By the time you read this, I will be gone. I have left you. Our whirlwind five-year romance has come to a bittersweet end. You are stunned and heartbroken, I know; you will sulk for years, perhaps forever, and wonder “why, oh why has Joe left me?” But you know, just as I do, that it was not meant to be. The problems in our relationship were legion:

1. Weather. It was your decision to turn yourself every winter into a desolate wasteland of bitter cold and ice. I’m sure you thought that was funny, watching your people scurry to and fro for seven months out of the year. I’m sure you got a kick out of the arctic wind barreling down Jackson Avenue. Maybe you thought the piles of dirt-streaked snow lining my sidewalk were hysterical. I’m sure you enjoyed the sweltering swamp-like humidity for the other five months out of the year. In our five years together, you granted me maybe ten days of good weather. It was your decision to cast the sky in endless gray clouds for the entirety of every January. You have the coldest winters and the hottest summers on earth; you are the worst of both worlds.
2. Parking. For the outrageous sum of $119 annually, you granted me the privilege of parking my car in your so-called “street parking”. But then you closed my street every week for your “street cleaning” and your “construction”. You sent your police officers to give me parking tickets for such heinous crimes as “no front license plate”, when the plate on the back was perfectly there. You even towed me once, because you were “filming a movie”. I paid you for parking; Batman did not.
3. The Chicago Transit Authority. Of all the evils I was subject to while living with you, none compare to the paltritude of your “CTA”. How long did you think I would tolerate your buses that were two hours late every day? Did you think it was funny when your employees didn’t clean up the urine that streaked the cars of your subway trains? Did you laugh when your people were trapped in your trains during the summer, with no air, sitting motionless on the track “waiting for signals ahead?” You are not laughing now, you bitch, for I am gone, and your CTA is but a distant memory.
4. Ineptitude. You, not I, hired complete and total morons to support your decaying infrastructure. Perhaps you were being kind, offering positions of authority to people who can’t read. But that posed a problem, as you know, when I wanted to renew my license, or buy a parking permit. And your “police”, who swore to “serve and protect”, were more often there to “harass and annoy”. You sent them to patrol the streets every day with their “ticket machines”.
5. Stupid laws. You banned cell phones in cars, smoking in bars, and fois gras. Your “city council” ignored the problems facing you and focused instead on the most inane regulations in the world. You made yourself the laughing stock of the nation when you outlawed goose liver because you were concerned about geese who don’t live there. Your politicians are worthless, Chicago, and in our five years together did nothing to improve you at all.

You were too cold, too hot, too loud, too crowded, too humid, too poor, too rich, too fat, too flat, too cruel, and far, far too costly. You probably don’t want to know, in the misery-filled wake of my departure, that I have left you for a younger, sleeker, healthier partner that has none of your centuries-old crust. I left you for a younger girl, Chicago.

But I will miss you anyway. There is simply nothing like your Lincoln Park in the summer, with the beach on one side and the bars on the other. I will miss Kendalls, and Lincoln Station, and Kelsey’s, the places where you saw to it that I had plenty to drink. I will miss State Street at Christmas-time, and I will miss your countless parties, festivals and parades. You are New York without the attitude, and Los Angeles without the fake. You are the greatest city on earth. But, it turns out, I’m just not a city guy.

It’s not you, it’s me.

Someday, you will meet a guy who deserves you, a guy who doesn’t mind your countless idiosyncracies that drove me mad. You will be happy again, Chicago, I promise. We had some good times, you and I. But those times are over. It didn’t work out between us, but somewhere out there is your Prince Charming, just waiting to be wrapped in your cold, steel embrace.

I’m sorry things didn’t work out. And, um, don’t bother to call.

Lies, All Lies

Aside from the intense awkwardness that comes from hearing too much Vanessa Carlton, I can report that the ten year high school reunion is actually pretty much a blast. The problem, of course, is that one faces the daunting challenge of summing up the last decade in a little 30-second soundbyte that can be retold a hundred times. For most of us, that’s fairly easy, because the truth is that most of us are fairly boring.

