I just can't get over how much I look like a drag queen when compared to my petite "big" sister.



Anyways, we finished the race. A nice n' easy 10 miles on a gorgeous day in downtown Chicago. It was fun to run through the tunnel of Soldier Field, and see ourselves on the big screen in a "sprint" to the finish. I highly recommend it.

Then...after the race...more pictures were taken. This time I stood a step lower so we were even. Who's the drag queen now!?

I do look a little haggard in the pics...but...seriously...I had just run 10 miles.

1. I’m going back to Chicago!
I haven’t been back since November. I have a 10 mile race with my big sis tomorrow that ends on the 50 yard line of Soldier Field. Woohoo! I haven’t worked much on my endurance so far this year, but my speed is much improved in shorter races (without any specific speed training). I finished 5th for my age/sex group in the last race I ran (5k), and I was only 10 seconds away from 3rd (Keep in mind that this was not a large race, probably 300 participants total). My 10k endeavor at the beginning of April seemed pretty effortless. I’ll hope to replicate that tomorrow, but it isn’t likely. I haven’t put in the miles yet, and my flight gets in at 11:30 PM this evening for a 7:00 AM race downtown tomorrow.

I’ll really enjoy seeing everyone. I’m tired of introducing myself to new people…it’ll be nice to finally go where people know who the hell I am.

2. We got our Wii Fit today! I pre-ordered it online because Seth and I are the types who don’t like grappling with soccer moms in stores.

It. Is. AWWWWWESOME.

I apparently have no sense of balance, and it kind of deflates my spirit to have my “personal trainer” call me weak and unbalanced…but it’s still awesome.
I sweat just thinking about it.

5 pounds?

Really?

5 pounds?

In the nearly 8 months since I migrated from Virginia to South Carolina, I’ve gained 5 pounds. For someone who has maintained the same weight from the age of 19 to 26 years old, that’s slightly distressing.

Is it distressing? Yes.

Is it surprising? Hmmm, no. Not really.

When I left the Old Dominion State, I was running at least 6-8 miles per day. I ate whatever I wanted, based on the idea that I’d be burning anywhere from 500-1500 calories per workout.

Here? I haven’t burned anything (unless you count charred pop tarts and movie theatre style popcorn).

Don’t get me wrong…my ass doesn’t have its own helipad or anything, but it is making me take a more thoughtful look at the kind of crap I shovel into my face.

Starbucks. …Heaven in a cup. My office recently moved to another building whilst the old one is renovated. I now live only 4 blocks from work instead of 8. …and would you believe it? In the FOUR blocks I have to walk to work, there’s a Starbucks. Calling out to me. Beckoning me.

“Drink me, Kerry. You DESERVE me. Get a scone too. You’re worth it. Scones and mochas will provide much needed nourishment for you to perform at your best.”

Hello? Scones and mochas? Nevermind that my favorite scone has over 500 calories and my favorite mocha has over 350. Put some whipped cream on there too. …on the scone and the mocha. Why not? It’s breakfast! Mom is always trying to get me to eat breakfast!

After recognizing that I was wasting half of my daily calories on garbage (2-3 times per week!)…the words “skinny,” “non-fat,” (and Heaven forbid) “tall,” have slowly started to work themselves into my vocabulary. My once delicious mocha with whipped has transformed into a tall, skinny, non-fat, vanilla latte.

That’s why it was so jarring to hear the words “venti, whole milk, 8-pump, vanilla latte,” from the woman in front of me in line this morning.

Whole milk!? 8 pumps!?

I nearly fainted. I had to tense all the muscles in my face in order for the blood to start rushing back to my head. She was like a walking tragedy in sweatpants.

I felt like I was in one of those cliché war movies where a hero leaps in slow motion to shield a comrade from a bullet…

“NOOOOOOOOOOO!” I yelled as I did a Superman-like dive into the open space between the Barista and the Tragedy in Sweatpants.

Alas, the Tragedy in Sweatpants ambled happily out the door with her treat, not to be seen again.


Anyways…

I’m getting older. It’s freaky. This May marks FIVE years that I’ve been OUT of college.

Gone are the days of eating Twizzlers for dinner. …and I think I’m pretty sad about it. Sad enough to eat a couple scones.

If there is a portion of hell devoted to terrible, ill-fitting underwear, I own a pair that were crafted by Lucifer himself.

If I ever decided to go on tour with a traveling museum of the world’s worst undergarments, I have some that would qualify as the most prized spectacle. People would come from miles around to pay two bits for a gander at the absolute scourge of my top dresser drawer.

Uggghhh. They’re just awful. Cosmetically, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with them. They bear a striking resemblance to their VS cousins.

