Aren't We (all) Pretty?

An associate from our parent company who shares office space with us stopped by my cube for a chat yesterday. In my cube hanging on my wall/tackboard is this picture of me, Hot Heather and Vicodin Jim from a show Jim played a few weeks ago:
.My associate asked about the photo and I told him it was my roommate and his girlfriend and that, yes, he does look scary, but he's really a very nice guy. G leaned in for a closer look and said, "Wait a minute. Is he wearing....eyeliner?"

Hot Heather laughed when I told them the story. Jim...did not.

Serendipity

I first saw her at the Jewel on Western on Friday night. Jim, Heather and I were having Slumber Party Night, and Jim and I were stocking up on greasy, fattening snacks. She came walking up the candy isle as we were walking down it, a vision of sadness and beauty: tall goth chick with short black hair, except for her bangs, which were magenta. A long black trench coat. Lime green leather gloves with the fingertips cut out. The biggest, soulful brown eyes I have even seen, framed by the longest eyelashes in existence. I may have imagined it, but I swear she was being followed by a heavenly light shining down upon her. As she glanced our way, I silently cursed my decision to leave the house in my Mickey Mouse pajamas in an attempt to amuse myself and my roommate.

"I saw her first!" Jim hissed at me after she had walked past.

"You have a girlfriend!" I hissed back savagely.

Jim thought this over. "Damn you!" he finally decided.

I told the bartender about her the next day. "She was perfect! Jim tried to steal her from me but I pointed out that he had Heather."

"Kick ass. Did you talk to her?"

"____________...."

"You're stupid, Amber."

"Shut up. Besides I was in my pajamas."

And then I went about my life.

Imagine my surprise when I happened to glance up from the book I was reading on the train on my way home last night and saw magenta bangs and lime green leather gloves sitting on the seat directly in front of me. It is fate. Fate I tell you! She will be mine and we will live happily ever after, or sadly ever after 'cause, I mean, she's a goth chick. I sent a text to Jim: "You will not BELIEVE who is sitting right in front of me on the train."

He called me back. "Who?"

"Goth chick from Jewel," I tried to whisper, though probably screamed. As I say this, she gets up and walks to the door of the train.

"NO! You should get her digits," he says, as I watch the doors open and she gets off at, presumably, her stop. "Did you talk to her?"


____________.

I hate being stupid.

Lost In Translation

My friend Demas has been entertaining our group of friends today by translating all of his e-mails into foreign languages. Foreign languages that most of us don't speak. He's sent us things in Spanish, Chinese and French. The thing is, the translator he's using doesn't always do a very good job, so nothing he has sent us makes any sense. Fortunately for us, Simmy appears to have actually paid attention in class, and corrected the one he sent us in French:

"L'email de Simone était drôle assez fichu. Par conséquent est exacactement il ce que j'ai dit. . Cependant, je doute de I dit lui en tant que sans à-coup parce que je ne parle ou ne comprends pas aucune langue de foriegn. Ainsi si c'est légèrement à toute la manière incorrecte, veuillez ne pas froncer les sourcils sur moi. Aujourd'hui je voudrais dire des acclamations à tous mes piaulements dans le capot. Tout est bien, séjour frais."

Simmy's translation:

"simone's email was funny. it is exactly what i said. nevertheless, i doubt what was said is without a cup of soup because i don't understand any foreign language. also, if it is legitimate all of the manners are incorrect, never force your sources on top of me. today i'm going to read the acclemations of my feet in the pots and pans. it is good. it is true. "

My City Is Cooler Than Your City

Well, sleazier anyway.

Amongst Grown-Ups

I went to Tai's last night, because on Thursday nights I go to Tai's. It was easily the best night out I've had since I moved here. It left me feeling refreshed and ready to take on Chicago with the kind of gusto that people who have recently moved here should be taking on Chicago with. Really, really great night. Because nothing happened.

That's right, absolutely nothing went on. A bunch of people went to a bar....and that's it.

We didn't all stand there like Easter Island, mind you. We watched the mock draft, followed by Baseball Tonight, followed by Sportscenter. The jukebox was played. Several people shot a few rounds of pool. I myself discussed Maurice Clarrett, Braylon Edwards, and Star Wars with Gene Honda for much of the night. We drank some beer, or whatever particular drink each individual had ordered. There was laughter. There was smiling. Just a bunch of relaxed, grown people, enjoying a companionable evening at the neighborhood bar.