Think about it. What have you done for the last decade? Odds are, not much. My actual history for the last ten years can be described, in full detail, using exactly eight words: college, law school, Chicago, beer, Colorado, more beer. But there’s no fun in that. So I decided to play a little game with my fellow alums. Here’s my reported story:

After graduating from high school, I trained as an Olympic bobsledder for the Nepalese bobsled team. Jim ***, also a member of the Class of ‘96, was my teammate. When a military coup d’etat threatened government funding for the program, Jim and I were both out of a job and also trapped high in the Himalayas. With our grizzled sherpa, Ningningitituck, we ascened Mt. Yuyuiammipa and there established the now-thriving metropolis of New Flint. (Go bobcats!) We were ultimately rescued from the mountaintop by Navy SEALs, under the command of Cpl. Todd *** (Class of ‘97), and thus began our 5,000 mile journey back to the states. We founded the Alliance for Peaceful War, a non-profit organization based in Schenectady, New York. When the corporation was overrun by fallout from the Enron scandal, Jim and I decided finally to part ways. Last I heard, he had taken a physical education teaching position at Mt. Holyoke College. Broken and disillusioned with life, I rented a Miata and decided to drive cross country in search of myself. Ningningitituck, our grizzled sherpa, somehow found me in Talahassee; he alone is responsible for saving me from the alcoholic depression that had by then consumed my life. In the blazing hot summer of ‘02, Ningningitituck and I were on a tour of the Budweiser factory in St. Louis when we reunited with another member of the prestigious Class of ‘96, Heidi ***. Equally fraught with disdain for The Establishment, she joined us on our epic journey. We eventually stopped short of the coast, in Baytown, Texas, a suburb of Houston, largely because that’s where the tranny on the Miata blew out. I ended up founding a business that sells retrofitted recreational vehicles with secret stowage compartments for illegal aliens. Heidi and I were wed at The Alamo; Ningningitituck was my best man. We now have five happy and healthy boys: Gary, John, Michael, Bill and Clarence.

Only two people believed my story. One was a fellow alum named Alex, who just nodded and replied, “Wicked.” The other was stoned. It occurs to me now that my error was not in lying about my otherwise sordid real history; it was in fabricating a lie that was simply too long. My advice for those of you considering lying at your high school reunion: Keep it simple. My second advice for those of you attending a high school reunion — whether you plan to lie or not — is equally simple: Bring a flask.

The Vast Anti-Detroit Media Conspiracy

You thought I was done talking about the beating administered to the New York Yankees by a certain baseball team from Detroit. Foolish you. The thrashing delivered upon those pinstripe baboons cannot be adequately described in a single post. Hence, here is now a second posting about the series.

My complaint today doesn’t truthfully lie with the Yankees. Instead, it lies with Sports Illustrated. I finally received my September 25 issue of S.I., which was delivered a mere three weeks late. (Special thanks to the U.S. Postal Service.) On the prestigious cover is a certain Alex Rodriguez, better known as “Choke”. Also on the cover, next to the picture of A-Rod, is this quote from teammate Jason Giambi:

“Alex doesn’t know who he is. We’re going to find out who he is in the next couple of months.”

Yes we will, as it turns out. Inside the magazine, an eight page article reviews the Yankees’ strengths and specifically discusses the need for A-Rod to prove himself in the playoffs. My favorite quote, from Choke himself, is this:

“I can’t help that I’m a bright person… I can’t pretend to play dumb and stupid.”

Actually, he can, as it turns out, although he wasn’t pretending. Batting 1-for-14 in the playoffs, with your career on the line, doesn’t sound like pretending to me. Aside from being a foolish thing to say to a reporter, A-Rod’s quote sums up precisely what most people hate about the Yankees. It’s not that the Tigers are a better team than the Yankees, although that’s true; it’s that the Yankees think they’re a better team than they actually are.

