Saturation Point, Courtesy of Trader Joe's Wine Department
Years ago, finding worthwhile music and art was an escape and a passion that took me away from the day-to-day stresses of maintaining a viable straight world life in the status conscious, prep school to private university, trying to get a leg up careerwise grind. I have been conscious lately of how much reading the Washington City Paper as a high schooler affected me and turned me on to the underground culture of the city. I certainly wasn't the only one. I remember a Model UN meet at the Washington Hilton in '89 or so when I met a bunch of guys that were dealing with their highly disciplined Catholic high school years with a steady diet of No Trend. 9353 and Rites of Spring. We couldn't get the Madeira girls to sleep with us, but we had fun trying. I hardly ever compare DC and Chicago anymore but having lived in both cities a good long time, I feel more entitled to make some personal observations. One thing that's quite different about Chicago is the feeling that there is so much going on that you could never really know the best thing to do on a Friday night. And if you don't show up, it's probably not a big deal. There's a ton of stuff going on. In DC, things were more manageable if sometimes predictable and cozy, and I often had the feeling that I needed to go do things and see things that were going on just to be there. I had much more of a "support the scene" mentality. And people certainly let me know if I had missed out on something special. It had many rewards. Chicago certainly is different but I have definitely had a bit more of the seeing the same faces in various places experience lately. That's what happens when you are home.

I have no idea what I am talking about but I hate to see wine go to waste. I also have to note that I watched way too many movies this weekend, and found "I'll Sleep When I'm Dead" and "Mean Girls" just decent not that great. Tina Fey is massively overrated in my book. And while I liked "The Croupier," and I understand the point of the class violence in "I'll Sleep" I found the movie almost totally uneventful, like a extended expositional opening scene that never ends. I'm almost tempted to point out that there is no real conflict in the film. Totally a bummer.