There weren't any 19 year olds wondering if perchance my roommate or I might buy them some beer. There was no rogue tattoo artist setting up camp on the bar and keeping people from their regularly scheduled whatever-it-is-they-do-on-Thursday-night. I was not subjected to a pair of people debating which is the more TOTALLY AWESOME movie: Anchorman or Napoleon Dynamite? Absolutely no one repeated back to me something that I had just said prefaced with "Your mom".

I have absolutely nothing at all to tell you about.

I've never felt so good in my life.

Ruining All The Kids' Fun

"tag your [sic] it" read the message from Hot Heather. The dinging of my phone had interrupted my leisurely reading of The Restaurant at the End of the Universe. I don't have a lot of leisure time during this season at work. But I carved out a little yesterday, Jim wasn't home and I was trying to enjoy it. I was not interested in playing tag or anything else. It was supposed to be just me and my book.

"Tag, you're strange..." I sent back. I went back to my book. The universe was about to end, I didn't want to miss it. I read for a few minutes.

DING! said my phone.

"we're playing tag...you have to tag someone ELSE"

I don't want to tag someone else. I want to read my book while I still can.

"But it's bizarre" I send back. I pick up my book again.

DING! "So?"

I sighed. Clearly she wasn't going to go away until I went along with her game.

"Fine. I'll go tag Jim since he's the only other person I know..."

I text Jim: "Apparently we're playing tag, which means you are it."

There. That takes care of that. I snuggle deeper into the couch and open my book.

DING!

I throw my book across the room. What. The. Fuck. Do. You. Want????

It's Jim. "You didnt call no tag backs you're it!"

I clench my jaw. Lucky for them they're in the suburbs, otherwise I'd hunt them down and beat them. I'm smart so I get an idea that I think will make them go away.

I text them both simultaneously: "You are both insane. I will now stay it and tag you later in person when you least expect it...MUAHAHAHAHAHA!"

I smile to myself. That's gonna piss them off for sure. I hold all the cards. No one can tag me if I'm it. I can read my book in peace. Damn kids.

Hot Heather sees her dilemma and tries one last time: "Tag Nick..." with his number.

I'm giggling now.

"No. I'm it. Which makes me important. So there." I hit send with a look of smug satisfaction on my face.

Ten whole minutes pass. Then...

DING! It's Hot Heather. "FINE THEN!"

I did read for quite a while after that, but I kept imagining the pouty look she must have had on her face when she sent me that.

How fucking bored do you have to be to play text message tag anyway? Asshats.

Good Morning To You Too

Nothing is better at getting me up and moving in the morning than a 5:00 am phone call from the bartender. Not because of the jarring sound of the phone ringing at 5:00 am, but because he always manages to say something completely weird, completely crass, completely off-topic, or some combination of the three.

Today we got on the topic of his well developed picking-fights-with-people-bigger-than-him skills. The bartender is kind of little. If you include the two inches added to his height by the great uprush of spikey hair, he tops out at about 5'7" or so. "I know I'm little and I kind of look like a wuss, but I'm really pretty scrappy," he informed me.

"You don't look like a wuss at all. Actually, you look a lot bigger than you really are. I think it's because of the way you carry yourself. Something in your attitude makes you seem much taller than you are."

"That," he stated matter-of-factly, "is because I have a huge dick."

.

To the Women Walking on LaSalle Right In Front Of Me

Ladies, just minutes ago I was returning to my office from CVS, having procured for my lunchtime pleasure a bag of pretzels and some sour cream dip, when I encountered you:

• A tall, rather attractive black woman, sipping apple juice from what appeared to be an 8 once bottle through a straw;
• A blonde in an ugly purple pantsuit, wearing her Building ID Badge of Importance around her neck;
• another blonde, barely five feet tall, shaped more exactly like a Weeble than any other human I've ever come across;
• a woman with the largest mass of non-moving hair I've seen since 1986;
• a woman smoking a Virginia Slim, who managed to flick ash into my eye even with the protective shielding from my glasses.

Ladies, I ask you, is it entirely necessary for you to walk FIVE ABREAST across the ENTIRE SIDEWALK right in front of me, while traveling at a pace resembling that of a marginally sedated inchworm??? Get the fuck out of my way so I can go write nasty things about you on my blog before getting back to my enormous pile of work.
Asshats.

