Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Phew.

The Borks sold their house in the suburbs, and they're officially moving to the city in April (or early May...)! A lovely young engaged couple is buying it as their first house, so I picture it filled with tiny kids (tiny only as long as they're kids...they'll grow, of course) within a few years. It's a nice picture. 

And of course we're thrilled to soon be joined by the Borks! The New City Borks. Trevor has offered them our couch for a while because the new condo won't be exactly ready when they are. I think they'll accept the offer, especially when they realize that they could be licked awake in the face each morning by Henry. Who wouldn't be interested in that?!

There's also some family tattoo news--and it's not ours! Rachel and Letty got some really nice work done last week, and although they said they think it hurt more this second time around, looking at the pictures alone makes me know it was worth it. Check it out:


Rachel's is the Celtic rose knot (her second piece), and Letty got an addition in honor of her sister Carmen, who recently passed away, to the fire sign piece she got last year. They both look kind of amazing.

This Friday is the near-monthly meeting of my Ribs Supper Club with my fellow rib loving friends J.C. and Angie--we're going to Fat Willie's Barbecue. I'm sure I'll have some tasty reporting to do about that, so until then, goooooooo ribs!

Friday, February 13, 2009

School makes the news again...

...and this time, it's not because of me! One of our Political Science teachers gave a lecture last night, and apparently it caused a bit of a ruckus as school. Here's the article. He's a pretty cool cucumber and it sounds like he took it all in stride, though I wish I'd been there to see it myself. 

A couple weeks ago, one of my students asked if I'd be the faculty advisor for a new club he wanted to start: The Science Fiction Club. That's right. The Science Fiction Club. It's a club for Sci-Fi fanatics to get together and talk about robots, aliens, space travel, time travel...Doesn't it sound like heaven? Yes it does! We only had three people at the first meeting on Tuesday, but I think the word didn't get out and around school enough; I'm going to spruce up the flyer and plaster it over every inch of campus next week, and I have a feeling we'll attract more nerds. I mean geeks. I mean super cool people just like me. I can't wait until we cover the X-Files!

Russ and Desiree's new bar, Simone's, opened this week, and Trevor, Simona, and I went to the soft opening on Tuesday night. We ran into Greg and Paula, and Audrey, who I hadn't seen since the wedding. We had a great time and ate some really tasty food (portabello fries and a slice of tres leches cake were the highlights for me--not on the same plate of course). Wednesday night was Bunco night with the girls, and I lost $20, but had a great time with everyone. It was the most friend-packed week I've had in a while, though next week, I'm having another dinner with the gals, and the Rib Supper Club at Fat Willie's on Friday, so I'll have to rest up this weekend.

For Valentine's Day, we're getting a new washer and dryer--it's getting delivered tomorrow, and I'm already mentally sorting the laundry. I am also hoping that Trevor will get me some candy. (Trevor, hint hint) So Happy Valentine's Day, all, and we'll have more to come soon.

Sunday, February 8, 2009

Resident Eeeeeee-vil

The title of this particular blog entry, though only barely tangentially relevant to its contents, is more of an eye-catcher than, say, "While I sit on the couch on a Sunday night." Trevor is seated beside me, and he's playing the demo of the Resident Evil video game (Can we still call them video games? These slick and shiny, bloody and gory fantasies?). And while I watch him fight overly animated zombies, I find myself asking a very important question, which was not originally intended to be the focus of this entry (see where Resident Evil gets me?):

When was the last time you saw a fat zombie?

My creative writing class got on this topic during Wednesday's class workshop. One of the students used the phrase "zombie-like skin" to describe a chubby woman in a painting, and some of the readers/students had issue with the correlation between a zombie and chubbiness. And of course, being interested in zombies myself, I actually let them talk about this for a few minutes.