Interestingly, the September 25 issue of SI didn’t contain a single page about the Tigers. Not one. So out of curiosity, I went to buy the post-series issue, thinking for sure that my underdog Tigers would grace the cover. Nope; a mediocre college football game was featured instead. I have cancelled my subscription.

The Vast Anti-Michigan Media Conspiracy

The vast anti-Detroit conspiracy marches on! When those dastardly folks over at Sports Illustrated disappointed me in the most hurtful way, I turned instead to ESPN. But there again, I found a distasteful smattering of untruth.

Apparently, the good folks over at ESPN have ranked Brady Quinn fourth in the race for the Heisman Trophy. Quinn, you will remember, is the quarterback for a certain parochial school in Indiana that borrows its name, however mispronounced, from the famous cathedral in Paris. He’s also the guy who was sacked three times by the University of Michigan, and in that same game threw three interceptions. (He was later sacked four times by Purdue.)

Brady Quinn’s stats are at best mediocre. That’s particularly true when he is compared to Michigan’s quarterback, Chad Henne, who was ranked only seventh in the Heisman poll. Henne’s yards per pass, at over 8, are higher than Quinn’s, and their completion rate is nearly identical, despite Michigan’s butterfingered receivers. They have both thrown about the same number of touchdowns, and they both average roughly the same number of yards per game.

But Henne has been sacked about half as many times, he’s undefeated, and he’s playing quarterback for a team that vastly favors a running game. Brady Quinn, who has the benefit of being a quarterback for a passing team, is neck-and-neck with Henne, who’s the quarterback for a running team. And thanks to Sports Illustrated’s excellent coverage — in the September 25 issue, no less — we know that Henne’s first two games were deliberately non-passing games! (SI’s theory is that Michigan knew it could win the first two games so easily that it intended to surprise Notre Dame by opening up a passing game that had never been seen before.)

Yet, Quinn is ranked higher than Henne by a lot; he received 31 votes, as opposed to Henne’s meager 7. If you can explain that, you are as stupid as the folks at ESPN. The vast anti-Michigan media conspiracy has ruthlessly disparaged Chad Henne. Considering either of these men for the Heisman Trophy is a joke, but ranking Quinn above Henne is beyond that; it’s laughable.

Just When You Thought It Was Safe To Go Back In The Water…

Lastly, I just had to share this story from today’s news. James Bertakis, who is 81 years old, was boating with his grandkids in Florida the other day when a stingray jumped out of the air and stabbed him in the chest.

Several months ago, I wrote about a pirahna found in a river in Illinois, and I had this to say about it:

Scientists have yet to explore my alternative theory, which is that whole schools of human-eating fish — including sharks — are lurking deep in the water and are simply biding their time before the organized attack.

You laughed. You scorned me. But who’s laughing now? Certainly not Mr. Bertakis, who didn’t heed the Joetown warning. (He’s going to recover, by the way, but this is a lesson to you kids: Don’t forget the body armor when you’re fishing.) The attack has begun. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Lest you think I have not written on this website for two weeks because I am lazy, let me assure you of two things. First, I am indeed lazy. But second, my excellent excuse for tardiness is that I have moved to Colorado. More on that later. In the meantime, I will share with you some random thoughts that have occurred to me over the last two weeks.

It’s Getting Hot In Here…

My deep thanks go out to all those Republicans who, for the last several decades, have been telling us that global warming is a myth. I’m talking about you, Tom Delay, and you too, Bill Frist. Thanks, fellas, for ignoring the vast majority of the scientific community for all these years.

My initial reaction to Republican denials of global warming was that maybe these guys are just stupid. Or perhaps, I thought, they are skeptical in a healthy way. Like the folks who denied that cigarettes cause cancer, or the folks who supported using Agent Orange, maybe the Republicans were just uninformed. But then it finally dawned on me: They just like it hot. They know that global warming is happening, but they deny it because they secretly want the planet to become a scalding desert.

