Journal

As was earlier suspected, Uni the Unicorn–missing over two years from the desk of Jackie Kane in the sales department of the Park Hyatt Chicago–has been sighted by multiple people in Los Angeles, CA.

Despite repeated requests of Nancy Grace, volatile talk show host and missing individuals advocate, the show has not agreed to profile Uni yet. We’ll just have to hope and pray that Uni’s situation will eventually compel Nancy to a change of heart so that Uni may receive the same media overkill given to Natalie Holloway, Caylee Anderson and other non-figurine individuals.

This is the last photo we received of Uni, who appears to be distressed, disoriented and dispirited. Or, as some leading psychologists have suggested: “Enacting traits and behaviors identical to any tourist currently in the Los Angeles area.

Please, if any of you have a sighting of Uni, whip out your camera or your cell and send us a photo. Do not attempt to wrangle Uni yourself as he might unleash some weird, mystical unicorn, emo, Twilight dookie on y’all.

Send clues/photos to: helpfinduni@josephroling.com

Uni the missing Unicorn desk figurine has possibly been spotted in Hollywood, CA.

Eyewitnesses reported almost stepping on Uni has he lay passed out on the sidewalk.

This is in no way an attempt to promote the Warner Bros. release of Edge of Darkness, starring Mel Gibson and directed by Martin Campbell–in theaters now.

Largely due to our Facebook campaign “Help Return Uni the Unicorn” photos from tourists began coming in.

We know that Uni is ALIVE, but disoriented and possibly under the influence of intoxicants.  If you have any additional photos, please send them to helpfinduni@josephroling.com

Take a GOOD look at this photo:

Now, take a CLOSER look!

This is Uni the Unicorn!  Uni has been missing from the Sales Office of the Park Hyatt Chicago for over two years now!

PLEASE we need your help to locate Uni and return him safely to the desk of Jackie Kane.  There between a pen holder and a jar of mixed candies, a space exists where Uni used to sit.  Nobody knows exactly when Uni disappeared, but we have absolutely no clues as to where he might be.

Sightings of Uni can be reported to helpfinduni@josephroling.com

The holidays are approaching, which means the requests for my Christmas Wish List are coming in with ever increasing frequency.  Therefore, I have created the comprehensive list you see below.  Whether you are a family member, a friend, or a rich tycoon who wishes to donate to me anonymously, please browse at your convenience!  Happy Holidays!

2010 Porsche Panamera

Now that I’m 39 and quite adult, it makes sense to have a four-door vehicle…

Please, only purchase in Silver

Please note that the Porsche is merely a get-around-town car, so for practical purposes, I will also need one of these in my garage:

2010 Mercedes-Benz GL550

A Garage

Did I mention I need a garage?  Anything in a traditional, Romanesque or Victorian style will do.

Clothing Sizes

• Pant = 33-34 waist and 34 length
• Shirt = Medium T or 16 X 34 Dress
• Shoe = 10.5
• Underwear (please only boxer briefs) Medium

Formal Wear:  Armani Collezioni, Hugo Boss, Dior Homme or Versace

Casual Pants:  Issey Miyake, Dolce & Gabbana Glen Plaid, Michael Kors Utility, Ralph Lauren Black Label and Theory

Shirts:  John Varvatos, Royal Underground, DSquared, Burberry Check Jersey T, Any Diesel Male Model and their shirt

**Please enclose all receipts as styles can be utterly wrong within labels.

Black & Decker SDC750 Coffee Maker

I’m sick of crap cluttering up my counter tops, so this should fit the bill nicely!

The Complete Desperate Housewives DVD Set (Seasons 1-4)

Please do not buy me anything that says “As Seen on TV” on the box.

European Cruise on the Regent Seven Seas ($65,000)

Cartier Sunglasses

Gulfstream G650: New York to Dubai, London to Buenos Aires, 7,000 nautical miles in one fill-up!  If the airlines can’t get it together, I’ll get my OWN plane!

Please check back as this is just a start.

The list will grow.

People have pointed out that I seldom say anything nice about Chicago.  So I thought, amidst the city’s corruption, excessive taxes, dogged quality of life and general lack of a pleasant ambiance, that I’d make an effort to look for the good.  Last weekend, I did not have to go far as the Lakeview East Festival of the Arts was in full swing.

The festival literally brought a smile to my face.  The first thing I loved about it was that Broadway was closed from Hawthorne to Belmont, which is so bold when compared to the event-phobic, hand-wringing magistrates of my hometown of Madison, WI who can barely cope with an annual Halloween party on State Street, which is already A MALL.

