Now, when I first saw this, I was taken aback. Not for the profanity, but more for the sheer idea that someone took time out of their life to carve this into stone. Who did this person have in mind? Me, specifically? The world? The fact that it’s so indiscriminate in its rancor made me laugh, when I stopped to think about it.
So, because of that unbridled hatred that pretty much seems to span the entire human race… I decided to post it on the web, where its message can be seen by those outside of Chicago.
I forget the name of the place we ate at. I really should write them down. Heather and I walked around to a few restaurants: Piece (which was more bar than restaurant), the Bongo Room (personal favorite of mine, but a big wait on the weekends). The third place we went to was nice, about a ten minute wait… so we walked around a bit.
Nearby, I saw this frame on an easel. I’m not sure if the frame was for sale, or if it was the easel, or both. But seeing it there, in the middle of the sidewalk, seemed like an interesting image. If nothing else, I may try to play with this in photoshop and Flash, maybe throw an animation onto that reflective surface. Good practice.
This I like, but I’m not in love with it. I like the woman looking away from the reflective surface… meh.
This was our server. I didn’t get her name, but asked to take her photo. As it turns out, she just moved to Chicago about two weeks ago, and found this job about a week ago. We were her first official table, and for that fact, I felt like we needed to document the occasion.
Strange coincidences like this seem to happen whenever Heather and I hang out. Keep this in mind for a later story.
We chat a while, and it’s really cool hanging out with Heather. We talked a bit about relationships and dating, and it felt nice just talking about this and that. At one point in the conversation, the topic of how you could kill someone almost without a trace came up. Not sure how, but it did.
Turns out, if you inject potassium, you can kill a person rather quickly and painlessly? This is according to Heather’s dad, who’s a doctor I think. Her dad is also convinced that that’s how Marilyn Monroe was killed.
For my money, I had originally thought it would be some kind of natural poison, like the kind that belongs to a particular species of newt.
Before the meal’s over, I wind up invited to a Survivor party this Thursday, at her place. I have never really watched a full episode of Survivor (bits and clips, here and there). I voiced my skepticism, but Heather replied with: "Oh, you’re all skeptical, at the start."
I’m a bit afraid. :)
At Around the Coyote. I hesitated taking pictures of the rooms, seeing how the artists might not appreciate someone else making a copy of their images. The event I went to was in a school, and it was a bit labyrinthine, but I liked it a lot. There were small signs everywhere, telling you where "more art" was located.
When I first saw this, I stopped because I was momentarily unsure if the sign was pointing to all the junk thrown into a pile.
Oh, I should also mention that we were surprised by an admission. Turns out, there was a $5 admission to all events. Since it was my suggestion, I felt a bit bad, seeing how both Heather and I are not in the greatest of financial circumstances currently. So, since she had to pay for her ticket, I now officially owe her a drink.
As much as I tried to tell this kid to leave his damn knight where it was, and to utilize his bishop more aggressively… the fucker just wouldn’t listen. Kids today, I tell ya. Think they know it all.
Around now, I’m looking for Heather. We both went in at the same time, but had different paces for how long we lingered. After a while, I lost her completely. During that time, I walked into a room where there were five girls, dressed in blonde wigs, each sporting a mole. The Five Marilyns, one of which was my friend Kristen. Remember that coincidence thing from earlier? :)
She was going on-stage in about 5 minutes, and I had no idea she was performing there. But scuttled off, found Heather, and we made our way up into the auditorium balcony. Good seats, and a nice view. On an even quirkier note, we happened to sit right next to Justin, Gretchen and Dave for a good 5 minutes before I noticed.
The performance was really cool, although I’m probably the last person who should write anything related to dance. My knowledge of the visual arts is limited; my knowledge and understanding of dance is even less.
Heather had to be home by 3, so after the performance she said goodbye (and reminded me about Thursday). I continued wandering a bit. Eventually, I found Matt and chatted with him briefly about the show, and how things were going.
I went outside with him for his smoke break, and he was comparing the two shows (last year’s versus this year’s). The place where he was displaying was definitely a bit "out of the way." Before you could even access the room where he was at, you had to go around the outside via a walkway – it was a bit buried. Traffic was constant, but seemed to be spotty at times.
Matt’s newer work uses oils on plexiglass. I’m digging it a great deal. There’s a crispness to it that I like… maybe it’s my bias towards vector images. The Plexiglas adds a degree of cleanness to it too. I’m not sure what that means.
When I left, Matt was heading back so he could be at his booth from about 3:30 until 6. I forget that each artist has to "pay" to be allowed to exhibit. If they don’t make any sales, they’ve effectively paid someone to take up all their time for three days. Last year, he said that he made the bulk of his sales in the last few hours of the last day… by then, interested buyers come back and haggle it seems.
I hope he did sell some work today.
Noticed this sign on our walk to the show. Stopped on my way back home and grabbed a pic. Who knew there were actual Cul-de-sac signs?
I found this abandoned stroller on Blackhawk and Ashland. Depressed the hell out of me, thinking about whatever events lead up to this.
I don’t know why, but I really, really, really like this image.
