  Keith and I spent yesterday shopping and eating and just hanging out in Boystown, and then we capped off our day with a showing of urlLink The Company , which we really loved.
In addition to Altman's brilliant restraint in letting the story tell itself, the focus on some of my favorite Joffrey dancers and the casting of a bunch of Chicago actors I recognized -- including the woman I saw so brilliantly play Desirée Armfeldt in urlLink A Little Night Music just two nights earlier -- I think I got the biggest kick out of seeing an endless parade of Chicago locations I recognized in this movie.
It's cool that after only three years here I feel such a sense of ownership and belonging in Chicago -- and that I've gotten to know the city so well I can pinpoint location shots in movies, commercials and TV shows. This morning, after a leisurely reading of the paper over orange juice, toast and big-band jazz, Keith headed off to the airport and I headed to the laundry room for some long-overdue sartorial cleansing (six loads!). A cute guy I've never seen before in the building tried to chat me up in front of the dryers, but I had my Crest Whitestrips in, so I couldn't make charming, flirtatious conversation ... and he eventually wandered off.
Sigh. But while my clothes were sloshing and spinning their way to cleanliness, I rotated my mattress (only 18 days behind on my strict three-month rotation regimen) and did naughty things with my credit cards on amazon.com. Within the week, I should be getting a huge shipment of DVDs including Finding Nemo and Bedknobs and Broomsticks and cast albums including urlLink Hairspray , Little Shop of Horrors , Urinetown , Wicked and Avenue Q . (Some picker/packer in some Amazon warehouse is probably making fag jokes as we speak. ) 