In ONE evening, workers and volunteers converted a hectic thoroughfare into a pastoral garden with trees, mulch, sand, soil, sod, sculptures and stone blocks.  They did a fantastic job and the normally congested, often hostile street was transformed into the Garden of Eden.

The second thing I really loved about the Festival was the community feel it brought to the area.  It was so pleasant to see people walking around in a calm, relaxed manner to enjoy the art, the day and each other.  This is what a city should be.  I really was amazed at how one day, that street could be a cacophony of horns and traffic-fueled outbursts and then the next day an automobile-free utopia of harmoniously gathered neighbors.  The outdoor restaurant seating actually seemed inviting without the taxis, buses, trucks and cars constantly jockeying for position and drowning out the lunch and dinner conversation.

The artistic whimsy of the Festival was also something to behold, from the artists’ own wares, to the sculptures and human statuary placed throughout the event.

The Lakeview East Festival of the Arts was an event that really raised the quality of life for two days in this neighborhood.  I refused to even think of what Broadway would look like the following morning, when it would return to its place in Chicago’s inhospitable street grid.

The smile I wore all weekend was really a manifestation of the notion that people do possess the talent and desire to create wonderful urban environments.  If residents could just take that spirit a bit further, to fulfill a vision of community and transformation, perhaps Chicago could become the model city it has the potential to be.

One very good indication that I have chosen the correct grad school is that we’ve already been on a field trip.   Today, our Fossils class went to the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago, IL.  This is an extraordinary place.  I felt like a child again, wandering from tank to tank, staring in awe at the wondrous fishes, reptiles and sea creatures.

Nature generates some of the oddest adaptations–like this sea horse below, that has been modified through time to blend in with the underwater plants in its habitat.

When you see these creatures–so delicate and so intricate, you wonder how they survive and flourish in the rough oceans.

I am captivated by jellyfish. They’re so alien and so serene. By the time I had photographed them once, they had already changed their colors (see below).

Jellyfish at the Shedd Aquarium

Jellyfish at the Shedd Aquarium

They truly are amazing organisms.

This little guy, below, was such a poser that I felt like I had to photograph him, lest I make him “crabby.”

Crab at the Shedd Aquarium

The underwater colors and landscapes rival anything on land.  This mysterious world seems to challenge everything we thought we knew about Earth.  Take this sea anemone below–is it a plant?  Is it an animal?  Is it both?  Is it neither?  Such is the allure of places like the Shedd Aquarium–a fantastic attraction that gives us land-dwelling hominids a rare glimpse into the hidden corners of the world.

Anemone at the Shedd Aquarium

Before I post all of my photos and video from my recent trip to Costa Rica, I want to take a moment to educate people on how to travel in a group.

1.  Renting a car for the group

When renting a car, do NOT, as a member of the group, discourage a thorough walk-around by saying, “C’mon, c’mon!  Let’s GO!”  I made our rental agent write down every scratch, every missing piece of trim, every crack in the plastic and every spot on the seats and carpet.  EVERY SINGLE LITTLE ONE!  The agent kept giving me looks like I was petty and obnoxious, but guess what?

When we RETURNED the car, the agent checking us out went over the car like a border control inspector.  Never let a rental agent make you feel that a scratch here and a ding there is “no big deal.”  It WILL be when you bring the car back!

2.  Riding in the car with the group

Why is it that so many people do not know jack shit about how the climate control system works?  I am so sick of riding in cabs that are full of exhaled air and when I look at the dashboard, the vent and the A/C are OFF!  Why?  Do we not all breathe air?  Europeans have got to be the worst about this.

There is nothing worse than riding through Paris with the windows fogged up.  Then, when you try to say something to the driver, they dismiss you with a “No, no, no” and a wave of their hand, before placating you by turning the fan dial one notch.  Driving school should include a run through of how climate control works.  Saab has a brilliant system:  when the windows fog up, it turns the defrost vents on A/C while maintaining the temperature you selected for the cabin, by blowing regular air out of the dashboard and rear seat vents.  “A/C for foggy windows” I hear you cry?  YES!  When the windows are fogged up in rain or humid weather, you run the A/C!  Even if it is 30º outside!  Blasting the heat, in an absurd attempt to evaporate the fog on the windows is just stupid.  Fogged up windows = A/C!  Get it?