But every time I wear them, people note my apparent displeasure. I have a perpetual look of confusion on my face…

“Did I put them on backwards? …is the hole that was meant for one of my legs currently sitting around my waist? Something is very very wrong.”

And you may be thinking, “Why put yourself through such uncomfortableness, Kerry?”

That’s an excellent question, friend. And it’s a question that I haven’t fully been able to answer this entire morning.

Here’s what I have come up with…

1. I have an extreme distaste for the common-man toils of housework and laundry. Let’s say that due to my distaste, I postpone my laundry activities for an extended period of time. Imagine the horror I might feel if my drawer failed to yield more panties! That alone has incited me to hang on to this scary, marginal pair.
2. It’s easier to make excuses for yourself in the face of such an uncomfortable obstacle.

For example,

Boss: “Kerry, were you able to finish those reports?”
Kerry: “I tried, but I’m wearing a horrible pair of underbritches.”
Boss: “You poor thing! I’m sending you home. I’ll pray that you feel better soon.”
Kerry: “God bless you.”

When you stop and think about it, it’s actually a fascinating commentary on human behavior…

Or maybe it’s just about sloth. …ill-fitting, twisting, uncomfortable sloth.

Am I the only one who has a bladder that is acutely aware of the proximity of bathrooms? I feel so strongly about this phenomenom that I made a graph. ...it's just what I do.

I think that this link is funny...

I shared my enthusiasm by telling it to somebody, and somebody didn't think it was funny.

Not. At. All.

Keep in mind that this is the same somebody who often regales me with stories of his/her digestive pyrotechnics. And shares such stories with as much thoughtful detail as one of those Reader's Digest book excerpts. Meaning: Thanks for sharing that chapter of your life with me, but knowing what I know now...it's a safe bet that I'll never buy that paperback.

I mean...really. Have you ever been to TGIFriday's and seen those sugar packets that have the conversation starters on the back (e.g. "If you could have any super power, what would it be?")?

I have yet to pick one of those up that says, "Tell your dinner partner about your last BM."

So in conclusion, I think that Garfield minus Garfield is funny. And some of you who submit poo stories to magazines may disagree.

So, about that art project I was working on...

I bring you...

TADA!

The Scrabble Table


The Scrabble Table (aka "The thing that caused me to have arthritis at a very young age") is 1,320 Scrabble Tiles that are meticulously glued to the surface of my $40 grad school coffee table.

There are many many many projects that I only do once. This is mostly because at the beginning, I'm too stupid to realize what a pain in the ass it will be to complete. If someone asked me to do another one of these tables, I'd seriously look to hang myself from the nearest tree. If Ethan Allen knocked on my door and asked me to mass produce these (which I consider to be a major possibility at this point) I'd turn his ass into a handsome, handcrafted settee.

And since I know it's at the forefront of your mind...

You'll be happy to know that while I did successfully resist the urge to sneak any dirty words into the matrix...(e.g. "poop", "bitch", and "shit"... in case you needed some examples)...I inadvertently included A-S-S-C-L-O-W-N. Maybe it was just my subconscious trying to honor Michael Bolton. Who knows.

But seriously...since Seth and I are so close to our families (emotionally, rather than physically), I thought it would be a good idea to spread all of their names throughout the table. It makes me smile every time I spot a familiar name. I even included pets (*cough* I'm sorry, did I say "pets?" They're not pets...they're "cousins/nieces").


In the beginning, God created Target. Many years later, Target created a table. They created this table in the likeness of...a table.


"500 tiles outta do it," Kerry thought as she purchased her supplies on eBay.

Wow. Really. Really. Piss. Poor. Estimation.
Those tiles sitting on the table in the picture above aren't glued yet. They were just helping me nail down the actual number that I'd need.

At about $.07 per Scrabble tile, this makes my coffee table the most valuable thing in my home. Anything that someone wishes to set on the table has to go through an intensive 12 point screening. The below picture is fairly early in the process. As I recall, it was in between the time when I had a healthy dose of enthusiasm, and the time when it got so monotonous that I started speaking in tongues.







And with four coats of polyurethane and a custom black frame... we have a usable table.



And there you have it. Since I purchased the Scrabble sets from different folks, some are disco-era tiles and some are much more recent productions. Of course, they're not at all uniform in size (which I found to be an interesting challenge), and so I have a slightly bumpy table.

I'm glad it's over. I was tired of explaining to people what I was doing (since it made me feel like a creepy loser with nothing better to spend my time on).

"Hi! My name is Kerry, and as a hobby, I like to glue stuff to other stuff!"

I think it's definitely S-C-R-U-M-P-T-L-E-S-C-E-N-T (that's 22 points if you promise you won't challenge it).

