July 28 - Ten Years, Five Minutes

Lauren joined me for a few deliveries.

We made a pick up at 180 N Lasalle.

To get into the building you must enter through the loading dock, take an elevator to the basement, and then wait in the basement for the often slow freight elevator to take to you to wherever you go.

I used to let this building's procedure stress me out.

But that was back when the industry was busy and you had dozens of other orders burning up your overloaded messenger bag.

We waited a couple of minutes for the elevator to arrive.

Tom the elevator operator took us to the 37th floor.

On the way up Lauren studied the old round soul with the gruff voice.

"He must be so bored," she later said.

Actually, Tom has always seemed pretty content.

Every day he reads the paper and shoots the shit with all the contractors and maintenance crew. Everyone knows his name and seems glad to see him. During the summer I think he works as a vendor for the Cubs. In the decade I've been in this line of work, I've never once had a problem with Tom.

That's an accomplishment for Tom.

I grabbed the package quickly from the 37th floor and caught the elevator before it could close again. On the way down, two other delivery guys joined us.

Lauren made sure to clearly say "thank you" to Tom on the way to the basement elevator.

We all piled into the basement elevator as a bike messenger was exiting.

He had dropped some lingering ass in there.

We were left to inhale it as the door took the maximum amount of time to close shut.

"No ventilation and it stinks in here," observed one of the delivery guys.

He got mock-woozy, or perhaps truly woozy.

There was no ventilation.

And it stunk badly.

I got my ID back from the dock security booth and we were off.

"That is the one interesting thing about your job," Lauren mused.

"You get to see a side of this city that not many people do."

I agreed but countered.

"Yeah, you've just seen ten years of my life in five minutes."

Tonight we opened Beatlemagica as part of The Annoyance's Wednesday night Triple Feature.

Alan from The Bitter Tears, John and Julia from The Columbines, Liz from Bully Pulpit, Jim & Vanessa from the PRF, Gillian from The July Green, some of the guys from Sad On Vacation, and many other improv faces came to see it.

It went over well. The music hit hardest. There's something about hearing these iconic songs forever branded into our cerebellum played in shambling earnestness.

Later I played drums for my friend Jessica's show Lady Cops. It killed.

We have one more night of this showcase and then that's it.

I recommend it.

Verdict: Win

July 29 - Suicide vs. Scallops

Usually my day begins between 7:45 and 8am, when my boss pages me.

"GM TONY, LET ME KNOW WHEN ON THE WAY"

I usually respond with a "ten4".

This morning I ignored it and continued to sleep.

At 8:26 the pager went off again.

"GM TONY, LET ME KNOW WHEN ON THE WAY"

I typed, "ten4. need more sleep."

Lauren and I got some "sleep".

Eventually around 10 or so I left the house and started driving.

While on Lower Wacker my boss called me.

I did not answer.

I sent a fibbing page saying I accidentally left my phone at home.

For the rest of the day we would communicate by pager only.

On the way up to Lincolnshire traffic on the Edens expressway came to an abrupt halt. It went from 70mph to sitting completely still somewhere around Skokie. AM radio told me that someone had jumped from the Oakton overpass.

Crazy.

I paged the information to my boss.

"ANY GOOD VIEW?"

We all sat there for a long time.

Periodically, fire trucks, ambulances, police units would hurl past screaming.

I felt a dark empathy for the selfish jumper.

It's easy to say that's an easy way out.

But that's a very difficult task to pull off.

I couldn't do it.

I wouldn't do it.

I'm afraid of heights.

And getting hit by speeding cars.

There was a lot of time to sit there and think about suicide in that hot, morose pile up.

I wondered why the guy or girl jumped.

I wondered how old they were.

I didn't feel like "jamming out" to "my tunes".

By the time I inched up to the Oakton bridge, the carnage had been cleared.

All that remained were a pair of short skid marks.

It didn't mean a thing to anyone.

From Lincolnshire, I took Milwaukee Avenue all the way up to Gurnee and then to Waukegan.

It was technically a nice day outside.

But it has taken me a long time to figure out that inside a car is not outside.

So it was not a nice day inside the van.

On the way back down I had to take the expressway.

