Holidaze 12/14/20

An oldie, but a goodie: Angelique, atop the living room lamp at La Casa del Terror.

Veterans' Day 2020

From the days of La Casa del Terror, this photo of my GI Joe collection, with a Fighting Yank doll in the mix for good measure.

I tip my cap to all who served and those who contnue to serve. You have my eternal admiration and gratitude.

Holidaze 12/4/18

I know I've posted this photo before, but it's worth another look, especially since its subject, Angelique, is one of the few survivors from La Casa del Terror. This year? She'll be making an appearance in the workspace. Look for her soon.

Shocktober 10/6/18

This is the model of the Frankenstein Monster that stood in the living room of La Casa del Terror before my heart attacks. Now? It's tucked into a cardboard box somewhere in a storage unit.

But it will be freed someday. Yes, it will.

The Christmas Tree

I don't put up my Christmas tree every year. In fact, I can't remember the last time I put it up. Usually, I just put Grandma's little lighter tree in the living room window and a few decorations around the apartment and call it good.

This year? I wanted the tree up.

2014 has been a rotten year from one end to the other. I lost my job in March. Spent most of the year flat broke. Won't be able to buy presents for anyone this year--the first time in my adult life that that's happened. And that doesn't even count the deaths of friends and family. So I decided that my Christmas spirit would need as much stoking as possible. Hence, the tree.

Granted, it's not a very big tree--just a three-foot artificial pine--and the ornaments and decorations are a mixed bag of remnants from various holiday celebrations past. Some are leftovers from Grandma's collection, including Angelique near the top of the tree. Others are thrift store finds. A bunch are from Hallmark or Target (in my neighborhood, they're right next door to each other). Still others were picked up on eBay (back when I could afford to shop on eBay). And a couple were picked up during Uncle Fun's going-out-of-business sale.

I had the tree set up before leaving for dinner at Mom's house Thanksgiving Day and had it decorated by the time I went to bed last night. It's a work in progress--I usually fiddle with the tree for a few days after putting it up, and I always see more bald spots on it than anyone else does--but the living room already feels brighter.

Every Picture Tells a Story 11/14/14

I found this floor lamp in the alley near La Casa del Terror. The only thing wrong with it? The threading on the light switch was stripped. All it needed was a knob that wasn't stripped and--ding! Let there be light. And there was. And it was good.

Vanishing Chicago: The Lincoln Restaurant

I was a sickly kid.

I spent much of much of my childhood in and out of hospitals with various ailments: Chronic tonsilitis, eventually leading to a tonsilectomy; a kidney infection that landed me in hospital for nearly three weeks; a viral infection that caused me to have internal bleeding and stuck me in St. Elizabeth's Hospital (the same institution where I was born) on New Year's Eve (grape juice at midnight, yum!); persistent migraines; a broken right wrist and a 2" gash in my left foot, necessitating stitches and walking with crutches for two weeks.

As a result of these illnesses and injuries, I spent a lot of time in my family doctor's office, which was in a small professional building at the corner of Lincoln Avenue and Irving Park Road.

My family doctor was a real-life version of Marcus Welby--a kindly, silver-haired man went the extra mile for his patients and always visited me in the hospital, even though the doctors there were taking good care of me. (We even shared the same birthday--May 4.) When Mom and I went to visit him, I might have been scared of what might be wrong with me, but I was never scared of him.

Even so, his office was nowhere near where we lived, and sometimes the appointments were late in the day (after I'd finished school and/or Mom had gotten home from her shift at the plastics factory). That meant either waiting until we got home from the doctor's office to eat dinner--which, given that we did not have a car and would have to submit ourselves to the none-too-tender mercies of the CTA, could be eight or nine o'clock--or we could walk around the corner from the doctor's office and go to the Lincoln for dinner.