I was flipping through the University of Illinois alumni magazine and spotted a familiar name...Rafael Correa...

he was my TA for Microeconomics way back in 2000. I was in a huge lecture of about 600 people, and Rafael was in charge of my discussion group that met once a week.

"Hmmm, I wonder what he's up to these days," I thought to myself. I wonder if he's achieved the almost unachievable heights that I have since parting with the university (not bloody likely, but eh, he is an Illini).

As I read the listing in the alumni mag, I stopped. I read it again.

Rafael was inaugurated as President of Ecuador in January 2007.

WTF?

President of Ecuador? Rafael?

Maybe he wanted a challenge. I mean...Ecuador? The words "economic implosion" come to mind.

In the 6 years since getting his grad degree in econ...he's President of a country.

In the 2.5 years since getting my grad degree in econ...I'm...uhhh...President of Keeping It Real (but not much else).

For the last 8 years, I've held onto a paper that I wrote in that class. It was an analysis of the Virgin Corporation brands. At the time, they were launching a discount clothing line in England and had plans to branch out to the United States; I thought it was a dumb ass idea and wrote the paper on it.

"95. Very well written! Interesting topic!"

The President of Ecuador thinks I'm awesome. Beat that, bitches.

You may remember a few posts ago when I was talking about my picky eating habits...and if you don't remember, please, by all means, go and read it again...

I'll wait...

...


Okay, now that we're caught up, I have to tell you that my picky habits have absolutely nothing to do with dessert. A healthy coating of chocolate could get me to ingest anything...even things that aren't considered food: Chocolate-covered rocks, turds...even pork chops. And I hate pork chops.

As I've mentioned before, I live and work near the downtown market. It's usually bustling with old people tourists who knock you over with their ample fannies and considerably more ample fannie packs (aside: I wonder why they went with the name "fannie pack" and not "ass satchel." It's catchier. Kind of rolls off the tongue). In between dodging the fogeys with ass satchels, you catch intermittent whiffs of what I call "hardcore pornography of the nose."

Candy and ice cream shops. Their scent is an amalgamation of waffle cones, pralines, and candied pecans. It draws you in like a scented siren song and takes hold until you can't quite remember where or why you were trying to be anywhere but the place you find yourself in.

Funny how a smell can make you feel like that. I'd even pay for it.
They could have little seedy shops with tinted windows on the outskirts of town... with private smelling booths. I'd go.

But luckily it's a free indulgence that's only steps out my front door.

So, I’ve started an “art project.” Seth gets a look of panic on his face whenever I say I want to start an “art project.” A lot of my ideas never come to fruition, but I really hit the ground running on this one. I’ll plan to display the finished product and a brief summary of the steps involved when it’s completed (I’m at about 40% right now, and I already think it’s SCRUMPTULESCENT). What I can tell you about my mysterious deed, is that it takes plenty of glue. Gorilla Glue: The Strongest Glue on Earth. Now, just in case you ever plan on gluing things for various shits and giggles, let me lend a word to the wise….

When you go to buy glue at the hardware store, and you read the bottle of glue that says, “use gloves while working with the glue.” It might be of use to heed that advice.

When the lady who works at the hardware store reiterates that directive, do not look at her with the same look of contempt that I did, and say, “Pfffft. Whatever, hardware store lady. I’ve been using glue since I was in preschool.”

On Friday, I glued about 500 separate pieces of my project (seriously). Now...on Monday… I still have solid-black, tacky fingers. I feel like the fly. I can pick up pieces of paper by simply touching them with the tips of my fingers. I haven’t tried to scale any walls, but I imagine that I’d have a fair amount of success at that as well.

At the very best, it looks like I don’t take care in washing myself since it’s like black, sticky, hand dandruff.

So there you go; News you can use.

I may just be the pickiest of the picky eaters. I'm the kind of lady who orders a BLT...hold the lettuce and tomato.

Green vegetables? Pass.

Anything gleaned from the sea? Pass.

Foods recognized by the USDA as being part of a healthy adult's daily diet? Pass.

Charleston is supposedly a hotbed of Southern culinary delights, and the signature dish out here seems to be shrimp and grits. It appears on 95% of all breakfast, lunch AND dinner menus. I can't help but feel like Joe Pesci in "My Cousin Vinny," and say,

"Sure sure, I've heard of grits, I just never actually seen a grit before."

Seth and I went out to the Food and Wine Festival a few weekends ago and had the opportunity to sample some of the region's fine wine and signature dishes.

Now let me tell you something about what happens when Kerry and wine intersect...
not only do I start to have an inflated sense of my dancing abilities, but I become a much more adventurous eater.

Kerry + wine = "Pass the octopus, and don't you dare skimp on the tentacles!"

