There are robots among us.

I’m a dog walker and bike rider. Unfortunately, neither one of these activities comes without dealing with a lot of big city traffic.

I used to be highly annoyed by motorists’ utter disregard for anything in the world besides getting to their destination. These days, however, I find myself becoming more forgiving. After all, who can blame them for being completely disconnected from life outside their tinted glass? Most modern cars are like floating living rooms. Temperature control, a comfortable place to sit, music and movie options and highly technical suspension systems designed to absorb any bumps along the way—pedestrians, dogs and cyclists included.

But every once in a while there’s the total jackass. This is the man or woman who uses their vehicle like a weapon. They drive on the wrong side of the road to get around school busses, they honk at elderly people in the crosswalk, they blow stop signs and nearly kill short guys walking sweet brown dogs—which is what happened to Jez and I this morning.

The total jackass usually elicits a handful of responses. First, I start off with a few choice cuss words. Then I try to determine if the driver is crazier than I am. If they appear to be, I continue on down the road. But if it’s just some idiot with his or her head up their ass, I take it to the next level with a dirty look. Often the dirty look is followed by a pound on the car.

So, I was in the middle of flashing a dirty look at the guy who nearly hit us (working up to pound), when he rolled down his window. For a moment I worried I’d misjudged his temperament based on the mini-van he was driving.

We all paused for a moment.

“I. Drive. Car,” he said mechanically, looking our direction.

All I could do was laugh. Robotic or retarded, this guy shouldn’t have been behind the wheel.

So, make sure to keep your head up this weekend when you’re out there wandering the streets—you never know when you might wind up on the wrong end of a robot or asshole.

Because he’s the ice cream man.

It’s a gorgeous Saturday morning here in Chicago. The wind in the trees, the scent of fresh cut grass and the strange song of the ice cream man.

Out walking Jez, I first heard the beat. Coming from a cheap loudspeaker, a tinny “tat, tat” sound echoed between the buildings. Jez’s ears perked up and so did mine. Pausing for a moment, we looked up to see a white truck, adorned with pictures of popsicles, Drumsticks and ice cream sandwiches. The music stopped abruptly. The bearded driver looked to his left and then to his right. He was checking the air for the smell of children and pocket change. He turned left. We followed.

“Hello,” a hyper-happy, recorded voice came from the truck’s loudspeaker. The beat started again, this time backed up by a creepy ensemble that sounds like something you might hear at a haunted circus. Ahead, I could see the yellow city roadblocks and the glow of a hot pink, handwritten sign attached to a wooden stick in the ground. BLOCK PARTY. His kid-with-pocket-change detector was right on the money. 20 feet ahead of us, he made a wide U-turn—positioning the truck’s ice cream window perfectly square with the end of the street. It was beautiful.

By the time Jez and I reached the corner, the ambush was underway. A little girl on a pink bike, three boys on scooters, a whole group of adults wearing sunglasses with bottled water in their hands. So what if it was only 10 in the morning. The ice cream man was on the scene and he was ready to slang his stuff.

Maybe it was the haunted circus music, or the desire to relive some distant memory from my childhood, but I found myself digging for change. I didn’t have a dime. The ice cream man wouldn’t get any money from me that day. But it didn’t matter. The entire block party was walking away from their trampolines and barbeque grills and headed for the strategically parked white truck at the end of the street. While I can’t say for sure, something tells me that left turn at Thorndale and Greenview Avenue was the most profitable of his career.

A different kind of love.

My buddy Sean told me when I first started this “blog” thing to make it funny. Instead it feels more like a bunch of bad country songs from the 70s. And today will be no exception, as I cannot get the death of good friend’s dog off my mind.

This is a timely issue as Jez, our own sweet dog, is starting to show blatant signs of her old age. The notion that someday she won’t be around to spread her unconditional love with us puts an enormous, painful lump in my throat. I’m using this public forum to let the world know how lucky I feel to share my home with an old brown dog from the pound and to make sure all my friends and family are prepared to feed me high-powered prescription drugs when time finally catches up with her. It’s going to be ugly—I guarantee it.

Is there a message hidden somewhere in this senseless chatter? Yes. My fellow pet owners, I command you to step away from your computers and hug your critters. Fill their water bowls with ice cubes. Buy them treats. Go to the hippie pet food store and spend $75 on the handmade, gourmet pet food from a commune in Oregon. After all, life is short—especially in dog years.

The Midweek Bender: Wednesdays off feel weird.

Please forgive my inner curmudgeon. And don’t question my patriotic spirit (clarified in the previous entry). But while giving us a Wednesday off to celebrate our independence is an admirable gesture, all it really does is ensure that 9 out of 10 people who actually show up to work on Thursday are going to be painfully hungover.

But enough with the aimless analyzation. To alleviate any guilt that could bubble to the surface after dedicating an entire day to polishing off the 30-pack of High Life, I went for a long bike ride early this morning. Now it’s time to let the drinking commence. Happy 4th. Remember, the only thing more “American” than setting off large explosions is drinking heavily while setting off large explosions.

Pre-High Life . . . soon this morning’s clarity will be a distant memory.

Learn more:
“The Lost Art of the Bender”