I found his ocean front cottage purposefully on accident. “My car is dead,” I whispered to his shadow at the front door, my breath catching when he stepped into the circle of the porch light. Yes, it was him, with the same crooked nose and pointed, milky teeth. But he was different, and it wasn’t just because of the dress.

He told me that it was always hurricane season; that the sideways rain and flying garbage were now as typical as the quiet, snowy nights that we had once shared in a different place, a different time. I followed him inside, the sheets of water slipping from my coat into steamy puddles on his Spanish tile. He didn’t look backwards to see if I was following, and he didn’t bother to ask if I needed to use his phone. I assumed he thought that the entire car was made up, and not just the dead part.

His kitchen counter was covered with artichokes, with equal bits heart and inedible choke. He told me to be quiet. “There is a woman upstairs sleeping,” he stated, his eyes rolling heavenward. I wanted to ask if it was the sleeping woman’s dress that he wore on this wet, stormy night, if it was her floral baby-doll affair that stretched taut across his tanned, hairy chest.

I didn’t. I wrung out my hair and wiped my slick face with a napkin that turned orange, black, and pink with make-up. I blinked hopefully at him, wide-eyed and willing. He had once washed me completely- body, face and hair. He had dipped me into the bathtub in his old apartment in Wisconsin, holding me under until I panicked and gurgled a scream. When he had pulled me back up, he was my savior and had told me that my gasping mouth in the center of my raw, wet face was a gorgeousness that could not be duplicated. As always, he was surely correct, and now he looked away, unable to give me anything.

“We can talk about you,” he offered quietly, picking up and sharpening a kitchen knife, “Or we can talk about me. Your choice.”

I wanted him to love me like he had, to remember the things that I had let him do to me and to promise that he would do them again. There were twists of my skinny arms and the palm prints he had seared into my backside, marks that I had once tried to rub away but would now try to preserve. After making do without the badness for so long, I would now swear to carry it in a basket on my spine. If only he’d let me, if only he threw in the occasional crumpled ball of goodness.

“I don’t want to talk,” I replied after a minute, an hour. He’d always made me sweaty, and tonight I was grateful to already be drenched. “I’ll help you with dinner, if you want.”

“I’m having company in a little bit,” he said pointedly. “They are the friends of the woman I have upstairs.”

I wanted to know who she was, but I didn’t dare to ask. I imagined that they made slow, passionate love while the hurricanes broke through their windows and splintered their doors. With me, it had always been quick and violent, and with soft, cold snowflakes that swirled lazily to the ground like ballerinas.

He trimmed the artichokes swiftly, gently. His hands were still achingly familiar, and, fleetingly, I fought the urge to lower my nose to his fingertips, his knuckles, his wrist. He had carried with him the scent of salt and sweat in Wisconsin. I imagined, here, that he smelled of cedar and pine, or my old perfume.

“You’re the opposite of yourself,” I muttered, absorbing the oceanside house and the entertaining of a woman’s friends when he’d ran wide circles to avoid mine. The short sentences that dropped from his mouth, concise and carefully constructed, were in deep contrast to his once thoughtlessly blurted paragraphs, long and mean. I soaked in the artichokes, and the dress. “What have you done?”

“It’s not that difficult to be different,” he said in a low voice. Then, finally, “Why are you here?”

Nothing truthful would sound honest. I shrugged meekly and repeated, “My car died down the road. I didn’t really... I wasn’t sure it would be you.”

“Why tonight of all nights?” he pressed. Now his voice sounded old again, and he was a rotten fairy tale from my youth.

“It was an accident,” I whispered back.

His ghost had haunted me for years after I broke up with him. It had been done on a whim, our last kiss tasting of blood and acid. I thought that if I stayed, he would consume me entirely, and his crystal ball eyes crammed the fear of a god into the lining of my heart. He would refuse my weak requests that he breathe life into me instead of draining it away. He once told me that he was a faucet and it was in my power to turn him. Right would be tight and left would be loose, but I couldn’t get it into my thick, dumb head. I was to blame if he was wrong.

I would drive past his apartment on the outskirts of town long after I knew he had disappeared. I wore coatings of regret on my skin, standing in the snow unable to freeze, standing in the heat unable to melt. I needed him to suck me inside of him. Pushing myself out had been the heaviest mistake I could make.

