Chicago Love and Life in the USofA

So many things, so little attention. These last few weeks have been super hectic, between brother's wedding, High Holidays, the other Jewish holiday (I know it's a tired joke, but when you tell people that there's one more Jewish holiday after Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur, they start to think you're making things up), car madness, loan madness and oh yeah, school...I'm looking forward to some peace of mind.

Luckily, the car is done. It cost way way more than I thought it would (let's just say the last post about car repairs turned out to be very optimistic), but the mechanic said it should be good for another 3 or 4 years. Loan madness goes on, but it looks like there will be some resolution (I've got some very nice people here at HR who are helping me out).

And I got $6 movie tickets for Nick and Norah (school discount :-) )!! $6 is great, the movie, however was not. I wanted to laugh more. I tried to laugh more. I was starting to annoy myself, so I just gave up.

On to the goodies.

Election season is in the air, and I've become a bit of a junkie. If you've seen my computer screen anytime since February, I'd have election news up from CNN, NY Times, The Economist, The Washington Post, and most recently, FiveThirtyEight.com. They're a little outfit, just two guys, that run daily stats on polls to give an idea of what they all mean (they favor an Obama victory by 90-some-odd percent currently) and also look at both campaign's ground games across the country.

Some context: last week, John Murtha, congressman of PA, said that while Western PA might be racist, they're still gonna go Obama. Horribly offensive and perhaps inaccurate, BUT, it does provide for some funny anecdotes:

So a canvasser goes to a woman's door in Washington, Pennsylvania. Knocks. Woman answers. Knocker asks who she's planning to vote for. She isn't sure, has to ask her husband who she's voting for. Husband is off in another room watching some game. Canvasser hears him yell back, "We're votin' for the n***er!"

Woman turns back to canvasser, and says brightly and matter of factly: "We're voting for the n***er."

I laughed out loud. I don't think this as a generalization to all Western Pennsylvanians, racists or anyone for that matter. But damn funny.

Personally, I'm going for Big O and so is R. I don't "hate" John McCain, I just really don't appreciate the fact that, like Hillary, he is appealing to the lowest common denominator in all of us to get us to vote for him. Also, Obama seems smart enough to be practical and has a solid organization--good predictors for what he might be like in office. At least one has been in short supply these days.

And finally, a paean to Chicago and Evanston. I miss those places. Miss the restaurants, miss the people, the food, the stores, the sidewalks, miss a lot of it.

Today R and I were strolling around Huntington, the nearby town, where she was shopping for a dress for my cousin's wedding. First off, if you want to see people trying to look cool and failing, I've got some places you can look. If you can stomach it. We stopped in two stores for dresses. Fox's, a classic, proved to be a bust. Then we went to a local store, where the proprietor tried to unload a $250 dress on R (hahaha...riiiight), saying it was the cheapest prices in the town (luckily we have a car) and that if R really wanted, she could probably buy a dress for cheaper then fix it up. We think the woman was trying to be helpful, but it really didn't come off that way.

The food here, not as good (oh Ken's, Slice and Taboun); the stores here, not in walking distance or as cheap; no sidewalks. Siiiigh. I'm coming back in December for a bit, and I'm getting out of this area next June or July. I'm already looking for new places (closer to New York), any thoughts?

I Hate Being A Grown Up

My dad is fond of telling me when things get difficult "welcome to being an adult". Today was one of those days.

R was over today, as usual, and we decided we would do some errands then head out for dinner to celebrate A's birthday (he's a friend of mine from back in Chicago). We try to do recycling in the town nearby, only to find out that for all it's thoroughness, they're closed on Sunday. When are they open, you ask? Well, there's Saturday/Shabbos, which doesn't help me at all, and, oh, that's right, weekdays from 9 AM to 4 PM. Because apparently, on Long Island, instead of taking lunch, one day a week, the inhabitants of Long Island go and drop off their recycling. Needless to say, this puzzled and annoyed both R and I, but we got over it and ended up dumping it in a dumpster after lugging a backseat full of trash around for an hour. Sorry environment, we owe you one.

That's only where the fun began. We went to Target. Target is dangerous. Target has a lot of stuff and fairly cheap prices (you think), so as is our habit, me and R manage to buy a little more than we intended, but no biggie. Lesson learned and all. We go to the supermarket, which I'm starting to like more and more. The guy watering the vegetables (waterboy?) could actually tell the difference between cilantro and parsley, which for the life of me, I could not do and neither could R. Also got a cake for my Grandmother, who we're spending Yom Kippur by. I want to eat it now. I'm going to try not to.

Then we get to arguably the best vegetable stand in the world. They grow almost everything there, it's all fresh, and it all lasts forever because it hasn't been sitting in a shipping container for Lord knows how long. It's also dirt cheap. We got four or five bags of produce and it cost me less than $20. That's right, less than $20. I'll be shopping there for the next four years and doing a victory dance every time I head to my car.

We bring back our booty (I use booty because it makes me feel like a pirate), which R, in her infinite thoughtfulness, unpacks and puts away so I can get started on some work. She's awesome. If my research here falls through, I will document her awesomeness and include graphs and charts and try to publish on that. I could totally defend that dissertation.

At about 5, we head out to catch the LIRR into the city for A's birthday. Now, something I didn't mention is that since I picked up R on Friday, the car had been acting funny. Not funny haha, but funny oh no. I didn't know what it was, so I chose the ostrich method of dealing with the problem--pretend nothing is wrong and keep my head in the ground. Sounded funny last night, didn't sound as bad today, until we're on our way to the station and we hit a rough patch of road (they've been repaving the roads here for the last 2 weeks...hmmmm) and my car starts shaking. And rumbling. And generally sounding like:

• It's gonna blow
• I souped it up
• It will take flight, we will make it into outer space and maybe even to Mars.

Although the last two would be cool, R (again right) said it would probably be better to turn around, head back, and get the thing towed and looked at tomorrow. LOVELY. My car must have overheard me saying that I love spending money on my baby. Except what my car didn't understand is that by baby I meant R and that the money I had in mind was, oh, say, $40-$60 for dinner and not $600 to get ripped off by a mechanic. Silly car. She's officially been named. It's Agnes.

So tomorrow morning, I'm getting towed to the mechanic, where I will say, "Fix it!" and his eyes (or her eyes...?) will fill with dollar signs and my grad student stipend I've been saving will go to Agnes, so that she can spend a day in the shop with the Beemers and Lexi (is that plural for Lexus?) of the townsfolk. I guess it's kinda like a spa day for cars...maybe she deserves it. Then again, maybe I should save money for the future. Unfortunately, Agnes is stubborn as a mule, or a lifeless, soulless piece of metal that is slowly becoming a money pit, so she has forced my hand.

Other than that...well, High Holidays grrrr. If you're in school and you're missing class for Rosh Hashana or Yom Kippur, you'll know what I mean. It's a mix of procrastination and celebration that leaves me breathlessly and barely making deadlines until the end of October. So holidays are great, but the intervening time, not so much. I have a problem set (perhaps two by the end of Monday) due by the end of the week, and I'll be fasting and praying for my soul Thursday. Funny how all that introspection can take a whole day. Eh, it was gonna be hard anyway, what's a little more pressure?

Also, for those in need of Yom Kippur humor.

Hope y'all have a great fast if you're Jewish, and if you're not, enjoy eating!