Zoobilee Zoo

Column note: My latest column is in the paper today, here's a link. As usual, the title is not mine, my choice was "When Tinsel Town Met J-Town." Also, the "8" after "The O.C." is supposed to be a comma, if anyone was wondering what "The O.C.8" was.

Does anyone else remember Zoobilee Zoo? I think it was the most terrifying children's show ever. I just did not enjoy watching grown people dressed up as animals. It scared me in the same way that I find Cats frightening. Anyway, it seems like there's a lot of brouhaha surrounding the Lincoln Park Zoo lately. First, there was the incident involving the death of "Wankie" the elephant, which led to this hilarious Open Line comment:

Dying of shame
Experts can't seem to figure out what killed Wankie, the elephant from Lincoln Park Zoo that died last week. I don't know either, but if someone named me "Wankie," I think I might just die of shame.
Joliet

Wankie's demise was followed by the deaths of 3 monkeys, and the amputation of another monkey's arm (Let's not name him Stumpie). All of this craziness led to some protests over the weekend, which were discussed on the news Sunday night, along with another bizarre zoo-related story. Apparently a zookeeper, Nancy DeFiesta, was mauled by some lions at the zoo in the fall and has just returned to work. The amusing part of this story is that Ms. DeFiesta plans to get the scars from the incident turned into some kind of tattoo. I really hope they follow up on this story.

In radio news, it seems that the excessive amount of Steely Dan on 99.9 has been replaced with a large amount of Heart. I am not complaining about this at all as I love "Barracuda," "Magic Man," and, of course, "Crazy On You." I do think they should add in some '80's Heart though, I would enjoy "Alone" and "These Dreams." 99.9 has been especially good to me today, I heard Steve Perry's "Oh Sherrie" and Journey's "Lights"! In other music news, I love the new Black Eyed Peas song, even though I'm convinced that the singer, Fergie of Kids Incorporated fame, has a face made of leather. Step away from the tanning beds, ma'am.

Time to recall some recent social adventures. Weekend before last was overall unexciting, did a little shopping, ice cream and Cemeno's fun on Friday with nothing too much to report, except that the Mother's Day gift with cologne purchase at Marshall Field's was a curse rather than a blessing. Field's was offering a free vase with purchase, and Courtney and I were trying to decide which of the vases was less ugly. I debated "forgetting" to pick up the vase, but I let my conscience be my guide. Saturday evening Shannon and I headed over to McBrody's for another Dueling Pianos Night. For some reason, the night ended up being Bizarro Joliet night: there were a lot of people there, all around our age, but the majority of them were people I'd never seen in my life. There were a few familiar faces from time to time, but it was just strange. I think I only said hi to one or two people. The pianos just weren't as fun either, so we headed out pretty early. However, we did enjoy some AWESOME cheese-filled breadsticks, and got a hilarious flier. Some Jager representatives were in the house selling shots, and handed out advertisements for Jagermeister On-Tap machines. For only $299, you can "host the hottest parties with the coldest shots" with your own Jager machine. I really wonder who would buy this machine, but I could see a lot of locals purchasing this marvel. I checked out tapmachine.com for more info, and learned that the tap machine uses about as much power as 3 light bulbs. Also, it chills the liquor at a temperature "AT LEAST 20 Degrees COLDER THAN ICE!" They seem quite excited about the claim. Personally, it just made me think of the Vanilla Ice film "Cool as Ice." Anyway, I think I'll be sticking to the Snoopy Sno-Cone Machine.

In movie news, I saw two flicks this week. Wednesday evening Courtney and I went to see "House of Wax." It was as entertaining as I had expected. I love bad horror movies, and it was nice to see so many WB actors getting work. Paris Hilton really wasn't too annoying. I'd give it 2 to 2 1/2 stars for sheer cheesiness. Saturday afternoon Melanie and I went to see "Kicking and Screaming." An odd note: both movies were at Movies 10. Is my luck changing? Anyway, "Kicking and Screaming" was. . .OK. Will Ferrell was amazing as usual, and Ditka's acting skills definitely surpassed his Meineke ads, but it was pretty much a kids' movie and very predictable. It felt like "Little Giants" meets "Ladybugs." I was also amused by the audience reactions to the movie. I believe there was clapping during inspiring moments, which disturbed me. Also, there was a LOT of audience crying, which led Melanie to ask whether the movie theater, like churches, has a "Cry Room."

