1,001 Chicago Afternoons

The hallway walls are gray and white, with a linoleum floor that echoes clack clack clack as you walk down it.

Clack clack clack up four flights of stairs since the elevator’s busted. Clack clack clack past the offices of counselors drug, marriage and guidance in a hall that looks and echoes like a 1950s grade school. Clack clack clack to the end of the corridor where a blank, windowless door sits between two therapists offices. » Read the rest of this entry «

1. Cuckoo clock? (from Wednesday)

2. WOLF! (from Wednesday)

3. Your crappiest day (from Wednesday)

4. ‘The one what?’

5. A bidding war

6. The mayor of Baltimore/Party at Uncle Fun

… » Read the rest of this entry «

1. Cuckoo clock?

2. WOLF!

3. Your crappiest day

4. ‘The one what?’ (coming Friday)

5. A bidding war (coming Friday)

6. The mayor of Baltimore/Party at Uncle Fun (coming Friday)

… » Read the rest of this entry «

Nerds.

Just a buncha goddamn nerds.

Nerds blocking the stairs. Nerds cramming the bars and taking up the booths. Nerds dressed up as the men from TV, clapping and cheering between the whams and slams on the show amid bouts of reciting each other nerd trivia.

But luckily the game ended and the nerds in jerseys left so the rest of us normals could watch the “Doctor Who” 50th anniversary episode.

“This is like Christmas!” said a girl wearing thick glasses and a T-shirt of Matt Smith fighting zombies. » Read the rest of this entry «

The afterlife has wine poured in plastic cups. And it has beautiful photos up on white walls. And it has old friends and old not-so-friends, all giving hugs and patting each other on the shoulders.

It has handshakes and gossip and catching up and sympathy, so much sympathy. » Read the rest of this entry «

His puffy, smiling face hadn’t seen a razor in days, thick white whiskers hovering between heavy stubble and thin beard.

His workman’s fingers clutched a CTA card. » Read the rest of this entry «

The lovers walk by the pro shop that looks like a castle. The joggers tread lightly over the ice as the dog walkers let their companions off the leash.

And a few emo souls like me stand by the lake to think in the new year. » Read the rest of this entry «

It was the guy at Quimby’s who told the man in blue where he could get the stuff. » Read the rest of this entry «

A soft, slow, sopping morning requires coffee. It requires coffee and an almond bear claw. » Read the rest of this entry «

A magnificent fat crow glared at me from atop the cemetery birdbath. Under gray, clamoring clouds, it cawed a warning to me. Somewhere, a man reading Lovecraft got an erection he couldn’t explain.

I was going a’writing in a graveyard. » Read the rest of this entry «