The Lincoln Restaurant, like so many places and things in our city (streets, neighborhoods, parks, etc.), bears the name and likeness of the 16th President of the United States, and the interior of the restaurant was decked out in an appropriate Civil War theme. The food, though, was standard diner fare. I can't remember how many times Mom and I ate there. It might have been just once; it might have been a hundred times. (Memory has a funny way of either creating reality that was not real or of obliterating reality that was.)

I know we went there at least the one time--I had the meatloaf sandwich, served open-faced with mashed potatoes and gravy. And I know that meatloaf made me feel better, regardless of what was wrong with me that particular day. (Like I said, I was sick a lot, so it could have been any one of a dozen things.)

Flash forward a couple of decades or so. Both the original La Casa del Terror and its nearby successor lie within long walking distance of the Lincoln, so I would occasionally pop by and have dinner there. Did the meatloaf taste the same as what I remember from those sick days long ago? No. Nothing ever tastes that good, really. But was it good nonetheless? Yes, it was, especially since, as a now-all-grown-up person, I could have a Samuel Adams with it if I wanted to.

With the sweet, though, comes the bitter, like meetings and dinners best forgotten more for the circumstances surrounding them than for the venue or its food. I know. That's just how life is. Doesn't mean I have to like it.

Just as I didn't like this news: The Lincoln Restaurant is closing.

Details are vague, seemingly because the owner (who is apparently retiring) doesn't want to talk about it. His right, of course, and I'll not intrude any more than to say this:

I'll miss you, Lincoln Restaurant. Thanks for the meatloaf.

Every Picture Tells a Story 8/13/13

Awesome artwork by my friend Josep Blas, now finally hanging in the dining room of La Casa del Terror.

Christmas at La Casa del Terror

It may not be quite as festive as in years past, but it is celebrated nonetheless.

Every Picture Tells a Story 5/8/12

I wasn't at work on Friday to post this shot of the hail that pummeled La Casa del Terror Thursday night, so here it is now. The hail fell for more than 15 minutes, and while Olivia didn't go into hiding, she couldn't effectively mask her concern under her usual guise of cool-kitty disdain.

Shocktober 10/29/11

Some of the many fascinating, frightening sights to be seen by visitors to La Casa del Terror tonight for the annual HMB!

On the Way to Work This Morning...

Look at all of the leaves that have already fallen on the sidewalk outside La Casa del Terror.

Last Night at Home

Olivia tries to ignore the explosions outside and comfort herself in the dark of La Casa del Terror with a stuffed sardine given to her for Christmas by Superbadfriend.

Halloween Night at La Casa del Terror

Shocktober Continues

Due to my heinous work schedule, there won't be a Halloween Movie Bash in La Casa del Terror this year--the first time in 17 years that there hasn't been such a gathering among my friends, whether at my place or one of theirs. (The first two HMBs were held at JB's apartment, as were at least two subsequent parties. The HMB of 2008, which landed less than two weeks after Ms. Christopher died, was graciously hosted by Superbadfriend and her husband, Scooter.

However, just because there's no HMB this year, there's no reason why you can't see the decorations that went up before party was cancelled, now is there?

The Mouse in the House

To be honest, I don't remember why I walked into the kitchen. It may have been to get a glass of water. Or maybe to slip a dirty plate into the sink. Or to give Olivia a cat treat or a bit of milk.

Doesn't matter, really. I walked into the kitchen, and Olivia immediately followed, as she nearly always does. I was about to do whatever it was that I was going to do when I heard the plastic Target bag on the floor near the trash container move.

I stopped and stared. So did Olivia.

The Target bag had fallen off the counter and onto the floor after my last visit there, but had I just knocked something off the counter to cause the noise that both Olivia and I had just heard? A spoon? A sponge? A pepper mill?

None of the above. Nothing on the floor but the bag--and whatever had just made it move.

Olivia and I watched and listened. The bag moved again. I Leaned down, looked closer, touched one of the red bullseyes at the outer fringe of the bag. It moved again. This time, I saw a small dark shape through the white-and-red plastic--roughly the size of a mouse.