Friday evening I met Melanie at Jameson's for a bit. The parking lot was packed, and apparently they were having a fundraiser for Troy bands, which is awesome. The band of the evening was NoJo. It had been a long time since I saw this band. In fact, besides one time at St. Joe's Park, the last time I saw this band was at Jameson's back when it was Natabella's. From Natabella's to Glory Days to Jameson's. . .that building is a chameleon! The band was pretty good, and the crowd was a bit older. Melanie and I were dancing at one point and may very well have been the youngest people on the dance floor, which was a refreshing change. However, some of the dancers were a little too exuberant and I was afraid of getting slammed. In other Jameson's news, they're getting an outdoor patio, which makes me quite happy.

Saturday morning I got up bright and early to attend an Irish dance feis. A feis, pronounced "fesh," is an Irish dance competition, and my little pals Maggie and Grace were competing. Though I've seen dancers many times in the past, this was my first feis, and it was hilarious. I just find the wigs so amusing. The girls are required to have curly hair, and while some just have their hair curled, the majority of them have giant curly wigs similar to this picture Some of the wigs look decent, but others tend to look like the hair you can make in the Play-Doh Mop Top Barber Shop. The dresses are also amusing. . .some of them are tasteful and not overly flashy, but others were sequinned monstrosities, including some hot pink and chartreuse getups that reminded me of the colors of a carnival fun house. I also saw a girl with dolphins on her dress. Irish dolphins? I don't know. Here's a picture of some dresses similar to the ones I saw. We also found amusement in watching a mom put a wig on her daughter. It was as though her head had expanded to three times its size! The same little girl was wearing a one piece zip up sweatsuit deal, leading Maggie to comment, "It's not bedtime." Anyway, the feis was a good time, and congratulations to Grace and Maggie on your third and fifth place wins, respectively.

Saturday evening I headed over to Joe and Shannon's to meet their new puppy, Abby. Abby is adorable, but I do wish they had gone with the other name option of "BoBice." She also seemed to respond well to "LindsayLohan." After dinner, we went out to North Beach in Downers Grove for yet another free drink party. We had an awesome time. It kind of felt like I had stepped into the Way Back Machine as Melissa and I danced on a speaker for a bit, reminding me of the "Slut Box" days at Heroes, and among the songs played by the DJ was "The Thong Song." Dumps like a truck, truck, truck. Speaking of the Way Back Machine, we were amused to see a girl wearing one of those skanky tops where the back only consists of a couple tied strings that were all the rage five years ago. I'm trying to find a picture of these tops, but it's difficult. There was also a really good U2 cover band playing in the back of the bar, and for some reason the bathroom attendant spent much of the evening discussing her possible allergic reaction to the "parsley" on her pizza. I haven't seen much parsley on pizza, but maybe I'm wrong. Any time one of us headed to the loo, more parsley stories were overheard. Melissa and I had some fun with the phone while we were waiting to get our coats, trying to get the intercom to work so that we could make some announcements, but we were thwarted by the coat check attendant who told us to "settle down." All in all a very entertaining evening.

In police blotter news, I feel terrible for the Just for Kicks owner whose dog was stolen, I hope it's recovered soon. I hate dognappers. In other robbery news:

Two men hold up Steak n' Shake

JOLIET — Two men in black held up the Steak n' Shake on Plainfield Road early Wednesday.
The bandits struck at the 2675 Plainfield Road eatery about 3:30 a.m. Only two employees were working at the time — a young man and young woman — and the black-clad men menaced the man with a handgun.
Neither employee was injured in the heist, police said, but the crooks absconded with the contents of the cash register.
Police said both thieves are 18- to 20-year-old black men, about 6-foot or 6-foot-1, and were wearing black T-shirts and black pants. One of the men is thin, police said, and the other is "heavy."

Ok, one is thin, and the other is "heavy"? Why is heavy in quotes, but not thin? Is the one man "heavy" only in relation to his thin accomplice? Is rapper Heavy D. a suspect? This case hit home for me as in high school, my friends and I engaged in some petty sign theft at the Steak N Shake on Larkin. I felt a little guilty every time I looked at the "Make Steakburgers, Not War" sign that hung on my dorm room wall freshman year. In other blotter news, I was amused by the Homer Township incident where a man brandished a knife at a homeowner, but ran away when the homeowner brandished a bigger knife. It sounded like something out of a Bugs Bunny cartoon. Also amusing: the headline: "Officer Spit On." I guess it speaks for itself. Oddly enough, another headline that day was "Fire Investigator Kicked."

I believe that's all I have for now. I am quite excited to see that Britney and Kevin Federline's new show, "Chaotic," will be premiering tonight. I don't know if I can handle their truth. More news later.