Extreme Makeover: Desmond Edition

One sign that my work with Desmond was not going unnoticed was this: He became "the kid who needs a haircut". Whenever someone would pass him in the hallway, they would say, "Dang Dezz when you gettin a haircut boy?" or "hahaha look at that sugarbush you got on ya head". Whenever he used to pass someone in the hallway, it would be scared looks or very cautious hellos. This "reaction evolution" has been a total validation of my efforts to reform his murderous tendencies.

He finally got his haircut, and became the local gossip for the day. Personally, his bare-headed return from Memorial Day weekend totally threw me off, even if it did give everyone else something to chat about.

I think old-look Desmond was a cuter kid than new-look Desmond in my book, but feel free to scroll down for a comparison picture, and make the call for yourself...

Chibloggo: The Windy City Chronicles (Part 2)

Tomorrow morning bright and early, I leave for China. I REPEAT: TOMORROW MORNING I WILL BE OFF THIS CONTINENT AND OUT OF COMMUNICATION WITH EVERYONE! Just a heads up for all who are not sure why my cellphone is totally inactive for a near half month, Rob Critchlow style. (By the way homie, if you read this, it's been way too long, let's do lunch when I get back) I should really pay a friend to change their facebook status to let people know I'm gone...or not...anyhow, let's move on to part 2 of our journey, shall we...

Saturday

11:06am - Successfully wake up later than the usual 7:00 my body clock is naturally set to during the week. Waking up early is great. Unless of course, you're on a vacation where later nights are the name of the game and no one else is around at sunrise.

12:22pm - Time to get our grub on. We walk over to a hot spot called Lou Mitchell's bakery for breakfast. More like brunch, as we were ready to hammer down one huge meal so that we could just snack pregame. Place is pretty packed, so my expectations began to build. I also had heard that breakfasts in the Midwest cost an arm and a leg, and was curious to see what the damage would be in relation to the quality of the meal. I got the 2 eggs meal, equipped with homefries and toast, then added on a couple pancakes for good measure. The coffee was not as good as Friday morning's, but the meal itself was outstanding. It came in a smoking hot skillet, a pretty cool touch I thought. Side note: The size variations of the 2 eggs you get at different restaurants never ceases to boggle my mind. I understand that eggs come in different sizes, but still...A pair of eggs at this spot was literally 5 times bigger than an IHOP or Dennys. That's a pretty enormous gap between breakfasts, and can be totally confusing when you're trying to order the right amount of grub.

12:58pm - Leave to table to go to the b-room, with every intention of coming back and finishing my monstrous meal. I start to get a weird feeling that the waitress may take away my plate while I'm gone, but shrug it off.

1:06pm - Noooooooooo!!! Always trust your gut, especially in food-related situations. Luckily, I've consumed 6 pounds of breakfast at this point so the 7th was not essential to my satisfaction. I just despise the idea of wasting food, so much so that it has led me to do incredibly "dirty" things in the past i.e. taking complete strangers leftovers off their hands so good food wouldn't end up in the trash can. As much as people rip me for doing things like this, I never once have gotten sick from it, nor do I believe I ever will.

1:29pm - After stiffing the waitress for taking the plate early (just kidding obvi.), we walk out and chat about what a cutie she was, and how its super lame to hit on any chick in a server position while they're on the job. Good chat, and one of a large bunch we had during my time. (I really wish I could make an all-time greatest conversations list. The two ones that easily make the conversation Hall of Fame that I can think of off the top of my head are 1-Me and Robbie's infamous "Cherry coke is the booooooomb. I wish we had invented it" one, and 2-Me, Doran and Scott's "Holy crap, if bugs ever joined forces with each other and revolted against humans we would be absolutely screwed" one a couple weekends ago)

2:00pm - We walk back to the Mercy Home where Tom shows me the kids' place where he works, and I get to meet a couple of them. It's a really nice facility in general for both the staff and the kids, the type of place I could even see myself at in the right circumstances. The kids rag us for sporting our bright orange Flyers shirt jerseys, and tell us we better watch our backs wearing them around the city. At this point, we had no idea what sort of response we would get from Chicago fans who didn't know us.


