The Angry Waiter

Last week, while hanging out in Chicago’s Lincoln Square neighborhood, I watched as an Orkin Commercial Services representative parked his truck and went inside a local business.

As I approached his truck, I saw what looked like a pro-life bumper sticker.  Sure enough, it was.

I don’t mean to make light of an important issue, but the idea of a guy who kills bugs and rodents for a living riding around town with a right-to-life bumper sticker on the back of his work vehicle struck me as more than a little ironic.

Yes, I have a sick mind…My first thought was, “I wonder how the mommy cockroaches and mommy mice feel about this guy?”

To be fair, I called Orkin’s media representative and he says Orkin takes no stance on abortion.  Also, he says the truck is a company owned truck, not a private vehicle, and that Orkin’s policy does not allow drivers to place their own bumper stickers on company trucks.

The bumper sticker includes a web address for VictoryWon.com.  From what I can tell, VictoryWon seems to specialize in selling all sorts of pro-life merchandise including models of fetuses in various stages of development, t-shirts and my favorite, abortion-related Christmas ornaments.

Obviously, this guy’s no Buddhist.

Forget about the dead and wounded in Iraq. Never mind that an entire U.S. city was all but wiped off the map. Don’t give a second thought to a Congressional panel suing the Bush administration. Who cares if our economy is creeping toward recession meaning fewer jobs and less disposable income to spend in, oh, I don’t know, restaurants, bars and coffee houses?

President George W. Bush certainly doesn’t care and he proved that at last Saturday’s Gridiron Club dinner - an annual “off-the-record” Washington, D.C. event where big-name journalists and high-ranking politicians, including the president, poke fun at themselves and at each other.

It’s like a Comedy Central Friar’s Club Roast, only here, rather than joking about William Shatner’s hairpiece or Farrah Fawcett’s sagging butt and dwindling intellect, the participants joke about current events - like Hurricane Katrina, the outing of CIA operative Valerie Plame and “oil-rich” Saudis.

Bush, not one to pass up a chance to make an inappropriate joke, took center stage at the dinner and sang a parody of the song “Green Green Grass of Home” that proved once and for all, the man has absolutely no soul…and I mean that in the spiritual sense, but it applies to his musicianship as well.

This was Bush’s eighth and, thankfully, last Gridiron dinner. Take a look at the video. You’ll understand why I, to paraphrase the hopefully soon-to-be incarcerated Vice President Dick Cheney, say, “Go fuck yourself, Bushie.”

There are few things I’ve done in my adult life (or any other part of my life for that matter) that have brought me as much fun, fulfillment and satisfaction as taking guitar lessons at The Old Town School of Folk Music.

Now, don’t let the name “Old Town School of Folk Music” scare you away. Though the original school was founded fifty years ago in Old Town, I take classes at the Lincoln Square location.

As far as “Folk” is concerned, folk is taught here and is still a part of the curriculum, but not really in the group classes. The music I’ve been learning since day one (I’ve been going there for about seven months now) has been Wilco, The Ramones, The Beatles, Bowie, Ani DiFranco, Greenday, Nirvana and a slew of other artists I love. (more…)