“You can’t stay,” he told me, dragging me through the years until I was once again standing in his shiny, dark kitchen. I had known to find him here because he had told me once, cryptically. I couldn’t remember the words, only the shapes that they made in the wind. “The guests are coming soon. I can’t disappoint them with you.”

His hair was wilder and curlier, and his eyes were magnetic as moons. I had not thought ahead to leaving him again. I had assumed that, tonight, I would find my way to his front door and then exit many decades later in a black body bag for two. I was ready for what I had foolishly denied before; I was ready for him to feast on me.

“I’ll use the washroom first,” I said slowly to buy time. “I’ll use the washroom and then call for help with my car.”

He pointed up, said that the correct room was the only room with an open door. He added, “I believe that the phone lines are down because of the storm. But that won’t be a problem, will it?”

I turned and walked through the living room towards the stairs. The room invited me forward with empty chairs, lit candles, and a long box on stilts illuminated by flashes of light. One foot in front of the other, each sinking deeper into wood and stone, and then I was on the upstairs landing staring at three doors. Through the washroom door, cracked open, I could smell his new scent, like the old one only more pungent. I could smell her as well, and she smelled like strawberries in a sealed pantry, like peaches in a locked wooden chest.

This would be my only chance to see her. I was drawn to the first closed door in search of the sleeping woman, my worthy replacement for whom my once lover deconstructed artichokes and initiated a party. I blinked madly in preparation and fixed my muscles. I would hate her, I would love her, I would want to become her.

Leaning into the first door, I placed my hand on the knob and twisted, brave as a child soldier. Left was loose, and right was tight. Inside the room were plain brown packing boxes strewn recklessly about a carpet littered with dirt and weeds and bottles of lawn care poison. This room had not seen sleep nor a woman, and I closed the door to move on to the next.

It creaked open, and after I stepped inside, it slammed shut with the sound of a gunshot. From a window missing panes, gusts filled with rain blew into the room on an angle. Yet the sleeping woman did not get wet. She lay on her back just out of reach of the storm, her figure centered on a smooth, flattened sheet and several thin, white pillows. Her dark hair cascaded to the floor in deep, chocolate ringlets, and her feet dangled off the mattress in a perfect V. She was nude and uncovered, and her open eyes stared at the ceiling and projected two small, tight circles of black.

That she was not alive was not the first thing I noticed. The first thing I noticed was her beauty. I noticed the curves of her body and imagined how they must fit so cleanly into his. I heard what must have been a portion of her soul that chose to linger, and it was light, easy giggles. I could not remember ever having laughed. What stayed behind for me would be strangled, muffled sobs. It would be begging and pleading and frantic desire.

“I knew you couldn’t resist,” he said behind me, and I whirled around to see his silhouette in the doorway. I did not have to ask if he had killed her. I released only one statement from my own stiffened body.

“It should have been me.”

He grinned, his teeth piercing the air between us. It was to be the only time I’d ever hear him laugh; a shared lack of mirth had been our single commonality. When his strange chuckles hit my ears, I realized that the lingering giggles above the sleeping woman’s body belonged to him, not her. There was nothing left of the woman except for her skyward gaze.

He took a step closer to me as the doorbell chimed below. The guests were here for the sleeping woman’s funeral, likely nobody that knew her as he had. Nobody that had ever swallowed her in pieces and spat her out whole. He had run his tongue through every last cell of her body, and I hurt with envy. He would be the enigmatic host of the party tonight, and when he slithered another step closer to me, I slithered back. The dress swished around his meaty thighs, and when I opened my mouth, it filled with the taste of artichokes. I retched, calmly, and then I bit into his tongue and let him slide down my throat.

Today I had lunch with a client at a great lakeside restaurant not ten minutes from my house. Sometimes I forget that I live so close to the chain of lakes and that while I am busy reading books or watching movies in my house, there's a whole, not-so-secret community of lake people who are busy living their lives with boats and water skis and margaritas under table umbrellas. This place, I would have never found it on my own. My client recommended it, and I was surprised to turn off a main street and onto a gravel driveway only to have this beautiful establishment spring up before me, the blue waters of some miscellaneous lake glimmering like a movie set ocean just a few feet from the parked cars.

