Colliculus and I went out for our anniversary dinner to a very nice place where I ate tasty chicken with cornbread-andouille sausage. It rocked. The only irritation was a toddler who screamed through our meal. S/he was sitting all the way across the dining room, but it was still loud as all get-out. About every 5 or 10 minutes one of the parents would take the kid outside for a minute or two, then return to continue our punishment.
A minor thing overall, but C. and I got into a debate about what you're supposed to do in this situation. He suggested that we complain to the waitress, but I couldn't think of what she was going to do about it. In a movie theater I'm all about complaining to the staff -- OK, so I waited through 45 minutes of Lord of the Rings part 3 -- 45 tortured minutes during which other patrons actually hollered "TAKE THE KID OUT!" -- but in restaurants I'm not sure. I did some web searches and there are plenty of etiquette columns devoted to what parents should and shouldn't do. But I already knew that and so did everyone else. The question is what I, the victim, should do, and nobody addresses that. I gave the parents some dirty looks but they were too far away and occupied to notice.
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WARNING: This story is totally gross
Today I met with my coworker and noticed his absolutely stunning view. All the offices have amazing views, but his has a really lucky angle -- Lake Michigan's shoreline, Millennium Park with the new Frank Gehry building, skyscrapers and gardens and stuff. While I was talking to him and half-looking out the window, I caught a movement out of the corner of my eye. It was a big, ugly spider hauling its fat ass up a thread. I was like, "Hey John, do you know you've got a spider in your office?" He said, "Oh yeah, but they're outside not inside." Now I looked more closely. The entire window is veiled with a spiderweb occupied by at least 6 big, disgusting spiders and a whole lot of dejuiced bug debris. I said, "That's really, really gross." He observed, "You know, one time I had a giant moth sitting on my window. The biggest moth I've ever seen. Who knew they could fly up this high?" I guess the moth's not the only thing, if there's enough prey to keep all those spiders fat and happy all the way up on the 63rd floor, smack in the path of all that prairie-coast wind. Who knew indeed?
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Everyone asks me how my job is going. That always seems like too ambitious (and too tedious) a question to answer fully, so I'll just say this: I don't really know yet. I think it's fine. It's definitely different from my old job, which was part of what I was looking for. But after a week and a half it still flip-flops between boring and overwhelming, as new jobs often do, so I'll let you know later on.