So they didn't have any octopus, but I was permitted the honor of my first grits experience.

That there in the bowl is chicken, cheesy grits, and some extra tidbits.
Now I don't know about you, but to me, that looks strikingly like some of the low-to-moderately priced fake vomits that I've seen in my day.

Nevertheless,

Note the look of panic on my face.

It tasted as good as it looked.

However, there were some food triumphs. The poached pear and blue cheese in the puff pastry was the best thing I've eaten in years. I was also pretty keen on the white truffle and cauliflower soup.

We're not fancy people...though...I think we played the part quite well:

Sometimes Seth and I have conversations that I could only imagine within the context of a bong, lava lamps, and Jefferson Airplane music.

Yet...

We're pretty straight-laced people as far as drugs are concerned. Caffeine and the very occasional alcoholic beverage will cure what ails us.

Fun Kerry Fact: I've never smoked anything at all. Cigarettes included.

So anyways...

We were talking and considered the following...

If you were impregnated with and successfully gave birth to a perfect clone of yourself...do you think that you could raise a better "you" than your parents did?

Assuming that your "child" started with an exact copy of your genetic material, do you think that you would create a better environment for "you?"

Do you think that you would treat that child any differently than one created the old fashioned way?

Do you think those who opt for in vitro fertilization with anonymous sperm donors would prefer to give birth to clones of themselves?

Feel free to drink a beer or two and enter your thoughts in the comments section.

Personally, I wouldn't mind a clone or two of myself lying around to harvest a couple supple organs from...but maybe that's just me.

Okay, let's start with the happy maker....

It's warming up again here. Yesterday was one of those days that was so perfect in every way. If we had that kind of weather in Chicago, you can bet that people would describe it as their "one day." Meaning...the one day a year in Chicago that has perfect weather. Anyways, we've had a few days in the mid 70s (woohoo! I love March) and things are starting to bloom. There's one plant that I walk by on my way to work that smells exactly like a raspberry wheat beer. I don't drink (heavily) before I get to work, but I imagine that this is the next best thing. Delicious.

I've been going to these two websites every day for a while now, but I enjoy them and thought you all might too...

1. www.freerice.com
I start all of my days with free rice. It's a vocabulary quiz that donates 20 grains of rice for every question you get right. The level of difficulty increases with the number of correct answers. I maxed out at level 44, but usually average about 41 or 42.

2. Walkjogrun.net
For those who enjoy walking around their neighborhoods, this uses google maps, and will allow you to map out your exact route to see how far you've traveled. It is precisely one mile from home to work.

And finally, a curiosity...

If the smell of food can trigger hunger...can the smell of poop trigger the urge to move your bowels?

Seth and I are undecided, but are willing to participate in the control group if the rest of you are willing to smell poop.

One of the projects I’m currently working on at work involves riding around on my bicycle (yes, Jackie…I do tuck my pants into my socks) and taking pictures. Some of the things I’m required to capture on film are local playgrounds.

Let me tell you something…

I’ve never felt so much like a dirty old lady. Every time I roll up with my camera, people look at me with horrified suspicion.

I guess it’s a good thing that people are so protective of their children. But…even after I explain myself and they’re still shielding their children from my view, I want to say…

“Listen, lady…it’s just a picture. I can assure you that I have no nefarious intentions. I’m not attempting steal his soul and sell it on eBay.”

Imagine. People suspicious of me…

Kerry the boogie-woman. I don’t drive a van, I’m not offering candy with razorblades, I’m not soliciting a child’s assistance in “finding my dog,” hell…I even left my ski-mask at home.

It’s reassuring and sad all at the same time.

I love to see people at parks. I love to see parents who engage in active play time with their children. It’s nice to see that they’re involved in their offspring’s lives and would shield them from any ill if given the opportunity.

It would be great if not for all that fear. …yeesh. We live in a society that thrives on fear. We’re leery of the 26 year old woman who dresses in business casual attire, rides a bike, and carries a camera. How scary and sad.

Regardless of all that, I’m having fun taking snaps about town (below are just a few of the seemingly millions that I've gathered within biking distance to my home). Creeps can manage a decent photo every once in a while…
Note to the Midwest: This is what it looks like in South Carolina during the dead of winter. I suggest you invest in an atlas and drive far far away from snow forever.

The Southeastern Wildlife Expo has come into town, and it seemed like a perfect weekend diversion (mostly because I scored free weekend passes and many of the events were within walking distance).

It's basically just a lot of Jack Hanna lectures, birds of prey, and fried twinkies that are spread out all over the city.

Today we headed over to Brittlebank Park to see some Doggie Dock Diving.

At first...it kinda seemed like doggie amateur hour.

