got the christmas stuff out of storage and decorated today. tomorrow baking cookies for our holiday party. i have the best wife in the world -- even though we had some disagreements picking out our tree -- she got me an early present: the two towers special edition on dvd. just call it geeky love!

so turkey day was pretty good. me and the missus headed up to rio, wisconsin for a visit with her folks. watched some football, and ate too much, just like every year. played some poker with sarah's cousins after dinner. i must have had a little too much wine because i lost about $10 -- i'm a better player than that. anyway good times.

insert your own caption here. . .

saw a very good show last night at the wise fools pub, my friend brian sharpe and a singer i'd never heard before that goes by the name mk. check out their respective websites and their schedules. if you're in the chicago area they're both definitely worth your time.

it's time to start the charles booher defense fund. who is charles booher you ask? he might just be the last angry man, read on:

FBI agents have nabbed a Sunnyvale encryption software developer who allegedly made death threats against a Canadian Internet company he wrongly believed responsible for sending him penile enlargement ad e-mails. The endless "want a bigger one?", "grow longer with the patch" and "add three inches" messages are a maddening plague upon most people's e-mail inboxes. Prosecutors allege they drove Charles T. Booher, 44, to distraction -- and onto the wrong side of the law. Booher was arrested Thursday and is charged with making threatening interstate or foreign communications, a crime punishable by up to five years in federal prison and a $250,000 fine.

links to the full stories here
spam sends a local man in a rage
bay area arrest in spam rage case

a balmy, 50-65 degree weather this weekend. wake up monday a.m. its 25 degrees with the hawk coming in off the lake, lots of flurries. now that's the chicago way.

celebrated my friend rob hitting the big 30 last night. woozy. too much sangria at emilio's and too much scotch at the green mill.

and speaking of the mill i'm not pleased with the new management. they got a guy running around shushing patrons. now let's be clear we know people are there to hear the music, but at the end of the day its a bar -- not a music venue. and people talk in bars, so unless you're so clearly loud that you can't hear the music what's the problem? this ain't exactly the cso when you're swilling scotch and martinis. the waitress is talking to get orders, isn't she? the whole shushing thing really ticked me off. but luckily the buzz kill guy left us alone when the house band, sabertooth, played their set. still i'm going to keep that in mind the next time i recommend the mill to somebody. they're going to ruin a classic chicago bar, if they keep up with this nonsense.

went to a wine tasting party at my buddy jp's last night. really a lot of fun as wine tastings go. jp had it set up like a "pepsi challenge" all of the wine was in brown bags with numbers and we were trying to guess which were the higher rated (and more expensive) brands. the tasting went as he predicted -- us non-connoisseurs can't tell the diffrence btw the cheap stuff and the pricey. most of us were really big fans of the charles shaw "three-buck-chuck" from trader joes.

just heard on xrt that arthur conely died today. conley was a very underrated soul singer protege of otis redding.

weather only a duck could love here in the windy city today. with all the standing water on the streets and lakes masquerading as puddles its a wonder this whole city doesn't rust shut.

saw a great show last night at the house of blues in chicago.
robert randolph and the family band. man can that guy play a guitar.
imagine jimi, meeting sly and the family stone, meeting the allman
brothers. everyone had a great funky time.

seems alabama judge moore has found out the hard way that we are in fact a democracy ruled by laws not a theocracy under the ten commandments. idiots like him only serve to make people resent religion not embrace it. we i think of his ilk jerry falwell, pat robertson, et. al, my one thought is: "the christian version of the taliban."

its good to have friends. just got set up to see robert randolph & the family band at the house of blues this friday. i'm psyched. also ryan adams is coming to town. should be a good winter for concerts here in the windy. the problem with living in nyc was that everybody came there but tickets were an arm & leg. here i can actually afford to go see some shows.

so yesterday me and the missus celebrated our one year anniversary. yah us! we went to gegas cafe for some romantic fondue. dessert was the top of our year-old-wedding-cake from the freezer. the cake really held up well, so gotta recommend our bakery, bittersweet.

who knew that cbs stands for cowardly bunch of sissies?! i'm referring of course to their decision to cave in to right wing pressure and cancel a sweeps movie about the life of ronald reagan. is this the left wing media bias, i keep hearing about? seems to me like conservatives are doing a pretty good job with making networks toe the line.

don't get me wrong i hate these made-for-tv movies of the week. before the blood is even dry you got the jessica lynch story, the oj murder movies, etc. etc. all this "ripped from the headlines" stuff makes me sick. the acting is usually poor and of course there is liberty taken with dialouge and facts. we know what these are -- movies -- not textbooks. if we can put up with movies showing the heroic president we can put up with a critical potrayal of our 40th president.

had a blast on halloween. john marshall sponsored a sba party @ john barelycorn. it ended up being one of the biggest parties in chicago. some of the better costumes: my buddy jp went as a sleazy high school coach -- his girlfriend as a tawdry coed; a guy in a flight suit as maverick from top gun; a guy dressed as the karate kid's nemesis, johnny lawrence -- what an outfit! a black cobra martial arts suit down to the bad blonde 80's hairdo; and finally my buddy rob schuman wearing a grass skirt and a coconut bra! schuman's got balls.

overused costume awards to all those britneys/school girls out there and nurses. it looked like a hospital on the dance floor!

sarah and i went as couple from the 50's. very ward cleaver/donna reed looking. she had an apron and an "i like ike" button. i was in a retro bowling shirt. think of pleasantville with a twist. as one friend pointed out the irony - you're an interacial couple, in the 50's, and you're republicans! oh yes.

gotta love halloween. it just might be the most fun party weekend of the year. with everyone wearing something cool, wild, or skanky you never lack for conversation.