It was clogged for miles and miles and miles and miles and miles and miles and miles and miles.

I had to go out near Rosemont to pick up a brand new plastic tool box from a True Value and bring it back to the loop. Because you can't fucking find a goddamn plastic tool box in godfucking Chicago.

The sun in my eyes was tired acid.

I felt like a corpse driving to his own funeral.

My pager went off.

"HOW YOU DOING?"

This question hit me at precisely the wrong moment in my life.

"HOW YOU DOING?" doesn't mean "How are you doing? Are you okay?"

It means, "Where are you? I'm getting more orders and I need to know if you're going to be doing them."

It makes sense.

It's work, after all.

Not Leo Buscaglia's Sensitive Love Service.

But clearly I have lost my desire to play this game anymore.

"miserable. stuck in traffic. dead end job. dying industry. wasting my fucking life with every passing day. that's how i'm doing."

A few minutes passed.

I was still stuck in westbound afternoon traffic on the Kennedy when my work responded.

"????????"

I ignored it and eventually picked up the rare plastic tool box from a hardware store.

I typed that I was going to drop off the toolbox and then go home.

My pager went off again.

"?????????????????????????"

I responded, "please fire me".

They waited a long time to respond to that one.

After some time, "WHERE ARE YOU?"

I typed that I was near downtown.

They immediately gave me an order picking up downtown and going way up to Lake Forest.

It was 4pm.

"no. not doing it."

I dropped off the plastic tool box and headed toward home.

They never responded.

On the way home I stopped in at The Annoyance.

I had forgotten to take down my drum set and store the Beatlemagica props from last night.

While I was there Tyler asked if I would write Mick's blurb for the Annoyance newsletter.

Mick is stuck without his luggage on a cruise ship and busy directing.

I happily said yes.

When I got home Lauren made some delicious pan-seared scallops and asparagus with a beurre blanc sauce and a saute of zucchini and grape tomatoes in a garlic infused olive oil.

I told her about my horrid day and took a delicious bite.

"This is why I haven't jumped off a highway overpass."

Then I passed out on the couch for an hour.

When I awoke around 8, woozy enough to write the blurb for the Annoyance newsletter while Lauren watched the Joan Crawford vehicle The Women. If you're a woman, you should see it. It portrays you people in a wonderful light. Especially the cat fight climax.

With a sliver of energy, I drove to the Empty Bottle.

I had originally planned to ride my bike.

But that wasn't gonna happen tonight.

The Columbines had graciously included me on their guest list that night.

It was the best sound system I had heard them play on since the Abbey Pub show last summer.

They sounded great, and I especially dug their new Phil Spector graveyard heartbreaker.

I love Lauren, I love music, and I love writing, but I desperately hate my life for the majority of the day.

Verdict: Loss

July 31 - Two Things I Enjoy, One Thing I'm Good At

It turns out that Colleen and Robyn liked the rough mix of the score I did last week for their comedy short. I asked Thea to contribute banjo and acoustic guitar and spent the majority of last night and this morning mixing it. It sounds decent for a garageband recording using built-in laptop mics. My recording engineer friends would probably disagree.

The rest of the day was spent catching up on this blog.

Between Beatlemagica opening, trying to secure a new vocational direction, and suffering from mild depression, I haven't quite been able to keep the pace I once had with this thing.

There's a lot of stuff I leave out or forget to put in.

Mostly about the frustration of the job search.

I don't want this loudmouth blog to become the reason I don't land a job.

Suffice it to say, I've been putting lots of energy into it.

I never mentioned that a couple of Sundays ago I had coffee with my old high school friend Laura. She's lived mostly in Africa for her adult life.

Now she's back in the States

She and I are the only ones in our old circle of friends who are not married.

"I think I missed the boat on that one," she said on the walk home.

I also forgot to mention that on the last night of The Bitter Tears tour, Alan went back to the hotel room in Amsterdam and they played The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant.

Today I walked out of the house in my slippers to get some Thai food and beer.

While the supermarket cashier handed me the change, the next guy in line moved within an inch of me and began his transaction. This happens all the time, so I should be used to it.

But I'm not.

