My mouth fell open and I got this tight feeling in my chest...you know...the feeling...when you NEED to post. Three words and a colon, friends,

STAR TREK: NEMESIS

Thank you Robbie. Thank you thank you thank you.

And while you're clicking, head on over to Silent Uproar and sign up to win LOTS of great (unbelievable, really) stuff. I'm eyeing packs 1-3 and 5 (I need #5 after checking out the $ on those Clive bags...sheesh...). Winning stuff from SU is always fun!

Scoreboard for yesterday: Lacey 3, The Man 0.

raaaahhh!

It's crystalline outside today. Stop tweaking the style sheets and get out, will ya [Lacey]?

I met a man last night. Not a man, not like that. But a man, nonetheless. I was at the beach just reading my Baha'i children's book (I am working my way through the amazing library here at work) and he just plopped right beside me on the bench and immediately we proceeded to chat. He is about 60-ish, from Lima, Peru originally but speaks about 5 or 6 different languages. Castillian (is that a language?), Portugese, Spanish, English, French, German, Swedish...I told him I wanted to learn how to tell my neighbors about the Baha'i Faith in spanish. I understand way more than I thought. There was a point where he was speaking to me entirely in Spanish and I didn't even notice. We talked about lots of things until the sun went down behind the impeding storm clouds. He talked about his late American wife, from before the days when breast cancer took her. She apparently worked for the American government, spoke several different tongues but had no accent.

He showed me where he lived an insisted that I come up to take a look. I didn't want to be rude so I went up. Flags from about 20 countries stood in a row on top of the bookshelf and he proudly told me the origin of each. Stacks of books, an immaculate bedroom, a cluttered living room with a bed right in the middle and a smell I couldn't quite put my finger on. But the door was propped open so all was good. We left and he walked with me to his friends' place on the other side of the el. He has friends of all different nationalities, and he told me their stories as we strolled down the street. Turns out he is a graphic designer. Turns out he is a scholar. Turns out he wants to come to the Temple if I would only invite him. Turns out I have a new friend.

If you haven't, you absolutely must get Doves The Last Broadcast album. Then you must plug in headphones and listen to said album. Block out all other noise. This is good stuff.

Oh lookie, I'm on Boochakanan today with Dave. You can see I'm a very demonstrative conversationalist.

More proof that the Man isn't all that spotless. I'm not immune to the charms of certain corporate people, but what all this might be telling us as individuals is to give our dollars to local places instead of the Corporate Scary Guys. Yeah yeah we've all read anti-corporate rants before, but I'm not gonna rant because last week I gave my four bucks to the evil empire for a large coffee and cinnamon scone which looked like it came out of a triangular cookie cutter. No, this post makes no sense. I quit.

Today is a very good day!

To avoid being unnecessarily negative, I will just say that MTV is really, really dumb. I have never seen a more shallow network in all my life. And you can't say "Well duh, of course it's not real. But it's SO funny and dumb, I have to watch it," because that's a cop out. MTV is a waste of time. Go outside or something.

All rants aside, did you know there's a new color out there? "Cosmic Latte" has been dubbed the color of the cosmos. Quite a change from "a sprightly pale turquoise," which was what they originally thought. This is more proof that Starbucks is, indeed, the Man and is taking over the universe. Bad pun, I know...couldn't help it.

Reading Robert Frost in the airport yesterday, this stood out to me:

Revelation (from "A Boy's Will")

But so with all, from babes that play
At hide-and-seek to God afar,
So all who hide too well away
Must speak and tell us where they are.

Check out the gallery from the weekend. A nice, well-timed mini-trip.

Okay I should clear up this whole love thing before you all jump to crazy conclusions...

...and you all are really going to roll your eyes at this, but it's the truth...

THE FIVE YEAR PLAN is an amazing piece of work (see: Baha'i Faith). It makes me excited and thrilled and giddy all at once. I understand the scope of this amazing work (if you're not a Baha'i, the Five Year Plan consists of 6 letters that the Universal House of Justice, the supreme body overseeing the Faith, wrote from 1999-2001) which talks about everything from the point of the Faith to specific tasks we are going to be involved with--inspiring community development, unity, education, and other stuff. I'm excited about that. You could say, even, I'm on fire with that.

So it's not *that* kind of love, people.

