if you're in chicago right now...
...support the Second City's annual Letters to Santa campaign, please. In this tradition, conceived and overseen by the peerless Heather Whinna, letters from destitute Chicago kids addressed to Santa Claus are diverted from the post office to Second City. Money is raised. Gifts are bought, and delivered, by van, by Heather, on Christmas Day to the needy kids that naively asked for them. So for instance, my 13-year-old, who doesn't believe in Santa Claus but insists on asking the kindly fool anyway for a $150 video game, an Ipod Nano, and ten other equally expensive and ridiculous gadgets: no van, no visit, no gift. See? I like this tradition. At the money-raising part, on Wednesday at 1P, I'll be playing the guitar for a little while. And a while after that, the greatly gifted Bill Callahan, whom I've never seen play and am quite excited to.
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Does Jessica Hopper follow the van on her bicycle and pelt it with coal? That would be hilarious. I heard she actually calls Steve Albini, like on his house phone. That to me is far worse than sending him strange collagey postcards that have the unintended effect of irritating his wife. I really liked making those things! Now I don't know if I really like anything anymore. (brooding cello and keening violins) I'm joking.
Some day I am going to meet the dorks who hang out at ... "The Premier Rock Forum," which is the proud title that the Electrical Audio Messageboard body adopted for itself. I should have gone to the benefit thing but my calendar is a prison this year. Probably some of them were there.
I will miss seeing you this season, Robbie. Around here whenever the winds of memory bother the pile marked 'Christmas' up you float amongst a flutter of pages from the Figi's catalog and the rattle of Marley's sad chains. You're doing your Rap of the Dead on a stage made of shiny gift boxes with gift tags signed by people who aren't yet gone. C-7 lights glow against the varnished knotty pine behind you and I can smell balsam fir incense (and your hair). We are all stuck in amber warm and safe but only for a minute.