Rose In a Box

Rose Dandan. Featured artist in the window at Uncle Fun's on Belmont on August 28th. Please be her friend on Facebook at:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Chicago-IL/One-of-a-kind-Artwork-by-Rose-Dandan/103068436405451?ref=ts

or purchase at Etsy: http://www.etsy.com/shop/DandanArt

Uncle Fun's at 1338 W. Belmont in Chicago for those who have no idea what they are missing!

MEGAN CAN'T BELIEVE HOW GREAT ROSE'S ARTWORK IS! Again, please join Rose's Facebook at:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Chicago-IL/One-of-a-kind-Artwork-by-Rose-Dandan/103068436405451?ref=ts

or purchase at Etsy: http://www.etsy.com/shop/DandanArt

Children's Memorial Hospital employee picnic. Can you believe I resigned from this place? Tons of food and fun all the time? And, during the worse economic calamity since the Great Depression? What an idiot...

Balloon animals. Nice

Bucktown Art Festival at the worst named park ever. Senior Citizen Memorial Park. Really? It's a park to memorialize dead old people in general?

A really nice art fair in general though

Frank's N Dawg at 1863 N. Clybourn in Chicago.

Megan had the Lamb Keema hot dog with lamb, English peas, cucumber salad, pearl onions and socca. Very good

The Southerner! It was great and for a great cause. Some of the proceeds go to Children's Memorial Hospital when purchased. This is not your typical hot dog stand. It's very gourmet and the prices reflect that. It's about $8-9 per dog. But, the many of the sausages are homemade and the toppings and bun are incredible. Check out their website at: http://www.franksndawgs.com/

That's about it. Megan got the ol' moving truck ordered and stuff like window ac unit, couch, rug, nightstand, bookshelves are going on Craigslist. There's also a bunch of books, clothes, more candles than you can imagine, and other items up for grabs. Let me know if you are looking for something and I'll send a photo or whatever.

Stanley and Me

Here's Flat Stanley (FS). For those who don't know, FS is a school project where kids give him to people they know and take pictures of all the places he ends up. This guy has been to way more places than I have including Paris, Ireland, England, and throughout the United States. Most importantly, the Kedzie Stop on the Brown Line of the CTA. This is for a little girl in Pennsylvania who is the niece of a friend's friend of my girlfriend...

at Soldier Field

Overlooking Chicago

At the lakefront

With storks giving away free calling minutes to Poland at the Polish Constitution Day Parade

At the Chicago Theater

Pritzker Pavillion at Millennium Park

The Bean at Millenium Park

Floating in the Twilight Zone or under the Bean at Millennium Park

Crown Fountain at Millennium Park

Art Institute of Chicago

Sears (soon to be Willis) Tower

Wrigley Field

What trip to Chicago is complete without encased meat? FS at Superdawg.

Megan's dad made a surprised visit for her birthday. So, we went to the Chop House and then they

went to a Cubs vs. Padres game the next day instead of work.

Megan and a co-worker had a shared martini b-day party at work. Her co-worker has a niece or

something who's an "exotic dancer. So, for Megan's b-day, he gave her this card and a pair of her

old 8 inch tall dancing shoes.

BEST WORK PERK EVER! My co-worker, Ruth, and I got free tickets to the White Sox right behind the

Sox dugout a couple nights ago. Here's the team during the national anthem.

A disputed bunt where the umpires didn't see anything wrong, nor did anyone in the stadium, but it

was called back because a Twins player complained and they called it back. It was a very strange call

and took a lot of time to sort out. But, Ozzie had a few words with the umpire and that was

entertaining as always

Maintaining the field

Enforcing order

Just a few of the people with worse seats than I.

Mauer nailed a homerun when I shot this...

Another Ozzie moment. I wish I could see a replay of this because it was very improbable that the player was safe. But, oh well.... I was hoping to catch him getting thrown out. Didn't happen

SOX WIN!

Another lifelong dream fulfilled. I finally got a game ball. This was tossed to me by Paul Konerko! I came close to getting one a couple years ago at a Sox game, but I just came back from the food stand with drinks and nachos and a brat in my hand when it headed toward me. As I tried to maneuver around, the ball landed in the seat in front of me and I had to fight some kids for the ball, which I lost to another adult who got it. This only cost me a half a beer I spilled on the dugout that the guy I gave my extra seat to bought for me. GREAT DEAL!

My new work buddy. His name is Harold

SWIM HAROLD SWIM!

Actually, Not Too Much To Discuss Leading Up To A Week That Will Change The World...

First, a few things to discuss:

1) I had my "annual review" at work. Everyone did. And I got a raise! Now, before you get all excited and start saying things like, "That jerk can afford to buy me some drinks at the bar now." or whatever; understand this. Since I've only worked there almost three months (one month for the review time), it is prorated. What does that mean in monetary terms? I have about 3-4 cents more in my pocket an hour. HELL YEAH! I was born to live in this kind of economy. Man, imagine how awesome I would have done in the Great Depression...

2) Along with my raise, I get a trip to Austin for a conference about Convio. For those that don't know about Convio, it's a computer database program that KNOWS ALL ABOUT YOU.

3) So, I understand that there's a presidential election going on. Some local guy named Barracks Obammers looks like a contender. Anyway, I guess he's having an election party with a million or so of his closest Chicago friends in Grant Park. Anyone going? Mandy? You're best friends with him, right? I expect to see you there? Does anyone know if there will be snacks and/or if it's BYOB?

Now for the real business of the evening:


At the Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA) for Children's Memorial Hospital's Cocktails For a Cause event. It was a real good time. Lots of people (about 500) eating lots of good food (rabbit, roast beef sandwiches, chocolates), bidding on auction prizes (sports memorabilia, walk on rolls for Samantha Who? and My Name Is Earl) and such. What was nice for me was I didn't have to go to work until 4pm and then hung out at the MCA until 1pm. Not bad for a days work.


Here was my office at the MCA. It doubled as the auction warehouse. There is wine, posters, photos, baseballs, and all kinds of stuff.


The mayhem


Art and bruschetta


Cubs fans would like this. It's Ernie Banks, (I forget), Ryne Sandberg, and Ron Santo.


Autographed baseball. I think it's the White Sox, but not positive. I lost the auction directory...


One of my neighbors decided to gussy up the outside of their building. There was so much going on that I can't begin to describe it. Plus, I was on a very important mission of getting pizza for dinner when we spotted this. So...


As many of you know, Megan and working to officially be smarter than I am by getting her Master of Business Administration degree at Loyola. Look at all those intelligent graphs and well thought out statements on that paper. My homework from grad school looked exactly like it did when I was in elementary; all drawings...

That's about it.

xoxo,

Mike