Career Change

I'm bored. I'm bored of doing math. Don't get me wrong - I love the dynamics of statistics; between you and me, it's secretly the main reason why I like baseball so much. But baseball is a 6 month affair. Investment analysis goes on all year round.

Part of my professional dissatisfaction is due to the fairly close proximity of Vicodin Jim. The rock star life looks pretty attractive from the outside. Keep basically any hours you damn well please. Win affection rather than a meeting with the HR manager for dressing up like a complete freak. Actual "work" consists of practice (basically a big jam session), promotions (talking about yourself), and shows (people clapping for you and trying to talk to you/get your autograph/sleep with you). Granted, I have much nicer stuff than he has, but the accumulation of stuff is not one of my larger goals.

I don't want to be a rock star myself per se; what I want is to get paid to do something I would be doing anyway. I've come up with a few possibilities, as outlined below:

Professional Den Mother - Organizes activities, prepares snacks and desserts to be served during or after activities, drives small groups around to activity destinations. Can serves both groups of children and groups of adults.
Qualifications: Creativity; the ability to both cook and bake well; vehicle ownership; an aggressive mothering complex; an overwhelming desire to please other people, often at the expense of my own happiness and/or sanity.
Barriers to Entry: Real mothers who choose to fill this role for free. Broke rock stars will have difficulty paying for these services.

Professional Wry Observationalist - Observes human behavior and comments on it. Commentary should be geared towards, but is not limited to: stupid people, stupid behavior, social ironies and the very very obvious.
Qualifications: Ability to find some type of ineptitude in most people; disdain for society in general; a willingness to spend a great deal of time in bars; above average sarcasm.
Barriers to entry: Ragging on others does not generally imbue them with a desire to give you money.

Male to Female/Female to Male Translator - Translates ambiguous and sometimes not-so-ambiguous phrases from their original gender to the opposite. Some examples would be "It's not you, it's me", "I'll call you later", and "I love you".
Qualifications: Status as an anatomical female; a reputation for "thinking like a guy".
Barriers to entry: No offense, but sometimes I just don't get any of you people.

Professional Procrastinator - eh I'll finish this one later.

Way Cool, If Somewhat Behind

Due to my raging egocentrism, I spent a fair amount of time googling myself in various ways yesterday. When I googled "Bizzybiz Blog" I came across the fact that I was listed as a link on Cleveland Rocks.

While I find this to be wicked rad, I am also a bit puzzled by the fact that the link was added on March 25, well over a month after I left Cleveland for the brighter lights of Chicago. Puzzled, but not surprised.

Brilliant Cross-Promotional Strategy!

As a communications major in college planning a career in radio broadcasting, I had my fair share of marketing, advertising and promotions classes. They were some of my favorite classes, due in part to the fact that I got to watch Sportscenter promos in class, but also because I had somewhat of a talent for it.

After school, I went into the field of finance and investing, and this talent lay mostly dormant, until a eureka moment I had in the shower this morning.

I was pondering my temporary living room tattoo parlor, and whether or not it would be funny to hang a sign over my couch that reads "Cap's Tats" as though it were a real business. This led me to think of my brother's idea of opening a bar called "Cap's Tap". I then employed my creative synthesis skills and came up with this magnificent marketing strategy:

1. Brandon opens a bar called Cap's Tap on the ground floor of a two story building. On the second story, I open a trendy tattoo and maybe piercing shop called Cap's Tats.

2. People come into the bar for a drink. Brandon and the bartender, whom Bran has hired away from Tai's, get their patrons drunk and plant the notion that, hey, wouldn't it be cool to go get a tattoo right now? Once this idea takes hold, they mention the convenience of the tattoo place that lives right upstairs!

3. Patron's of Cap's Tap head upstairs to Cap's Tats to get them some ink. Between the time it takes to get the new tattoo finished, and the effect of the pain, Cap's Tats patrons will have considerably sobered up by the end of their visit. My tattoo artists will casually suggest they should celebrate their new body art with a drink. Conveniently, there's a bar right downstairs! Cap's Tats patrons will jubilantly head downstairs to drink some more at Cap's Tap.

You get enough easily led automatons and this could go on all day. My pupils are shaped like dollar signs right now! Excuse me, I have to go call my brother...

Is It The Hat?

