What I Do All Day

This question has been asked an awful lot of me lately, so I'll attempt to answer it. "A Day in the Life of Unemployed Young Guy", if you will.

Waking up usually comes first, though this is not always the case. The ole "I slept-walked through the morning/I think I'm still drunk" routine comes along every now and again, but it's too late to do anything about that sort of thing before it's too late. So, it's best to go ahead and get out of bed before tackling most skilled morning tasks, such as shaving.

Before I even think about any sort of grooming or robing, I am required by programming to flip through the t.v. channels, read my email and Reuters Online, check my bank balances, and smoke a butt. (I express the right to extend any of the individual components to this process at my discretion.) Occasionally this step includes cleaning up the wake of the previous night, or previous nights, though most mornings it does not. Also, 9 times out of 10, I find it beneficial to stick my arm out the window to see how the weather is. Then, it's time to shower, followed by whatever the day brings.

Today, for example, I endured a rather extended "first thing in the morning" episode. It included listening to a dozen saved voicemails (important phone numbers nestled amongst funny messages), and filtering a long string of emails from my buddies (the uncovering of Deep Throat, followed by a Republican buddy trying to bait the lefties amongst us).

At noon, I heard my brother coming in.

"Hey. What's with all the cups?" I said with a nod to his stack of Starbucks cups.

"Yo. Wha? Just watch, it's for my tea," came the reply. He had on his terminator glasses and looked like he was ready to take care of some serious shit...like making his perfectly iced tea. "Green tea," he said. "This is how you gotta do it. Watch."

He set up what was for all intents and purposes an assembly line of cups--three to be exact. One of the paper cups was filled to the brim with ice. The other had a lid on it and, presumably, the teabags. He said something about letting the tea brew, but then he began to make a series of movements which the cups that no martini bar waiter could duplicate.

After some pouring and shaking, he left the tea sitting in all the different cups for a little while, as we bullshat about one thing or another. He went into his backpack and pulled out one of those Nalgene bottles and unscrewed the lid.

"I love this shit, dude. Green tea. All the antioxidants. It's so good for you." He held up the bottle, and I sort of snickered. "Do you pay the water bill in here? What's with the shower? I can't take that running water. I might not be out here when you get done."

Of course he was sitting there after I got dressed. I didn't ask him why he was being a bit of a dick back there, but I ignored it. He was sitting there drinking the tea out of the bottle.

I made him listen to a couple job-related phone calls, so he could report back to my parents to lay the fuck off. I lined up an interview with a small marketing company, and got a bad report on the Wall Street hiring outlook. Screw the Street anyway. I was much more excited to talk to the girl at the marketing company (she sounds pretty cute--don't they always?).

After phone hour, my brother said he wanted to buy a case for his new Vaio at the Sony store and check out chicks. Game on. First, though, I had to make my own Starbucks run.

We ran down there, and he ordered another one of his tea concoctions, and they knew exactly how to prepare the mad scientist's tools. (My regular order is being made the second I hit the door. They love me in there, and I love them right back.) My brother made some wisecrack about my passion iced tea, which admittedly sounds kind of gay but tastes great (so blow me). I noticed he didn't say a word about my triple espresso--he thinks I'm nuts for drinking so much caffeine, but what can you do? He put some tea from his bottle into a big plastic Starbucks cup, one of the see-through tallboys.

We walked outside and started down Pearson toward Michigan. As I looked over to my right to check out a cute blonde at a newspaper box, I noticed with horror that my brother's tea looked absolutely 100% like a cup of piss. It wasn't some strange urine color, but rather a slightly watered down hint of piss, like the color of your pee just before you start peeing completely clear when the drinks are piling up.

I held in my laughter as my brother occupied himself by making fun of my pink drink, and some crassness about the level to which it is completely unmanly to have a pink drink. I'm sure other people saw my brother's tea and thought the same thing that I did: That a guy was walking down the street with a not only a cup, but also a plastic bottle full of urine, which for some reason or another he was chugging.

After a couple blocks, I pointed out to him that pink is pink, and people probably assume it's something like fruit punch, but definitely not...other things.

"What? What other things?" He really didn't know how much that drink looked like piss.

