and who endures its hardships (cold, wet feet, uncomfortable bedding, grumpiness when deprived of smoking) as opposed to the plot propellant/deus ex machina he is essentially reduced to in the film version (though I do love me some Sir Ian.)

And then of course, there's Tom Bombadil. I had long been told about this character as being the single largest, yet most understandable, omission from the Peter Jackson films. In fact, it seemed whenever I mentioned that I had begun reading Fellowship, anyone who had read the book before inevitably asked, "Have you gotten to Tom Bombadil yet?" No one could explain why this character was so fascinating, nor could anyone summarize exactly what he does in the book, but now that I have read it, I must say ... actually, I don't think I can explain him. But when you read it, be prepared for that for which you cannot prepare. And enjoy.

Ps. I'm very much looking forward to Treebeard now.

List # 3,848,931

People I most hope to see in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame before I die:

1. Tom Waits
2. Lester Bangs
3. Pixies
4. The Beastie Boys
5. The Smiths
6. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
7. The Roots
8. They Might Be Giants
9. Annie Lennox
   
10. N.W.A.
    
11. The White Stripes
12. The Jam
13. Björk
14. Neko Case
    
15. Neil Diamond
16. Warren Zevon
17. Sonic Youth
    
18. The Wu-Tang Clan
    

Please don't tell the ASPCA.

So I've had the new car for a month now and have gotten accustomed to every feature save one - I can't, for the life of me, figure out what this button does:

At least it doesn't collate and staple ...

Rock & Roll, Hoochie Coo.

Well, I can now say first hand that Cleveland does, in fact, rock. Or at least, if it doesn't full on rock, it emanates an unusually pleasant vibe to which one might amble along. John and I hit town on Tuesday evening (making fabulous mileage in the new Hyundai, which Daisy has christened 'Shark', for its dorsal fin/XM radio antenna) and grabbed a bite at a nearby sports bar (the Mongolian barbecue that had been recommended was closed) and crashed at our hotel, the Alcazar (which was the low point of the trip - despite being high on curiosities, as it functions simultaneously as hotel, long term business housing for foreigners and a retirement home, its lack of comfort earned it a solid 'thumbs down' from the Henry/Luzar Board of Review.)

Wednesday morning (after an unpleasant and largely unsuccessful battle with mattress-inspired insomnia), we trundled across town to check out Hot Sauce Williams for some breakfast barbecue, the likes of which I have never before had. It wasn't the best I've ever experienced, but it was one of the more unique sauces ... somewhere in between Chicago sweet and Louisiana hot. Once full of meat, we were off to the crown jewel of the trip, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame!

The RRHoF was a blast, though the things included just made me want more. Music is such a vast field that every time I came across a choice artifact by one of my favorite performers, I wanted to see other things. For instance, there were only a few Led Zeppelin pieces on display (both belonging to John Paul Jones.) But on the whole it was a very unique and entertaining experience. The one big minus: lousy gift shop. Just the standard caps/mousepads/shotglasses all with the ugly logo and "Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum" emblazoned, and a lot of grossly overpriced compact discs.

That evening we stuffed our bellies with steak at the Cleveland Chop House. I had a fantastic Kansas City strip and some delectable white cheddar mashed potatoes. Also, it seems every place in Cleveland offers beer in two sizes, 16 and 22 oz. Guess which we usually chose.

Finally Thursday morning we made a trek through the Museum of Art, which was surprisingly delightful. The forbidden newly renovated East Wing featured a fantastic collection of paintings and sculpture from Romantic to Impressionism to Modernism to Post-Modernism to Pre-Apocalyptic (including some of the most charmingly pretentious pieces I'd seen in a long time), and the rest of the gallery was quite well stocked too. We did get pushed away from an area containing what I'm sure was either a bastion of mystical treasures or a heist in progress by a condescending Russian docent, but on the whole, the experience was enjoyable.

After that, it was a quick but incredibly satisfying lunch at Yours Truly (housed in America's second oldest planned shopping center) and we were back on the road, Chicago-bound.

On the whole, a very nice getaway, even though very brief. And the best part - I still don't have to be back at work until Tuesday. Ah, vacation, I adore you!

Flee to the Cleve!

I am officially on vacation! I have the whole week off from work and the first order of business is, of course, road trip! John and I will be heading off to the Chicago of the Mid East, CLEVELAND!



Envy me. Envy me till you turn green as asparagus.

Ps. Stupid Hulu commercials. Browse in another tab for 30 seconds, if you like, but please don't hold it against me.

Awesome.

Portrait Of The Artist ...

... as a 31-Year-Old in Need of a Shave

September 12

Today is my birthday. I am thirty-one years old. According to Patton Oswalt, this is not a birthday, and really, after hitting thirty last year, I'm not that excited about being a year older. But it is the way of things, what with linear time always progressing in the direction of increasing entropy, so I have accepted the facts and will do my best to enjoy the day that is, in the most trivial of measures, more mine than yours (unless you are Mary Therese or Lee Newman or Daisy's playground pal Matthew or any one of the other millions of people that certainly share this birthday as well. We can share.)

I have so far celebrated by waking up far too early, discovering a new cavity, and going to someone else's birthday party (the aforementioned Matthew.) If that's sounds gloomy or depressing, then let me spin it and say I am also having a terrific day. My early wake up was a shiny blond toddler smiling and saying "Happy Birthday Baba!", which far and away outcharms my alarm clock. And Matthew's birthday was a blast - held at Pump It Up: The Inflatable Party Zone, and chock full of bouncy glee, as well as pizza and cupcakes (Daisy continues to amaze me with her dexterity and resilience when the grail at the end of the quest is a pink iced cupcake.)

