“I swallowed the leprechaun! I killed him!”

Yesterday was St. Patrick's Day in Chicago... and I was sick. Drunk people screaming for 20 hours, while sick, not entertaining. I live on a block with a dozen Irish pubs and sports bars, you can draw your own conclusions.

This city loves St. Patty's Day. It's like Christmas, New Years, and Fourth of July all rolled into one. They dye the river green, roll in the green kegs of beer, and dress from head to toe in every shade of tacky green fabric imaginable. I love this holiday, I have fond college memories of green mugs of beer and early morning shenanigans. However, I have seen a new side of this holiday as a Chicago citizen.

The morning began early. Day 4 of being sick is not fun, but when you are awakening to violent shrills from drunken men fourteen floors below its a little disturbing. As noted above, I live at an absurd street corner of tacky Irish pubs and sports bars. Its where the graduated fraternity men and retired athletes retreat to. I use to think this was the place to live. It seemed so glamorous to live within walking distance to these bars. I was mistaken. They are overpriced and overrated. Not to mention, I thought when I graduated Beer Pong and Stripper Poles would have been a thing of the past. Call me naïve, but when I imagined my grown up life I expected chic martini lounges, not the ESPN fanatic sports bars.

These bars located steps away from my apartment have 5AM closings. As a hard working city girl, this isn’t ideal. Every Friday and Saturday I fall asleep to the soundtrack of crying girls, police sirens and fighting men. I have grown accustom to sleeping through this noise, but St. Patty’s Day was completely out of control. It was raining, every bar had a line out front, and people had been drinking for hours. It was basically an all day riot. If you were partaking in this holiday, it may have been a great time, but I was not. I stopped counting at 26 different police sirens, 14 screaming men, and 9 cat fights. My favorite quote of the day was a man screaming “I swallowed the leprechaun! I killed him!” I can only imagine how the retired man living on the floor above me feels about this crazy chaos every year.

As a sober bystander, this was ridiculous. No wonder everyone in Chicago celebrates St. Patty’s Day, to be sober is too irritating. I plan to take my Vitamin C next year so I don’t have to suffer through another Saturday St. Patty’s Day next year stuck in my apartment listening to the chaos below.

Jammmming

One of the best things about living in this town is you never know just what you will find. A few weeks back, my future roommate, Megan, and I were sitting in a Starbucks off of Belmont. This Starbucks was very busy, almost impossible to find a seat. We see a woman sitting at a table and finishing her Grande latte. We start to hover a bit (hoping she will get the message) and she says "I will be up in a second you can have this table" BINGO. (Your own table in a Starbucks on a Saturday is not an easy find!) The woman takes her good old time getting up, and her conversation topics were a bit bizarre, but that’s awesome. She sat there talking about puppies and all kinds of crazy things and it was just funny.

So, she leaves. We are sitting enjoying our hot beverages and this man sitting behind Megan is ROCKING OUT… like not a little bit, but a lot. He is a grungy old man with long grey hair all knotted together pulled into a ponytail. If I had to guess his age, I would assume he’s about 55 or so. Let me remind you, he is ROCKING OUT, sitting on a bar stool looking out onto Belmont Street. His heads is banging, his feet are a tapping and he is lost in the jams coming out of his headphones. At one point he was thrusting his body so violently in his seat his Starbucks card falls out of his pocket and onto the floor. He was starting to cause a bit of a scene with his head banging and hip thrusting in the window of the Starbucks.

…Just then, a girl about our age walks up to him and starts a completely serious conversation. She asks him what he is listening to and when he says “The Killers” I almost spit my drink out, this was not a “Killers” kind of jam, but whatever, I don’t judge. She starts talking to him about MGMT and gets her iPod out for him to listen, they start a legit conversation and swap phone numbers to meet up later that night. This girl was super cute, like short blonde hair, cute outfit, designer bag, and he, well.. you can read his description above.

Like I stated earlier, you will never know what you find in this city, its awkward and amazing all at once.

SSSSketchy Skkkateboarder

In a city with almost any mode of transportation, you might question why someone would choose a skateboard, in February, during a snow storm, on a busy street, without a jacket. Yes, this man may have been a little off his rocker, literally.

But let’s start at the beginning… So two friends and I were out to dinner in Lakeview on a Sunday night. We were at this great Thai restaurant, totally delish. After dinner, we head out to the car. We weren't happy to see this snow/rain substance falling from the sky, but who are we kidding, we live in Chicago.

As we ran to our car we started to cross the street. No cars, left, right, and left again. We begin to cross Broadway and see a skateboarder building up speed, coming right at Megan. The crazy thing is, he continued to push himself down the street, building momentum. I continue to run across the street, I’m the pedestrian, he can slow down! When I realize that I was the only one to cross I turn around to see this awkward dance between Megan and the skate boarder.

Megan moved left, he moved left, Megan moved right, he leaned right, it looked like two seventh graders dancing at a canteen to an NSYNC song. All of a sudden this man grabs onto Megan’s shoulders wips around her body and the skateboard goes flying! I can’t even remember what people were saying or who was yelling what, it was so crazy. I just picture the slow motion fall in my mind of this overgrown man falling off his skateboard and choosing Megan as his airbag. This is quite a sight to see. First off, Megan is little, like 5’2”. Second, this many is huge, like 6’5”. He totally pulls Megan down, and he isn’t even that embarrassed, he’s just like “you cool, you cool?” and ran off with his skateboard! Crazy!

The rest of the night Megan and I would just burst out in laughter and we would know the other was laughing about the crazy skateboarder man flying into her on the crosswalk. Lunatic.

Like anyone actually believed I would blog for 30 days straight... : )

So, turns out, I lied. 30 days straight lasted for like 5 days. Oh well, I had good intentions. Hey! I'm a busy lady! Someday, some publisher will stumble across this hot mess of a blog and offer me a book deal for my stories and I will make millions of dollars and live in a pent house on Oak Street. OR maybe I will just have to work my way to the top and break that damn glass ceiling. That's what I have been doing instead of writing on this blog, I have been "paying my dues" as my dad puts it, working, working, and a little more working. : )

I apologize for breaking my promise, but some good stories are to come.. I promise! : )