You suck, "Maggie." Go back home and eat your Wheaties...urrr...kibble, or whatever will make you suck less.

But then...

Holy shit!

We stayed and only watched one heat out of six in the competition. The finals are tomorrow and the winning pooch will take home a fat one hundred dollar prize.

With mad cash like that, I'm sure that Fido will get all the bitches (*snort* ...sorry, couldn't resist a lame female dog = bitch joke)

I am deeply saddened and sickened by the shooting at Northern Illinois today. For those who are new here and unaware, I am also a former NIU graduate student(MA Econ '05).

It was the latest in a serious of violent crimes that have hit pretty close to home for me.

3 weeks ago: Woman is raped and robbed at Queen Street Grocery. At 9:30 in the morning. In a good neighborhood. 2 blocks from where I work.

2 weeks ago: 5 murdered at Tinley Park Lane Bryant. Near to my childhood home. Much nearer to my sister's current home. Things like this don't happen in that neighborhood.

Today: 6 dead at NIU.
Update: A seventh died last night.
Update: They're saying it's six again.

The fact that these violent crimes all occurred in such familiar and "safe" settings makes me realize how apathetic I was to most violence that happened in "other places" to "other people." But you have to desensitize yourself. You'd literally go crazy if every crime you saw on the news had the ability to shake you to your core.

But this last one certainly has. I'm sure someone, somewhere will dub this the St. Valentine's Day Massacre Part II, and all my fellow Huskies will feel a little less safe in a place where their biggest fear should be an endless string of midterms.

I'll be praying for the survivors and the victim's families. Things like this don't happen there.

Update: The gunman is 27 year old Stephen Kazmierczak (I've also seen it as "Steven Kazmierczak"). Award-winning graduate student (2006 Dean's Award Winner from the Sociology Dept. at Northern Illinois) at the School of Social Work at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. 2005 Vice-President of the NIU Academic Criminal Justice Association.

"You can’t just go ahead and be anything you want to be. Face it, no matter what other people tell you about how special you are, some of you are never going to be astronauts.”

We sat there. Frozen. Bug-eyed. From the faint odor that began to fill the room, you could tell that someone had soiled themselves from fright (which had him a leg-up on the rest of us who wanted to be astronauts).

Our trigonometry teacher actually had the nerve to “be real” with us. How dare she. How dare she not tell us how gifted we were. I didn’t learn a stitch of trigonometry that whole year in a lame attempt at a silent protest. Ugghhh, what a horror that teacher was…with more chins than common sense and a druthers for accusing me of cheating. I wouldn’t put it past her to rip up Helen Keller’s exam if her super-sleuth mentality detected Helen’s wandering eye.

She made me hate math.

But hey…it wasn’t always that way.

I maintain that I had the absolute best junior high math teacher ever. He was a short, slight man with tinted glasses and a receding hairline. Of course, he was bit of a nerd who always entered the room with a big smile and a nasal, “Hey Gang!” We were one of the top math teams in the state, and back then, math was part repetition, part teamwork, and part magic.

“Take a pencil from the jar, but be careful with your choice. These are magic pencils. They’ve been used by decades of junior high math teams before you. The short ones have been around for a while, so they know all the answers. They’re just waiting for your guidance to let all that knowledge out.”

Of course it was corny. It was corny in the same way that he made us check our “biorhythms” before competitions (a computer program that told us where our physical, emotional, and intellectual peaks would be given a particular date). But I’ll be damned if it wasn’t the best time.

I would complete 18 years of schooling before I recognized a sad fact: Teachers rarely inspire like he did. Like the time when he stopped the lecture…reached for his wallet and counted out $200.

“I want to have a school-wide hot dog day. Make all the arrangements of where, when, and how…and if you succeed…we’ll use the profits to buy pizza. I’m not going to help.”

But then…somewhere along the line…I started to hate math.

And let me tell you something… For someone who loves economics and wanted to make a life out of it…math is a terrible thing to hate. Robert H. Frank describes the insane level of mathematical formalization in economics as “too high for the same reason that people tend to raise their voices at cocktail parties.” It’s true. It’s an arms race. My inability to step-up my level of abstract mathematical thinking just about weeded me right out the graduate school door. I was a base 8 girl living in a base 10 world.

Which brings us to the present-day…

A woman I know is taking a pre-calculus class. Word got around to her that Kerry “knows math.” After talking to her, I know that she has all of that same math anxiety and hatred that I’ve seen in myself so many times. Ever wonder why math is always a requirement and rarely an elective?

Ice skating is an elective.
Differential Equations? Not so much.

“Kerry, I’m having trouble with this problem.”