2:35pm - Cruise around the city for a bit in our Orange, and try to get to a landmark or two covered in Blackhawks stuff so we could deface it, or far more likely take pictures with it wearing our Philly gear. Traffic is getting bad in the city however, and a couple roads are blocked off, so we veto that option and return back to the pad to get a few down hours before we entered the madness at the United Center. While in Tom's neck of the woods, we get heckled for our orange attire by a cop and a paramedic in succession. Yeeeeeesss.

3:30pm - Watch some of the lacrosse final four and veg out with Tommy's roomies before catching our cab to the arena. The calm before the storm, exactly the mental preparation needed before going into enemy territory in Game 1 of a championship series rocking the away team's colors.

5:50pm - We catch our cab, which was only a 7 dollar ride, and get out at the United Center. Entering a sea of Red and Black, I get a serious adrenaline rush and start walking like I'm in a posture contest. I put on a fierce scowl, which in reality probably looked like a constipated face, but in my mind...I looked like I had more intent to kill than Liam Neeson in Taken.

6:15pm - I had so many people tell me going in to "be careful" and "don't wear your jersey" and all this nonsense. Bottom line is that other than the consistent (yet ultimately underwhelming) heckling, no one even seemed like a remote threat. We chatted it up with some diehard Hawks fans on the way to the standing room section, and got a solid picture with the ice in the background. Upon arriving at what would end up being "our" standing room for the game, we met a really nice couple sitting in front of us and some other standing room people, a group of Hawks fans our age and a couple Philly fans, who ended up being our go-to guys for high-fives, man hugs, and mostly an awkward combination of the two at the same time.

7:20pm - The United Center game introductions were incredible, and the arena was rocking. It's so strange when your will for something is directly opposed to the hopes and dreams of 22,000 people, and you're all in the same building. The other really crazy thing was after a Flyers goal, hearing nothing but the shouts of the road team's fans sprinkled intermittently throughout the crowd, echoing in the arena. There were so many other things that stood out during my time watching the game. Too many to mention, and I fear too many to even remember. I suppose I will just have to do it again the next time a Philly team makes a Championship Finals.

10:30pm - We left the arena disappointed with the outcome, but absolutely thrilled with the experience. I didn't diary the game, because everyone who would read this either knows how it went down, or would be bored with the details. We both agree it's the most fun we've ever had at a loss, and also agree that we are totally confused about Chicago fans. They were incredibly friendly and showed great hospitality, but on the flip side I felt like there was no question which city needed/needs to win more. There's a reason Philly is the greatest sports city in the country, and even though once in awhile we have a drunken idiot draw negative publicity our way, the majority of fans are upstanding citizens who are extremely passionate about their squads who don't draw the positive acclaim they're due.

10:42pm - Getting back to Tom's place, we excitedly tell of our time at the game to whatever roomates would listen, while refueling with food and brew. A few team members hit the hay, and it's me, Tom and two of his roomates, Megan and Erin. We play some pong, and put the Ry-pod on music detail. One of my favorite things ever is handing my Ipod to someone who has never seen it, and watching them scroll through the selection and eventually put on a tune or a playlist. I don't know why it's so exciting to me, but it is.

12:01am - The fantastic four as I referred to us (and by that I mean "never-ever referred to us as until this particular sentence"), ventured to a little dive that reminded me of a bunch of places in Philly I've been to over the years. We chatted there for a good while, then headed back to the homefront.

7:20am - Finally crashed on a couch in the living room area after essentially pulling an all-nighter chatting it up with Megan, whose hand I will ask for in marriage if I ever venture out to the Midwest again. I alluded to great conversation earlier, and I must say this was a theme throughout the trip, one that enhanced the entire experience.
On a "ridiculously cheesy yet totally true" note: There are sooo many dynamic people out there. It's crazy to think that while you are blessed with some people in your lives for long periods of time, others just make a brief appearance, leave a mark, and you never see them again. I feel totally undeserving of all the wonderful people who give me joy as mere passerbys, let alone the ones that contribute to the awe-inspiring love I feel on a regular basis. It was an absolutely overwhelming feeling that hit me on the flight home, and one that I felt tied into my trip to a certain extent. (More on my blessed self in a future serious/religious blog, always a reader favorite haha)

10:30am - Sunday Morning was relaxed. We walked around a bit and got lunch at bar&grill that was a stone's throw away from the Mercy home. Watched the Phils offense continue to sputter against the Marlins and reflected on the time I spent in the Windy City. Eventually Tom dropped me at the airport, we hugged it out, and I was on my way. The weekend there was really difficult to put into a couple blog posts, just too many little things and quirky details words wouldn't adequately explain.