Inside Lacey's head,

Question: What should I eat for dinner?

Answer: Ice. Just ice.

Yesterday it actually felt like The South here in Chicago. Unfortunately, my resistance to the idea air conditioning is deteriorating rather rapidly. I experienced some kind of heat-induced hallucinogenic sleep last night, though today I feel more like it was just 6 hours or so of laying flat in the dark with a fan directed at my head.

Note to self: rollerblading across Sheridan road should be done sparingly, as it is a very freakin' scary road.

I'll be in TN this weekend. I thought I was about due for some more airport antics.

Yay tourism!

Not even 9am, and already in the past 12 hours I've been asked twice if I'm in love.

I forgot to tell you guys before: new edition of Fertile Field went live last week. Hand-coded with love, there are no articles on smoking this time; however I do have an article on sexism which I might post here.

I had the distinct pleasure of going to the top of the Baha'i Temple yesterday. Up the stairs, up the scaffolding inside the dome, into the little room at the top and then on to the roof, outside under where the magnificent ribs meet. I have never seen such a breathtaking view of Chicago, Lake Michigan, and the surrounding area. It felt like the top of the world.

I would like to propose an 8th day of the week, known in any official capacity as "recovery day," a special day reserved for recovery from weekend activities. I remember back in college I could spend the weekend doing absolutely nothing and it wouldn't mean a thing to me; it would be typical. Now that I'm in the "real" world (and it's been nearly a freakin' year), I have to cram anything that isn't work-related into two days: forty-eight hours of to-do lists, rendezvous-es, getting out, going out, eating out, meeting-up, getting down, and all those things you can't do during the week because you don't have time. Oh the irony.

So on this 8th day, all you have to do is sleep in and be selfish. Alarm clocks will have a special 8th-day setting which disables the alarm. You can read all day, run, bake yourself at the beach, eat burritos, think, listen to NPR, write the Great American Novel, meditate; anything that isn't bullet-pointed and organized. Spontaneity is mandatory. Someone please copy God on this memo, as He will certainly be confused by the reorganization.

Scenario: it's a beautiful day. You walk up to the platform and the train is just pulling up, so there's no wait. You look particularly stylish for work, sporting your new sunglasses and your lipstick just happens to be symmetrical and your hair isn't frizzy and you have your coffee and your skin is (for once) not rebelling against you. You feel very ready for that big meeting today and you've been preparing and thinking about what you might say. You are thinking and trying to relax and enjoy life so you take a drink of your coffee in your new travel mug when the train makes one of those unexpected jerks, the kind which throw you forward slightly even though you're sitting down.

The amount of coffee that can come out of a travel mug in this circumstance is amazing. On your face with your symmetrical lipstick, down your jacket, on your skirt, on your skin. You try and wipe it off but all to no avail. The makeup thing is hopeless (it'll be gone by 10am anyways), the clothing thing is hopeless (try getting coffee stains out in the bathroom...oy), and just about the only thing you can do is hope the people in that big meeting won't be examining the lapels of your formerly-stylish-but-now-stained jacket.

I should have known it would be one of those clumsy days before I even left my place. I was on my way out the door when I spotted the flyer that said, "We will be examining your apartment June 14, 2002, spreading some pest control powder and this is regulation and please have all of your cabinets, upper and lower, cleared out in the kitchen and the bathroom. Thank you for your mandatory cooperation." Or something like that.

In 10 minutes I managed to stack dishes, pots and pans, boxes and bags, towering on top of my kitchen table. I reluctantly locked the door while I thought of someone bumping into my table and when I get home, all I see is a "sorry" note and shards of my former dishes everywhere.

Perhaps my paranoia is getting the better of me this morning.

Some people say it's not smart to run at 10pm. Some people say it's extremely dangerous, in fact. But I say I got hit by a car in broad daylight on a Saturday morning in a neighborhood that is supposed to be extremely safe. I'm going to run at night if I want.

Last night was perfect for a night run. Sometimes you go outside and the neighborhood has dodgy energy; people jetting across alleys, yelling in the distance, strange people loitering at odd hours--such was not the case last night. It was warm and inviting and dark...perfect to be outside, listening to your own breathing, the perfect opportunity to clean out the residue of the politics of the day through one's own burning muscles. This, to me, is relief.

