Wednesday, May 6, 2015

Good morning crew,

So last weekend, after I spent the afternoon scampering around the roof, the wife sprang a little belated birthday surprise on me. She announced plans to take me downtown for dinner at one of those fancy restaurants with cloth napkins and seats on the toilets, and then the climax of the evening; a live retrospective of the career of Louis Prima, one of my favorite, old-timey, Vegas lounge-type performers.

The only catch was that the poor wife had to work Saturday morning, meaning we were on an extremely tight time schedule. Her plan was to come screaming into the house at 3:30, grab a lightning fast shower and change, and be walking out the door by 4:30 to make our reservation at 5:15.

She assured me that this was a very exclusive restaurant and 5:15 was the one and only reservation she could get all day. We HAD to make it.

We left the house almost on time, but the wife must have forgotten what it is like to drive downtown. 45 minutes was barely enough time to make it into the city, but then came the 30 minute hunt for a parking spot.

As I cruised up and down the packed side streets around the restaurant the wife quickly became unhinged in the passenger seat beside me.

At 5:20 she exclaimed, "How can there not be a single parking spot in this entire city!?"

At 5:30 she was practically foaming at the mouth as she forced me to pull into a spot behind a fire hydrant and tried to convince me that the 6-inch clearance between the hydrant and my bumper was enough to keep me from getting a ticket.

She was apoplectic when we finally found a spot at 5:40, 6 blocks from the restaurant.

"That's it!" she foamed as we speed-walked down Halsted Street. "They must have given our reservation away by now. We're never gonna get in. Never. Why didn't you park in front of the stupid fire hydrant like I told you?!"

"Hey, there's a hot dog stand," I contributed as I trotted along behind her. She was able to keep up a surprising pace in 3-inch heels.

When we finally walked through the front door of the restaurant at just shy of six o'clock the wife immediately threw herself of the mercy of the seating hostess. "I'm sooooo sorry we're late. My husband drives like an old woman with glaucoma. Can you still seat us? We'll take a table by the kitchen, or the bathroom. We'll take a table IN the bathroom if you have one."

"I think we should be able to squeeze you in somewhere," the hostess said as she ushered us into a mostly empty dining room.

"It appears we snuck in before the dinner crowd," I commented.

The wife gave me a withering stare.

"What?" I said, "I'm sure the food attracts quite a crowd. I'm just glad we beat the rush."

But my sarcasm was unfounded. As it turned out the food was excellent and the service just as good. Which is important. Rude or inattentive service can ruin a dining experience.

The only drawback was that this was one of those restaurants that try to make a presentation. This means the food looked like a piece of art on the plate, but I only got about 8 ounces of it.

But that was okay too, because after dinner as we were walking down the street to the theater I made a stop at that hot dog stand.

Laugh it up,

Joe

joe@gophercentral.com

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"Did anybody watch the big fight this weekend? The fight had so much clinching. If those guys had been hugged that much as children, they wouldn't have grown up to be boxers." -Seth Meyers

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"Kim Kardashian is here tonight because she has a new book out. It's called 'Selfish.' It is 400 pages of pictures she took of herself. You know how you can't judge a book by its cover? This one you can." -Jimmy Kimmel

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"Congrats to Prince William and Kate Middleton, who welcomed a baby girl on Saturday. The royal baby weighed eight pounds - or around 12 American dollars." -Jimmy Fallon

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Because an increasing number of people are having heart attacks while gambling, the big, high-class casinos are now equipped with sophisticated defibrillators. They are computer-controlled to deliver the exact electric shock needed to revive a heart attack victim. That is, if you're at a big, high-class casino.

At the cheaper casinos downtown, they just drag you across the carpet and touch your finger to the doorknob.


*-------------- Guaranteed to Roll Your Eyes --------------*
Seven months pregnant, my hand on my aching back, I stood in line at the post office for what seemed an eternity.

"Honey," said a woman behind me, "I had back pain during my pregnancy. I was bedridden for four months because my baby was sitting on a nerve."

Then the man in front of me piped up....

"You'd better get used to it now. Once those kids get on your nerves, they can stay there till they're 18."