I grew up thinking that the city of Chicago was the greatest place in the world, that nothing was worth a damn unless it was bordered by expressways. I became an adult imagining life in all of the cities that I knew I would never move to- Seattle, Boston, New York, L.A., Las Vegas. And when my fears kept me from moving anywhere but here, existence in general was laced with a bitter reluctance. I knew I had it in me to go anywhere that I wanted, but there were invisible ribbons that kept me anchored to certain regions. The suburbs are safer, so I will live there. I don't know anything but Illinois, so I will stay here. I can't imagine life without a car or the job that I'm already used to, so here is the radius of possibilities that I have drawn for myself. I can go fifteen miles here, thirty miles there, maybe sixty miles max from where I know the back roads and the best places to get a beef sandwich or a deal on shoes. That's where I am now, sixty miles northwest of where I started. And it can be so disappointing, but such is the flavor of choices made by the weak.

And yet today, on lunch with a client during which I ate a cheese panini and dared to try the peach iced tea, I found myself looking at the boats and the people and the brilliant sky. I saw those who have chosen to lead lives on the outskirts of a great city, like me but so unlike me. One small hour away from the captains of industry and the angry hipsters and the artists and the men who mill at the merc in colored jackets. An hour can be a strange measurement of time- it can be an instant or a half of a century. Or it can be meaningless, if you're happy where you are and are not bothering to measure. For why would you, when you have a life like this? When your life has the potential to be perfect as long as you stop comparing it to what you thought you wanted but knew you didn't, what you had expected for yourself even when quiet voices hinted that they weren't sure?

This enclave tucked away on a street I would have never ventured down, next to a lake I would have otherwise had to consult a map to prove, made me feel proud of my choices, be they accidental or slyly, subconsciously planned. My husband, he's been happy here since the day we wrote out the earnest check. Me, I've taken almost a year. Many years, actually, if you start counting from the day I started counting. That's always been the major difference between us, and it's been a pretty big one. I want, he has. I dream, he's happy with his eyes open. I complain, he jokes and sleeps well. But today, there was a change. All because of lunch.

The reviews for Alice Sebold's "The Almost Moon" have been mostly unfavorable. I, however, think that the novel was just as good, if not better, than "The Lovely Bones," which was the must- read novel for halfway literate women everyone. One of the reviews I read for "The Almost Moon" said that the novel was "annoying, unconvincing, and deeply perplexing." I've deduced that this reviewer must have had a mostly congenial relationship with his or her mother and therefore could not relate to the story of a woman who hates her mentally fucked up mother just as much as she loves her and one day, after 49 years of much of the same, kills the old hag in a manner both kindly and violent.

The book, for me, wasn't about the murder, even if that's where the story begins. The book was about growing up with an unbalanced woman and then trying, unsuccessfully, to leave those lopsided pieces behind through-out adulthood. There were a lot of moments in the novel that hit home for me, although my own relationship with my mother was not nearly as disturbed as Helen's relationship with Clair. The character that I really found myself intrigued with, however, was the main character's father, the man married to the Clair, the mother. Here is this man that we see, at first, as such a wonderful person, such a redeeming force in life. Then, slowly, you find out that he's sick, too. That either Clair drove him to being sick, or he was always sick, but, wouldn't you know, his problems in life were both eclipsed by, and aggravated by, that crazy old bat in the living room. He made me the saddest- the husband that sacrificed his life to do his best in dealing with the nut job.

Anyhow. If you spent most of your life alternating between wanting your crazy mother to hug you and wanting your mother to get nicked - nicked, not killed, I won't admit to anything- by a city bus, then this is the book for you. If not, then you probably won't like it. I, however, think it's a great study of how love and hate can be so completely intertwined and how a mother's work is never done- even when you've tried to put in the distance, time, and effort. Her work just shows up everywhere- and after she's gone, then what?

Chris fired up the barbecue grill yesterday. Between the three of us (Chris, Carole, and myself), we ate four hot dogs. To me, this was a monstrous waste of time and resources. Hot dogs can be microwaved in one minute flat. And a grilled hot dog doesn't taste that much better than a nuked hot dog. All you really taste is mustard anyhow.

But, alas, we have a grill, and I suppose we have to use it. I guess this is the final ingredient to the slow-cooked stew known as suburban homeownership. Other ingredients include a commute that makes you wish you were dead, neighbors with whom you discuss the other neighbors, an honest-to-goodness interest in lawn care, and your very own entry in the White Pages. Can you believe they're still delivering White Pages and Yellow Pages these days? How many trees did those people have to kill just so one old lady ten miles away could find herself a plumber? Although, perhaps when I get drunk one night, I will take the phonebook and reenact the scene where Marty McFly finds 1955 Doc's address in the book and proceeds to rip out the whole page and take it with him out of the diner. Ah, heroes in '80s movies- always ripping pages out of the phonebook because they lacked the foresight to carry a pen.

