Go Shorty. . .

It's my birthday. Man, 50 Cent is incredible, he can he dodge bullets AND write birthday songs. You can bet I've been blasting that song today. In celebration of the blessed day I was born, I will share with you random Whiskey Tango moments from birthdays past.

2002: Since in the last few years my birthday has been on a weekday, I usually celebrate it twice, once on the actual day and again on the closest weekend day. Last year we went to Naperville the Friday before my birthday, which was fun but pretty Whiskey Tango free (despite the odd line, "If I was wearing that dress, I wouldn't look half as good as you." Wow, what a compliment! I look better than a potential drag queen!), and on my actual birthday we went to the Pub (now the Lodge) in Lisle. A momentous occasion occurred that night: our first meeting with the Male Strippers. While no particularly entertaining conversation occurred, the Male Strippers have become disturbing yet recurring characters in the soap opera that is our lives.

2001: My 22nd birthday involved another trip to Naperville, I believe we ate at Chili's first and Melanie had a wicked sunburn from the time trials. We visited the Lantern and strangely enough, got a table dance by a group of rowdy guys. Melanie bought me personalized Emily stickers as part of my present. We proceeded to stick "Emily" on a dancer booty.

2000: My 21st birthday, where all the bar fun began. We started at Houlihan's, then set out for a tour of Joliet's finest bars. We stopped by the Club Zanzibar on the Empress, but being a Monday, it was closed. Apparently the "every night's a different club" promotion didn't carry on from Club Chameleon (the former Empress Club)to Club Zanzibar. We decided to check out Shorewood's latest and greatest bar, Bedrocks and the Cave. The clientele was slim, but the owners were awesome. I believe I got a free birthday shot and I got to sing karaoke to myself of the Beatles' birthday song. After that we went over to Larsen's, where I ran into some guys I had worked with at the Bus (oh, how I miss you, beloved radio station) who decided to buy me a shot of Crown Royal. At this point I wasn't drunk, but wasn't sure about doing a whiskey shot, but I was a trooper and did it anyway, though I immediately had to spit it out. Very classy. Anyway, Dawn knew the guy who was managing Heroes at the time, and we saw him at Larsen's. He invited us to go back to Heroes with him, and he'd reopen the bar for us and give us drinks for free. We headed over there drank some more, and played the trivia game (alas, no Foxy Boxes). We had some drink that for some reason we decided was called the 10 Inch Lover (I think we heard the name wrong), and Melissa added the drink to one of their bartending books. All in all, an awesome 21st.

1999:Nothing particularly trashy, we missed our train to Chicago and went to Chili's and saw American Pie. Ah, to be below legal drinking age.

1998: Highlights included a trip to Plainfield Fest and Odyssey Fun World, where Wens and I stole stickers of other people from one of those machines where you can take picture stickers of yourself.

1997, 1996, 1995: Birthday barbecues with volleyball, squirting water bottles, and lots of video games. It might have been at one of those parties that people tied Katie Ryan to a pole in my basement, but I had a lot of parties then so I'm not sure. I also remember repeatedly playing R. Kelly's "I Like The Crotch on You" because we thought it was hilarious, blissfully ignorant of his future notoriety.

I don't remember much about birthdays before then, but they probably involved some lovely(?) Esprit outfits, biker shorts, and MTV Party to Go CD's. I still think my favorite present ever was my Nintendo in 3rd grade. Duck Hunt seemed so awesome then, but I hated when that mutt would mock me when I'd miss the duck.

And back to our regularly scheduled report: Tuesday night was the Jackhammers game. Our office had one of the deluxe suites for the evening, so Megan, Court and I were living in the lap of luxury while we watched the Jackhammers lose. Though it was neat to be in air conditioning and not have to go buy food (though I still did it anyway, those chicken breast sandwiches are soooo good), I think I prefer to be down in the regular seats and not so separate from the game. Of course we walked around a lot and saw mullets galore. Yes, pictures were taken. After the game we decided to go over to Alfa's II (why II? I don't get it either, yes, it used to be in another location, but when the Tinder Box jumped across the mall to its new location, it wasn't renamed Tinder II). We saw a man wearing a cowboy hat in the parking lot, which made our listening to Bon Jovi all the more appropriate: "I'm a cowboy, on a steel horse I ride, and I'm wanted (waaaant-ehhhhhd) dead or alive." "Barpet" (bar w/carpet) was crowded, but there weren't a lot of people we knew. There were, on the other hand, a lot of fashion mistakes (ie shiny orange shoes) and a girl that could have been Melanie's twin (we renamed her "Felony"). Courtney recognized a burly bouncer from her high school days and due to the connection, we got free drinks, which is always good. It's time to get back to work and drink some Dasani like it's my birthday, so in the words of the waitresses of Joliet, "Have a good one!"