Today I wore a light green sundress with a peach, yellow and white floral print, and a peachy-pink little sweater top over it, and a gold necklace with my Italian horn charm on it. None of which could be seen as I walked to the el this morning, because it was entirely covered by my Inspector Gadget trenchcoat. I also had a sweet little hat on.

No less than 6 gentleman honked or whistled at me during my 10 minute stroll to the Addison Brown Line stop.

I ask you: Is it the little hat? Or is it the trench?

Den MILF

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That's What I get For Tempting Fate

I should not have written either of these lines yesterday:

“I like to come home and know that no one will be having an impromptu party despite the fact that they know I have to get up at 4 am the next day.”

and

“I can’t wait to find out what awaits me when I get home today!”

Karma can be a mother fucking whore.

I stopped for a couple of drinks at Tai’s, a trip which has its own set of bizarre stories (remind me if I forget: Holdup at the Citgo, the bartender’s new lecture series “What not to do if you want to score with chicks”, Brawlin’ at the Bar: Drunk Chicks vs. Arrogant Pricks).

Being a person of the grown-up persuasion, I had to work in the morning, so I said goodnight to the bartender and headed for the serenity of home and sleep.

I walked up the stairs and was about to put the key in the lock, when I realized there was a loud buzz coming from inside my apartment. “Huh,” I thought to myself, “What could Vicodin Jim be doing in there? Installing florescent lighting?” I shrugged and entered.

I walked into the living room…and stopped dead in my tracks.

On the couch, cuddled up like two lovebirds, were Hot Heather and her little girlfriend. I will call her Hot Chef Girl (she’s in culinary school). They looked cozy, spooning there under a pink fuzzy blanket (which belongs to Jim) and watching Trainspotting. My coffee table was littered with empty wrappers and cups from Burger King. Also scattered about the table were packs of cigarettes, some lighters, half a dozen half-empty glasses of Kool-Aid and assorted cell phones. My lounge chair was blocking the entrance to my bedroom. Shoes and jackets were scattered about the floor.

Jim was sitting in one of my dining room chairs, which he had pulled into the living room. Beside him was a fold-out card table that I didn’t recognize, containing some tools unfamiliar to me, a huge box of latex gloves, and a few rags. I cast about for the source of the incessant buzzing.

Directly behind Jim in another of my dining room chairs sat a scruffy looking boy I did not recognize. Beside him on the floor sat a sharps container. Jim’s right arm was extended out behind him, and was resting on a little stand, which the scruffy boy was hunched over, peering at it in what appeared to be great concentration. The buzzing sound seemed to be coming from his general direction.

As it turns out, Jim was not installing florescent lighting – the scruffy boy was installing ink into Jim’s elbow.

Jim acts as if this were all perfectly normal. “Where’d you go? Tai’s?” he asked me with a patronizing smile. “I wish you wouldn’t go there anymore,” he continued in his best benevolent tone of voice. “He’s just going to do something to make you cry again, and I don’t want him upsetting you anymore. He’s not good enough for you anyway.”

He is referring to the bartender. I find this entire lecture about my being upset to be very odd, given that it was coming from the mouth of someone who had invited a stranger to set up a tattoo parlor in my living room without telling me.

I attempted to maneuver through the obstacle course that has overtaken my home and get to my kitchen. There I found a sink full of dishes, an empty box of Girl Scout cookies and the remnants of the last of my Texas toast. Defeated, I went back to the living room and flopped down in my lounge chair. Figuring there was nothing to be done about it, I decided that I too should pretend there was nothing amiss and did my best to watch Trainspotting in lieu of strangling Jim.

Hot Heather turned toward me. “You’re out of sugar.”

“Oh?”

Heather shrugged. “I had to make Kool-Aid.” Yes, cherry Kool-Aid is a necessity in a living room tattoo parlor. I looked at the glasses of Kool-Aid dregs. There were far more glasses than people. This means one of two things:

1. There were far more people in my house earlier than the ones I see now. If this is the case, I don’t want to know because I will be livid.

2. These non-dishwashing children feel the need to have a fresh glass every single time they pour a drink. If this is the case, I don’t want to know because I will be exasperated.

I address Heather. “So what you’re telling me is, I’m out of sugar AND Kool-Aid. Is that correct?”

“Um, yes.”

I don’t respond to this. My head turns at a flash of motion on the other side of me. Kristen has opened my bedroom door a crack at the sound of my voice, and has poked only her nose out into the room to try and find me. “Did you guys lock her in there or did she do that herself?”

