“due to security concerns, there are no luggage storage lockers available at o’hare international airport.”
i would pay good money to not have to haul my heavy-ass winter coat and accessories with me to california and back. GOOD MONEY. i’m talking like ten bucks here, people!took today off work in order to prep for heading off to LISA. you know, pack, clean house, run errands, pay bills, et cetera.
naturally, i have therefore browsed the web, listened to music and blogged about it, made a pot of delicious delicious tea, opened a window to let some fresh air in, chatted on IM and in IRC, and in general done fuck-all to actually get ready to get on an airplane tomorrow. i’m not as excited about LISA this year as in most other years previous. not sure why, exactly. maybe because my friend john isn’t going (though many other friends are), maybe because it’s in san diego again and the thought of crossing the border for dinner isn’t as novel as it used to be, even if i probably will do so tomorrow anyways (hey, i don’t care if it’s only tijuana, there’s something to be said for sitting on a patio basking in the setting sun, drinking cheap cerveza in mexico. …ah, which reminds me, must pack passport). anyways, yeah. not as excited as i used to get. possibly because i fear drama related to the Sage/LOPSA thing. possibly because last LISA ended so well for me. possibly because i’m just a fucking slacker. it’s not the program; i’m signed up for several tutorials which i think will be good, and i really like the conference chair this year. dunno. maybe my lack of jittery fangirl joy is related to the fact that it’s just a lot less interesting to pack a suitcase than to do what i actually want to do (which is, honest and i swear to you, start packing boxes for my impending apartment move. WHICH ISN’T UNTIL APRIL. i don’t know why i feel lately like i really need to get started packing, i just do. frankly, i find it all a bit freakish. at least last time i moved, i managed to forestall packing operations until january.). also, packing involves doing laundry, which just inherently sucks. needless to say, i think i’m going to put off the laundry and actual packing until i can put it off no longer, or roughly 2200 this evening. i *curse* my choice of a 0917 flight out of o’hare. yes, it’ll get me to the hotel with the afternoon to blow off (probably wandering around tijuana, as mentioned — i can’t help it; it’s not that tijuana is that great (it’s sort of a dive, but on the bright side it does make me think i’m on the set of a robert rodriguez film) … it’s just that the idea that i can take the trolley (read: el) to a foreign country is strangely compelling). but, the fuck was i thinking, timing my flight so i have to leave my house at like 0700? i hate early mornings. gourmand probably won’t even be open yet. i am a moron. in other news, i saw my physician yesterday after work, for that persistent pain in my wrist. congratulate me: i have arthritis! i have official sanction to ignore package directions and take up to four motrin at a time, up to three times a day if i am feeling frisky. laissez les bons temps roulez! i cannot get enough of listening to (previously-pimped) american edit. now pulled off the web due to pigfuckers angsty record companies, and fomenting a revolt, i still really like listening to it. i wish i could take part in the dean gray tuesday re-hosting, but id don’t want to take advantage of my kindly web host‘s generosity. also it’s tough to ask for a lot of bandwidth when you have no idea how much might be required. but i continue to think about alternatives. in the meantime, if you would like a listen, get in touch and i’ll ship you a zipfile. take that, warner!
okay, the situation is this:
chicago’s a big town, with lots of people who drive cars or trucks. there’s a limited amount of street parking, which is further complicated by [residential parking] zones, meters, and so forth. and, we happen to get some amount of snow every winter, which leads to further loss of parking real estate as the snow piles up, taking up square footage which used to be occupied by cars. (note to foreigners: we’re really good at parallel parking in this town.) so there’s this well-known, and at least in my experience generally very well-respected, custom in chicago: when it snows, if you dig your car out of a snowdrift, you are allowed to lay claim to that spot until the snow is gone. you “lay claim” by piling crap up in the spot. most popularly the piled items take the form of lawn furniture, but people really use whatever they’ve got on hand, including real chairs, kiddie pools and toys, and i’ve even seen someone — who had obviously failed his new year’s resolution and was a little bitter about it — sacrifice a stationary bike to the cause of saving his spot. a little history of the dibs custom, for your reading pleasure. and mayor daley has even, famously, officially blessed the custom, saying, “That is their property. If someone spends all that time digging their car out, do not drive into that spot. This is Chicago. Fair warning.” now here’s the problem: because not respecting the spot saving (i.e., moving the shit out of the spot, so you can park) will get your car smashed (literally), few people are willing to risk taking a saved spot. since few people wiil risk taking a saved spot, there’s a very large incentive to save spots. since there’s a large incentive to save spots, people will do it at the drop of a hat. like the jackass i saw today who had “called dibs” on a good two-spot stretch of the 6100 block of S. Woodlawn (with paint buckets, possibly full — which just adds to the threat factor of taking his spot). sweetie, yes, it snowed this morning. ONE HALF INCH, YOU LAZY FUCKING TWIT. i’ve had my fair share of shovelling out my car. as a matter of fact, i carry a full-size shovel (not one of those crappy folding ones; mine means business) in my car all winter long. i have a car-digging-out strategy, and a specific outfit for the job (long-sleeved t-shirt, t-shirt, sweatshirt, no coat; thin scarf around the neck; hat; awkwardly thick mittens; thick jeans, oversized so there’s some insulating air between the denim and my skin; et cetera). i know the gotchas, like how to be very careful shoveling snow off the hood, so you don’t scrape the paint with the back of your shovel (it’s key to be very familiar with the dimensions of your car so you can shovel all but an inch or two off the car, then brush the rest off). i’ve dug out cars that were snowed in on the street after the plows went through and threw a thick layer of sandy, icy crap over the two feet already on the car. i have more than once invested a good half-hour in digging out a car before i figured out that it was not actually my car, because there was so much snow you couldn’t actually tell. yeah, sometimes it takes a long time. sometimes it is a pain in the ass and it makes you an hour late to work. and yeah, it’s frustrating to come home and not only is there nowhere within a block or two of your home to put your car, but the spot you so carefully excised from the snowbank has got some trixie’s freshly-washed jetta parked haphazardly in it, while her bumper sticker of “I’ve Got Mine” laughs in your face. and yet … you’re a big whiner if you sit there and moan about how it’s your parking spot and you deserve it. seriously, get over yourself. if you really didn’t want to deal with snow, you’d either move to the south or get rid of your car, and since you haven’t, you signed up for this. so deal with it! and, Mr. Woodlawn Avenue 2005: get your shit off the goddamn road, and quit making my city look like a slum.