I guess there really isn't a positive spin to put on the cavity. Stupid inconvenient flossing!

The rest of the day appears to be similarly pleasant: Daisy and I are about to head to the playground, then will go out to dinner with Heidi. Tomorrow night I will be imbibing birthday beer at the Long Room on Irving Park, so feel free to stop by.

Daisy's movie is over - we are off to Bixler! Happy Birthday to me!

Swimming with Sharks

Back in Chicago after the briefest of jaunts west to share the ladies' final weekend in La Jolla at Grandma's house. And it was absolutely magnificent! I have not swum in the ocean or sat on the beach in ... well, possibly ten years. Grandma (sometimes also known as Jackie) is a magnificent hostess with a beautiful home and a terrific hot tub - which I was immediately ordered to jump into by Commandant Daisy.

In addition to playing the beach bum, Heidi bought me my birthday present (early, and wonderfully timed): my first ever pair of Ray Ban sunglasses. They are black Wayfarers with blue trim; Heidi dubbed them "Elvis Costello meets Risky Business." I approve.

We also made a trip to the aquarium, where the above photo was taken.

Oh, and the title of this post comes from a moment of the third day. After spending plenty of time observing specimens at the aquarium, we made a trip to the beach. As I was making my way back to shore, I looked down and saw something moving past me. The thought process that followed went something like this "Oh look, a shark, no wait, sharks are dangerous, that was just a fish that nope, nope that's a shark alright, well then let's make our way towards shore, yep, shark, actually that's awesome, where did it go? I want to see it again and also avoid it, Shark!"

In the words of Tracy Jordan, "Live every week like it's shark week."

Bloody Baba update

By the way, I have a new secret ingredient in my Bloody Mary mix, and it is ...

Smoked Spanish Paprika

You may now continue about your life.

Elotes!

Apparently when the cat and kitty are away, the mouse shall ... cook. Since H&d left last Monday I have been unusually prolific in the kitchen. First Bloody Marys, then beans & rice, jalapeno lemonade, chicken stir fry and now: ¡Elotes!, the Mexican street corn I have grown to adore.

Making this delicious treat was remarkably simple, yet I still managed to mess it up. Actually, the only thing I didn't do well was the grilling of the corn itself, and that's probably due to the fact that I didn't use the grill. Instead I roasted them in the oven. I shucked off the husks first too and maybe that was a mistake as well. Anyway, the kernels shrank a little and a few places got burned. I think I should've picked up some fresher corn too - these had been sitting around a while.

But imperfectly cooked corn aside, the rest was simple but fantastically delicious: mix about two Tablespoons of mayo with a teaspoon of lime juice and set it aside, then combine 1/2 tsp chili powder, 1/4 tsp cumin and 1/4 tsp crushed red pepper with 2 Tbl grated parmesan cheese (or queso fresco if you have some readily available). Brush the corn with the lime mayo and then sprinkle the chili cheese mix on top, and bam! Hyde Park is suddenly Pilsen.

Tell Them What He's Won, Bob!

A New Car!

Yes, I am the proud purchaser of my first brand new car, a 2009 Hyundai Sonata (the artist in me appreciates the model, the Welshman enjoys the make). It is a four cylinder GLS with the most spacious trunk ever, an adapter for my iPod, and fuel efficiency to shame my Buick into a state of inconsolable weepiness (not that Buicks frequently weep.) And it is black as the Ace of spades - sexy!

The wheeling and dealing was remarkably pleasant. The dealer in question was the aptly named 'Happy Hyundai' of Oak Lawn. And though purchasing a car the last weekend of Cash for Clunkers sans clunker was not the most convenient experience (Ford dealers didn't even want to talk to me as I kept bringing up the Harrah's casino employee discount on Ford products), once the Sonata was settled upon, smooth sailing abounded.

In other news, my dad is in town (hooray Grumpy!) and we ate lots of barbecue and saw Inglourious Basterds, both of which delighted. Tomorrow's agenda: the Field Museum to see Harry Potter and the submarine that may or may not've sunk a cruise ship my grandmother was aboard, and then a swing by the Horseshoe Casino to display its opulence to my pater. And who knows what else? Where ever we go, we shall be traveling in style.

Beans, Beans, Good for Your Heart

I did not realize it until today, but upon reflection, there appears to be an unwritten rule in our household that the minute the ladies leave town for any period of five days or more, I immediately gather supplies and cook an enormous batch of red beans & rice. I don't know whether my subconscious fears that I will otherwise have nothing to eat, or whether I simply realize anew each time they depart how long it has been since I had beans and rice and how much I love it and we don't eat it much as I cook it entirely too spicy for Daisy. (As she would say, it is grown up spicy.) But really I think it is that both the act of cooking and the delight of eating just cheers me like nothing else. Beans and rice are definitely my supreme comfort food.

So that is what I find myself doing this evening, cooking cajun and listening to the new Patton Oswalt album, which while neither as sublime nor gutbusting as his previous record Werewolves & Lollipops is still a terrific way to get through the doldrums of Chicago this week.

Here is the Top Secret Henry Family Beans recipe. Tell no one.