See ya in a few weeks peeps!!!

Chibloggo: The Windy City Chronicles (Part 1)

You ever have expectations for something become so large that there's almost no way they can possibly live up to the fantastical images your mind has created? I single- handedly ruined the movie Training Day for Ben before he saw it by building the hype to a point where no matter how much he enjoyed it, it would fall short of the lofty expectations I set. I think for me, many trips are the same way. Rarely does everything go as smoothly as planned, and it's not realistic to think that there won't be at least some logistical issues to subtly change one's mood through the duration of their travels. My trip to Chi-town this past weekend was the exception to the expectation rule. Allow me to share with you a 2-part diary of my time with Tommy Boy and company, which exceeded the unreasonably high hopes for it I had going in...

Thursday

11:15am - I decided to go into work for a few hours since my flight wasn't leaving till 2:15pm. It was pretty cool to see my coworkers excitement for my trip, which I had been beaming about for weeks. They knew how much of a big deal it was, and that it became an even bigger deal before when I purchased the Stanley Cup Game 1 tickets. There were points where I was visibly giddy, and they seemed to feed off that energy. Very cool stuff, and I believe a natural part of having great coworker chemistry which we have. I told Desmond that I was leaving for lunch, and that I would see him on Tuesday. I found out later, and not surprisingly, that he just heard the "lunch" part and apparently was talking about me the next day as if I was absent from work because I was still on my lunchbreak from the day before.

11:53am - Arrived home, where my sis was waiting to drive me to the airport. 2 hours before, she had signed for the Flyers tickets, which were overnighted to me just in the nick of time. She agreed to stop and let me treat her to some Philly Flavors Ikeem while en route to Philly International. Needless to say, a ride to the airport, Stanley Cup tickets in hand, and some ikeem to get us on our way was a recipe for a perfect start to a trip.

12:55pm - Got to the port, snagged my carry-on bags, and started the process of getting to the actual gate. The process was far more painless than I imagined, and I was sitting for a mere hour before the 2:20 departure time.

2:12pm - Began to board the plane, with the LOST finale fresh in my mind, sparking a train of convoluted thoughts regarding planes, death, tropical islands, and whether or not I was an in-closet science fiction fan. (I decided on no, because outside of Star Wars and some LOST episodes, I really think the genre is painful. That, and I already filled my nerdiness quota with fantasy sports)

2:37pm - Aaaaaaaaaaaaand Liftoff. A few minutes in I convince myself there is no shot of me sleeping, so I opted for reading and playing a game I call, "Guess what's on the stranger's Ipod, and creepily try to glance over and find out when they're looking the other way or sleeping." This game, and all its many variances, is eventually going to get me into a VERY awkward situation.

3:35pm (Central Time) - The Southwest Airlines Flying Jawn touches down in Chi-Town while 2 babies, a black boy and a white girl, curiously stare each other down. Meanwhile, their fathers are holding them like ventriloquist dummies, speaking to each other from the baby's perspective. Dad 1: "Hey girl, what are you doing this weekend? We should hang out" Dad 2: "Well you know I am just super busy. Eat, sleep, poop, eat, sleep, poop." ....and so on, back and forth....absolutely dynamite moment even before setting a foot on the Illinois ground.

3:46pm - After finding out that Tom is caught up in some traffic, I take the time to grab a bag of pretzels and a dollar lottery scratch-off ticket. My thinking with the ticket was simple: If I hit big, not only do I cover the price of the Flyers tickets but also have a fantastic story to start my trip. Alas, it was a dud, but it was a chance worth taking. I try to take huge risks like buying buck lotto tickets, if for no other reason than to live on the edge. I am such a baller sometimes.


4:45pm - Tom eventually gets to Midway and we head back to his work & residence, while agreeing that the trip sneaked up on us. Arriving at the Mercy Home, I instantly feel comfortable. Tom hooked the room up with a welcome sign, as is the tradition with every guest that stays. He went far past the usual guest welcome though, adding a liberty bell-shaped Phillies banner, some bottled water, a tastykake and a "doll" with a Phillies Jersey to the room's decor. Finding an old acoustic guitar proved to be the final piece to the puzzle, and I ended up rocking out in a rocking chair in my room in brief moments of down time throughout my stay.

