CHICAGO FASHION NIGHT OUT

1. this 25 things meme that's going around is really entertaining, mostly b/c it's being repeated by people who aren't the usual suspects. my cousin's awesome fiancée making a list of 25 random things about her? fantastic.

2. the internet knows more about me than you ever will. 99.99% of it is untraceable, but i just found out that my flickr account is associated with my full name somehow. this freaked me the fuck out.

3. i love my job. it's crazy, but i do. i think that what i do is totally important & worthwhile, & even though some parts of it have become tedious (FORM 7), i actually feel really fulfilled & happy most days. the university politics sure can get back-bitey, though.

4. i like cooking dinner every night, & then eating it while watching tv programs about cooking. it's pleasingly circular. failing that, watching CSI: miami is pretty righteous b/c it's a truly terrible show that makes great background.

5. i've been spilling my guts online since 1997. it's cathartic, but also awkward.

6. now that i have my new camera, a project i would like to do is photograph all of my friends. i'm not sure i'll be able to pull it off, but i think it could be really interesting.

7. i sometimes wonder why i have little to no contact with any of my former best friends. i'm not sure i can process relationship downgrades in a healthy fashion.

8. i can hear daniel listening to the deftones right now in the studio below me. sometimes i think about how he & i met, & i think about our relationship before we started dating, & i wonder how the hell this happened. our first date was almost a dare -- six months before that, i thought he was the biggest dick in the metropolitan area, & i was half-convinced that the date itself was some kind of joke. i fully expected to be stood up.

9. i didn't really want to be friends with my sister till she went away for college. now, even though we get on each other's nerves sometimes, i think she's the best person in the world at sticking up for me & i wish she'd move back home.

10. i have one secret i will take with me to my grave. everything else about me, no matter how embarrassing, is known by at least one other person.

11. i wanted to go to culinary school when i was in high school, but i thought it was a waste of my intellect.

12. i feel like the biggest jackass ever for not having my doctorate, but i also think i'm a jackass for even caring, so it kind of evens out.

13. when i was in sixth grade, my friends found out i was switching schools at the end of the year & they all stopped talking to me. except to prank call me. which was fun. sure did make it easy to change schools, though.

14. i actually got pretty good at changing schools. between pre-k & 7th grade, i attended seven schools. i didn't stop feeling nervous on the first day of school till my junior year of high school. the trick to changing schools was to befriend someone shy, draw no attention to yourself whatsoever, & always have a book.

15. apparently, my mom had to tell my teachers all through elementary school to take my books away during recess so i'd actually interact with people.

16. there are three people in the whole world i never want to see again. one is an ex-friend, & the other two are daniel's ex-girlfriends -- though to be honest, i probably couldn't pick either one of them out of a line-up anyway.

17. i'm going to get spoon tattoos in celebration of my marriage. when i have a baby, i'm going to add another spoon. my grandparents will hate it.

18. i have a whole lot of opinions. i try really hard to be like my dad & keep my own counsel, but it's pretty challenging.

19. i like to rebel against the man. pointlessly.

20. i believe that people are not generally assholes. i believe that they make the best decisions they can with the information they're given. no one wants to be a dick. not even daniel's ex-girlfriends, i suspect. haha.

21. shagy's cancer diagnosis has devastated me. i feel guilty about how bad it makes me feel, & i try not to write about it publicly too much, but i am so angry about it in a totally adolescent, railing-against-the-world kind of way. sometimes i think i know too much about what his diagnosis really means. i would give him a lung if it'd make a damn bit of difference.

22. so much of who i am comes from other people. i like that.

23. when i dropped out of college, i drove around every afternoon for hours & told my mom i was going to the library. i just needed to think.

24. i miss my record label. i truly wish i could've powered through without caroline, but her leaving sapped all the fun out of it.

25. i think next time i'll do better. next time i'll be more compassionate, active, thoughtful, motivated.

In 1996, after graduating from Notre Dame, I took a job in Miami for an urban design company that specialized in urban reconstruction. One of my first jobs was the reconstruction of downtown Fort Pierce, Florida

Fort Pierce is one of Florida's original cities and more recently has been devastated by rampant drug use. Avenue D is a notorious den of depravity.

While walking the streets to get a "feel" for the neighborhood, one of our guides picked up this rock and asked us if we knew what it was.

The rock is coquina. A hard sediment rock composed of compressed course sand. In one side a large hole (the size of dime) had been bored out and the other a small pin sized hole.

This of course seemed to us college educated folks nothing more than a rock, but to the street educated eye it was a crack pipe. Some poor guy took the time to cut out a hole and fashion this rock into a pipe. Then got so stoned out of his mind he lost the pipe.