- 2 lbs large red beans
- 2 lbs andouille pork sausage
- 1 large yellow onion (chopped)
- 1 clove garlic (chopped)
- 1&1/2 Tbl cumin
- 1 tsp smoked paprika
- 1/4 tsp cayenne
- pinch red pepper
- 1 hambone or pork hock
- 2 bay leaves

1. Soak beans in cold water overnight. Water should be fairly deep. If you are enthusiastic, you may pick out any funky looking beans and discard them, but no need to be overzealous.

2. Drain and rinse beans and toss into a pot with the pork hock. Fill with water just to the level of the beans. Put on the stove on medium.

3. Add the spices. Feel free to be generous with the cumin, reserved with the pepper, depending on your tastes. Cover and continue to simmer on medium.

4. Chop the sausages, onions and garlic. Sautee in a large skillet until onion is soft and sausages are starting to brown. I chop onions in the Cuisinart so they are just a step above pureed. Add to beans. (Feel free to hold back some of the grease and discard.)

5. Stir well, cover and reduce heat to low. Let simmer for at least four or five hours, stirring occasionally.

Serve over rice.

AHHHHHHH! Brain Broken! AHHHHHH!!

Thanks a lot, Bowloftoast. Now my mind is melted. Good times.

Life in the Turn Lane

Wow, June 13th, eh? And not really much of a post. Still, I refuse to abandon this blog-project. Even though I find it hard to motivate myself to post sometimes, actually writing something continues to be one of the most rewarding things I do these days.

For those of you who have used this blog to keep tabs on me, there have been a great deal of changes since my last few posts. For starters, I moved. Still living with Heidi and the Little Baby (who turns four next month) and still in Hyde Park. I am currently living in what I realized is my tenth Hyde Park apartment, though the first time for this street. I've had three apartments on Ellis, three on Woodlawn and scattered pads elsewhere. The new place is incredibly comfortable and homey, much moreso than the last place, which honestly was just too much space for us. Plus the new location has cut ten minutes off my commute, which is awesome.

On the subject of work, things continue to be going well. I was dissatisfied with my annual evaluation (and though the resultant 1.25% pay increase was appreciated, the 3% + bonus that was missed out upon did instill some bitterness) and have since decided to involve myself more with the goings on and hope to prove myself indispensable. So far, the major accomplishment has been to establish myself as the in-house master of ceremonies of choice: I played host to the first annual emloyee-only "American Idol"-style singing competition and have now been pegged as the caller for our upcoming $25,000 Bingo Blowout promotion. And I can honestly say, after three and a half years of working there, my boss finally knows who I am. (To be totally fair, he is actually the boss of my bosses, of whom I have ... 16? 17? It's hard to keep track.)

The girls are in California for the next two weeks, visiting Heidi's mom. They left yesterday morning and I have spent the time since both enjoying and being saddened by the quiet. I woke up this morning around 7:00 and waited for someone to ask me to get out of bed, turn on a movie, make her some toast, etc. And it kept not happening. I think I reset my alarm clock three times out of pure confusion over when it was actually necessary to get out of bed. So the next few weeks will be a little different.

I am actually a little disconcerted that I've sat at the computer this long to write this ... I keep looking at the clock and thinking it's time to round up Daisy for the bath, but I guess for the next few weeks I'm not responsible for keeping anyone clean but myself. (I'll let you know how that goes.)

I am off to watch Sansho The Bailiff, recently fervently recommended to me by the one true John Luzar. Before I go, let me share my delicious recipe for the Bloody Mary I concocted this evening (hereafter to be known as "The Bloody Baba".)

Combine in a cocktail shaker full of ice
- 3/4 cup tomato juice
- 2 0z vodka
- 2 0z delicious, delicious beer (I recommend Anchor Steam)
- 1 teaspoon Worchestershire sauce
- 1 teaspoon olive juice
- as much black peper and salt as you feel necessary
- as many dashes of Tabasco as you feel you can handle

Shake well and garnish with the following: 1 olive, 1 cocktail onion, 1 gherkin, 1 piece of salami, and 1 stick of string cheese. Back with remainder of beer.

Sláinte Mhaith!

Beware!

Beginning of a Beautiful Friendship, Part Deux

Lady Beatrice (aka Bee) and the General MacArthur (aka Mac) make nice on the couch in the Biggest Little City. Not pictured: Sir Winston (aka Winnie)

Not a hair on my chinny-chin-chin

I missed my face.

Beginning of a Beautiful Friendship

Bee has arrived in Reno. She and Nana appear to have similar interests.

The Princess, The Dairy Queen, and The Wonderful Playground of Oz

A lovely day today! Our wonderful friend Jen Littlefield is in town visiting from New York City (where everything looks beautiful when you're young and pretty) and joined us for a picnic in Hyde Park before an afternoon excursion to the south loop Target, Alcalas Western Wear (to get Baba's boots cleaned), Dairy Queen, and the fantastic Oz Park, certainly the finest playground in Chicago I've yet seen. Statues of Dorothy and Toto, Tin Man, Scarecrow and the Cowardly Lion, a garden, plenty of space for baseball and soccer, and a terrific play area with some of the best play structures I've ever come across. It makes me wish I was either five years old or an eccentric billionaire who could have a similar (though larger-scale) set up built for myself.

Dynamite Kid

So I have my third ever black eye. The other night, Daisy and I were playing 'Airplane' (the game in which one person lies flat on his back and suspends the other in the air on his knees, not the one in which players take turns doing Leslie Nielsen impersonations) and Daisy slid forward and conked me right above the eye. She giggled "Baba, I bumped my head!" I screamed in pain and held back tears. She laughed even more as I walked around clutching frozen peas to my eye and groaning. And a valuable lesson about playtime was learned.

