it's been so long

and i have nothing new to report. they finally tore down the entire building of Stefani's. the only thing that remains is the foundation. i saw another building that i may want to breach, on Paulina and Wrightwood, but i am going to have to rally the troups for that one. it's an old construction building, only one story. but it has something akin to granary silos in the back of it. so we'll see. plus it's getting darker earlier and it's kind of cold out.

speaking of cold, i have one. and it sucks.

and speaking of dark, don't forget day-light savings time tonight. for the 5 farmers left in america, let's turn those clocks back an hour. but do it only at 2am, or else you won't truly feel the effect.

oh, and if you're wondering how that bank loan is going, don't ask. we're appealing to yet another bank, so hopefully we'll hear something on monday. it looks as though we'll have to lose the space we were angling for, but i don't think it's such a huge loss. the foot-traffic there didn't blow my, or annette's, socks off. as much as we liked the tin ceilings and the hardwood floors, i think we can find another place that will actually be able to pay our bills. and maybe even our salary.

so, word of advice if you're thinking of starting your own business: don't do it unless you're independently wealthy. or if you have a ton of cash laying around. but then, aren't the two the same thing?

oh, and i saw cerberus shoal and micah blue smaldone last weekend with scott. it was an interesting experience. it was held at a hall at the university of chicago campus. it was free and in what looked like a ballet studio. the sound kids were... well, kids. they had no idea what they were doing, really. for micah, they couldn't get the mic to work, so he had to play unplugged. it was amazing. we sat in the front and watching his fingers fly over the fretboard was mesmerizing. for cerberus shoal, it seemed like the sound guys set up all the mics, turned them off, took a powder and never turned them back on. they had their own amps, thank god, or else it would have been very strange.


ok, that's it, i swear. oh, and i promise that some day i'll get the girl's weekend and railway museum pics up. i'm sure you're all on the edge of your seats waiting, right?

illinois railway museum

after the accident, my sister and i decided that we didn't really want to go home. so we stopped off in Union, Illinois to see the illinois railway museum. it was pretty cool. i was hoping that they would have had more old CTA stuff, like books and paraphenalia. they have an original CTA stop that was dismantled in the 70s (i think) and reassembled at the museum, but it was closed for restoration. of course. they have these barns filled with old trains and shannon and i went on a short trip on an old CTA car. it was totally bitchin'.


they had a barn full of old chicago street cars. look at this relic from 1899.


when i'm not at work, i'll upload some pics to my kodak gallery so you can take a peek.

girl's weekend

a bunch of my girlfriends get together once a year and hang out at amy parent's camper up in Milton, WI (actually, it's Newville, but it's so small it doesn't have its own website) for a weekend. it varies who goes. kristin and amy started it and then we all just globbed on as each year passed. this year it was amy, kristin, me, shannon, julie and jen. i was firmly enwrapped in my anti-kid movement and that generally doesn't bode well when 2 of the chicks you're hanging out with have kids. of course, they just solidify my stance on non-procreation. they complained about their husbands and how little they do. but they love the kids. of course.

we went to a craft-fair in janesville on saturday. wow. a lot of stuff. we all bought something (i think) and managed to get away without any major damage done to our wallets. thank god.

then we went and got lunch at famous daves, which was fucking awesome. i had the cod sandwich with flamin' green beans. yummmmm... then we all went to shopko and i bought a puzzle for scott and i and some other crap i can't remember. then it was back to the camper to eat ungodly amounts of trans-fats and carbs. damn, it was good.

we left sunday at 1pm. shannon and i stopped off in Janesville to go to target, as my tape adapter is having some serious issues. we bum around, use the facilities and then motor off. as we approached the highway, i noticed traffic at a crawl. i said, "there better be limbs on the expressway for this back up to be happening." i should have kept my mouth shut. here's what we saw:
there's a car in there somewhere. but the coolest part about the accident was seeing a helicopter land on the expressway.

anyway, we were backed up for a while, but the oncoming traffic was just terrible.

we got home in one piece. some people weren't so lucky. read about the accident here.

prostate-tickling sycophancy

check this out. hilarity ensues.

cronyjobs.com

mad bank denied

no money from north community for kim and annette. we got denied because we don't have any collateral. stupid bank, trying to cover their ass.