But why would anyone want that? Well, I finally figured it out. I read this report recently that found a negative correlation between Republicans and sex. Essentially, ABC News did a little study a few years ago, and found that Republicans are basically closeted on sexual issues. They are far less adventurous, sexually speaking, than their Democratic counterparts. In almost every major category, Democrats have “been there, done that” and Republicans have not. In layman’s terms, it’s like this: A Democrat is going to get absolutely smashed in a game of “I Never”, and a Republican is going to stay dead sober. The most telling statistic is this: Republicans think about sex 10% more often than Democrats.

Eureka!, I thought to myself. Who would want the planet to be a scalding hot desert? A person who doesn’t see much action in the bedroom! (I’ll go ahead and draw the connection for slow people: When it’s hot outside, women wear less clothing, which is ideal for a typical Republican, who needs that kind of stimulation.)

Then today, the Chicago Tribune reported in this article that the Earth’s temperature is at an all-time 12,000 year high. Looks like the Republicans’ plan is working. Thanks again, fellas.

The Earth Is Flat…

I know we’re all supposed to believe that whole Copernican idea that the Earth is actually a sphere that orbits around the sun, yada yada. I bought that theory too, hook line and sinker. But then, I drove through Nebraska.

My heartfelt sympathy goes out to all y’all Nebraskans. As I drove through your great state, I couldn’t help but wonder: What in the name of all that is holy are you doing there? I admit an occassional obsession with the notion of a barn dance, and I like country music and corn chowder as much as the next guy. But I have to ask: Are you aware that there are places that are not flat?

In related news, I sometimes watch the Discovery Channel, and I saw recently a show about Antarctica, where the temperatures sometimes reach 140 degrees below zero. The narrator was raving on and on about some beetles, which are able to survive in the cold. How amazing, said the narrator, that life can adapt to even the harshest of environments. But the narrator did not answer the question that immediately popped into my head: Would the beetles still live in Antarctica if they knew there were other places to go?

On Michigan Football…

I resolve to never again move in the fall, because I have now missed three consecutive weeks of college football. I did listen to the Michigan vs. Notre Dame game on the radio while driving through Nebraska (see above), and I listened for three hours on my cell phone to play-by-play commentary of the Michigan vs. Wisconsin game from my friend Jim. (Thanks Jim.) Since I did not actually see either game, the Joetown analysis is once again lacking. My apologies. Nonetheless, I have three things to say.

First, to Notre Dame: Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. Ha. I hate you.

Second, although I did not get to watch the games, I did play them on my XBox. Michigan crushed Notre Dame 108-0, and then demolished Wisconsin 122-0. Once again, in case I wasn’t clear: Ha.

Third, and this is important: Predicting a several week inability to post things on Joetown, I arranged with my buddy Todd to post updates on my website concerning Michigan football. Like me, Todd claims to be a rabid Wolverine fan. He assured me that he would keep up with things; I even gave him a password so that he could write what I imagined to be creative little missives about how brutally thrashed the Irish were last weekend. I was sure that Todd would fulfill this task because he did, after all, graduate from Harvard University, and no one from Harvard University ever drops the ball, ever.

But like Brady Quinn, Todd fumbled his prestigious task. Yes, I’m angry about that. But on the other hand, I now have the opportunity to analogize Todd to Brady Quinn, and that’s kind of exciting.

Before I get into reviewing the movie Lady In The Water, I want to clear something up. It seems that there’s some confusion (at least among my friends) about the genre of “scary movies”. Scary movies provoke an almost visceral response, even among people who don’t like them. Think about it this way: When you hear someone say, “I like scary movies,” you either entirely agree, or entirely disagree. You’re either in the scary movie camp, or you are not. Like no other genre of movies, scary movies draw a wide, bright line through the movie-going public; you’re either with us, or you’re against us.

A lot more people like scary movies than let on. In fact, a lot more people like scary movies than are willing to admit even to themselves. The problem is simply the words we use to describe the movies themselves. I’ll give two examples: Nightmare on Elm Street and The Others. Both are theoretically about ghosts. Both involve hauntings and supernatural things. Both are undoubtedly scary.