I did make several references to the pro-wrestling move 'the diving headbutt', made famous by the great Dynamite Kid and the late ... well, I don't care to call him great, what with the filicide/uxoricide, but he was one hell of a wrestler ... Chris Benoit. And here's an example of said move:


The referee disqualified Daisy as well.

One Blonde Down . . .

The furriest member of our household, the lovely Beatrice, left Thursday night on a cross country trip to Reno. Our new apartment doesn't allow for pets, so Bee is going to live with Nana & Grumpy (and their two canine companions, Winston & MacArthur) in the mountains of Nevada. She will have a backyard to run in, two new friends, and a permanent lap to sit in - on the whole, a more luxurious accommodation than we could provide in Chicago. But even though the barking was infuriating, and I lost one half of four different pairs of shoes, and apparently something about the rug in Daisy's room just demanded to be peed upon, I am already missing our morning walks (though in the winter, that will be a different story, I'm sure.)

Bee is making the trip via a pet travel service called Get-M-Home.

I'm trying, alright!?!

It's Facebook's fault ... it makes it so easy to feel like you're sharing deep thoughts and opinions when really you're just making lists of the top five purple vegetables you can think of. Still, the formatting is so pretty ...

Anyway, so much is going on that it seems like nothing is going on, if that makes any sense, which it doesn't. We're moving next month - Heidi and Daisy and I are going to an apartment closer to the Midway and, more importantly, Lab School. A little less space, but also less rent, and a back yard and included heat. Our furry friend Beatrice is moving to the scenic vistas of Reno, NV, to live with Nana & Grumpy, Winston & MacArthur.

Work is going fine; my schedule has changed much for the better. I have the weekend off - the real weekend, Sat/Sun - plus Monday, which is awesome. I have a lot more time to spend with Daisy, and we actually have a day on which all three of us can hang out. And then I have Monday to myself to run errands (or more likely, goof around on Facebook.)

Anyway, Daisy has been curiously preoccupied with death lately, or more accurately with the forbidden nature of the discussion of death. She seems to be testing the subject out and gauging reactions. Tonight in the midst of a round of "say something funny" (typical entry: Today I saw a monkey and do you know what he said? Pickles.) Daisy said, "Today I saw a bad baby who wasn't listening go into the street and get hit by a car. It got hurt and then it got died." It's very difficult because it is of course a horrifying image, but ... her delivery is just so good. I gotta give the kid props for timing. If anyone can make the story of a bad baby getting hit by a car and getting died, it's her.

K. We'll see how long Facebook keeps me away this time ...

And They Didn't, So He Died.

Good news everyone!

The Hold Steady released a new live album (A Positive Rage) this week and it happens to be from a show recorded at Chicago's Metro on Halloween of 2007. This is probably only exciting to me and John Luzar and the few hundred other people who just happened to be at that very show. Nevertheless!

If you're not familiar with The Hold Steady, you should take steps to amend this shortcoming. The Hold Steady are a fantastic band. I recommend The Hold Steady if you enjoy any combination of the following things: cheap beer, Born To Run, pain pills, Elvis Costello & The Attractions, Minneapolis, Chicago, John Berryman, heroin, Charles Bukowski, Joe Strummer, rock and roll music of any kind. However, if you are among the unexposed, I do not recommend you purchase this new live release. Stay the hell away from it, in fact. Instead, pick up the amazing Boys And Girls In America (2006) or the nearly-as-amazing Stay Positive from last summer. The live album is strictly a 'fans-only' sort of deal.

But if you do pick it up, listen closely for the dulcet tones of SMH chiming in on the 'Woah-oh-ohs' of "Massive Nights".

Oh, and their Halloween costumes? Banditos. Complete with fake mustaches, except for the guitarist. His was real.

Well even though I have absolutely nothing of consequence to say today, I am going ahead with the incessant posting. The events of the day were minimal: I went to work, Heidi went to work, Daisy went to gym class. (By the way, if any of you know of anyone looking for babysitting work who lives in Chicago and has a car, please let me know.)

Work was work. Sat box all day. It occurs to me how many elements of my job must seem incredibly foreign to those of you who don't frequent casinos. It's a bit difficult to give the full evocation in prose. Here's a quick quiz to demonstrate the secret language of the casino:
Sean has not held which position at the Horseshoe

• A. Stick
• B. Box
• C. Floor
• D. Pencil
  

If you're not familiar with the terminology, I imagine that question makes about as much sense as "How many licks does it take to screw in a lightbulb?" And thanks to issues of security and the privacy of our guests, there are almost no pictures of me at work in my environment. (What few pictures exist have been taken by surveillance cameras and are the property of the Horseshoe Casino.) Someday I'd like to be able to post a pic of myself sitting box at a crap game; perhaps I shall resort to self portraiture.

Nevertheless, I went to work and did the things I do there. Feel free to stop by someday and observe.

And on a non-sequiturial note, I have been re-watching the first season of Deadwood. Good god I miss that show!

April Fool

I hit a stumbling block somewhere in February and have yet to pick myself up. The major reason I started this blog was to give myself a forum in which I could write without pressure, just get something, if not down on paper then up on the screen. (I don't believe I punctuated that last sentence at all correctly.) But I let a few days go by without posting, and that turned into a week, and then two weeks, and all I managed to post in March was the St Patrick's Day Pants, and you needn't the internet to see those: I'm relatively certain they were visible from space. (Punctuation, I declare your implements devoid of meaning. I shall reclaim and repurpose them as I see fit.) The point being, it's a new month, and under the revised calendar of Emperor SMH the first, it's a new year, and what better time to make bold declarations of commitment.

