So, we’d probably do it anyway, but one of the perks of the freelance life is that when a friend asks, “Are you busy Friday morning? Can you join us in Star Trek uniforms at the WGN Morning News to do a bit for William Shatner?” you can say “sure!” with zero hesitation. Chad and Jenny Byers of the World of the Weird Monster Show were kind enough to not only ask us to join them, but to loan Erica and I much better costumes than we could have put together.
WGN has posted clips of the several bits we did with and for Shatner: providing him with various Star Trek tableaux as he walked from his green room to the studio, making up the audience for his interview, and fielding a scifi trivia team to face off against Shatner. And Tom Abraham’s Gorn stuck around to help Smarty Pants and some kids build a balloon car.
This is not my first time hanging out with the man:
Erica, Kristen, Claire, Shaun, and I all ran the Rave Run 5K last weekend. It’s an untimed novelty run with raveish music and (some) lights along the course. It was fun, but in the podcast we get a bit nitpicky about how it didn’t quite live up to its own hype. But hey, when else do I get to paint my fingernails.
I was asked by a friend for running headphone recommendations because “white earbuds be slipping and sliding”. I pooped out this little review below that will probably not help her, because I use the thing that doesn’t work for her, but may help you. Or not.
For day-to-day use I wear Skull Candy Ink’d (w/ Mic) because they are cheap (I find them on sale for less than $10 fairly often and buy in bulk when I do, because I’m hard on headphones) and they’re pretty good at blocking outside noise, which really helps on the train. But that feature makes them terrible for running—they block too much noise and I worry I’m going to miss some insanely fast cyclist grunting “left!” or a mother who just lost her stroller yelling the traditional “my baby!” and get in a wreck.
For running and cycling, then, I usually wear the white ear buds that come with iPhones—they’re actually kinda crappy at keeping out background noise, which is good for me, and I like having the little mic/control so I can pause music quickly to be able to hear even better. Right now I also have in the mix some crappy earbuds that were a promo item from Brooks at the last race expo I went to. They don’t have a control, but they were free. That’s a thing for me—I’m hard on headphones, but I’m really hard on running headphones. If I don’t catch them on something and end up stomping on them, then my sweat corrodes them into non-functionality.
I’ve never tried any of the hook-over-the-ear or whathaveyou type headphones. Sorry!
warmly,
Fuzzy
So if you’re a subscriber to Time Out Chicago, issue #425 showed up in your mailbox today and page one greeted you with that handsome bunch up there. This is the last print issue of the magazine, and most of the pictured staff have been laid-off, including myself. Friday was my last official day with the company, though I’m doing a little bit of contract work, helping the new reduced staff get transitioned into their new roles as primarily a web team instead of print journalists. But as Frank Sennett, our outgoing Editor-in-Chief, pointed out in his Afternoon Shift interview yesterday, it really is an amazing crew for a website and I don’t doubt that they’ll continue to be an important part of the Chicago cultural landscape.
As for me, it was great being on the Masthead of TOC for the last seven months (especially right next to such a good friend), but I’m off to new adventures of my own in the Chicago cultural landscape. I had put the word out on Facebook and Twitter (and obliquely, here) that I was looking for a job and a lot of great friends pointed me at various IT jobs. I’m not ruling out a regular IT position, but TOC has made me very picky—I’ve been spoiled. Until that perfect job comes along, I’m going to try putting together various freelance gigs and see how that goes. Friends have been very generous in that regard as well, and I already have gigs lined up in a variety of my talents: IT, web work, video editing, photography. If someone would come along with a job as a ‘beardy guy’ I’d be just about set.
Photo by Lisa Hanna Akroush.
So our good friend Jose Gonzalez, who is, seriously, just one of the finest human beings on the planet, was out in Chicago for CIF and he stuck around in town a few extra days to see even more improv and got a slot in Kevin Mullaney’s Hump Night show and invited a number of people to play. It ended up being Jose, Shaun, Shaun Clayton, and I playing and I have to say that I had a ton of fun. With very little warmup or discussion, we all clicked and played a form called “going where the winds of improv carry us,” which is to say we dicked around. And yet we actually told a somewhat coherent story. Of sorts. Anyway, it was a bunch of fun. More photos from the evening are here.
Erica and I (and you know, 39,998 other people) ran the Shamrock Shuffle 8K* this morning down in the Loop. It was an interesting exercise in determination, because my right knee started hurting after the first mile and usually that would be my cue to walk or slow down, but this morning I decided to just keep pushing it and see how I could do. I ran the next four miles in pain, but at a pretty good pace. So, that’s good to know, that I can do that if I need to.
Erica and I reviewed the race for the podcast.
Official Results: Time: 49:40 Pace: 10:00 Place: 17,734/33,219 Place in Sex: 9,741/13,988 Place in Division (M40-44): 1,238/1,810
*5 miles, more or less, for you metric-phobes.
Puppets, Singing
Puppet Improv
A Coupla Quickies
Team Robot Lazer Kittens
Rock 'n' Roll New Orleans Marathon (PR)
Hey, I Know Them
ZZZZZZ
Third Podcast of the Combo HM
Second Podcast of the Combo HM
A Half-Marathon, Sorta
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