The vapors?

Last night's rain cooled Chicago off considerably, which I'm so glad about, because I was really dying there for awhile. I can't handle heat at all. On Saturday night, we went to this art show that I normally enjoy very much. However, the loft space it's in wasn't air conditioned, and I felt like a swooning Victorian from a romance novel. I kept on having to sit down and take a break. In my defense, we'd been at A Prairie Home Companion that afternoon, which had also been stifling hot, so I was just beat down in general. But at one point, I really had to resist the urge to scream at everyone that we needed to LEAVE, because FOR GOD'S SAKE, the paintings were MELTING OFF THE WALLS.

However, Amelia (whose art is in the show and, I feel, routinely kicks the ass out of all the other art on display) got this great shot of me, completely ignoring the art around me or the photographer, in lieu of playing with my new phone. Also, don't ask me what the Hell was going on with my hair, because I don't fucking know:



She also got this great shot of Steve looking like a serial killer, and me looking like I'm trying to convince her that "no, really, he is a very nice person":



****

A few things:

1. Today at lunch, there was a Meeting of the Minds taking place by my house, which included:

a) The guy who I lovingly refer to as my Homeless Doorman

b) The Crazy Old Man, who lives next door and likes to bark at Mojo when we walk by*

and

c) His Downstairs Neighbor, a man from Poland who, for a living, appears to enjoy collecting Stupid, Worthless Crap Noone Wants. I only say that I think he enjoys it because he likes to keep his precious finds in his front yard, sort of museum-style.

It was a pretty awesome crew collected there in front of my apartment. Actually, they're all very nice men, but I'd just come from picking up my birth control, so I sort of felt like I was carrying drugs or something, and that I had to rush past them and not meet their eyes. Why do I still feel like I'm doing something wrong every time I pick that up, even though I'm 26 and live on my own and have my own life? It's like I'm afraid my dad is going to come around the corner and totally bust me.

*Which is hilarious, because Mojo is so used to this that he just looks at Crazy Old Man, in a very condescending, "Yeah, and they say your Kind are smarter than us," sort of way.

2. Speaking of, I hate it when you call a pharmacy in advance to request your precription, and you make sure to do it right at the beginning of the day so that they'll have LOADS of time to fill it. Couple that with the fact that your prescription doesn't take any real FILLING at all, just plopping the pre-packaged item into an envelope, and you feel like all is right with the world because you are so on top of your game. But then, lo, you get to the pharmacy - FOUR HOURS LATER AND EVEN AFTER THE TIME YOU SAID YOU WOULD BE THERE - to find that the prescription hasn't even been filled yet.

Stop testing out some of your products in the back room, Mr. Pharmacist, and do your flippin' job already. Damn.

3. Maybe some of the mothers and fathers that read this can answer this question for me: Why are parents of twenty-somethings so hard on their kids? Not my parents in particular, but more just parents in general.

Right now, I have a friend whose getting crap right and left from her mom, and it's very unwarranted, seeing as how my friend is so responsible she makes me (and all my other friends, really) look like we're just goofing off and Prolonging the Inevitable with all this going back to school to get all these "secondary degrees" and other bullshit. Oh, and she just sent me a card on the one-year anniversary of her OWN wedding, thanking me for making her invitations and party favors. She is seriously the LAST daughter I would think a mother would have any excuse to gripe about.

So hey, Parents: we're just trying to figure out who the hell we are. Which is kind of a tough job, I'm finding out. Isn't the fact that we're able to live on our own without starving to death AND STILL have money left over to go to the bars good enough? Christ.

4. I have no idea why I thought wearing this super-low-cut shirt was a good idea today, considering my present circumstances. The copy guy that kept on blushing when he came in today? Yeah, in retrospect, I'm thinking that was not just because he's new to our company and doesn't know anything.

5. Finally, in the same vein as #4, I burst into tears on the way home for Mojo's noon walk, because this song came on. What the fuck, I don't even like Billy Joel. He reminds me too much of those douchebags from high school and college, who wore white college hats and talked about how awesome it was that they drank alcohol.

But then I started thinking, Oh my God, that is probably completely what Steve thinks when he thinks of me, because I never give him an inch, God I am such a Bitch, blahblahblahblahblah. I'm sure you've all heard that sort of thing before.

That said, I really need to finish this entry and go home and sit in the dark, by myself, and not make any contact with anyone for five to seven days.