So.

I hearby boldly declare commitment to this blog.

And we'll see how long I can keep it up.

(That's what she said.)

Do Not Stare Directly At The Pants

A belated St Patrick's Day greeting from Baba & Daisy

Chick Magnet

Under the Sean Michael Henrian calendar (which the United States should be adopting any day now), today would be Christmas Eve. But for the time being, February 27th will have to be content to be the birthday of one Mr John Luzar of Chicago, Illinois.

Being John's birthday, I got to join in the indulgences of a meal at Hot Doug's (where I had a pork sausage with pear and almonds and a duck sausage topped with foie gras. Yes that's right, foie gras. God bless Hot Doug.) and a chocolate malt at the Medici. Daisy joined us for the malts (though she had an ice cream cone, consumed with a degree of intensity and focus not seen outside of grand master chess tournaments) and the opening of presents.

I'm particularly proud of John's presents this year. The theme was "adorable villainy". Daisy picked out a wind-up bunny rabbit toy that, while not particularly villainous, did some pretty wicked backflips. I gave John first a ridiculously cute action figure of Doctor Doom (Marvel MIGHTY MUGGS) and the coup de grâce, a print of a painting by Brandon Bird entitled "Sir Ian". Words cannot possibly do this painting justice.

Anyway, a lovely day, and to top it off, there will be beer later. So thanks John for getting older and giving me a reason to get fatter, and thanks for being the swellest of best friends, and the only person I know who would enjoy that painting as much as I do.

Things That Don't Exist ... Yet

The thing I am now most anxiously awaiting more than anything in the world is tentatively due in 2011. It is a book of magic by Alan Moore, author of Watchmen, The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen, V For Vendetta, and many other mind-blowing comic books that have been turned into mediocre movies (that's a little unfair to Watchmen which opens a week from tomorrow, but cannot possibly succeed on the level of the graphic novel.) The book is called The Moon And Serpent Bumper Book Of Magic. Moore says about it, "We want to make this not only a perfectly lucid and accurate book about magic, but we really want to make it a book about magic that would not disappoint an 8-year-old child if they came across it. Back when I was a child and I first heard about magic, then I kind of knew instinctively what a book of magic would be. It would be unimaginably wonderful. It would have fantastic things in it. It would be much better than the children's comics annuals I got at Christmas, and they were pretty wonderful. That is very much what we've tried to achieve."(From Wired)

I am chomping at the bit for this book. Having to wait two years is mind-bogglingly frustrating to me. If one of you could make it appear now, I would indenture myself to your servitude.

An advance copy of this book has made my list of things I most covet that I know do not exist. Chief amongst these items:

• An episode of The Muppet Show, fourth or fifth season, hosted by Tom Waits, in which he performs the songs "Whistling Past The Graveyard" and "Monster Mash"
• a Kindle that can read .cbr files (comic books) and display them in color. It also needs reasonable wi-fi capabilities.
  
• a sizable high school marching band, preferably from a midwestern parocial school, performing Eric Clapton's "Cocaine"
• A complete set of the works of Shakespeare, published individually by McSweeney's
• knowledge of a secret entrance to the classical underworld, such as was used by Orpheus, provided the underworld resembles the one featured in the book Greek Myths by Ingri and Edgar Parin d'Aulaire
  
• anything made of an adamantium/vibranium alloy
• Ambrose Bierce's diary
  
• Vince McMahon's conscience
  
• a clone of my old dog Betty

Should you happen across any of these things at your local flea market, go ahead and pick it up. I will reimburse you.

Talk Derby To Me!*

It is a lovely Friday afternoon here in Chicago. Though this morning was wretchedly cold, the sun came up and boosted things to a tolerable 27 degrees. Daisy has been consumed with thoughts of springtime and sunshine and swinging in the park these past few days, so we stopped by our favorite playground after school today. Reality trumped fantasy, however, and once we'd made it through the gate, I heard a tiny voice say "Baba, I am cold." So we went home. We did make it to the bakery for a scoop of chocolate ice cream and a coffee for me. For those of you expatriate Hyde Parkers, let me tell you: Med coffee has gotten worse. It was never fantastic ... inconsistently decent, is probably the nicest thing I can say ... but now it out-and-out sucks. Which is a shame, and will be even moreso come summer, as it is so conveniently located across from the playground, and the pastries are great. But we've got two Starbucks and, more importantly, two Cafe Istrias, so we shan't be wanting for coffee. I just wish we had a Peets.

Tonight I am cooking some buffalo burgers and then running off to the roller derby! The Windy City Rollers have a show tonight at the UIC pavilion and Herr Doktor John Luzar and I are very excited to get our fill of estrogenal mayhem. My only worry is that some Xena-esque fraulein will choose me for her mate, club me over the head, drag me back to the cave, and I will be too in love to go back to work. I will stay home, washing dishes, baking cookies, and sharpening her shoulder pad spikes. *sigh*

*that pun blatantly stolen from The WCR website, but too good to pass up

26 Books Update

I have fallen a bit behind schedule in my reading lately, but have still been chugging along with my alphabetical plan. Since July, I have been at it (the original list is here), and here is what I have read.

• The Music Of Chance, Paul Auster: A fine novel, and a good way to ease myself into reading novels with some semblance of substance
  
• Paradise, Donald Barthelme: Very funny, insightful, if ultimately slight.
  