Mix Tape

White Daisy Passing- Rocky Votolato

This is a good song for long, lonely nights. This is a good song for reminiscing, for dwelling. A fitting background song for that twice-monthly cry that all girls require.

Girl In The War- Josh Ritter

Josh Ritter writes songs like I wish I wrote novels. Or, you know, grocery lists. They're rich, well-constructed, and full of intelligent metaphors. This is one of my three favorite songs by Josh Ritter, the other two being "The Temptation of Adam" - talk about dense- and "Wolves." However, I couldn't find legal MP3s, so here's the third best.

The Opposite of Hallelujah- Jens Lekman

I took my sister down to the ocean. But the ocean made me feel stupid.

That Was The Worst Christmas Ever!- Sufjan Stevens

Every Christmas I have feel likes the Worst Christmas Ever. Although if my mother manages to trump Christmas 2007 with Christmas 2008, then I'm pretty sure that there won't be a Christmas in 2009. Nonetheless, at least my gifts were never thrown into the stove.

The End- David & The Citizens

I have no idea what this song means, but I think it's brilliant anyway. Ridiculously catchy, I kind of want it to be my theme song (i.e., this song should blare from the speakers every time I "make an entrance"), but I won't make that final theme song decision until I actually read the lyrics.

Soul Meets Body- Death Cab For Cutie

I find that listening to Death Cab can be a touch cumbersome. "I Will Possess Your Heart," for instance, requires way too much of a commitment. No song should last longer than eight minutes, ever. When somebody asks me what I'm going to be doing in the next eight minutes, I want to be able to reply, "I dunno," not "Still sitting here listening to this song." Nonetheless, despite the fact that this band can be a drag at times, I love this song. This is one of my driving songs- I crank it up and, ironically, repeat it again and again until I've invested well over eight minutes. Funny, eh?

Did a search to see who links to me. Short answer: Two people. Long answer: Maybe five or six people, but only if you count blogs that haven't been updated since 2005. Anyhoo, I did, however, find a haiku that a total stranger wrote about my blog:

I like this girl’s blog
Been reading it for two years
You will like it too.

And that, dear readers, is why I waste my time at all.

Three things I recommend:



1. Obama. It's change I believe in, and I don't believe in change. For all the Hillary supporters that would rather have McCain than Obama- don't you dare ruin it for the rest of us in November.


2. "My Sister's Keeper" by Jodi Picoult. Holy crap, is this book powerful. I couldn't put it down, and I'm telling all my friends about it. At the heart of the story is a young girl conceived solely to be a blood, marrow, and eventual organ donor to her older sister, who suffers from leukemia. This girl finds a lawyer to represent her and sues her parents for medical emancipation. At thirteen, she's done having her body harvested for parts. If it sounds boring, it's not. It's about difficult decisions and, ultimately, fate. I cried my eyes out during the last half of this novel, and when I heard that they were making a movie out of the story, I got excited. For a split second. Then I found out what they're doing in the movie and how they're butchering the characters and the plot and I almost decided to sue for movie emancipation.

3. The movie "Eagle Vs. Shark!" A lot like "Napoleon Dynamite," only funnier and more adult. This story of two uber-nerds finding love in New Zealand (I had some trouble with the accents) was on my mind all day today. Rent it. If you don't like it, I'll refund something.

Last night, I went to the second meeting regarding this summer's neighborhood block party. I went to the first one out of curiosity, and despite the fact that I've entirely lost all interest in the whole affair (the fact that I have a wedding on the proposed date of the party notwithstanding), I went to last night's meeting partially because I'm extremely nosy, partially because I figured it would be a good way to get a free glass of wine, and partially because I didn't have anything better to do. My next door neighbor and I walked over to the meeting together, and let me just say, thank goodness that there's someone else in my 'hood that also realizes what a train wreck this is going to be.