“She must have done that. We haven’t seen her all day”. All day? You’ve been here all day?

I give up on the genius brigade and climb into my bed. Ahh, sweet rest.

But no.

Through the door I hear ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ from the tattooing as loudly as if scruffy kid had been drawing a thorny rose tattoo on my ear drum. It’s like Chinese water torture. Kristen and I stare at each other, dismayed and wide awake, until Jim’s new body art is completed. This momentous event finally occurs at 3:30 in the mother fucking morning. By the time they close up shop, retrieve their belongings from the places they had thrown them, admire Jim’s arm for 10 minutes, dance a reel, and leave, it is 4. Wisely, Jim decided to go home with Heather, thus preventing his bloody early demise at the hands of his completely frayed roommate. I need to get up at 6. I can’t go to sleep or I’ll never get up, so I text the bartender and tell him to call on his way home so that I’m forced to stay awake. As of this writing I have been fully conscious for the last 36 hours and 14 minutes.

I will not be including any flippant remarks about what might be going on at my house today in this post. Clearly that’s just asking for it.

My Chemical Roommate

Two nights ago, I had a terrible headache of the please-I'm-begging-you-to-stab-me-through-the-ear-with-some-scissors-and-put-me-out-of-my-misery variety. After some Excedrin and a nap, I felt much better, and decided to further sooth myself by painting one of my bedroom walls (home improvement is my favorite hobby). I'm happily painting away, all dressed up in my painting pants (I deliberately spill paint on them from every room I've ever painted, like so many brightly colored memories. Also I'm a big klutz.) My cell phone rings and I see that Hot Heather is calling. "Are you at home?"

"Indeed."

"Then why aren't you answering your door?"

I must have been in the painting zone or something, because sure enough, I opened the door to find Hot Heather and Vicodin Jim standing on my porch. They had brought with them a laundry bag full of clean clothes, a bunch of spiked belts (punk-rock kid wardrobe staple, you must own at least 6 and wear at least half of them at once), a box of girly, fruity toiletries, another box full of shoes, and some DVDs. I was perplexed. "Is it my birthday? Or have you two finally decided you can't be seen with the preppy girl in public, and brought me some punk clothes so I can play dress up?"

"I'm moving in," Jim announced.

Queue headache rebound.

OK, it wasn't as big of a surprise as I'm making it out to be. Jim has been complaining more and more often about the antics of Jimmy O (et al.), the condition of his apartment (squalor) and the status of his material possessions (missing). He peppers these laments with little comments like these: "I'm getting out of there, by hook or by crook." "I should just crash over here." "This storage room you have is pretty big." "I love your neighborhood." and my personal favorite: "You're my best friend." All of this is designed to manipulate me into thinking that I want to have a roommate, and that said roommate should be Jim.

Amber and roommates don’t go well together. Ask Heather – she’ll remember my wacky college roommate experiences. I’ve proven this to myself over and over again. I like peace. I like quiet. I like my stuff to be where I left it. I like to walk from the bathroom to my room without any clothes after I shower. I like to come home and know that no one will be having an impromptu party despite the fact that they know I have to get up at 4 am the next day. Roommates are not conducive to these desires.

Unfortunately, I also have two huge personality defects: a mothering complex and an inability to tell people no. So there is Vicodin Jim, standing on my doorstep with his clothes in a bag, deliberately trying to look pathetic. My poor little friend. Trapped in a filthy apartment in a shitty neighborhood with a cokehead roommate and no heat or stove because the landlord won’t pay to have the gas line to the house fixed. Giving me puppy dog eyes and the ever-persuasive but always fictional promise: “Just for a while until I find a place…”

With a deep sense of foreboding I reply, “Can I help you carry anything?” I am Amber, Captain of the Idiots, and he is Jim of Borg. That is, resistance is indeed futile.

Yesterday, he is singing to himself gleefully when I get home. He’s cleaned out my storage room and shoved most of my stuff in the attic. The bathroom smells like apples or something. I find him piling crap into my medicine cabinet and talking to either me or himself, I’m still not sure. “Strawberry body wash…. razorblades ….make up bag….nail polish…”

“WHAT??? Is this Heather’s crap or something?”

(Indignantly) “NO, it’s MINE. I have to have nail polish for shows, so that I look bad-ass. And I’m wearing black eyeliner and black mascara every day now, ‘cause it makes me look all goth.”