I ran down the street to the beach, around the park, my adrenaline reminding me that any second the boogeyman might come out and get me. Not so. There were people of all kinds lounging in the benches, playing instruments, chatting, drinking iced lattes. Young people, old people, black, hispanic and white; they were all called by the hypnotic lapping of Lake Michigan, out of their humid apartments and into the air. I was with my brothers and sisters last night.

Try not to let paranoia and fright rob you of something wonderful. Get out and enjoy yourselves.

I woke up this morning stiff and exhausted (but happy...always happy!) from my exciting weekend. In fact, I felt like I had been hit by a car, I was so sore. Ironic that I felt this way, because on Saturday, I was actually hit by a car.

Yes, my perilous foresight nearly came to pass. I was innocently running on Saturday morning through a crosswalk along Ridge, when the driver of a red SUV decided crosswalk stops didn't apply to her and she hit me. Luckily for me, I saw it coming and tried to quickly move out of the way, but not quite. It was more of an impact with the pavement rather than the stupid dumb suv (which I am even MORE prejudiced against now, with good reason). The lady driving the thing didn't even get out! As I lay on the pavement, I realized nothing was broken, and thought I would get up and give her a stern talkin-to, only to see two small kids in the back seat. So, minus the flowery language I would have liked to use (because you know, she could have killed me in her damn suv), I kept it to a brief lecture on how she should pay more attention and look where she's going and I was not friendly at all. All she could say in her broken english was "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry." She could have killed someone. It could have been much worse. And I'm not one to want pity or anything, but for God's sake, she could have run me over, driven her damn jeep into traffic, and killed her kids too. I have no idea if she even spoke english or not. Strange who they give driver's licenses to these days.

So despite my little "run in" with an evil Jeep with a bloodthirst for 5'10" pedestrians, I had a lovely weekend. Met up with Brett and Pete from Normal, IL and had a delightful evening with those guys. Before that, got to see a couple of folks from out of town, and before that was a bridal shower. Then yesterday was more downtowning with a friend.

And last night? Well, sometimes things just happen and you don't know why. All I can say is that I'm not angry anymore. Thank you, Ani Difranco.

I am the cascading style sheets master. Oh yes, I am.

Not to blow my own horn, but I have stumbled through learning CSS for the past few months, and friends, I think I finally have it. 3 editions of Fertile Field (and one on the way), multiple additions and adjustments to lay-c.com, and an O'Reilly guide later I finally have the hang of CSS. I think I went wrong with thinking that Dreamweaver was doing "real" CSS when it's all a facade: it is, in reality, a very messy CSS tool. So forget that junk. It's back to notepad with me. Feels so, so good. I guess I'm a nerd at heart.

An amazing thing has happened in Chicago. The weather has become...NORMAL. OH MY GOD.

Now, enjoy some pictures. Or just this one.

I'm not much of a cook, so when I see something that's easy, fast, and inexpensive to make at home I jump on it. There are several pet peeves I have about following recipies; one is that I dislike buying a whole container of something that I'm going to just use once (see butter, cream cheese, various different fresh herbs and spices), I don't like fried food, I don't like complicated food, I don't eat partially hydrogenated oils anymore, I'm cutting down on meat (nor do I particularly like cooking it), and I don't like anything to take longer than 1/2 hour to prepare. Dilemma indeed.

(I think I've figured out why some people eat when they're upset. There is something extremely satisfying about chopping something with a big ol' knife, cooking the hell out of it, and then consuming it. Sick, isn't it? But it does make sense...)

Enter Cooking Light, a magazine I would have never picked up except for the delicious picture on the cover this month (of a banana creme pie...you can see the slices of banana...which means it came from a real fruit!). I normally scoff at cookbooks and cooking magazines (especially of the "diet" variety, which just have lots of fat-free chemical-laden ingredients in them), preferring my defrost-and-eat diet of frozen vegetables and tortillas; but as that particular menu is getting old, I am open to new ideas.