First of all, there were only six people at the meeting, including two of us that are already busy on the date of the party. They're talking about getting sponsors to donate free food, which will most definitely not happen. This is a block party in a neighborhood that is 60% vacant, not the Taste of Chicago. And even if they did get free catering, there's just way too many logistical problems with setting up in the sun, getting everyone in line, and then dealing with the trash issue. They want us all to wear "block party" T-shirts (I'm putting my foot down on this one- for far too many events have I been forced to purchase a T-shirt that sees the light of day for exactly two hours) and they want to rent one of those bouncy things for the kids (what kids?) for five hundred bucks. Five hundred bucks? Good luck selling this one.

And then they wanted a band. Where's a band going to set up and play? What are they going to plug their amps into, the trees? Who's going to pay this band? And if a band is willing to play the "60% Vacant" Block Party for free, then you'd better believe they're the shittiest band to ever waste their time, effort, and breath.

But what did I say to all of these bad ideas as a sat on a folding chair in a very lovely home two blocks away? Did I point out the flaws, did I object to the insanity? Nope. I sat there, took it all in, and then picked it apart with my neighbor on the walk back to our street. That's the kind of person I am, folks. Lots of opinions, no voice.

Ah, well.

Anyway, speaking of homeownership, I got my first tax bill this week. Twenty bucks. Something tells me that the days of tax bills equal to the price of sixteen Arby's roast beef sandwiches are not long for this world. I'll brag about it while I can, for today I laugh, tomorrow I cry.

In The Meantime- Spacehog- on "Can You See The Sunset?"

Go to this website now and Right Click, Save Link on the best song to come out of the '90s. I loved this song when I was 17, and, up until yesterday, I hadn't heard it in years. I think I owned this Spacehog CD at one point, and I remember being bitterly disappointed with every song that wasn't "In The Meantime." Alas, the brilliant and soaring melody of "In The Meantime" was well worth my $12.99.

Listening to this song, it feels like summer in the late '90s. I am in the parking lot of the Salvation Army thrift store in Burbank, down Harlem, and there's a bag of men's polos in the back seat. I had a thing for men's polos for a while- thank goodness I grew out of that stage. The sun is setting somewhere in the distance by the corn plants off of I-55, and the rest of the evening is stretching endless in front of me. What will I do? Coffee shop, drive around aimlessly, maybe catch "American Beauty" for the fifth time in as many weeks. Dan's there, natch, with one white sock and one black sock. And, believe it or not, all is well and well is all for all.

Something about this sign tells me I'm getting screwed out of a cookie.


Sausage race at Miller Park.


Forehead girl strikes again!


If you can tell me what this downtown Milwaukee sculpture is and what, exactly, it means, I will give you a Special Prize.

Well, I did it.

I will never see Harriet the Cavalier again, because today I had her taken out back and shot. I know, old girl, I'm so, so sorry. But I had to. It was time. It's been time for a few years now.

I honored her memory by adopting Polly the Cobalt. The Chevy Cobalt took the place of the Cavalier in the pecking order, so I don't feel as guilty as I would have had I purchased a Toyota or a Kia. My new Cobalt, Polly, is nice. She's a 2008 sedan the color of smoke, and she came ultra equipped with bells and whistles. But she's not a new car- my family doesn't buy new cars. She has 20,000 miles on her- pretty much the same amount of miles Harriet had when I bought her.

Oh, Harriet. You were so good to me.

I cried a little when I cleaned Harriet out, piling all of her possessions into two little boxes. Just thinking of the last ten years with that car- my god, she saw me through so much.

Let's have a moment of silence for Harriet- for the best damn car a girl could ever hope for. For a car that saw me through ten years of changes, for a car that took a licking and kept on ticking.

I hope that someone who really needs a car gets my Harriet, puts a couple hundred dollars into her, and keeps her running for another ten years. I'll be looking for you, Harriet. I won't forget.

Nice day for a mow.

Woo-fucking-hoo! I'm not going back to work for nine days! It's more of a stay-cation than a vacation, but I'm all about it. This is the first time I've had more than a four day weekend since we moved back in late September, and I AM PUMPED. Originally, the plan was to do as little as possible, but now, slowly, the days are becoming packed. Mostly, of course, with very exciting trips and visits. Tomorrow, for example, the Cheese and I are packing up a casserole and toting it down to see Baby Jack- and, of course, his parents, Brian and Andrea. I told Brian I didn't want to see the kid until his neck wasn't infant-wobbly anymore, and apparently I've waited so long that the boy is not only able to support his own head but also skip rope and understand the how incredible Cliff-notes are. Ah, well, better late than never.