“Hmmmm, let’s see. A decaying exponential function!? What fun! Let me grab my magic pencil and we’ll be on our way.”

After helping her work through the problem set (which was quite a bit of fun, I must admit)…I thought of my relationship with math. And you know what? I’ve made my peace with math. We’ve had a long history, and despite my hatred of it…I’m pretty decent at it. For me, math is like an old boyfriend who you see out every now and again…and who you’re perfectly cordial to, but shudder at the thought of ever deeply committing to again.

And we’re cool like that.

Dear Math:

I’m sorry, but I’ve fallen in love with another. His name is Seth. It’s not me…it’s definitely you. I hope we can still be friends even though I’m not an astronaut.

Love and Lemmas,

Kerry

So Seth and I were chilling at IHOP this morning...

...when all of a sudden the old dude sitting adjacent to us starts convulsing and grabbing his chest. His eyes rolled back and he couldn't respond.

When something like that happens, the bacon that you're gnawing on doesn't seem so tasty anymore. Two nurses in the restaurant hurdled some Sunday breakfast eaters and rushed over to him after hearing the commotion. Seth jumped on his phone and called 911 to summon the ambulance.

Seth and I had pretty much served our purpose...I mean...unless Mr. Heart Attack wanted us to regale him with tales of nuclear power or government spending, there really wasn't much more we could do.

It all reminded me of that scene in "When Harry Met Sally" when Meg Ryan has a big "O" in the middle of the restaurant and the old lady tells the waitress, "I'll have what she's having."

Except...I'll never want what that guy was having. In fact, he may have given me a lifetime aversion to buttermilk pancakes.

And I love pancakes.

I hope Mr. Heart Attack is okay. We left when the ambulance arrived.

I know, it's rare for Kerry to write two blog posts in one week let alone one day. ...but lucky you! You get to suckle at the ample teat that is my creativity.

Actually, I overheard some valley girls today and didn't want to forget the meat of their conversation...it must be preserved in its entirety for posterity.

Scene: A drugstore.

Girl #1 in line to check-out points at a tabloid

Girl #1: "OMG! Jamie Lynn Spears is giving up her baby!"

Girl #2: "Yeah, I read that one already."

Girl #1: "She should give it to Oprah. I think Oprah would be a good Mom 'cause she would be able to buy Gucci onesies."

Girl #2: "Or she could give the kid to Brangelina."

Girl #1: "No...they only like 3rd world babies."


Utterly hysterical in its unintentional vapidity. Loved it.

Where I come from, if someone looks disheveled and tired, you might refer to that person as a "hot mess."

I have to say that I really enjoy what appears to be the equivalent of that phrase here in the South. I've heard it before, but saying it with the Southern accent gives it a sense of authenticity that I haven't previously witnessed.

"Damn, that girl looks like she was rode hard and put away wet."

Ouch.

It's of course, a term for riding horses. If you don't give a horse a little rub down, remove the saddle, and cool him off after riding, it means that you've "put him away wet."

But I'll be damned if I just don't titter like a school girl every time I hear someone say it. Hysterical.

Seth and I went away for a day. Where are we!?

Clue #1... You can ride dinosaurs! YEE-HAW! Is it Jurassic Park?


Clue #2...it's home of the one and only Kiss Coffeehouse!


Clue #3... the view from our hotel room. Yeah, that's the ocean.

Ron Paul and I are BFF (Best Friends Forever). This is me and Ron just hangin':


Kerry: "You're my personal hero!"

Ron Paul: "You seem genuinely excited to see me!"

Seth: "We're big fans and huge Libertarians!"

Kerry: "I'm totally gonna blog this when I get home, Ron!"

The South Carolina primary nears. Ron Paul would have my vote if I was eligible to vote here. We ran into him after eating chicken wings at a local establishment. He was alone except for a guy with a camcorder.

As evident from the picture, I've had a LOT of alcohol. In other weird news, some bartender at the bar we went to tonight recognized me. We're from the same high school on the South Side o' Chicago. We're also from the same junior high and grammar school. We drank to celebrate the occasion. Crazy!?

The Catholic Church downtown here isn't much like my church in Chicago...

If you looked around at the parishioners in my Chicago neighborhood, you'd notice that we're not the fanciest bunch. Where I come from, the answer to the question "WWJD?" is clearly, "wear sandals everywhere, grow a long beard, and drink lots of wine." Most of the men at my church look like they're participating in a Bill Belichick look-a-like contest.



It's kind of a place where you come as you are...and I'm not sure that there's anything wrong with that.

The church here is markedly different. A lot of the people are fairly well-to-do, and some of the ladies look like they're going straight to Ascot after the service...


I felt naked without a hat.