Surprisingly, this magazine not only had easy recipies, they made sense (they listed ingredients in order of use, not importance). Not lots of salt, prepackaged ingredients, or oils; lots of summer vegetables, and seemingly "fun" to prepare food, and a vegetarian section to boot. I'm actually looking forward to making many of the things in here (check out the YaYa menu on their website). I am not planning on subscribing, because this magazine is so chock-full of recipies I'm going to be using it for a while (last night I started with gazpatcho; a cold vegetable soup which just involves a blender, a bunch of vegetables, and tomato juice: perfect). Enough about food from me: go check out FCG and Kiplog's food blog, some creative foody types in Chicago.

This isn't something you see everyday, as visitors aren't allowed up top. Nobody's really allowed up there; these pictures were taken by Jesse K., who was assisting in the installation of new wiring. Cool stuff.

Through their music, Public Enemy suggested to Americans that oppression operates on many levels. Kids raised on MTV and rap would soon wear the label of sluggard Generation X-ers, known for their apathy, a cynicism brought on by a lack of connection to their broken communities and families, withdrawal from a government they no longer trusted and disillusionment with a corporate world that exploited them. Thus, a white kid who would never know the frustration of watching paramedics mishandle a dying friend or white artists make millions off the work of blacks would still know what it was like to feel thoroughly alienated. (link)

I was talking with a colleague yesterday and he asked me if I identitfied myself with Generation X. Initial reaction: yes. However, I think I am classified more with "Generation Y" (considered to be people born from '75-'81, when there was a boom). The interesting thing about pinning specific-generation qualities is that it is difficult to really identify a generation until after a boom in births is over, and folks start to cluster as they grow up. So, for that reason, I prefer to wait and see if I'm actually classified in with the x-ers, as I was still in Camporee when "Fight the Power" came out.

FYI: the term "Generation X" comes from the Douglas Coupland novel, Generation X: Tales For an Accelerated Culture. If there's ever an author I consider to be the epitome of Generation X (or Y, if there is such a thing) it's Coupland.

By the way, would anyone be interested in writing an article regarding activism and the evolution of hip-hop music for Fertile Field in the fall? (preferrably someone in "Generation Y")

It's stormy, and I'm in an unusually good mood. This is surprising, because I had a rather...unlikely dream last night.

I dreamed that myself and a friend got tickets to...an *nsync concert. Oh yes, that would be "the" *nsync (I know, because I just had to go to a fansite to find out how to "properly" spell *nsync...yeah). It was in a huge football stadium, and people were coming in and buying popcorn like they were going to watch a Bears game in a movie theater, only they were 80,000 teenage girls and their moms going to watch an eye-candy spectacular, featuring fireworks and synchronized dance moves done by boys which will appear the size of dust specs from their elevated seats.

My tickets were free, I don't know about yours.

So my friend and I get to our seats, monster bucket of popcorn in arm. We then realize that we have some of the highest seats in the entire stadium. We are above the main speakers, above the noisiest part of the show. The stage is so far down there it's the size of a graham cracker and I am blissfully satiated, knowing that I'm at a stupid *nsync show, and someone paid too much money for my seat, and the band is so small I can't even see or hear them, and that everyone around me is acting like this is perfect. Ha. Hahahha. Then I wake up 1/2 hour too late. The end.

When I was at home, I was able to sit with my grandfather and chat about his life in Chicago in the late 1930s. He was 20 when he moved here, and about 26 when he left. The amazing details he remembered were rather remarkable because he sometimes doesn't know where he is presently. How he recalled his days over sixty years ago was beyond me...but he was so sharp. He used to work at 2100 Wells (which apparently no longer exists according to Mapquest), and he lived at Dearborn and Clark in a tiny studio efficiency apartment. Amazing.

Today I was looking up maps to these places on Mapquest, when I see a little option that says "aerial photo." I click and see a freakin' PICTURE (satellite) of the actual streets. Now, I know this is not such new technology, and I've seen these things before, but it just struck me as so odd that anyone, anywhere on the globe has access to these things. My mouth stayed agape when I pulled up an overhead picture of my apartment. Whoa.

All wierdness aside, I am fascinated with the history my grandfather had in this city in the post-depression era, before he married my grandmother. He frequented "dance halls," where the sounds of the big bands would get everyone out on the dancefloor. One of the places he would go often: the Aragon. This is the same Aragon next to the el where the marquis said No Doubt not so long ago. Bizarre.

It's nice to live in a place with not just history and character in general, but now a personal connection. Another reason to love this place.