5:32pm - Tom introduces me to Binny's, the Wal-Mart of alcoholic beverage purchases. I have to take a few minutes, overwhelmed by the beer selection and the equally outstanding prices. Tom and I grab a 6-pack of 312, a Windy City special, and head back to my new home away from home.

6:03pm - Still in shock that we actually are going to be in attendance for the Flyers game, we get on the topic of the Broad Street Bullies special on HBO. Sure enough, we turn to HBO and it's on, and only 3 minutes in. I can get on board with any well-made documentary, so you can imagine my thoughts on a well made documentary on a subject that interests me. We stay mesmerized by the tube for the next hour, enjoying some quality brews while we lounge.

7:09pm - Out we go to Giordano's for some deep dish pizza. I had heard mixed reviews about the whole deep dish scene, but this is the conclusion I came to: It may be called pizza, but it has to be evaluated by its own rating system. It's like comparing a golden retriever with a wolf. And best believe, I wolfed down my fair share of the delectable local favorite.

11:35pm - After getting to meet a good handful of Tom's 13 roomates, we went out with 2 of them, Erin and Rachel, to a local watering hole owned by a couple of diehard Blackhawks fans. Beautiful night, as a cool Chicago breeze blew through the open windows in the front of the building where we sat. Just a perfect end to the first night, totally laid back and relaxed before the schedule began to pick up in the days to follow.

Friday

9:51am - Wake up up after a comfortable night's sleep, cop a shower, and it's off to a coffee shop for some breakfast. The place was excellent, think Starbucks but with better coffee and without the pretentious names of drink sizes. So it was the Fennario of Chicago more or less.

11:25am - Hop on the El to Wrigleyville. Chicago's transit system makes Philly look like they are still in the horse and buggy days. Maybe I'm overstating the point, but at very least, I never felt my life was in danger from the potential communicable disease that lurked on any of their modes of transportation. Septa is really a sad organization.

11:55am - We arrive in Wrigleyville. Totally overwhelmed by finally reaching a location of this sports/cultural magnitude, I take the above picture of the street the El stop runs over. One of the transit workers who can clearly tell that I'm out of my element calls me out on taking the dumbest picture ever. This is followed by me cracking up and him giving me and Tom some great pointers to fully enjoy the experience. Everyone in Chicago is super nice. This was a reoccurring theme throughout my exchanges with the locals.

1:06pm - After wandering around Wrigley and taking a sufficient amount of pics, we made our way to our seats. It's important to note that the temperature during my time in the 312 was as inconsistent as my verb tenses in this very blog post. With that in mind, it was a gorgeous 73degrees in the sun and a blustery 18 below in our shaded seats. There were people with blankets and hoodies on, the true veterans attendees of the historic ballpark. We were literally in the top row of the place, but the view was still great and we watched the first few innings in our nosebleeds before finding a new spots to watch the remainder of the game from.

4:22pm - Postgame, we head out to get a first hand look at Chicago's version of Mardi Gras, which happens before, during and after every Cubbies home game. After peeking in a few places we walked down a few blocks to catch the El back. A much quieter, laid back pub caught our eyes as we walked, so we decided to make one last stop before saying goodbye to Wrigleyville. After playing a few games of pool with some locals on a crooked table, we were ready to leave, just had to take a quick leak. The problem was, two St.Louis Cardinals fans thought it would be super classy to consummate their love/beastly urges in a public bathroom, so we debated whether it was worth it to venture in at all. Bottom line we came to: they didn't own the bathroom, and any awkwardness we felt as we beelined it to and from the urinal was surpassed by our desire to make them feel they were not, in fact, entitled to that space. On that note, let's exit Wrigleyville.

7:25pm - Grabbed some much needed grub in the form of a Chi-town hot dog and polish sausage combo. Both incredible, although I definitely understood the special appeal of the deep dish far more than the dog. I'm just coming to the realization that the majority of the weekend was spent heavily immersed in food and sports, surrounded by good company. It's really no wonder it was such a fantastic weekend.

9:04pm - After spending the entire day out, and anticipating a packed day and night on Saturday, we made the executive decision to stay in. I got to know the roomates a bit more and a few other Philly transplants we knew stopped in to visit and have a cold one with us. Great times for sure, as we physically and mentally prepared ourselves for the main event on Saturday night...