no one does it like me.

the winter of 2009 was very cold and frigid. dark and bleak. the icicles that hung from the roof of my third floor porch roof pierced past the length of my story, cascading down to the 2nd floor, a story beyond my view. it averaged 0 degrees,  or below, on a regular basis. january 2010, was particularly dicomforting.

it was a rough winter, and what i thought would transpire into an even tougher year - but i was wrong. in retrospect, it was one of the most crucial and turning point years in my life to date. i had just exited the only real relationship i had known, and had very few friends. after the winter of frozen hearts, i eventually met my friends and found myself. and the first year at 4953 north oakley, i lived with one of my closest lifelong girlfriends- and while we took turns sobbing in our bedrooms and nursing heartaches with pbr, i'm going to her wedding next weekend and i've been married for nearly 2 years, so the sloppy lovedrunks we were, really had no idea. (how good we had it bad. at least we had one another).

one night, it was particularly freezing. (literally). 32 degrees below zero. it was mid january, and i had tickets to see department of eagles at schuba's in exchange for a review. being in love with grizzly bear at the time, i was on the fence - do i freeze my ass off to go to a show? or more difficult - do i freeze my ass off to go to a show by myself? keep in mind i had all but 2 friends in the city of chicago at the time, and their musical palette hardly mirrored my own. going to a show solo was a new concept of mine.

but against the odds, i suited up and i trudged the freezing hell to southport and back and made the show. it was magic. the performance was fine, but the independence and gratification i got of doing something independently and outside of my comfort zone was so much more than a hipster concert. it was the transitioning of who i have become today.

it's been nearly 4 years since that terrible winter. i listened to a lot of (ok, way too much of) kanye west's 808s and heartbreaks. heartless? yeah, sorry courtney, that shit was on repeat. and the shout out louds' 'very loud'? that too, for some reason induced the sobbing.

now i can listen to both and laugh it off. dept of eagles' 'no one does it like you?' just makes me feel strong. a minor action in a larger scheme. i'll never forget that freezing commute home. lonely as i may have been, i finally found comfort in myself.

this used to be my jam.

your girlfriend is really beautiful. do you know she's a bird?

livin la vida old lady.

it is fall now. getting darker earlier every day. all i want to do is sleep, every minute, every day. i think i am a polar bear and just want to hibernate. instead, i go to work. and sometimes, meet friends. like this particular evening where i met a girlfriend for a hamburger. 6pm at the grafton, the sun was still flirting in the lincoln square sky. 7:15 pm departure, and it is dark. flannel weather. warm, baggy clothes. energy rapidly depleting, i anxiously await my evening routine of cat cuddles and this comfy, big bed. tonight, this is my date. lyle loves his 'gossip rags'. i don't know what a duck dynasty is, but lyle is mesmerized. he won't even let me read this. that's ok, i just want to nuzzle his big boy belly anyway, and sing along to girly songs until i fall asleep at my 8:30 bedtime.

is this 30? or is this fall? something in the air tonite. i wish i was a cat sometimes. they get to sleep all day and never need to feel guilty about it. everyone loves them (unless they suck and are going to hell). they don't have to pay bills. and endless cuddles. not to mention free subscriptions to tabloids.

friends forever.

this song has been in my head allll day. but i still totally hate the lead singer of this group.

i told you from the start, just how this would end.

courtney love pre-plastic surgery was the best. 1994 forever.

jam of the day.

private eye(s).

hall & oates + alkaline trio in one blog post? i must be drugged up. (i am).

legally, of course. i'd never wanna break the law or anything like that.

this is the first afternoon i've had off from work with the exception of early release or trips to external meetings.i'm home, at bed, eating an icecream treat in my undergarments, listening to ridiculous music with a halfway molesty/halfway marble brained creepster named lyle. it's ok though, he's a cat.

i probably shouldn't be blogging, let alone youtubing videos from my past, as my doctor told me to go home and sleep until dinner - but fuck that, i'm not wasting my time off from a crazy work week to sleep. i'll sleep when i'm dead. (or later tonite, at 10pm on the nose).

but yeah, lasik man. had round 2 today. that was a trip. for some reason, i forgot about how fucking insane the procedure was until i relived it today. i blame it on my nerves of steel i had last year, given i had to undergo a double lumptectomy on both breasts to remove potential cancerous masses. that operation seemed much more scary than having some 2001 space odyssey noise zapped in my eyeballs.

today wasn't scary, per say. but totally bizarre and surreal.. maybe it was because i spent my morning at the state building, discussing policies for state wide healthcare legislation. and then, had to rush down the street for a quick zap. whatever. i'm totally out of it right now. i feel like a cliche stoner type from a john hughes film. or like, sean penn from that fast times movie (that i've never seen).

i go into the office, and it's pristine as heck. after i get slipped some vallium i get some crazy light show eye tests completed. then, because they incised flaps in my cornea last year, i was fortunately relieved of the procedure again, and they instead just numbed my eyeball up, shined a hella bright blinding white light on my eyeball, and proceeded to poke at it with some sort of tiny crochet hook. i couldnt feel pain, persay, but i def felt pressure, and saw a metal device coming at my eyeball. then they lifted they somehow re-opened the flap for me, and shit got jerry garcia weird and swirly.

after that, i moved into some crazy ass equipment room with 'DANGER' signs on the door, alerting all to beware of the lazers inside, especially those with pacemakers.

cool.

they scotch taped a makeshift paper pirate eye patch on my left eye since they only operated on my right. they then put some sort of weird ass sheet on my right eye, all the time i'm completely reclined in some sort of dentist chair with the blood slowly rushing to my head. next came the clock work orange aparatus to make sure i couldn't blink, all the while drowing my eye ball with drops. meanwhile, my mascara is making me resemble a less unstable courtney love. (i blame the business clothes).

they placed me under the lazer, and keep in mind, my cornea flap is still folded back so shit is blurry as hell. the lazer's making all these loud ass clicks and bangs, but i'm so subdued on pills that i dont even care. just laying there like a slug. 'don't move your eye,' they say, 'the lazer is coming now,' while some dude is reciting transcriptions along '16 seconds, 1.4 meters, sassana,'. i guess it only took 16 seconds? i wouldn't have even noticed had the BURNING smell not invaded my nostrils. so wait, i'm thinking to myself, is this normal? why does it smell like a combination of burning hair, flesh and mushrooms? OH, THAT MUST BE THE LAZER EATING MY EYEBALL. that's cool. they slapped a contact on that badboy, made a follow up appointment for tomorrow afternoon, and sent me on my way.

regardless of the sci-fi bizarreness of it all, shit was over and done withing 15 minutes. luckily, my father in law was kind enough to give me a lift home, and here i am not an hour later, with dried sticky icecream fingers, cuddling a creeper cat. the weird thing is, i can already see decent out of my eye. i'm rocking my fake pair of vanity glasses in lieu of sporting the horace grant goggles i'm supposed to wear. this is prob the only legit excuse i'll ever have to wear these since i'm obviously a poser and got eye correction surgery so i wouldnt have to wear glasses, but whatevs.

i wanna eat icecream in bed all goddamn day.

surgery rules.