Chicago MMXII

@ribfestchicago

I did actually got to ribfest yesterday and, guess what, it sucked. I don't know why I ever held out any hope that it wouldn't, really.

We bought a meatstravaganza when we got back into town in Friday. Brought it back home though. Would never actually hang out at ribfest.

The meatstravaganza was delicious, but I credit a good part of that with Jeff going to get the food while I stayed home in the AC and unpacked.

Here's a depressing article about Chicago if you are in the mood: http://www.city-journal.org/2012/22_2_chicago.html

That's an excellent -- but, yes, depressing -- article. Logan Square Kitchen is now defunct, in fact.

as with everything nowadays, do yourselves a favor and don't read the comments

Yikes at that article. It's depressing because so much of it is true.

City Journal does have conservative/libertarian leanings, so perhaps some of that article should be taken with a grain of salt. But, yeah, i think chicago is fuct.

Holy shit I read the comments. :( forever

xp I've never read anything on the site before but yeah, it became very obvious right about when the first mention of unions came up

I am unfamiliar with the publication but I guessed it had some conservative leanings, particularly since the first thing the author mentioned as ruining Chicago was unions*. And since so much of the solution revolved around business-friendly policies.

But the bit about byzantine government, corruption, being broke as hell, and a decade of quick fixes that just make problems worse is OTM.

*I have some specific issues with some specific unions vis a vis city and state government that I do think make some of these problems more difficult to solve, but I don't think SCAAAAARRRY UNIONS BOOOOOO are the main problem here.

Ha! xp to Dan, who is OTM

hi 5

You all are approaching the comments section wrong. Just embrace them as a hilarious epilogue.

There are too many talking about how great it is for the city that black Chicagoans moved to the suburbs (or how terrible it is for the suburbs). It's just straight up hateful.

a friendly reminder that this is on wednesday!

http://www.justforlaughschicago.com/justforlaughschicago/stories/story/0,,262043,00.html

Chicagoans, I have a favor to ask of you.

You may remember last year many of you attended and very generously donated to a fundraiser I held for The Organization On Whose Board I Serve. I'm not going to hold a fundraiser this year, but you can still help us out in a very easy and delicious way!

On July 18, Homemade Pizza Company on Southport is donating money to us based on their sales. We get $5 for every large pizza and lesser amounts on salads and breadsticks. Each member of the org has been asked to "sell" five pizzas, and if we all do as instructed, we'll raise $1,000! Whoa man! So if any of you people who occasionally enjoy a delicious Homemade Pizza Company pizza, or have always wanted to try one, would make such a purchase from the Southport location on July 18, I would be very grateful.

*Fine print bad news: it's only at the Southport location and it's only takeout, no delivery. But HPC is very easy to transport and this store is right next to the Southport Brown Line.

Also if any of youse want to post this info on Facebook when the time draws near, email me and I'll give you more specifics.

Oh and you have to make your purchase between 1 pm and 8 pm.

And you have to pay with a Discover card.

Just kidding about that last one.

ok i will do that

I'll do it too, though a reminder closer to to july 18 would probably be a good thing

Definitely. I have a calendar reminder set to remind you all the week before. I just wanted to give you lots of advanced notice so you can apply for your Discover card.

For Jesse, because we just discussed it at lunch, but also for Amanda, who IIRC likes this kind of thing (also: Ohio connection) -
http://gawker.com/5914621/the-long-fake-life-of-js-dirr-a-decade+long-internet-cancer-hoax-unravels

Thats a fantastic read, but OMG at the horrible editing. Come on Gawker. Sorry, this shit just makes me IA.

J.S. had embedded himself firmly in online the online lives of hundreds of people.

"Everybody was devastated when she was died,"

I guess since that second one was a quote, it may be verbatim, but I doubt it.

Yikes, that is bad.

I usually pick up on that stuff but I didn't notice, which either speaks to me being very engrossed in the story or reading it clandestinely on my phone at work.

Who can tell me about Fitzgerald's and whether I should go see the Waco Bros there on July 3?

http://fitzgeraldsnightclub.com/AmericanMusicFestival.html

don't know anything about fitzgerald's but it's going to be a little bit of a hike out to berwyn, especially without a car

I wouldn't bother, but that's just me.

carl, is there any advantage for you or your organization if people buy pizza instead of making a cash donation? I am going to ask around the office and it would be much simpler to solicit plain old cash since no one here lives anywhere near Southport.

that club's site says it is a short walk from the Blue Line, but yeah I will probably just go see the White Sox.