• A good portion of Sixty Stories by Barthelme, most of which I enjoyed more than Paradise
  
• Storm Front, Jim Butcher, which was awful. It's the first book in a series that I find staggering anyone wanted to read more of. Also I'm offended that it's set in Chicago despite the author clearly never having set foot within the city limits.
  
• Tell No One, Harlan Coben: Only slightly better than the Butcher book. To be fair, I didn't expect great things from either one, but in Butcher's case, I didn't think competence was too much to ask.
  
• Crooked Little Vein, Warren Ellis: Warren writes wonderful comic books. He has many fantastic ideas. He is a brilliant, fascinating man. His prose leaves a great deal to be desired, and scatological humor is not really so much my thing. On the whole, good geeky fun.
• Little Brother, Cory Doctorow: Probably the best thing I've read in the last six months, save some of the Barthelme shorts. Really great commentary on technology and civil and human rights, aimed at a sophisticated but impressionable young adult audience. I recommend this book to everyone.
• Cryptonomicon, Neal Stephenson: Something I'd picked up and put down more than once, but after reading the Doctorow, it just seemed a perfect follow up. Very enjoyable and probably the fastest I've ever made it through a 900+ pagecount.
• Pattern Recognition, William Gibson: Once I started down the geek-lit path it was too hard to turn around. This was my first Gibson novel and certainly won't be my last. I imagine I'll read either Spook Country or Neuromancer before too long.
• Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson: Hard to believe that this book is over fifteen years old now and the internet has certainly evolved, though not in the ways predicted here. Still, a fun time. I did get a little maxed out on the cyberpunk though, so moving back to the alphabet . . .
  
• And Then We Came To The End, Joshua Ferris: Wonderful book. Very funny, very touching.
• No One Belongs Here More Than You, Miranda July: Lovely stories. I do have a tendency toward male authors and am always taken aback and a bit embarassed that I don't spend more time reading women's works and basically considering the experience outside myself. So I feel reading July is both pleasant and healthy.
• Three Signs Of A Miserable Job, Patrick Lencioni: I had to read this for work. It was homework. I can't talk about without sounding like it was a terrible experience, but honestly, reading it meant nothing to me except it took up some time.
• Dune, Frank Herbert: Just started it today.

So that's my reading from the last eight months. I've made it A-H, with jumps ahead to J, L & S. I think I will try to follow Dune with either some Ibsen or that Innaurato play I'd originally planned on, but right now those both sound like dreary prospects. I also think I may dump Sarah Kane in favor of Robert Kirkman's Invincible or The Walking Dead (or both!). And then with luck, by July I'll have made it to 'S' and be ready for my next syllabus: A year of reading Shakespeare!

Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally

This has been driving me nuts for weeks. I had the phrase in my head, but could not, for the life of me, remember what it was supposed to be mnemonically reminding me.

I'd Buy You A Green Dress

I was discussing yesterday what I would do in the unlikely event of a massive windfall of cash into my life. A friend asked if I went to a casino and won $100,000, would I quit my job, and with very little thought I decided, yes, I certainly would, and would most likely go to graduate school. Not particularly grand plans, but $100,000 is not really that much money. However, if I were to find, say, $10,000,000 in my lap? That's a different story.

Obviously, setting up a new standard of living for myself, and Heidi and Daisy, and Mom and Dad too, is a priority. And taking care of Daisy's education, from now till college, is on the agenda as well. But honestly, if I wake up with $10,000,000 in my bank account, the first thing I am doing is going out and buying myself an elephant. I will buy an elephant, I will buy some place to put my elephant, I will pay someone to take care of my elephant when I'm not around, and I will buy a saddle and ride that elephant all around.

And then, after the elephant, I'm finding a nice small town with a good sense of humor (someplace like Munster, IN, but consistently warmer) and running for mayor. Or I might found my own town and probably name it after a celebrity, like Burgess Meredith, KY, or 2Pac, MO.

So years from now, you'll be on an airplane and pick up the in-flight magazine (because you forgot your Jodi Picoult novel - for shame!) and flip through looking for the drink specials to see if they still have ginger ale and bam! there's a human interest story on one of the most absurd and pleasant citizens of the midwest, the elephant-riding mayor of Tupac, Missouri, and you'll know I've made it.

I'll Have What She's Having

Baba: Sweetheart, what would you like for breakfast?
Daisy: Money!

Bum Update

After weeks of fretting, I had my second follow up with the surgeon yesterday. Lately I've been dismayed by the amount of time it's taking to heal from the fistulotomy, and things were starting to seem like they were before I had the surgery. I was dreading going in to see the doctor, expecting him to announce that things weren't going the way they were supposed to and we were going to have to take another swing at it with a different surgical method. To my great glee, he said everything looks like it's supposed to and it's healing up just like it should. Hooray for ass health!

Another Of My Fashion Icons

How Do I Act So Well?

What was that deadline again?

"Could I have so many baby puppies today for my birthday some other time on Wednesday?"

Oscar, Schmoscar

Well, the Oscar nominations were announced today, and they were, as usual, completely unrepresentative of the best films of the year. Granted, I'm not really the best source, as pretty much the only films I saw all year were cartoons and super-hero movies, but I'll wager Iron Man and Kung Fu Panda were better than Benjamin Button and Frost/Nixon (even the nicest reviews of which have dubbed meandering and unnecessary.) As an alternative, I present to you the nominees for the first annual Sean Michael Henry Awards For Excellence In Films That I Saw Last Year, heretofore known as 'The Babas'.