Baby Got Back

I'm back from my week in Chicago. It was very entertaining; I visited my sister, who was on vacation and went to my college roommate Janice's wedding. Here are some quick highlights:

1. Segway: I met a guy on a Segway scooter outside the bar we were at on Thursday for part of Janice's bachelorette party. I didn't know if it was appropriate to ask to ride it; after all, I didn't know the guy and since we had been drinking, I didn't want to get an SUI (Scootin' Under the Influence). Instead, I had my picture taken with him. I also got his business card for his ice cream store. I have no idea what the relationship is between Segway and ice cream, and I don't know if I'll find out, but the picture is awesome.

2. Old School: The original bachelorette party plan was dinner at Flat Top, drinks (with the bachelor party) at SoPo, then karaoke at Trader Todd's. Parts A & B went fine, but we left Trader Todd's quickly due to the fact that it smelled like vomit (or, as Sean Murphy said, "like yack"). Alas, I never got to serenade the bride with my version of "Butterfly Kisses," (walk me down the aisle daddy, it's just about time. . .does my wedding dress look purty daddy, daddy don't cry) but maybe it's better that way. We decided to go to Brew N View, a movie theater with a bar, to see Old School, one of my current favorites. The highlight for me was a group of drunk guys sitting next to us who yelled throughout the majority of the movie, "You're my boy, Blue!" "You're my boy, Blue!" After a while, I joined in too.

3. Other people like the Jackhammers: Caille, a girl I went to Northwestern with, was in the wedding, and her parents were at our table. Little did I know that her dad was an avid fan of minor league baseball and had attended some Jackhammers games, even though they're from Indiana. He was highly entertained by my story of the Jammermobile incident.

4. The Dance-Off that Never Was: At one point "In the Club" was played during the dancing. You can imagine my excitement. As I was dancing, I overheard some random guy saying, "50 Cent's my man!" I couldn't back down from this challenge and said, "No, he's my man!" This went back and forth a few times until we decided to have a 50 Cent Dance-Off. I went to go request more songs, but unfortunately that was all the Fitty that the DJ had. I requested some Journey and went on my merry way.

5. Illegal Electric Slide: Being a sane person, Janice specifically requested that the DJ NOT play the Electric Slide or the Chicken Dance. Being insane people, we decided to do them anyway, but to whatever song was playing at the time. This was very entertaining.

6. Bachelorette fashion: The night before the bachelorette party Julie and I created Janice's outfit for the evening. We decided to make a crown using a tiara that Julie had along with various items we purchased at the Pleasure Chest (like the Morris Adult Bookstore, only on Fur Face), ie condoms, and little tubes of "Love Gels." Julie bought a shirt for us to write the various things Janice would have to do during the evening on the back, and the front had a picture of the Chicago skyline. I decided to violate Janice's "no penis paraphenalia" rule and cut one out of a magazine (I creatively used a Caress soap add that showed someone's back in order to get skin toned paper) and we glued it on the outline of the Sears Tower on the shirt. I suppose the Hancock tower would have been more appropriate, but oh well.

In other news, I did a little Herald News backtracking in order to update you with the latest and greatest from the Police Blotter.

Car burglarized


JOLIET — A Lockport woman watched from the door of the Bennigan's restaurant in the Louis Joliet Mall as a man looted her unlocked car Wednesday.

The 19-year-old was at Bennigan's with a 17-year-old from Indiana and a 17-year-old from Lockport. They reportedly saw a 6-foot black man in his early 20s with a medium build, wearing a striped shirt and head rag in the 19-year-old's 1991 Oldsmobile.

The man made his getaway in a blue four-door Pontiac Grand Am with a woman behind the wheel, police said.

The Lockport woman reportedly lost a DVD, a phone charger and a pack of Newports to the car-breaker.

First, I hope she wasn't too distraught about the Newports. I know they're an irreplacable item, but I think she'll be OK. On to the main question: Where's the Bennigan's at Louis Joliet Mall? Are they talking about Friday's? Is Shamrock Furniture a secret pathway to Bennigan's? What's the story? I want my Irish themed restaurant and I want it NOW!

Man shot in face


JOLIET — A man was shot in the face with a bottle rocket outside his Morris Street home Wednesday.

The 34-year-old man told police he was standing at the end of his driveway shortly after 3:30 a.m. when he heard a vehicle approach.

He turned toward a late-1980s Ford Mustang convertible and the next thing he knew he was hit in the face and chest by a bottle rocket.

The man told police he yelled at the driver of the Mustang, who he apparently believes shot the bottle rocket. The driver stopped his car, according to a police report, and "challenged" the man "to do something about it."

The man's shirt reportedly was burned in the attack. He also suffered redness to his upper lip and told police a tooth on the left side of his mouth "did not feel right."

"Challenged"? I keep thinking of that Cosby Show episode where Cliff has the tap dance-off with the guy at the dance studio and they keep saying, "Challenge!" I just can't imagine the pain of suffering redness to the lip. I tend to put my self through that pain intentionally, I think it's called lipstick. Also, what exactly is the medical explanation for a tooth that does not feel right? No wonder it doesn't feel "right," it's on the left side of his mouth!

That's about all I got to write right now. I should have some good Jackhammers related stories tomorrow.