I still mumble things like "Jesus fucking Christ, give me some fucking room".

When I walked into the Thai place to get my carryout, the woman shouted across the room full of diners.

"PICK UP? WHAT'S YOUR NAME?"

Since I didn't feel like yelling my own name to a room full of strangers, I walked up to her and said it.

"WHAT?"

She was annoyed.

"I CAN'T HEAR YOU!"

Why do I even leave the house?

I spent the day working on sound design, writing and being a difficult curmudgeon.

If there's a way to do that for a living I'd like to find out how.

Verdict: Win

July 30 - Too Weak Notice

My pager went off at 8am.

"GM TONY, let me know when on the way"

I guess I wasn't fired after yesterday's e-tantrum.

Bummer.

Looks like I'll have to give them my two weeks notice then.

It's painfully obvious that I can't keep doing this.

I made an egg scramble with grape tomatoes, baby asparagus, fresh basil and swiss, and reached out to more possible employers. I still haven't heard about the writing position.

It's beyond frustrating at this point.

I showed Lauren the piece I wrote last night for The Annoyance newsletter.

Here it is:

My name is Tony. I'm one of Mick's improv pals.

If Mick were writing today's newsletter I'm sure he would be happy about how rad and gnarly summer is. Plus the gorgeousness of the heatwave. "Bitchin'!" he would write. But Mick isn't here. He's on a cruise ship. Selling out again. This is how he can afford all those fancy leather house music shoes (but can't seem to afford socks to wear with them!).

However I am not Mick. I don't rollerblade everywhere. I don't mooch Mountain Dew off of my students and I don't use binoculars at church. And unlike Mick, I hate summer. This summer in particular has become a steaming sack of mutilated genitals. Let's say Tommy Lasorda's mutilated genitals.

I was trying to think of one positive thing about the mutilated genitalia of former Los Angeles Dodgers manager Tommy Lasorda. Maybe the mutilated genitalia of Tommy Lasorda could be used as a puppet in an anti-drugs puppet revue for troubled teens. Oh, but if a teenager is hooked on drugs, it's probably too late.

What if Baseball Hall of Famer Tommy Lasorda's freshly mutilated penis and charred scrotum were used to plug up the nasty gash (hold for laughter) in that BP oil blooper? Oh but wait, that problem has already been solved and we've all moved on.

Jesus cunt. I can't think of one single good thing about the crudely vivisected headless shaft and desiccated testicles of Tommy "The Dugout Wizard" Lasorda. Why do people love his mutilated genitalia so much?

Lauren didn't necessary follow my scattered trail of entrails humor.

I imagine she wouldn't be the only one.

After some research, I noticed that past Annoyance newsletters weren't so blue.

Or so unfunny.

God, I was exhausted and between naps when I wrote that last night.

Fuck, and I had already sent it.

I got bummed out a-fucking-gain.

Ultimately, Mick was able to write the newsletter and I was spared another round of public embarrassment. But it felt shitty to put manure in a friend's hand.

It seems everything I've done in the last month has not been good enough.

I left the house dejected at 1oam and did the weekly mail and payroll runs out to Hermosa.

At 11am I walked into the office.

My boss was the only one there.

Quitting a small company is more difficult than quitting a corporation.

You know everyone on a more personal level.

My boss took over the company about four years ago.

We had about ten drivers and ten bikers, three dispatchers, and a payroll lady.

He was married.

Now he's divorced.

We have about four bikers and four drivers, one dispatcher, and auxiliary folks like Arturo and the payroll lady who dispatches badly.

It's not going to get any better.

He's desperate for drivers.

That's why I didn't get fired for yesterday's nonsense.

I was getting ready to give him the bad news.

"So did you see anything yesterday?" he asked excitedly, referring to the person who jumped off of the Oakton overpass onto the Edens Expresseway yesterday.

"No, just some skid marks."

That killed that conversation.

"How are you doing on drivers?" I asked.

"Not good."

I told him I would tell everyone I knew that the company needed drivers, but that I was giving him my two weeks notice.

He looked at me in the eye for a second and then looked down.

"Right when it's going to start getting busy," he tried.

It's not going to get busy.

Not like it used to.

And that was it.