We don't see many overweight zombies, which is odd, and frankly, a misrepresentation of the human population. Since zombies rise from the grave (due to various reasons and according to various philosophies), there should be quite a number of heavy, thin, short, tall, male, female, old, young, one-legged, four-fingered zombies. Right? Once they're out of their graves, ambling around and picking off humans as fast as their zombie-legs can carry them, the white and gray matter of the brain might not be super nourishing, but do you know how long it would take a zombie to lose weight? Well, I don't really have an answer to that question, but I'd imagine much longer than it takes the average zombie survival team (gang of misfits fighting to survive the zombie apocalypse) to kill those zombies. So, why don't we see more size diversity in our undead?

Sooo, now let's talk about Macbeth. From zombies to Shakespeare...it makes complete sense. My friend Angie and I went to Chicago Shakespeare Theater for The Scottish Play. Both of us worked there for a while, but neither of us has been there in years, so we were excited to see both the show as well as the theater itself. We recognized a few familiar faces and had a beer in the pub before we took in the show, which was above average. As was expected, the production was superb and the acting was solid. There were a number of artistic choices that I really could have lived without (Mike Nussbaum was one of the 'weird sisters,' and I really [and I mean really] could have done without seeing him, all 85 years of him, dressed in S&M bondage gear. He was a great porter, though.), and I frankly preferred the performance of Ben Carlson, who did the Short Shakespeare! version and the last Macb. production I saw. This Thane of Cawdor was fine, but I want better than fine. The "Tomorrow," soliloquy was okay, but other than that speech, he yelled a lot. The fight choreography was great, though, and the set was super fun. The whole night was a huge hit for me and Angie, just getting to the theater again. Twelfth Night is playing in the spring, and we're going to go again, this time with Trevor.  

So it's now way passed my bedtime, and I want to finish my Agatha Christie novel tonight, so I'm off like an itchy pair of socks. Until next time, true believers!

Tuesday, February 3, 2009

Cheeseburger in Paradise

I ate dinner tonight with a girl I went to junior high school with. It's the lovely part of Facebook: you reconnect with people you haven't talked to in sixteen years. And then you think about the fact that you were sixteen years old fifteen years ago, just a hair younger than the students you're currently teaching. And then you feel kind of old. 

But, dinner was fun. Jen (formerly Jenni) and I met at a restaurant in Algonquin, which is close to her house and on my way home from school, called Cheeseburger in Paradise. As you might have guessed, it's a beachy Jimmy Buffety themed place that specializes in burgers (though the menu was quite extensive). They also had fried pickles. I'll repeat that. They also had fried pickles. Of course, Jen and I couldn't resist ordering them, and we were pleasantly surprised at their deliciousness. I mean, they were really, really good. The burgers were good, too, and the coleslaw had golden raisins (!yahoo!), which is a major turn-off for some, but it's high up on my list of coleslaw "do's" so I was thrilled. 

In addition to the food, Jen and I got to catch up, which was so nice. I don't keep in touch with anyone from the "olden days" (as my students would call the Eighties. I'm not kidding.), so we swapped some stories and then she filled me in on what's been going on so far this decade. She's married, teaching high school English at Maine West (West is Best!), and raising a little boy named Nate (whose picture I've seen--he's a totally adorable peanut head.). She lives in one of the towns I drive through on my way to work (one of a dozen), so we're planning to get together frequently. 

And that was the night. I'm currently writing this to put off doing a lesson plan on writing poetry, and I should probably finish it up so I'm prepared for tomorrow afternoon's class. Poetry is something that still confounds me, and I'm finding it a bit difficult to teach. Fiction, no problem. Creative non-fiction, super. Poetry. Huhflawwh? Before the semester started, I went through a few of my old poetry journals to get inspired, but it only made me realize what kind of themes I'd be likely to see from my own college freshmen: parties, broken hearts, teenage angst, post-teenage angst (totally like, much deeper than, like, regular teenage angst), sneakers, and sex (wanting it, not getting it). I'm hoping that this first assignment my students wrote, using any piece of art from campus that they choose, will elicit more interesting fare. 

So, here's to hope! Have a good night, true believers.