so now we go to another bank that will give us a loan for nothing. i guess la salle and banco popular also do SBA loans. so... keep crossing your fingers.

and we welcome anyone who might have $68,000 laying around. we'll give you free coffee....

hello? money?

it hasn't been shown to us yet.

tick tock

tick tock

infrared update

so, i was asked by liz about the status of my infrared film.

it came out ok. there were some fogged pictures, but i didn't demand more film or free or anything like that. my contact sheet came out looking pretty good and i'm thinking of developing some of the images for my dad's birthday. which is next weekend. i better get crackin'.

now i have to get my color roll developed. more on that later.

show me the money

annette and i went to North Community Bank on Monday to beg for some coffehouse money. the woman who helped us out, Lori Bailey, was nice. we had come laiden down with papers that the bank might need (hell, i even brought my social security card). the bank woman seemed impressed by how prepared we were. i gave her a copy of our business plan and she asked a few questions. then annette and i filled out an application and i got to write the amount of $68,000 in the blank. wow, that was sobering. when annette was filling out her life insurance info, i made a comment about not understanding life insurance. Lori said, "if she dies, the loan gets paid off." annette slowly turned her head to me and looked at me with this, "don't even think about it" look. then annette said, "hey, you don't have life insurance, do you?" and i said, "no, so if i die... you just have to work twice as hard!" the bank woman and annette had a good chuckle over that.

so, i guess we'll know today if we have all of the requisite paperwork. and we'll also find out if our loan needs to be done by a packager, which means we'll have to pay a fee. lori said the fee was going to be less than $2000. jesus! then she said she'd call the SBA and see if they could just send it on without having to send it to a packager, because she knows we probably don't have that kind of cash lying around. and if we do, it would to go to buy bodum pots.

so cross your fingers, audience. and drop me a line if you'd like to send me wishes of luck.

mini golf

so, scott and i went to the par-king miniature golf range. it was pretty cold and cloudy, but it was a ton of fun. this weekend was the last weekend they were open for the season. they have a some very unusual holes, including a replica of the sears tower and a rollercoaster for your balls. there were two courses, and we were on the one without the ball rollercoaster, which was a bummer. i was worried it would be crowded, since it was the last weekend, but at one point, scott and i were the only ones there. i think my car was one of three in the huge parking lot. i think it was dead because of the weather. but we had a great time, despite the chilly temps. i ended up with a 59 and scott had a 62. see more pictures here.

utica

on saturday, kristin and i went to utica, IL. we had seen the billboard on I-80 that said "historic utica," so we figured we must be close. it was about 20 miles away from our campsite and it was a quick drive. we got there and turned left at a 4-way stop sign and headed into town. right away, we saw the tornado damage. trees with leaves stripped off. part of a building demolished with caution tape around it. we parked right across from a memorial sign and a row of white crosses. (read the details here and see pictures here. evidently the memorial was erected on the spot where the bar had been. it was really overwhelming and emotional. i had never seen real tornado damage before. wow.

after we read the crosses, we walked around the town. we stopped in some shops and walked down to the end of the street. there we found the la salle county historical museum. and hell, yeah, we went in. we were greeted by Jen, who gave us a little background about the museum and said that there was an old schoolhouse out back and if we're interested, we can come and get her when we were done with the museum and she'll let us in. we came across this binder of photos from the tornado. wow. we kept looking out the window at the town to compare the damage then to what it looks like now. they had a carriage that abraham lincoln actually rode in. they had a ton of civil war paraphenalia and tons of historical ephemora. it was awesome. when we were done, we found Jen and she took us out to the schoolhouse. wow. then she asked us if we wanted to see the blacksmithing barn. hell, yeah, we did. so we walked over there. i gingerly asked Jen if she had lived in the town when the tornado had hit. up until this time, i had been hesitant to ask anyone about it, considering it's a town of 1,000 people and 8 of them died in the tornado. but Jen had not been here, but her brother, who was a police officer with a drug-sniffing dog, helped with search and rescue. yikes. she pointed out some of the buildings that had been damaged and told us where the bar had been. when we got to the blacksmith shop, there was an old gentleman who was the caretaker of the shop. evidently, when the tornado came through, it tore down an adjacent building and took out a wall of the blacksmith shop. i asked him if they had lost any artifacts in the storm. he said that they lost very little, just a bunch of signs labeling the equipment. the wall had been rebuilt and used to have displays on it, but now it's blank and new. kristin said something to the effect of that it's nice to see a city rebuilding itself after such devastation. the gentleman said, "we're rebuilding, but we're not rebuilt." you could see in his eyes the damage that was caused, not just physically, but emotionally, too.