On Friday, August 13th I will retire from messengering.

Officially.

No more coming back.

I have to leave the abusive relationship once and for all.

Lauren seemed the happiest about this.

"Do you feel a weight off your shoulders?"

No, I feel the weight of a new burden.

What do I do now?

Verdict: Loss

July 27 - Reality Headquarters

It was a day spent doing lots of low paying runs.

Around 3:30 I decided I was done.

I went to Fantasy Headquarters.

It's a huge costume and gag shop on the northwest side.

The windows are painted with goofy likenesses of leprechauns, Elvis and Austin Powers.

I've always gone there for some reason.

For show props and stuff.

I should probably specify that.

Beatlemagica needed a knife and some clown white.

At the register I noticed a come-on taped to a glass case.

LOTTO TICKETS $2 EACH

"What's with the lottery tickets?" I asked.

"Each one is a guaranteed winner," said the nice, short girl with the thick Chicago accent.

"It's if you wanna play a prank on someone who always plays the lottery and they haven't won in a while."

Hm.

I wonder how that prank is being received in today's desperate economy.

It was our last Beatle rehearsal before the show tomorrow.

During the second run through, the knife broke in two pieces.

Fantasy Headquarters has a strict no returns policy.

I hope the clown white isn't just wax anthrax.

Verdict: Win

July 26 - Paging In Sick

I used the USA Mobility Unication Pager to page in a personal day at work.

My boss replied.

"TONY, CAN U DO IT TOMORROW, I ONLY HAVE YOU AND HERIE TODAY"

I typed no.

It wasn't a leisurely day.

Lauren led and directed the cleaning of the apartment.

Then we went grocery shopping.

In the evening, I led and directed a tech rehearsal at The Annoyance for Beatlemagica.

Then we all went grocery shopping.

Just like a real Beatles tribute band.

I haven't driven an automobile in three consecutive days.

Verdict: Win

July 25 - Brunch Combat, Beatle Magic & Wedding Etiquette

Lauren and I forced ourselves to a rare weekend brunch, and descended upon Pauline's. Surprisingly there was no wait, and we chose a spot in the shade while the oppressive heat took a brief but much needed break from Chicago.

Thin Lauren ordered egg whites. Since being penniless has a shed me of a few pounds, I opted for a five egg omelette of bacon, sausage and cheese that somehow refused to be greasy.

While we waited an aged hippie woman parked her car in the loading zone by the restaurant.

An angry old man attached to a small ventilator appeared from nowhere and began yelling at her. He staggered and pointed in all directions.

"I'M GONNA HAVE YOU THROWN OUT!"

The hippie woman played bemused.

"Why am I going to throw up?"

The old coot shot back.

"IT WOULDN'T BE THE FIRST TIME YOU MADE SOMEONE THROW UP! YOU DECLARED WAR ON ME THE DAY YOU MOVED IN!"

The hippie woman dismissed him.

"You've been saying that for fifteen years."

It seems they had a history.

The food arrived while they were trading more school yard barbs.

Before our first bite the man leaned into our table and offered to pay for our breakfast.

"YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND-"

Lauren cut him off with her hand.

"Sir! We would just like to eat our breakfast!"

He obeyed.

As it turns out the hippie woman owns the business next to Pauline's, and the mad old man is the owner. He is Pauline.

Crazy.

We ordered delicious, freshly squeezed orange-papaya juice to sweeten the bitterness experienced. Meanwhile, the hippie woman talked to another table for well over twenty minutes about her plight with the restaurant's owner.

Time to go.

Beatlemagica band practice proved to be two hours of smiling and laughter.

Their take on the music of The Beatles is not to be missed live.

We open on Wednesday.

My friends Brooke and Josh were married today.

They had their post nuptial party at The Annoyance.

I wore the same pink short sleeve shirt that I've worn to the last four weddings.

I drank beer and felt socially awkward, even among good friends.

Something's wrong with me this summer.

But thank god not everything is about goddamn me.

Today was about Brooke and Josh.

Not social faux pas.

Or forgetting people's names.

Or being miffed by people who snub you.

Or all the things that we're supposed to play nice about.

Verdict: Win