A rodent. In my apartment. Again. Really? REALLY?

I quickly shagged Olivia out of the room, opened the back door (so I could rush out with the varmit, if indeed I could actually catch it) and grabbed a cloth to toss over the bag, which I did.

Two unfortunate realizations happened next.

First, when I lifted the cloth, I discovered that the mouse wasn't in the bag, as I'd supposed, but under the bag. Consequently, it made a dash for the back door.

Second, when I opened the back door, I should have propped the screen door open as well. Had I done so, the rodent would have scampered out and never been seen again. Instead, when it reached the base of the screen door, it did an abrupt about-face and ran back into the apartment. Since I was standing where the mouse had already been, it ran past me and made a sharp left into the dining room.

This was a problem. I'm in the midst of rearranging La Casa del Terror, so there are piles of stuff everywhere--plenty of cover for a midsized mouse. I'd have to depend on Olivia's tracking abilities and my own hearing to zero in on the little bugger. I grabbed the longest implement I could lay hands on--an unopened roll of Christmas wrapping paper unearthed during the rearrangement--and flipped on the dining room light.

Olivia had not failed me. She was crouched low, tail twitching, staring at the cat bed, which the mouse had to be either in or under. This was not the brightest rodent on the world. In a roomful of hiding places, it chose not only the most obvious one, but the one that afforded it the least number of escape routes. It had two choices: It could run toward me (and likely get clouted with the Christmas wrapping roll), or it could run toward Olivia (and likely get eaten).

It chose the latter.

Bad choice.

When I poked the pet bed with the wrapping paper, the mouse ran away from me and toward the plant by the dining room windows. Olivia pivoted, pinned the mouse to the hardwood floor with her paws (she has no claws, but is young, strong and willful) and clamped down with her jaws.

"Good girl!" I exclaimed as Olivia held her catch fast in her mouth. I reached under the plant stand, pulled her out and ran toward the back door. When I got out past the screen door (which, by this time, I'd propped open with a white vase), I shook Olivia from side to side to dislodge the mouse from her mouth.

One problem: No mouse fell from her mouth. It was gone. She'd dropped it on the way out. Which meant it was still in the apartment.

Damn.

I set Olivia down in the kitchen and retraced our steps. I didn't have to go far. The mouse was lying just beyond the doorway between the dining room and the hallway--very, very dead.

I quickly covered the body with the Target bag and cloth and swept it all into the dustpan. One brisk trip the the Dumpster later, the invader was gone.

olivia was now parker in the dining room, mere inches from where the mouse's body fell out of her mouth. She scowled at me (as only a calico can scowl) and cried. I'd taken away her hard-fought prize, and she was not pleased. I was, though, and I gave her extra kitty treats as a consolation prize.

There was still a troubling question hanging in the air, though: How had the mouse gotten in? Had I not sealed all the most likely entryways? The kitchen barriers seemed intact. What about the bathroom, where the rat from two summers ago had most likely gotten in? The plaster that had been knocked out of the wall was still in place, but as I felt around the seal, I found a nickel-sized hole at the base of the seal. A hole more than large enough to allow a midsized mouse access to La Casa del Terror.

I found the can of Great Stuff sealant that I'd used last time and shot enough of it into the hole to seal it well. Great Stuff is, well, great stuff, and the new hole is now plugged, but will that be enough? Will that prevent another invasion?

This is the third rodent to make its way into my apartment in four years. I have to assume it won't be the last.

Holidaze: 12/24/09

Various decorations from La Casa del Terror.

Holidaze: 12/6/09

Christmas at La Casa del Terror, circa 2001.

Shocktober, 10/8/09

The living room window of La Casa del Terror--a preview of horrors to come.

Every Picture Tells a Story: 8/21/09

As requested by Superbadfriend, here's a picture of the "new" couch in the living room of La Casa del Terror--which is not, in fact, "new" at all, but was sold to me by a coworker who was moving to Minnesota and was taking very little with her. As you can see, Olivia approves.