Catching up on the Vacation

Thursday I got on my flash gear and went to work with my dad. (high school math teacher, currently at 32 years total service)
It would be a day of intense learninating for the children of Pendleton County High.
Meeting my dad's coworkers was weird, because previously, those coworkers had been my teachers, since I had gone to the same school where he taught. It's also weird to meet his coworkers that are younger than me.
The Cruise started feeling old.
Most of my day consisted of watching my dad teach, giving a few quick talks on what the field of architecture is like (math classes needed, length of college programs, amount of money I don't make, blogging opportunities…)
Then I also went to several gym classes and showed them ultimate.
That was a near disaster. I had no idea the ammount of contact high school kids not only endure, but look forward to.

That night our Scrabble game got cut short because my parents watched Survivor, insisting it is the only reality show they watch.

I'm falling behind on my vacation wrap up

Wednesday my mom and I went to play golf.
There were three things weird about this:
A-I don't play golf, it was my 6th time playing in my life.
B-My mom doesn't play golf, it was probably her second.
C-My mom made me drive the golf cart around the course, and I have driven my mom around in a car three times in the past 15 years.
D-We had a great time, we laughed and joked, and had fun losing golf balls in the barren woods.
E-We were the only people on the course, until I ran into the head groundskeeper and he asked me where I lived.
He was very friendly, but since he also asked me my mom's name, I lied to him.
F-Afterwards we went to a diner in town. We talked about the building's architecture. My mom pretty much never asks me any question other than "Did I tell you this story already?" or "Are you gay?"
G-Once we got home, I went to work on sanding some baseboards that my parents found in a dump. Because wood is 'spensive Yo.
H-I also dug a hole. One of the sheep helped me.

When my dad got back from his late conference about Japanese Guys who teach math, mom told him how horrible golf was.
The continued exaggeration of the size of one of the hills would be a recurring theme the rest of the week.

That night our Scrabble game got cut short because my parents watched Wife Swap, insisting it is the only reality show they watch.

Musical Interlude

I realize that most of you don't know my parents, so I have to explain them a little for you to get the full effect.

The 'Rents:

Gstoff-My dad.
Born in Cleveland, Ohio where he once saw Malcolm X speak as one of only 4 white people in the crowd.
Hard working teacher who wants to be farmer.
Only talks when necessary, is in better shape than me even though he's almost 58.

Momstoff-My mom.
Born in Mansfield, Ohio where she once saw a black person. On the other side of the street.
Has mastered cooking all forms of animal and vegetable, is currently working on mineral.
Was nice enough to not cook any beef or pork for me on my visit.

We grew up in Cincinnati Ohio, but they moved to Kentucky part time while I was in College.
They moved full time once I was in Chicago and my grandmother passed away.

The Homestead:
120 acres of rolling farmland, bought for a song because only 4 acres are suitable for tobacco farming.
Livestock consists of 26 sheep, 2 rams, 3 donkeys, 4 alpacas, 4 dogs, 1 cat.
Coyotes ate all the ducks, guinea hens and chickens over 4 years ago.

The Vehicles:
1996 Dodge Ram
1991 Mazda Miata
1998 Geo Tracker
2003 Toyota Prius
1991 Mazda Protégé
2001 Massey Ferguson FarmAll
1952 Ford Harvester
2005 Kawasaki Mule
1972 golf cart painted to look like a MaryKay cadillac
1983 Airstream Mobile Home

The Compound:
-Log Cabin, primary residence. 1500 sqft
-Farmhouse as book suppository, Christmas room, and craft workshop. 1600 sqft (existing)
-Tobacco barn, currently used for livestock. 1500 sqft (existing)
-Pole barn, affectionately called Mormon barn after the 65 yr old man and pregnant wife who blacktopped the inside. currently set up as fully functioning 'Curves' workout room, heavy tool workroom, and furniture storage for both my old furniture, and my grandmother's entire house minus her Christmas room. 1800 sqft
-(2) room 'Fair' house used for guests. 200 sqft
-'Mike's Diner' bought off eBay, restored. 275 sqft
-"Country Ham" food cart, bought at auction, not restored. 120 sqft
-Steel Barn still under construction, bought with KY tax incentives to promote livestock farming over tobacco. 1500 sqft

November 7 is a good day

Tuesday morning was that weird feeling.
It was the first morning I could sleep in, and the time zone, and the farm animals, and the dogs in the house.
I slept in until 9, really lazy I know, but just remember, I got up before everyone in Oregon still.

Dad was at school, and mom left to do errands, so I spent the whole day picking up osage oranges out of the pastures and dumping them in a creek. Nothing quite like brainless manual labor on your vacation. It felt good. My parent's new vehicle is fun. And I love those Donkeys.

That night our Scrabble game got cut short because my parents watched Amazing Race, insisting it is the only reality show they watch.

Rare Lost Footage of Coltrane Practice

Sunday Nov 6 and Monday Nov 7

Saturday was pretty average.
Nothing you'd even really be interested in.
I hung out with my friends Ned and Colleen, got some great middle eastern food, watched TV.
Funny thing about Ned is that he looks exactly like Steve Carell.
Here's a picture of both of them to prove it.










Uncanny.

Monday was even more average.
I wandered around and took pictures of Chicago, and went to the museums.
AIC is probably my favorite museum of all time, narrowly beating out the "Rye Museume of Spectacular Oddities" that I always used to go to in England. It was full of stuff like taxidermied stillborn puppies dressed in tuxedoes at a masquerade ball, or three headed pigs in formaldehyde, so it is almost unfair to compare that to a lame normal museum. AIC kicks ass because it has so much shit I love.
They had a new Demuth, and a weird O'Keefe that I had never seen before so I was stoked.