Well I'll be damned. It's only 1/2 mile from the Blue line. I never knew where the city of Berwyn was. I thought it was way out past Joliet or something.

No, there's no advantage of pizza over cash. I posted about the pizza because I knew some of you were Homemade Pizza Company fans and lived nearish to that location and it seemed like an easy way to meet some of my fundraising obligations.

If any of you want to donate cash instead, email me and I will give you the information.

I do need to do some kind of a fundraiser (I have a $500 give/get fundraising commitment every year) but I'm reluctant to do another "Come over and give me your money!" event since that kind of thing gets old pretty quickly. I need some kind of angle on this one. Like, sponsor me in a hardboiled egg eating contest or something. Maybe I'll organize a Malort Mile.

One of my colleagues did an art sale (she drew the uterus pictures that we used for arts and crafts at the last fundraiser) with a pledge/reward structure, but I can't think of anything I could make that would entice people to give me money. I'm also kind of handicapping myself by not being on Facebook.

If you organized a Malort Mile I can all but guarantee I could send multiple people your way.

That is, if I understand what a Malort Mile is. If it involves the opportunity to drink Malort for charity, I know some people.

Which is a little depressing but it's their problem, not mine.

haha

It would be structured like a beer mile. Find a quarter mile track and then take a shot, run a lap, take a shot, run a lap, take a shot, run a lap, take a shot, run a lap. One mile, four shots.

I wonder if a liability waiver would hold up under those circumstances... I don't want anybody to sue me because they get Malort poisoning and die.

Hmmm... I think I could do this. Jeff has the local running connections, I have the drunken goofball (no offense everyone) connections. I would need Malort and some kind of first, second, and third place prize items. Do you think people would pay $25 as an entrance fee?

Could I get t-shirts donated? People would probably pay extra for a Malort Mile t-shirt.

http://jeppsonsmalort.com/

^^^just launched apparently

I don't even know what thread to put this in, but I'll drop it here because maybe some of you can relate. So I've been working at this new job a couple years now and I like the hours, I like most of the people, and I like the benefits. But it's become really clear over the past 7-8 months that I'm being groomed and steered towards solely focusing on pretty much the exact opposite of the type of projects I want to be working on. High pressure, short timeframes, no design input, just basically going through a lot of redtape to essentially redesign bathrooms. Its just, ugh, I don't know. Super annoying because when I started I was working on a couple really cool, interesting projects that were really fun. But now that those are wrapping up, it's been made clear by a partner and our business development person that they are focused only on lining up more of these crap projects for me.

Anyway, my question is - is it worth sitting down with them and explaining that these aren't what I want to be doing? Is there a productive way to have this discussion? I mean, its to the point where if I picture myself still doing these same types of projects in five years, it makes me feel sick to my stomach. But should I just be happy to have a job? Ugh. It's super frustrating.

First, humans are complex beings and we are capable of just being happy to have a job, and also wanting something better at the jobs we have. So put that aside, IMO.

Second, I think that's a reasonable conversation to have, but the success of it is all going to be in the wording/presentation. Like you have to word it in such a way that you don't sound bitter or unwilling to do the crap projects, because you don't want to be on your boss's radar as a malcontent, but that expresses enthusiastic interest in the kinds of projects you like. And it's reasonable to express that interest and ask something like, "Do you see me being able to do these kinds of projects in the future?"

There are probably some examples of how to do this somewhere on this website, which I love: http://www.askamanager.org/

Also, if the kinds of things you like to do are not in your future at this firm, I think you should look for another job. It's daunting and exhausting but it's easier to find a job when you have one, and you can look very intentionally and deliberately, and you have a really good reason for looking if the new potential employer asks - "I want to work on X kinds of projects, which is what you do here."

I know how defeating and exhausting it feels to be in a job you hate, but you're in a good position to move into something that will make you feel happy and fulfilled, and I think you should pursue that!

Thanks for the response! I'm really not at the point where I really "hate" this job, but I think the more I look towards the future and don't see many options to learn and do new things, I could easily see it turning that way fast - and I want to try and head that off if I can. I would be significanly more fulfilled here if I just had a balance of projects similar to some of my other peers. Totally going to check out that site, too, thanks!

The other part of this I forgot to mention is that these projects are also requiring a lot more out-of-state travel than I was told would be a part of this job. Five years ago I'd be thrilled by this, but these multi-day trips are a little more painful with the little guy around, both in terms of missing him and dumping all of the responsibilities for taking care of him on my wife for multiple days.

framing it as "wanting to learn" is one good talking point i think

Yeah, that's good!