But they are within entirely different genres. Nightmare is mostly gory, filled with blood and grotesque scenes of mutiliation. In this camp you will also find Chainsaw Massacre, Halloween, and the Scream series. But Others doesn’t contain even a single scene of violence. Not one. Not a single character dies. There is no gore at all. In this latter camp, we can place Sixth Sense, Signs, What Lies Beneath and a score of others.

Yet both Nightmare and Others are lumped together in the mega-genre we call “scary movies”. And as noted earlier, the genre “scary movies” is one you either like or do not. I observed this phenomenon first hand the other day when I invited some friends to see Lady In The Water. Most of my friends immediately declined, explaining, “I don’t like scary movies.”

“What about The Sixth Sense?” I asked.

“Oh, that’s different,” was the reply.

Yes, it is different. And that’s because of our inability to properly characterize “scary movies”. What we need is a way to distinguish between a scary movie like Nightmare and a scary movie like Others. Until we do, great movies like Others and Sixth Sense will be avoided by millions who equate them with the blood and gore of Nightmare merely because they are all, currently, referred to as “scary movies”.

Put differently: It’s very silly to equate Nightmare with Others. Anyone who has seen both movies can unequivocally agree that they are completely different types of movies. And yet, we lump them together in the “scary movie” category, thereby immediately turning off millions of viewers who would enjoy the suspense and fear of Others but are afraid to see the movie, because they don’t want to be grossed out by the gore and violence they remember from Nightmare.

What I propose is a bright-line distinction between the two genres we currently lump together as “scary movies”. I propose a divorce between the blood-and-gore Nightmare genre and the artful suspense of the Others genre. Heretofore, a Nightmare-style movie will be in the “slasher” movie category. Slasher movies are those that are (a) scary, and (b) involve a lot of blood, gore and violence.

The “scary movie” category will then be populated only by movies that are (a) scary. You think I’m splitting hairs here; I’m not. When Sixth Sense was revealed by critics to be an artful film about ghosts and not what I have dubbed a “slasher movie”, its popularity soared; its opening weekend ticket sales were dwarfed by subsequent sales after the public learned from critics and friends that the movie was scary, but not a slasher flick. The Blair Witch Project enjoyed a similar boost in sales after it properly characterized as “scary” but not “slasher”.

The converse effect is equally true. Movies like Hostel and Saw are undoubtedly scary, but are also undoubtedly in the “slasher” category. Those movies have financially enjoyed the benefit of being in the non-descript “scary movie” category, yet have only lent to the perception among movie fans that all scary movies must involve extreme violence and gore. We can certainly agree that it’s ridiculous to equate Hostel with Sixth Sense. And yet, we do. And until we fix that shortcoming in our terminology, my friends will continue to be needlessly afraid of watching movies with me.

Yes, that’s right: What this really comes down to is a not-so-subtle effort to convince my friends to be not quite to lame.

All that being said, Lady In The Water is equally lame. M. Night Shyamalan previously wrote and directed Sixth Sense and Signs, two of the more brilliant examples of the true “scary movie”. He’s known for twist endings, such as the ending in Sixth Sense and his heavily ridiculed The Village. In Lady, he was seeking to make a comeback. Sadly, he fell short.

Paul Giamatti plays Cleveland Heep, a landlord who manages an apartment complex called “The Cove”. The apartment complex has a pool, from which springs, in the middle of the night, a girl who calls herself “Story”, played by Bryce Dallas Howard. After some truly banal dialogue, it is revealed that Story is not human. Rather, she is a creature called a “nymph” from an underwater place called the “Blue World”. We learn that Story’s purpose in visiting our world is to inspire a writer to write a book that will convince a future President of the United States to dramatically change the world for the better.

If that wasn’t enough of a stretch for you, this certainly will be: The character of the writer is played by none other than M. Night Shyamalan himself. That casting decision is the best example of grotesque self-indulgence in the history of movies. Ever.