Best Actor In A Motion Picture:
Robert Downey, Jr, Iron Man
Clint Eastwood, Gran Torino
Heath Ledger, The Dark Knight
Mickey Rourke, The Wrestler
Jason Siegel, Forgetting Sarah Marshall

Best Actress In A Motion Picture:
Penelope Cruz, Vicky Christina Barcelona
Anne Hathaway, Rachel Getting Married
Frances McDormand, Burn After Reading
Amy Poehler, Baby Mama
Kristin Scott Thomas, I've Loved You So Long

Best Director:
Darren Aronofsky, The Wrestler
Jon Favreau, Iron Man
Michel Gondry, Be Kind, Rewind
David Gordon Green, Pineapple Express
Christopher Nolan, The Dark Knight

Best Picture Of The Year:
The Dark Knight
Doomsday
Igor
Iron Man
Forgetting Sarah Marshall
Gran Torino
Kung Fu Panda
Man On Wire
Pineapple Express
Tropic Thunder
WALL*E
The Wrestler

And The Baba goes to ... ?

My Neighbor, Mr President

My goodness that last post seems awfully bitter! I apologize - I really do not despise dealing blackjack quite that much (though under certain circumstances it probably is the most unpleasant thing I have to do at work.) And after the events of today, cynicism and bitterness are so far removed from my mind ...

Well. I'm sure you all heard the news that my neighbor is now officially President Of The United States Of America, which is awesome. I'm a little bummed that I didn't get a chance to watch the whole inaugural ceremony and only got to see part of the speech. Actually, I was mostly upset that people were still playing craps and not standing and watching the televisions in reverence of the march of history. But it happened and now he's President Obama, and he lives in Washington, D.C. in the White House, and not in Hyde Park/Kenwood in a big house that Tony Rezko helped pay for.

The mood at work did seem a little lighter today, despite business being slow and the weather being borderline misterable. And though the stock market didn't soar and the snow is still on the ground, I do feel better today about my future, and my little girl's future, than I did yesterday.

20 Below

I freaked out a little when I pulled up the temperature on the computer and it read "-20". That's cold. I forget every year that there is a difference between 20 degrees and -20 degrees ... a lot of the time once it gets to 20, I just think, Man it's cold, better wear some mittens. But there is huge difference. I sat in the car this morning, desperately praying for heat, and thought it out: -20 is almost 50 degrees below the freezing point. And fifty degrees above the freezing point is 82 degrees, which is a subtropical temperature, which is what human beings are naturally adapted to function in. So 20 below is almost 100 degrees below the temperature nature prepared us for. And yet, here we are, going to school, going to work, going to the grocery store, instead of huddling in caves around fires and eating leftover mammoth.

See, it's so cold I'm starting to get a little delirious ...

Somebody Call My Mama

I watched The Wrestler last night. I was very excited to see it. As some of you may know, I have been, in the past, quite the afficionado of the professional wrestling. In the early days, I was intrigued by the spectacle, but later, after I started following it closely on wrestling websites and fan discussion boards, I found the far more interesting aspect of the business was the bizarre and often tragic personal life led by the average pro-wrestler. This is a business where even when guys are at the top and really successful, they're wrestling four days a week, getting dropped on their heads and backs and whatnot, all year long with no off season, and making less than an entry level major league baseball player. And when they're not at the top? Well, they're trying to do the same thing, only without getting paid.

The Wrestler focuses on the life of a grappler whose day in the sun has come and gone. It does a good job of portraying many of the issues these guys face - chronic injury, disastrous personal lives, and the addiction to the spotlight - but it doesn't really touch on the current state of wrestling, in that there's no mention of Vince McMahon who is, honestly, one of the most monstrous human beings in America today.

McMahon is the person people probably associate most with wrestling after the big names like Hulk Hogan and Stone Cold Steve Austin, and he has more influence over the entire business than anyone else. His WWE (I still miss calling it the WWF; way to go pandas.) is really the only name in wrestling. Sure, there's TNA wrestling, and Ring Of Honor (which appears in The Wrestler), but the WWE is the only place to go if you want to make any money or be considered a success. To his credit, he took a sideshow business and made it a mainstream success, but the heyday has come and gone and where one could previously acknowledge his 'vision', now it's his personal shortsightedness and unwillingness to relinquish creative control that is bringing down both his television programs and performers. Not only that, but Vince's personal opinion on what a wrestler should be has been incredibly devastating to the average man trying to make it the business. Vince wants every wrestler to look like a bodybuilder, so everybody, everybody, takes steroids. (Ok - one exception: Chicago's own hometown hero CM Punk, the Straightedge superstar. Ed note: Punk is also known as Phil Brooks, and is a good friend of my good friend Steve Lund.) Steroids and growth hormone abuse combined with the incessant travel and performing have led to innumerable wrestling tragedies - countless early deaths from heart failure, life long mood disorders, drug addiction brought on as a result of self medicating mood disorders, death from drug and alcohol overdoses, and incidences of violence, including most horrifically Chris Benoit and family.

The Wrestler does paint a portrait of a man whose health has been significantly abused by the wrestling lifestyle (he wears a hearing aid, consistently wraps parts of his body in tape, and, oh yes, has a heart attack.) But mostly it's about his failed personal life and the dichotomy of life inside and out of the wrestling ring. Mickey Rourke does give a magnificent performance and there are some terrific moments (I think my favorite is his 'entrance walk' to the kitchen.) It is well worth seeing, and I hope it does well, because I feel that the subject matter is a realm full of many more stories that need to be told.