We've got a Brewers' game during the week, as well. We're considering spending the night and going to the Milwaukee art museum the following morning, as its been a while since I've made one of my top five favorite jokes. I'm sure I've blogged this before, but the Milwaukee art museum has a "chair garden," and my hysterical joke is, of course, that the motto for this chair garden should be "Plant your ass!" Oh my god, how I crack me up. So, yeah, it's been a long time since I've said this within context, and I think I could very easily stretch this one comment into yet another long afternoon of laughter and merriment.

There's Mother's Day, natch, and next weekend, Gigi and John are coming over for another casserole (I'm all about casseroles lately, it's kind of my thing) and a night of Mario Kart on the Wii. Have you bought this yet? No? Well, you should, it's ridiculously fun. It's the steering wheel- I love that thing. I feel like I'm in a real car, maneuvering my way around turtle shells and banana peels. It's actually a lot like my daily commute. The only problem with the steering wheel is that it doesn't have a horn (Nintendo, make a note for the next generation). I can't even begin to imagine how much fun I would have with a horn on my steering wheel. Anyway, what the game lacks in honk-ness, it totally makes up for with the use of the Mii avatar as a usable character. It's great fun to see mini versions of me and Chris cruising through Bowser's castle. For some reason, Chris especially.

I digress. Anyway, I'm not going back to work until May 19, and it feels great. I left a banana in my top desk drawer as (a) a kind of science experiment and (b) a handy snack for when I return.

I felt bad for the Mexican wrestler, Bazooka. At first, he looked a little ba-zonkers to me- cape, full face mask, red tights, red Dago tee. Then we talked to him, and he said that even though the people throwing the party were paying him to be there, he still felt out of place. "Like a fish in a fishbowl," Bazooka said. And I thought, maybe behind that mask lurks not the expected face of fear and anger and a dare to Mexicanly wrestle, but a face of sadness, loneliness, and extreme social discomfort. A little while later, Bazooka went to the corner and sat there by himself, unable to drink his bottle of beer through his Mexican wrestling mask, unable to have a single conversation that didn't revolve around Mexican wrestling and whether or not he'd be willing to pose for a cell phone pic with some drunken broad. I should have talked to him, but I didn't. I wasn't that brave, and, besides, my cell phone was out of batteries.

It's official: my co-worker MV and I are on the same menstrual cycle. It happened slowly over the course of nine months or so, and for the past few months, we've been only HOURS apart. She's the forefront female in my life, as far as who I spend large, daily chunks of my time with, and I suppose it was destined to happen the minute she started setting up her desk only three feet away from mine. Nonetheless, I'm still kind of surpised by this turn of events. I've never been on the same cycle as anyone before, not even my sister or mother. I'm not even sure how it happens, or why, but I suppose it's all those hormones that float like butterflies, sting like bees.

Today, we were walking out to her car to have a smoke and MV said, "Hey! Guess what! We're ovulating!" This is the only time I've ever heard these words together: "we" and "ovulating." But they're funny, to me, these two simple words, and I'm thinking it would be nice if somebody could buy us matching t-shirts to wear four to five days out of each month. Pink T's with an egg shaped decal and glittery writing that spells out, "We're ovulating!" Or, maybe we can each wear a shirt with only HALF of an egg on it- one shirt will say "We're" and the other? "Ovulating!"

If that's the case, though, I'm calling dibs on the "We're" shirt."

Oh, forget the whole thing, it's starting to sound kind of creepy.

All things considered, the drive wasn't bad. Just over an hour from my house out in God's country to Carole's apartment in the city. I'm typing on her roommate's computer while Carole showers for our night out. Sushi, Tara's birthday, some bar hopping, hopefully meeting Carole's new boyfriend. Why don't I do this more often?

I had the radio turned low on the drive in. It was peaceful, and the city unfolded before me like a greeting card saying, "Welcome, we've missed you." I did have a few moments of anger, though, when I passed through the toll that said "Rod Blagojevich, Governor." Why does that man have to plaster his name on everything? How much paint are the tax-payers going to have to pay for in order to cover that business up once that lowlife is out of office? I also read somewhere that Todd Stroger put his name on all of the Cook County forest preserve signs. For Christ's sake, no wonder he had to raise the sales tax. Still a hot button issue for me, friends. Still an issue.

Please don't ruin our city, Todd. Please don't ruin our state, Rod. And, Chris, while I'm away, please don't ruin the sofa with beer stains.