Story, the nymph, is hunted by a wolf-like creature called a “scrunt”, which hides in the lawn at the apartment complex. A handful of mildly suspenseful attacks by the scrunt is the only part of the movie worth watching. In the end, the landlord and others at the apartment complex help Story return home, but not without some bizarre — and deeply silly — conversations about the roles that must be played in Story’s story. If there is some religious or political metaphor to be found in the various roles played by the folks at The Cove, it is not apparent.

Shyamalan is an excellent director. But whatever inspired him to do his best work — Sixth Sense and Signs — has clearly left him. Lady In The Water is not a good movie.

Two of my friends are headed to law school to join my illustrious profession. (You know who you are.) I’ve done what I can to talk them out of it, to no avail. Rather than continue to try to convince them that the practice of law is crazy, I’ve decided that I’ll simply let the law speak for itself.

In Massachussetts last week, an Indian man filed a lawsuit on behalf of his son. They’re suing another family on the theory that the other family, the defendants, failed to perform on an arranged marriage. By itself, that doesn’t seem so crazy. But the truth is that the other family did provide their daughter; the son just found her too ugly. I’m not kidding. You can read the actual complaint here. What the suit amounts to is this: A man is suing another man because his daughter is too ugly to get married.

I know what you’re thinking. “Family law is supposed to be nasty.” And that’s true. Maybe something else is for you, something flashy and fun, like sports law. But check this out: A Seattle man named Allen Heckard sued Michael Jordan and Nike earlier this week. Heckard’s theory is that MJ and Nike owe him money because — get this — Heckard looks like Michael Jordan, and he’s tired of people getting confused. That, according to Heckard, is Jordan’s legal responsibility. The best part about the case is that Heckard is merely seeking fair and reasonable compensation in the amount of half a billion dollars, simply because he looks a little like the retired basketball player. The story is here.

I know what you’re thinking. “I won’t represent bad clients with bad cases.” And hopefully, that’s true. But some of the insanities of the legal profession are unavoidable. Consider, for example, the case of Donald Thompson, a 59-year old man recently convicted of indecent exposure in Oklahoma. What makes Thompson’s case so remarkable is not that he indecently exposed himself using a penis pump, but rather that he is a state judge who used the pump while on the bench. Yes, that’s right. A judge spent the majority of two trials playing around under his robe. The story is here. Do they teach you that trick in law school?

Warcrafting at Level 60

You may have picked up on the fact that I’m a video game junkie. Recently, I’ve been playing a game called Warcraft, which is loads of fun, except that I’ve sorta hit a wall. I’m at “level 60″, which is the top level in the game, and I’m sort of out of stuff to do. I want to keep playing, but there’s a point of diminishing returns here that has me frustrated. Here is a very good article written by another player experiencing the same problem. And in reply, I have found this article which has helped a little. But the problem remains: How do you have fun at level 60 in Warcraft without investing every waking moment in the game? If you gamers have any thoughts, I would love to hear them.

Coolish websites I’m currently obsessed with

www.flightview.com
www.wolf-claw.com
www.harley-davidson.com
www.rei.com
www.backpacker.com

Book Review — “Black Wind”

Clive Cussler is an action/adventure author in the style of Ian Fleming and Tom Clancy, whose hero, a character named Dirk Pitt, overcomes all odds to save the world for the umpteenth time. Last summer’s movie Sahara was based on a Cussler novel. The stories are known for historically-based plots that are simply audacious. In his latest, Black Wind, Dirk Pitt is off saving the world again, this time from a North Korean terrorist who attempts a biological weapons attack on the west coast of the U.S.

As a Cussler fan, I have to admit that I’m disappointed with Black Wind. I loved many of the other books, including Raise the Titanic, Atlantis Found and Trojan Odyssey. But Black Wind lacks the enigmatic plot twists that make Cussler such a great writer. It lacks the catastrophic end-of-the-world mega-climax. Black Wind is just flat. It’s interesting, and in places, fun. But the Joetown review has to be this: Don’t read it.