And after talking about The Wrestler, here is a clip from ... a totally different movie! Jules Dassin's The Night And The City (1950) which is in part about the shift from real (shoot) wrestling to the phony (work) wrasslin' of today, and is one of my all-time favorite films.



By the way, today's title comes from the catchphrase of Ernest 'The Cat' Miller, a former WWE performer who appears in The Wrestler.

2009: The State Of Sean

One week into the new year, I think now is as good a time as any to present the annual State of The Sean report. I'm not fully familiar with my blog readership at this point - I know I have one 'follower', and Margo has me in her Google reader, and Pops Coleman drops by regularly, but other than that, I'm always surprised who turns up on the comments. Old high school friends, casino buddies ... it's a wide range. And since very few people interact with me often enough to keep abreast of all the nonsense in which I'm involved, I feel it wise to post an account on the status quo of my life as we go into this new year.

Work: I am still employed by the Horseshoe Casino of Hammond, IN, Chicagoland's finest gaming establishment ("Where entertainment knows no bounds.") I am currently in the position of dual-rate supervisor, which means on any given day, I may be scheduled as a table games dealer or as a table games supervisor. Business needs dictate what role I shall perform, and sometimes I may do both in one day. I enjoy the diversity, and as a dual-rate, I have a great deal of seniority, which has allowed me to keep my current day shift schedule (even if I did lose my Saturdays off.)

We have experienced a number of drastic changes in the last four months, as I imagine most businesses have. We had a number of layoffs, and our supervisory staff had quite a shake-up as an entire tier of management was eliminated and redistributed. This has meant a lot more work and a lot of new tasks for me to learn, but honestly, I welcome the challenge - I was starting to get a little bored.

Home: Well, as you may have heard, our most famous neighbor moved. Apparently, his job is not one that's open to a work-from-home, telecommute sort of arrangement. I offered to pick up the mail and water the plants while they're in Washington, but the Secret Service informed me that those duties "aren't the concern of ... civilians." A shame, as I was really looking forward to seeing if the Obamas get the same YOU HAVE WON A FREE CRUISE!!! junk mail that I get.

Our apartment seems to be handling the winter better this year than last. Heidi covered all the windows with that transparent plastic stuff and the heater has only broken down once. But the pipes haven't frozen, the streets get plowed regularly, and we're well stocked for blankets, comforters, sweaters, heavy coats, boots, hats, scarves, and mittens.

Family (Elsewhere): Over New Year's, I flew out to Los Angeles to see Grandpa, and Mom and Dad. Grandpa had his 92nd birthday this past August, and I believe I have determined the secret to his longevity: don't smoke, have a gin martini every day, and put Tabasco sauce on EVERYTHING. Other than the fact that he can't hear very well, he's doing pretty darn good for a man in his nineties. Actually, he's doing pretty well for a man in his mid-to-late seventies, if the old white guys I see at the casino are any indication. Then again, those guys are clearly not getting enough Tabasco.

As good as it was to see Grandpa, I was more invested in seeing Mom. I haven't seen her since she started chemo and I've been really worried. But this visit filled me with confidence that she's going to make it through this thing just fine. As of now, her hair is gone, and for about a week after every treatment (actually, a week after two days after the treatment) she's absolutely miserable, but then she seems to bounce back pretty quick. I've never doubted that she was tough as nails, but I've also never seen her challenged quite like this. I'm more filled with hope now than worry and dread ... by a small margin, but nonetheless, the balance has shifted towards hope.

Dad's doing great. Lost about sixty pounds since the beginning of the year. Looks sixty (which he turned in October) but looks healthy and happy with himself (though I'm sure he's more worried about Mom than I am, seeing her on the day-to-day.)

Family (Here): The biggest news from the homefront family is that Daisy was accepted to the University Of Chicago lab school, and will begin classes this summer. Next stop Sitwell Prep! Just today she had a placement audition (at Lab, not Sitwell) to figure out where she'll be (with three-year-olds or a mix of three and four.) In other Daisy news, Santa heard that pink was the color de rigueur of Princesses in Chicago, and everything this holiday season matched appropriately, from new bike to magic wands to dresses to candies to kitties to bunny ornamented helmets for aforementioned bike.

Mama (sometimes known as Heidi) is still dividing her time between the University Theater and the Live Oak fellowship. And applying for doctoral programs. And teaching classes. And developing the U of C arts center. And of course, raising a three-year-old. Rinse, repeat. Though justifiably exhausted, Mama maintains high spirits and home, and is more often than not the leader of the evening dance party, and still the best cook in the house.

Facial Hair: I have managed to keep the handlebar goatee, but the casino's appearance guidelines dictated that I shave the sideburns.

My goals and ambitions for 2009: A career might be nice. Going back to school. Finding a winning lottery ticket on the ground would be o-k (Hey, I found a hundred dollar bill, didn't I?)

This is an important year to get some things accomplished, I think. I've used a number of excuses the last few to keep from setting some goals and taking any steps toward achieving them, but I think this is going to be one of those 'crux' years where I have to either make things happen or they're going to happen to me in ways I don't particularly care for. Let's just hope that superstitious dread is enough to motivate me.

Well, that's where I am at the beginning of 2009. I hope you (whomever you may be, friend!) are doing well and are happy, healthy, wealthy, and chock full of moxie and vinegar and all that good stuff as we begin this, the penultimate year of the first decade of blah diddy blah blah.

Hogs & quiches,
SMH