That night I flew to KY, and got picked up by my parents for an exciting 2 hour car ride with the topics of:

-how wrong are your directions
-why my mom is so liberal
-how some gay people really are gay
-gay women are faking it
-am I gay?
-how shitty the service is at Cracker Barrel
-was that woman at the Fazolis restaurant retarded? Or Russian?
-why they bought a Geo Tracker
-mutual adoration of my two nephews.

Just so you know the score, I hadn't been home in almost two years, and hadn't seen my parents in 20 months.
So this was a visit to get reacquainted and make sure that I'm back in the will, and that they can count on me to help them in a court case when they get senile and want permission to blow themselves up in a motor home accident rather than get sent to a nursing home.
Well, I got their back again. The Cruise, Gstoff and Momstoff are once again on good terms. A truly unbeatupable team.

The tale of November 5

I woke up Saturday and pulled out the ironing board in swank palace.
You might have noticed that my typical modus operandi when it comes to ironing is to either not do it, or just accentuate the existing wrinkles by making them crisper.
This time I defied the odds and ironed me up a nice shirt. My slacks needed no help because they are a space age design involving polymers and whatnot that don't require ironing. (Note to the reader, I was not wearing jeans. They were like those Dockers or something, with staindefender)
As I put the finishing touches on the shirt, I realized that if I wore the shirt to the wedding, my backpack would wrinkle it, and the sweat would be ungainly. It was somehow in the 60s that day, and I had a long commute to make the wedding still. So I did the sensible thing, I folded the shirt up again and shoved it in my bag as gently as possible.

When I arrived at the church, I sauntered right up to the groom as he waited on the steps.
I looked like a mess with my hobo gear, but I assured him that I would hide the bindle and clean up before the ceremony.
The basement restroom was a convenient spot for me to freshen up, but when I saw the rest of the attendees, I noticed that I was still underdressed. I had a bright green shirt and looked totally wicked fly for a Portland wedding, but I guess Chicago expects everyone to dress for a funeral. Dark suits all around, I was like a lone spot of sanity, shining through the darkness. My shirt brought hope, hope for a new tomorrow.
Have you ever been to a Catholic wedding? I'm guessing it was Catholic because there were little boys that kept walking around on stage behind the priest and everybody kept kneeling down, standing up, kneeling down, saying stuff on cue, and then eating crackers.
Anyway, Catholics.
Whatever man.

There were exactly 3 of my old friends at the wedding. The groom, the bride, and one of the girls in the goofy dresses.
So I was at an impasse of what to do next, while waiting for the reception that night.
The chain of command decided on drinks at Pippins, right near the hotel and reception hall.

It was good to get a head start on drinking and watch some college football, because there would be more dark suits, and nobody else I knew at the upcoming reception.
The reception was swank, not just open bar, open bar with the hard. Pretty sweet when no matter how many times I order a vodka tonic, the bartender will start pouring me a gin and tonic as soon as I saunter. The table that housed me was cool, I had two boyfriends of the people that I knew, and then some nice lady that liked to talk about Portland.
What more could you ask for? After I got my verbal props for setting up the couple in the maid of honor's speech, I quickly took my sabbatical from the festival. Highlight of the night was the father of the bride giving a very personal toast about the relationship. Pretty much made the official wedding ceremony look like a joke. It's the personal touches that make a wedding memorable, not the pomp and circumcision.

There was beer to be drank with former ultimate friends.
I hit the Chicago Fall League party and got some goose island with old pals.
The weird thing was how many people I didn't know.
Maybe injuries are taking their toll on my generation, but there were lots of new faces.


Just to keep this interesting, in a high school text book sort of way,
It's now time for the questions:

1-What was the fanciest wedding you went to?
What did you have to wear?

2-Would you knowingly get shitake'd at a wedding knowing full well that you are not only making an ass of yourself, but also costing the family of the bride hundreds of dollars?
Would you think people were there to see your drunk short ugly fat ass, and heckle the people giving toasts? Is that what you thought asshole?

3-Is a bar with plastic cups worth going to?
Would you tip a bartender less if he gave you a plastic cup?

The tale of Friday Nov 4

This is the true story, the story of my first vacation since 2003.
The last time I took a vacation I missed Portland so much that I came home, got drunk, and hit on Paige.
These things never go well, just so you know.

Well what I did was go to Chicago. Chicago's nickname is "the city of big shoulders"
I decided to call it, "the city of where Doody is marrying Glozniak".
It might not stick in the National lexicon.

First order of business after arrival: Go to my old grad school and try to not owe them 5000 dollars and get them to make the collection agency leave me alone.
First off, no one was available t ohelp me from the school of architecture. They were kind enough to feel sorry for me though. Sorry don't get this debt off my back.

Next I headed over to see Clarence, the man in charge of delinquent accounts. Clarence (a dead ringer for the grandpop huxtable, yet wearing a Cosbyt sweater) listened to my story of hardship, gave me a few options of who else to talk to or how to pay up, sternly told me there was nothing he could personally do, then quietly whispered "this won't effect your credit rating, they can't actually do anything to you."
So here's where I'm trying not to be racist; I love 60 year old black men. Sorry, I like them all more than I like you.

The rest of the day was a blur,
-I softened my hatred of Rem Koolhaus
(pictures to follow when I return to non dialup)
-wandered Wicker Park looking for old friends
-used the kickass CTA, public transit is a boon
-stayed in a way too fancy hotel
(normally I save my money for food, and 134 dollars is a lot of food. that's even after I got a deal by talking down the normal price of 189)
(55 dollars is still a lot of food)

Stay tuned for Birdflag crashing the wedding as a homeless man.