None of that really has any point except to say this...

last week when I went to church with me mum (she was in town), there was a little girl (probably about 9 years old) sitting in front of us. She had a cute little purple charm bracelet with several trinkets on it...including...The Little Mermaid, Spongebob Squarepants, and THE REPUBLICAN ELEPHANT SYMBOL.

Hello!? I'm all for encouraging children to get excited about the democratic process (it's awesome to learn those things and plant seeds of responsible citizenship)...but to encourage them to make party affiliations? That's just creepy.

Or maybe she just likes Young Republicans for the same reason I did...

they attract the cutest boys.

I'm getting a ton of folks from the West Coast end up here because they're wondering and googling "what's an Illini?"

Oh. You'll find out today, my friends.

Welcome to my blog! As I'm sure you already know, quite a few people underestimate the Illini football team. Well, David has had a few weeks to load up his slingshot. Ready yourself, Goliath.

Enough about football and back to the reason you're here...what is an Illini? Well, here's my shitty reader's digest abridged version...keep looking on the web, you'll find a more complete answer:

The Illini were a confederation of tribes in the Mississippi Valley area consisting of the Peoria, Kaskaskia, Tamaroa, Cahokia, and Michigamea tribes. Of course, "Illiniwek" means "men" and gave the state of Illinois her name (after some minor tweaking by the French).

They grew maize, squash, and pumpkins.

...but TROJANS are the main staple of their diet.

Learning is FUNdamental, ladies and germs.

If there's a lesson in anything I write...it's usually that you don't want to get Kerry angry.

The other day, I accidentally made a wrong turn downtown when I should've known the way. Seth had to get back home to #2, so he was understandably upset and impatient. I was mad that he was mad, and when we got close enough to home, he jumped out of the vehicle at an intersection and raced home.

I hate it when my driving skills are questioned. I think that driving is very personal for everyone. Like I've heard George Carlin say, "everyone that drives faster than you is a maniac, and everyone that drives slower than you is an idiot."

My perfect driving technique will undoubtedly be my legacy and gift to the world:

Here lies Kerry
1981-2132
Loving Wife, Sister, and Daughter
Communist Dictator
Inventor of Digitally Transmitted Smells
Transcendent Motorist

I'm the Mary Poppins of drivers: practically perfect in every way. So when my automobile operator ego is bruised, it really stings. I was angry that he called attention to my driving faux pas, so I had to reciprocate the humiliation that I felt. I rolled down my window, pointed at Seth, and yelled to a group of old people tourists, "he got out of the car because he has to poop!"

Hmmm...I don’t think it was Seth who caught the brunt of the humiliation on that one. Those old people looked at me with the same look of confused pity that you would bestow upon a woman who's 5 years too old to be wearing an outfit that's 5 sizes too small.

Oh well, the unintentional comedy quickly quelled our anger. Funny how that happens.

Twas the Night Before Christmas
and all through the house,
not a creature was stirring,
because we both got locked out.

Okay, so maybe that didn't rhyme. Maybe my sense of iambic pentameter has been clouded by rage and subsequent relief.

It was an unseasonably warm Christmas Eve for two native Illinoisians, probably about 60+ degrees and sunny. So...we decided to play some frisbee in the soccer fields next to our condo. After an hour or so of running and jumping, we were sweaty and cashed. We collected our things to head back home when...

Seth: "Shit. The key isn't in my pocket."

Kerry: "Ha ha...whatever, ass clown."

Seth: "Kerry...I'm not kidding."

Kerry: "Ha ha...you're kidding.

Seth: "We better start looking, there's only an hour of daylight left."

Kerry: "Whatever. You have the key."

After Seth started looking for the key, it became apparent to me that maybe he didn't actually have it. Shit. Locked out. Christmas Eve evening. No money. No phones. No identification.

But let's look at the bright side...at least the tiny little key had to be somewhere in the GIANT ASS OPEN FIELD.



Kerry: " *%$#@!, Seth! Mother %$@#$@!& &%*#*@ key! For the love of #$@!@#$ Stinking #$%@#$!"

I combed the field, while Seth did his best impression of Spiderman.

Note: We don't live on the first floor.



But we got inside somehow (hence my typing on the computer)...and Sethie feels bad.



I'll forgive him in exchange for some early Christmas presents.

What a sweet guy.

but what are high-heels made for?

I walk to work in gym shoes. They don't exactly complement the ensemble, but at least my feet don't have to cower in fear. Every time I wear high-heeled shoes for any distance greater than 8 feet, my shoes begin to fill with blood.

Who...in the hell...would do that to themselves on purpose?

Right. So I get the fact that high-heeled shoes make you taller and make your ass stick out, supposedly so you'll be more attractive to the opposite sex. Unfortunately for me, the opposite sex can't seem to look past my strange hobbling and the trail of blood originating at my feet. C'mon...what about that scenario isn't sexy?

