Okay, so not such a great week. 

1. I got word that a former student of mine died. Actually, his whole family died. They were on the side of the road when a car struck them, killing him (16-years-old), his little brother, and his mother. He was a funny kid, had a certain star quality to him. And now him and his whole family are gone.

2. Then a friend of mine went missing. I guess he was at his girlfriend's place in the suburbs, came home, and then they had plans to go out to lunch near where he lives in Chicago later that day. Apparently he left his apartment and never came back. It is said that he liked to walk on the lake front, but it was freezing that day, like 17 degrees. 

As the days go by things look more and more grim. When he didn't show up to work on Monday morning I knew it was bad. I was holding out hope that he just turned his phone off and got the F' out of Dodge for the weekend, planning to return to work. Then with each day it's really looking more and more hopeless. I'm searching for scenarios where he is still alive. Maybe he dropped everything and became a Buddhist in a temple somewhere? Or maybe he just assumed a new identify in another country, but would he really just never talk to his father, sister, or girlfriend ever again? And wouldn't he have packed some things, and wouldn't there be records of travel or spending?

The other possibilities are just too sad to think about. It could have been foul play, like maybe a robbery went wrong. And sadly, it could be that he took his own life. But in either case, how has his body not been found?

I saw my good friend who is pretty much best friends with the missing guy on the local news, and my heart just sunk. It's just so real to me after seeing that. When you have stuff like that going on, you still go into work, come home and take care of your family, and life just goes on. But then seeing that it's on the news, my friend is pleading for someone to come forward with information, his sister is talking about how it just doesn't make sense, how they knew something was wrong when he missed his weekly phone call with his father, it's all just so damn sad and such a mystery. 

Everybody get out and live your life. You never know when your number is going to come up or you'll be a part of a real life damn "Unsolved Mystery." This thing is nuts, you guys. Thanks for listening. 

Roll Call

Okay, let's get after a blog in the moments this kid takes a nap.

So a package arrived recently that was covered in Chinese writing, and the only English on there was my address and my son's name. As I opened the package I noticed that it was expanding. A giant plush stuffed elephant was mashed in there! Erik seemed to really like it, but first I had to spray it down to remove any SARS or bird flu.

There was no note inside, and my attempts to post a picture of it on Facebook did not yield any results as to who sent the unusual gift. I believe there were close to 100 comments and "likes," so that's 100 suspects eliminated. I figure if I ask the countless readers of this blog for some resolution, that's another . . . seven suspects I can cross off the list. I'm faced with the sad realization that the mystery of the adorable stuffed elephant has been moved into the cold case files and may never be solved.

You know those parents that post a million pictures a day of their kid? Well, we post a lot of them, but we are not under the impression that he is the cutest kid of all time in every single picture. Take this one that Mrs. Noisewater took of him at the doctor's office a while back, for example.

This morning we had Baby Erik in bed with us, and Mrs. Noisewater was doing roll calls. Remember that?

Sha-Booya! Sha-Sha-Sha-Booya Roll call!
His name is Erk (Yeah!)
And he's super cute (Yeah!)
Sometimes he fart (Yeah!)
And sometimes he poot (Roll call!)



But then I tried to do one about Mrs. Noiswater bringing back pastries from the bakery when she got back from the gym.

Sha-Booya! Sha-Sha-Sha-Booya Roll call!
Her name is Mommy (Yeah!)
She brings daddy a danish (Yeah!)
She didn't like "The Phantom" (Yeah!)
Said it's too Billy Zane-ish (Roll Call!)

Mrs. Noisewater and I are going out for a "romantical" night at a fancy-pants restaurant and overnight at a hotel downtown. It will be the first night the two of us have been away from our boy overnight. My first drink (and let's be honest, my first time going number 2) without worrying about a baby waking up will be for you, my beloved Seven Readers.