We wandered down Michigan, checking out and getting checked out by girls of all sorts. Once the weather changes, man oh man, Chicago comes to life. I couldn't remember where the Sony store was, so we went into the Virgin Megastore. A cute girl was checking out movies but just as I was about to drop a cheesy line, my brother said, "Yo, they closed. That's where the Apple store is now. Let's roll." The little fucker saved me from potential public embarassment and he didn't even know it. What a guy.

As we were crossing the river, he exclaimed, "God, I can't believe I get paid to do this. Just roll around with my brother all day. And it's SO nice out!!!"

God, I CAN belive how I'm NOT getting paid to do this--rolling around all day with my piss-toting brother, that is. Enjoy it while it lasts, I guess.

We finally made it over to the Daley Center, where my brother stopped for a moment and asked me to hold his cup while he rummaged around his backpack.

Just as one of the sheriffs was exiting the courthouse, I took a sip from the cup and said, "Geez, bro, your pee doesn't have any salt in it at all. You should really see a urologist about this." The sheriff laughed.

"Very funny asshole. See ya later, bro." And he was off into the tall cavern of humanity that is the county court system.

I admit it: I stood in Daley Plaza for a second, fairly disoriented. After all, every other person I knew would have tooled back into some Loop high-rise to finish off their Wednesday afternoon. I, on the other hand, was out looking for entertainment.

I strolled up Clark Street and headed back across the river, to see my friend at the lunch cafe he operates--Keefer's Kafe, at Kinzie and Dearborn. Thanks to the Starbucks earlier, I hit the bathroom immediately upon entering.

When I came out of the john, my buddy Seamus was working away behind the counter, his boss Rich giving him his lunch order. (Special order--Italian beef sandwich with tons of peppers, little salad, tomato soup.) Seamus worked away and I said hey to Rich.

"Oh no. Is this the bathroom brother? Is this the guy?" he said.

"Huh? I was just in the bathroom. Why? My brother's not in the bathroom. What?" I was so confused.

Seamus stopped what he was doing and said, "Did you not hear what happened with your brother?"

"No," I said. "I saw him the other night at my parents', but he was sneakily concealing details.

Rich smiled and made a wise-ass remark neither of us heard as he left the cafe.

"Oh man! Hold on. I'm coming home from work. Give me a ride home and I'll tell you what happened. Your brother is out of control."

"Cool," I say. "I need gas anyway. Throw me a couple bucks and your on." I refuse to pay for overpriced gas downtown, preferring to fill up either in the 'burbs or Wisconsin.

I had a nice, uneventful walk home, which is how it should be. I walked by the interview buidling (it's above a terrific bar--and the girl sounds hot--and it's marketing--this should be interesting). I hit Starbucks again, because I have something wrong with me.

I stopped for a second and talked to one of the doormen who was leaving for the day. He said, "I've enjoyed your doing nothing. It's very amusing to me." Thanks, bro. I try to please my public.

Then I traded barbs with the guy whose shift just started. He's a younger guy from Poland, so I asked him if he'd ever been to Dresden. (One of my best friends from high school just moved there, and he's been nagging me to come visit him. I keep telling him that it's like stealing for him to buy dollars with euros right now, but he's insistent on ignoring me, the fucker.) Anyhow, we shot the shit about how awesome it is in Germany, hot girls, the Cubs, etc. I left when some delivery guy stopped by--somebody's gotta work around here.

I hung out and played some PlayStation2 for a while. Seamus came over right about then, and the chilling began.

It's hard to tell where the next hour or so went--part of it spent watching SportsCenter, part of it playing video games, part of it reading various books I have lying around, part of it screwing around with my iPod.

I mentioned that I thought Danica Patrick's kind of a hottie, and Seamus said she's a dyke. I quickly corrected him: "You have to weight the decision given that she's an athlete, and most female athletes are butch. If she was walking down the street, you wouldn't fall over, but you wouldn't puke either, which is as much as you can ask from a female pro athelete. That's excepting tennis chicks, of course. Like that Katerina Witt chick--she's considered this super-hot ice skater, but she's fucking butt ugly." Seamus saw my point, but I doubt he thinks Danica's that attractive. I'd still bone her.