Yet...defying all odds, I managed to snag a man without wearing high-heels.

Woohoo! Take that, social norms!

But still, I can't help but feel like I'm in the middle of some kind of a weird sexual arms race. Before I know it, women will be walking around on stilts and toting their enhanced breasts around on dollies.

Presumably...if all women wore high-heels, then no woman would gain a competitive advantage ...but all women would be in pain.

Hello!?

The solution then should be fairly obvious....I'm going to talk to every woman on the planet and convince them that if we all agreed to not wear high-heels...then we'd all be better off collectively.

Yeah...that might work.

"Just sign on the dotted line."

But then some bitch on stilts would come around the corner and blow the whole deal.

Uggghh. I hate bitches on stilts.

Punishment for violating the agreement would have to be swift and severe. On the third occasion that someone is found to be wearing performance enhancing shoes, I propose a lifetime ban from society.

The sexual market would become a police state...and we might all recognize that we were happier with the illusion than with the truth.

Who said anything about baseball? I'm talking about shoes here, people.

One of the benefits of living so close to the action in a metropolitan (but not humongous) city, is that everything is pretty much right out our front door.

Last weekend, we headed off to a Celebrity Chili Cookoff that was only two blocks away on the waterfront. We had some chili (some good [and spicy! mmmmmm], and some was downright putrid), we drank plenty of beer, and tooted our drunk asses all the way home. Later that night, we watched some decorated boats and fireworks from our balcony.

The next morning, we woke up and noticed that there were a bunch of people congregating in the street below our condo.

PARADE!

Except...

It was one of the most broke parades I've ever seen. It looked like cars had accidentally driven into the middle of the parade and decided to stay, wave, and honk their horns. Some of it was cute. A parade is a parade. I enjoyed waving to the little kids (half of whom were asleep) that were riding on the floats.

Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade can keep their elaborate blown up cartoon characters, and magical Santa Claus / Winter Wonderland floats....we've got the College of Charleston Belly Dancer Club.

Which...I don't know...seem like they probably spend a lot of time inside. Far far away from sun. Which could be true, since I'm not exactly sure how outdoorsy the sport of belly dancing is. And I haven't seen any belly dancing bangles in L.L. Bean lately.

Aside: Like I should be one to talk. My skin borders on transparent. I scare little children with the reflective glow from my body.



To each his own. I mean...I was in Econ Club. Now that was a rowdy, midriff-baring bunch of pale people.

According to HGTV, a Rose Bowl full of Illini is the new look for 2008.

Shit. We have 10 Capital One Bowl tickets to sell.

UPDATE: Shit. We sold 10 Capital One Bowl tickets. But we hastily evaluated the crazy fluctuations in the Bowl market and sold them for 70% of what we could have gotten. Shit.

Seth and I decided to take our long Thanksgiving weekend and go the the fam's condo in Florida.

Then...just for giggles, we went to a local greyhound track.

I kept staring at this girl saying, "Seth, that looks exactly like my first college roommate."

And it was! At a greyhound track! In Florida!

Weird.

Melissa and I didn't have a whole lot in common (sorority vs. independent ... I'll leave you to figure out which is which), but I still remember some good times. She was definitely a good person to start the college experience with. After the first semester in the dorms, she moved out to be in the sorority house.

7 years later, and we're at a dog track in Florida.

I'm gonna go all Oprah on you guys now and describe one of my 'favorite things.'

Unfortunately, those in my audience (unlike Oprah's) won't be handed a truckload of Omaha Steaks or the World's Greatest Emery Board when I've finished.

I love it when strangers are eavesdropping on my conversations and then laugh (presumably) because I've said something funny.

"Ooo! Strangers think I'm funny! Big warm fuzzy for Kerry!"

One of the last times it happened, we were in line for movie tickets...

Kerry: "$10 for a movie ticket! That's absurd! But look...it says that Manatees get in for $5.50. Seth, help me perfect my manatee impression so the ticket guy doesn't catch on...

*Ahem*

I'm a Manatee. You may also refer to me as Dugong or Sea Cow. Oooggggaaaaaahhhhhh."

Seth: "Kerry...that says matinee."

Kerry: "DAMN IT!"

(Stranger behind us in line laughs)


I say stupid things. A lot. Sometimes my family and friends are desensitized to my extraordinary wit (that's the theory I'm goin' with. No comments please), and don't see the absolute hilarity in a manatee joke.

So...

Thank you to the lady behind us in line. You're the first person to ever laugh at that one....and I've been saying it for years. You've given me the encouragement that I'll need to tell it for years to come.