after the museum and a $4 donation, we walked back up the block. the town was getting ready for a car show that night. we passed some ladies putting up black and white balloons and checkered flags. as we walked past, they said, "good morning, ladies!" we said hello and kris said, "have a good time with the car show tonight!" they said, "oh, we will!" everyone there was so nice. laid-back. personable. old-towny. very nice.

we got in the car and pulled out (thanks to someone who actually let me out and didn't even want my spot!) and turned left past the memorial. we came across an old train station that had suffered damage, probably most of it before the tornado. we looked around at the damage still visible and were amazed at the tenacity of a tiny town. we then left. it was amazing.

before

after

if you love history and helping nice people out, make a donation. every little bit helps.

view more images here.

illini state park

kristin and i went camping this weekend. it was awesome. we couldn't have asked for better weather. it was kind of cold friday night, but i brought long johns and fleece to keep me warm. we got in to the park (after some wrong turns) at about 4:30. we realized that the site we had reserved was indeed right on the river like we wanted, but we were surrounded by RVs and had absolutely no shade or privacy. so we drove around the park a little bit before finding a section of sites that seemed to be for tents only. we picked one and we were on our way!

setting up the tent was great, just like old times. kristin suffered an injury while getting things arranged. d'oh! the first blood of the trip. after we got everything set up, we broke out the new propane stove. the one question we were asking ourselves... how did we live this long without one?? it was an amazing piece of equipment. after the initial hesitancy of connecting the propane tank, we lit the burner and heated up some water for tea. it boiled in about 5 minutes. then kristin, attempting to settle into her laz-e-boy-like camping chair, spilled scalding tea in her crotch. *snicker.* so, bleeding and burning, she managed to keep laughing, not that i wasn't laughing enough for the both of us. heh. anyway, we made mac and cheese on the stove and it didn't turn into mush, unlike the last attempt a few years ago. it was delicious. anyway, kris started a fire for warmth and we settled around it. it was getting a little cold.

around 7:30, a huge RV had driven past a few times and kristin and i started to get a little nervous. we had been enjoying the peace and quiet (our only neighbors were across the way about 100 yards and they were quiet). of course, the RV picked the spot two down from us. back up beeping and a retard behind the wheel had the passenger outside, directing him/her into the spot. "JUST A LITTLE MORE! A LITTLE MORE! CRANK IT TO THE LEFT!! THE LEFT!! A LITTLE MORE!!" oh, jesus. they set up, with their RV's generator creating this nice, disturbing white noise. they make a fire, break out the acoustic and start singing. laughing. carousing. then, around 9:30, a friend of theirs arrives. yelling, more carousing, more loud talking and laughter. kristin and i went to bed around 10:45, having taken some tylenoll PM to help go to sleep. when i woke up around 3 to use the "bathroom," they were quiet. even the generator was turned off. thank the lord.

the next morning, the ranger came around to see who had moved in over night. we complained about our new neighbors, but didn't really think he was going to do anything about it. he moves on to talk to them and kris and i get ready. we eat breakfast and leave around 10:30. we were going to visit Utica, the site of a terrible tornado outbreak on 20 April 2004. but i'll post the details of that later. after we were done in Utica, we went back to the site. kris said, "maybe our neighbors will be gone when we get back." i laughed. but when we got back, THEY WERE GONE!! yay!! we had a very peaceful night. it was a beautiful night out, tons of stars, nice breeze. we started the fire, made dinner (burritos with beans and cheese), played Scrabble®, and relaxed.

the next morning dawned damp and swollen. i slept kinda crappy as my hips were becoming bruised from sleeping on the ground. i awoke at 7am, right before the camp PA system kicked on and started to play moldy oldies. WTF? it turned out to be a car show. at 8:30am. on a sunday. in october. that we were never told about. so, we got up, made breakfast to The Yardbirds, Sonny and Cher, and Aretha, packed, and got the hell out of there. the drive was hazy and quicker then coming out. we got home in about an hour and 20 minutes. ah, home shit home.

here are some pictures of our adventures.