“Fine. But strawberry body wash? I don’t even have shit like that.”

“Why shouldn’t I get to smell nice just because I’m a guy? Huh? HUH? Now, let’s see…deodorant…body spritz…”

I shake my head sadly and go to my room to change. I’m standing in my bra with my skirt unzipped before I realize, oh yeah, I have to shut the fucking door now. Thankfully Jim is still unloading his Channel No. 5 or whatever the fuck he’s “spritzing” himself with.

Five minutes later, I’m in the kitchen looking for something to drink before I go out and run some errands. I notice that I am missing both the half gallon of milk and the carton of orange juice that were in there when I left that morning. I also notice half a pizza in my fridge. I check the freezer. Just as I suspected – he’s eaten my drunk pizza. He yells from inside the bathroom (6 feet away) “Hey, let’s go get some dinner!” Oh yes, lets. Dinner of course means “let’s eat somewhere expensive and then stop by my old house and pick up more of my crap and then have Heather come over and bring Napoleon Dynamite and whine until you agree to stay up all friggin night and watch it”. In 24 hours, I am already going insane.

The good news is that I KNOW this will lead to some excellently funny posts, probably almost daily. My loss is your gain, people. I can’t wait to find out what awaits me when I get home today!

Seriously though, body spritz?

Episode III Insanity

OK, granted, I'm going to see this on opening night, and I'm going to full-out nerd myself by dressing up as a Jedi or perhaps Padme (though Natalie Portman I am not). I know that's going overboard. But this...this is just ridiculous . It's seven weeks away for cryin' out loud.

Hutch ---> Sick Little Monkey

So Hutch has been out of town working on some trial for what seems like forever, and to keep up with him while he's gone, I've been reading his blog . As often happens with compulsive blog reading, Hutch's blog led me to read Fitz's blog, which led me to this post. Ranch dressing my ass.

Hutch, seriously dude, what the fuck? Please please tell me that this has nothing whatsoever to do with my telling you that I want to make out with your sister. Please. Even if it's not true.

Maurice Clarett

Is it vindictive of me to be laughing at this little brat? Even if it is I don't care. I am so very very pleased.

A Table For Manny

Manny is a man of many opinions, which he expresses through analogies that make no sense. Thursday night, Manny stopped into Tai's for a beverage. He got onto a story about how he broke up with the guy he was dating because he was always wanting Manny to act "straight" and go to straight bars, and Manny was sick of it. Manny likes being Manny and likes who he is. He doesn't want to pretend to be something he's not.

The bartender sympathized. People frequently assume he's gay based on the fact that he used to be the manager of one of the biggest gay bars in town and also that he's not married yet. It's not that he cares really, he just doesn't understand why people have to stereotype.

Manny nodded in agreement, then summed up the situation with this:

"You see, there is a table. And the table is in the bar. And there are stools in the bar, and glasses in the bar, and even lights in the bar. Now the table is a table. But just because the table is in the bar doesn't mean that the table is gay."

Man I love that kid.

I Love Chris

So I ran into Chris G. at Tai's. I mentioned that his brother Steve had asked for an acknowledgement of their gracious moving help on Bizzybiz. Chris appeared offended that I don't blog stuff about him all the time. He asked "Don't you love me anymore?"

Chris, sweetie, of COURSE I love you. Don't tell Cap, but I really moved here for you and not him. In fact, I'm stalking you. I'm really good at it; that's why you don't see me. Sometimes I order vodka and Red Bull even though I don't like it just so I can be cool like you. I have a life sized poster of you hanging on my bedroom ceiling. I sewed tags that read "Chris G. is my pimp" into all my underwear. I named my cat Kristen because whenever I call her I get to say Chris. I know I got her a year and a half before I met you, but I knew it would happen. I silk-screened your face onto my pillowcase and I make out with it every night before I go to sleep. I also named one of my vibrators Chris. I have a keepsake box called "Elements of Chris" where I keep a lock of your hair, and cigarette butts you've dropped, and lint I've surreptitiously gathered from your pants. Sometimes I take out the cigarette butts and lick them. I've started rooting for the Bengals and the Reds. I've named you the beneficiary of my life insurance and my 401(k). I spray your cologne on my sheets. I have a hit out on the girl you said you want to marry. I scribble my name with your last name in the margins of all my notes.

Chris G., you are the bomb.