Republicans at it again

I have to admire the Republicans for their consistency in promoting a hateful and racist agenda. Earlier this week, the U.S. House debated whether to renew the Voting Rights Act of 1965, long considered the crown jewel of the civil rights movement. The Act effectively abolished Jim Crow laws, protecting the right to vote for millions of minorities, particularly in the south.

We’re not talking about earth-shattering programs here. The Voting Rights Act protects basic liberties, by outlawing poll taxes, literacy taxes and a whole slew of other hateful ways to discourage poor minorities from voting. It would be nice to think in the year 2006 that we have moved beyond Jim Crow segregation.

Leave it to the Republicans in Congress to show us otherwise. House Republicans moved to amend the bill by removing its bilingual requirement, which provides Spanish ballots to people who speak Spanish (groundbreaking, I know). They also tried to shorten the lifespan of the Act, which normally comes up for renewal every 25 years, to only 10 years. The Republicans’ goal, essentially, was to erode the centerpiece of civil rights laws. And, get this: The Republicans who sponsored the amendments? They’re all from Southern states.

Thankfully, the Republican Party leadership, realizing how politically devestating the amendments would be if successful, brokered a deal with the Democrats, who were overwhelmingly opposed to the amendments in the first place. In the end, the amendments failed, and the renewal of the Voting Rights Act was passed. Jim Crow was defeated. Again. But that’s not the point; the point is that he reappeared. And this time, just like the last time, he found his home in the Republican Party.

Among the seven signs that the Apocalypse is upon us, an Illinois fisherman the other day pulled a piranha out of the Des Plaines River, about an hour outside of Chicago. I’m not kidding. You can read the Chicago Tribune article here.

My friends think I’m a sissy when I hesitate to swim in Lake Michigan or other bodies of water where one cannot see the bottom. I refer them to Shark Week on the Discovery Channel, and the occasional story about piranhas, alligators and other carnivorous beasts lurking in the serene waters of the midwest. Further, as the Tribune article notes, this is not the first time a piranha has been found in the region.

The most common theory to explain such sightings is that the piranha — not native to North America — is an aquarium pet fish, released into the rivers and lakes of the midwest by pet owners who truly personify the word “jerk”. Scientists have yet to explore my alternative theory, which is that whole schools of human-eating fish — including sharks — are lurking deep in the water and are simply biding their time before the organized attack.

Some will call me paranoid, or even crazy. And that’s fair. Then again, a guy in Illinois found a piranha in the water the other day. Who’s crazy now?

A few months ago, I wrote a guide on how to train a dog to do his (or her) business in a litterbox. You can read the first post here.

This is an update to my guide! It’s fairly simple: You’ll need a liner for the litterbox. In other words, before you put litter in the litterbox, first lay down a liner. A garbage bag will work just fine. Place the garbage bag so that it covers the entire bottom portion of the litterbox, and then place the litter on top of the liner.

There are several reasons to do this, but the big reason has to do with a concept called “molecular diffusion“, which I learned about the hard way. It turns out that a liquid stored in a plastic container, given enough time, will actually seep through the container, through little microscopic pores in the plastic. In the case of the litterbox, molecular diffusion means that your litterbox after a while will actually start to leak, even in the absence of an actual hole or drain.

It takes a long time. In my case, diffusion didn’t start happening for nearly a year. But it will happen. Trust me.

As you can imagine, this is a nasty problem. But the problem is fixed by adding a liner to the bottom of the litterbox. Just remember to change the liner when you change the litter, every few months or so, and the diffusion won’t have enough time to occur. Voila, problem solved.

These are pictures from a late February trip to RMNP. I don’t have much to say about them, because they speak for themselves… truly one of the most beautiful places on earth. Please excuse my fascination with the elk; I don’t get to see many of them in Chicago, unless you count the ladies on the south side.