Mrs. Noisewater and I are going to miss some things about this apartment.  Hearing the drunks congregating in our alley having loud conversations filled with "WOOS!" is not one of them.  This often wakes us up out of a dead sleep, and then they hang out by the dumpsters and we can make out every single word they say.  I never could figure out why they would want to smell garbage while they converse, but then the other night we could gather from their conversation that they were doing cocaine.  Lovely!  As I have said in previous posts, rather than telling them to shut the heck up, like some of my neighbors have done, I prefer to just interject, chiming into the middle of their conversation.  They suddenly hear from above, "Is that pretty good coke?"  The problem is that they would probably want to talk about that all night with me, so I would have to add something creepy like "Can I come down there in my pajamas and do a bump?  And then maybe you guys can come upstairs with me and cuddle?"

Anyway, one thing I am going to miss in this hood is the middle aged Black man on the block who takes excessively meticulous care of his sky blue circa 1991 BMW.  The thing is dented all over the closer you look at it, which is no surprise because he parks it on the street in a busy section of Chicago - a great way to get dinged.  He is down there when it's cold out warming up the engine while he fusses over cleaning the interior or checking the oil, but I have never seen him actually go anywhere.  Sometimes I will see it parked in a slightly different spot, suggesting that he has taken it for a spin, but it's always returned to the same side of the street.  It's not so much that I'll miss him, it's that I'll never figure out his story/solve this mystery.

In case I don't get a chance to talk to my favorite OCD neighbor to get an explanation, something I will be doing if I see him again before I go, would any of you like to wager a guess at why he behaves this way with his "beemer?"

So, Last Night . . .

. . . I was at a party with Beatnik and Gung Ho and some other folks, and things got really out of hand: We were all totally shit-assed.

As we were leaving, I just remember someone pointing out that the exit sign in the hallway was smashed and dangling off the wall. I don't remember hearing it get punched or whatever, and I have no idea which of us did it. The girl who lives there came out into the hallway and was pissed, rightfully so.

What's incredible is that I talked with both Gung Ho and Beatnik today, and nobody is sure who did it.

It was truly a mystery. A drunken, stupid mystery.
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This is one of those posts that is so dumb and pointless that I centered the text to make it seem somehow more important.

Does The Naked Guy Run Marathons?

And yes, "The" is capitalized in the title of this post because that's just how I write his name.

I ran with a running group for the first time along with my friend Monique, who is running her first marathon like myself, and first let me rant about how dumb these groups are. Yes, you get some free Gatorade and water along the way, it gives you encouragement not to stop, they have pace people to keep you running at whatever pace you want, and there are no doubt many other advantages. Ooh, and free crackers and shit at the end. That's good too, but here's what I don't like: They yell out when there is a guy on a bike coming, they yell when there's the slightest divot in the gravel, and overall, they just make you feel like when you were with a nerdy group of friends in high school when you see normal people who simply run by themselves, the cool kids in this scenario.

Okay, now for what's been on my mind, and brace yourself because this is a break through:

I think I saw The Naked Guy from The Liars Club running in the 8 minute mile group with Monique's friend.

We opted for the 9 and a 1/2 minute miles and that was plenty fast when you're doing 15. I don't want to get off on another rant about how dumb it is to run so damn far because I need you, My Seven Readers, to help me get to the bottom of this mystery.

Now, The Naked Guy is the gentleman who strips naked and dances around at my favorite bar of all time, a place where my ashes will likely be on a shelf behind the bar next to the Goldschlager, The Liars Club. I know from my conversations with The Naked Guy that he is a nudist, but if he were an avid runner it wouldn't surprise me because he stays in pretty good shape (click here if you want to know a little bit more about the LC or the NG).

I write on The Liars Club Facebook page from time-to-time so I was going to ask on there if The Naked Guy is also The Marathon Guy, but I was the last guy to comment on the page - making me look like a weirdo if I comment twice in a row.

This is why I enlisted the help of my Heterosexual Life Partner (HLP), also a big fan of the bar, the two of us got in lots of trouble in there over the years, to ask this burning question for me.

I shall keep you posted, Seven Readers . . .