Another chunk of our time together was dedicated to the afore-referenced story involving my brother. Since this tale does not involve me, nor was it approved for retelling by the person in question, I will spare him the potential embarassment of publishing it. Let's just say that it's unreal, and in its own twisted way, it was completely, hysterically awesome.

Speaking of the devil, my bro called and said he'd give Seamus a ride home. We got up to go just as Sheehan called. He said he was dying for an Italian dinner, so I told him to come by when he was done at work.

I walked Seamus's to my bro's car, so I could ask my brother to print me a couple resumes to bring to my meeting. He said to email to his work account, and they pulled away.

I walked around the block and pretended to listen to my iPod. That's right--the iPod headfake. When I become pathetically obsessed with a new electronic gadget, I encourge the it taking all forms--in this case, it played the headfake. I listened to a couple of cute but rapidly approching over-the-hill secretaries bitch about work, their nails, and their dry cleaners. So, that's what they talk about all day. Yeah right.

I got home just a minute before Sheehan. We watched some t.v., smoked a cig, and debated about dinner. He wanted Papa Milano's but I steered him toward Rosebud. Never in my life have I turned down a Rosebud call. If I ever get really famous and move away from here, I will have Rosebud flown to me, that's how much I love it.

Sheehan complained that two girls at the office, being bored to tears, have become overly gay with regards to his hooking up with a co-worker. Sheehan's trying to keep it a secret, but that sort of thing never stays under wraps for long. One of the girls in question is huge to the point of vacuum of attractiveness; for just a split second, I thought that Mike might ask me to do something with said fat bitch in order to shut her up about his romance. (That might work, too, because this girl is as desperate for hog as she is enormous.) Mike knows me too well for that, and he sort of dropped it. We departed for the restaurant.

Rosebud is the best food ever. People complain that the portions are too big, but they apparently don't go there when they're starving. They do give you a ton of food, but it's a ton of tasty-ass food. I switched my order up. Usually I go with a bowl of minestrone and vodka rigatoni. Tonight I ordered a caprese salad and fettuccini alfredo. Sheehan ordered his usual sausage and peppers. He asked if it was okay if he ordered a Moretti, in light of my pledge to take a few weeks off from drinking after the Mad-Town incident. I told him that it might constitute a major test of my will, but I'd come out the other side stronger and sober. (Such was the case, by the way.)

Dinner was hugely enjoyable as always. We sat next to a table of four girls in their twenties--fantastic. I did a quick glance and noticed presents (uh-oh) and three of the four with rocks on--not fantastic. Why the uh-oh for the presents? It's an automatic deal breaker. If the girl is getting the present as some sort of wedding shower gift, it's not worth the effort to pay any one of them any attention--they're young enough they they're "so in love!" with being married that you'll never make any headway. If the gift is a birthday present for the single girl, she's invariably depressed that another birthday's passed and she, unlike all of her friends, is unmarried--too much baggage potential. So we passed the meal by trading tales about our buddies, girls, drinking, work--the usual. It was great.

Sheehan came back here and we watched episodes two and three of the first season of Entourage, possibly the best HBO show of them all. The writing is so dead-on, and the girls are so hot. From what I gather (as I've never seen the comparison case) it's like the O.C., only you don't have to chop your cock off in order to watch it.

We watched a couple innings of the Cubs game, and they somehow tagged Derek Lowe of the Dodgers for a 4-run second inning. Equally shockingly, John Koronka was making his first MLB start and was holding his own. Sheehan doesn't have cable, most Cubs games are on a local cable channel this year, so he allows himself to get sucked in as much as possible. Since the game had a ridiculously late 9 p.m. L.A. start time, Sheehan had to go after the end of the third.

He hopped in a cab, and I had just enough time to make the ultimate bachelor's run to Potash Bros. grocery store across the street. With about 10 minutes to close, I grabbed a 12-pack of pop, two boxes of microwave popcorn, a thing of milk, a bag of Hershey's kisses, and a couple bags of sunflower seeds--raw sustenence, in other words. I love going into stores minutes before they close, so no one's in line ahead of you, or blocking the aisle.

I ran back upstairs to catch the end of the Cubs game (it's now 6-5 in the top of the eighth), and decided to do a little writing.

What do I do all day? Not much. But I sure do stay busy.