So, on a trip through a country with 100% humidity and 100º heat, do NOT put the skinny, whiny, perpetually fickle person in the FRONT seat.  Just when you feel the heavenly, cool air reach the back seat, skinny minnie in the front shivers, lets out a disapproving sigh and turns DOWN the air so SHE can be comfortable.  You sit in back, dripping with sweat, glaring at the blower fan dial sitting on LOW, while she opens up a romance novel and sips her Crystal Geyser® water.  Who ARE these people who complain about being cold in 100º heat anyway?  They’re f***ing MUTANTS is what they are!

If you are in the front seat and you get cold, just close YOUR vent and leave the middle vent blowing towards the back.  You’ll live.  Furthermore, it’s easier for you to put a jacket on then for the sweltering hostages in the back to cool themselves down.

If I hear one more idiot tell me that keeping the fan blower on LOW saves gas, I’m going to beat them with a tire iron.  THE FAN HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH GAS MILEAGE!  Understand?  The COMPRESSOR is what lowers gas mileage!  When you press the A/C button (or the snowflake) THAT action activates a clutch in the compressor, which engages the compressor pulley, so that the belt from the crank can power the compressor.  This has only a minimal effect on fuel consumption and NONE at all if your other option is to open the windows.  Open windows create drag as the outside air rushes in and hits the back seat and back window of the car.  I come close to losing it when idiotic people turn the A/C on and leave the fan on LOW.  Stupidly, they are committing the heinous crime of additional fuel consumption, but none of the passengers get to benefit from all the cold air the compressor is producing.  Again, if you try to explain simple physics and mechanics to these people, they shrug you off and stick with the dumb wives tale illogic they learned from their parents or made up in their own head.

Lastly, if you start to feel the air getting really weak and barely anything comes out of the vents after awhile, this means your compressor is FREEZING up.  This especially happens on RECIRCULATE.

The RECIRCULATE button is the rightmost of the three buttons below.

Again, the Europeans kept cranking up the fan and began panicking that the air was broken.  I suggested that it was frozen and to shut of the recirculation feature first, then the A/C altogether if it continued running weak.  They were obstinate that freezing could not occur in 100º heat.  WRONG!  It can and DOES happen.  Fortunately, when chunks of frost started shooting through the dashboard vents as the cold air picked up strength, they grudgingly conceded that I was right.

3.  Accommodating the Group

I hate people who think coffee is unnecessary.  I will not even discuss this point.  Coffee is essential and I refuse to be part of another group who will not wait for me to have my coffee in the hotel room, before we step out, or who will not pull over when a coffeeshop is available.  These people pulled over for, I kid you not–MANGOS from a roadside cart, CHEESE from a roadside market and a machete from a little shop in a small village, but they scoffed when I made a polite request to stop for coffee.  NOBODY tells me I cannot have coffee.  I will make anybody’s life hell when they refuse me coffee.  They will rue the moment they denied my simple request.

That is all I have for now…

Another year has gone by and it is the holiday season again. We all had a great time this weekend, with Grandma and the family, at the Cedarville Community Center. This was a brilliant idea from my aunt Heather and my cousin Nate. We had space to spread out, or to watch the game, to cook, eat and most importantly: to wear the kids out.

November 4th, 2008

IMAGES AND VIDEOS ARE BELOW

What today means to me cannot be fully expressed.

But I’ll try…

The Republican administration of the past eight years echoed many sinister missteps that have marred the history of countries, both those which survive today and those which perished as a result of hubris, evil vision, greed and ignorance. Throughout the Bush administration, we stood by and did nothing as an American president systematically dismantled the spirit of our Constitution, used fear to accomplish hidden agendas and allowed truth, justice and the American way to fade into unprecedented corruption.

America, it seemed, had lost it’s founding principles–a government “of the people, by the people, for the people.” As neglected, underfunded public schools continue to generate citizens who are wholly unaware of the underlying meaning of essential documents such as the Declaration of Independence, the Federalist Papers and the Constitution of the United States of America, our country was brought to the precipice of serious, almost irrevocable peril.

For the disturbed factions within the U.S. that provided the votes for two terms of George W. Bush, it should be pointed out that your president did not end abortion for pro-lifers, while he IS responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people throughout the Middle East–many of them pregnant women and children. George W. Bush did not protect us from 9-11, even when a memo entitled “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.” crossed Condoleezza Rice’s desk. George W. Bush did not keep “government out of people’s lives” when he took away many of our rights to privacy, had innocent people investigated, coerced companies like AT & T to turn over customer phone records to government agencies and pulled thousands of citizen soldiers away from their families to fight a war, based on a succession of lies. George W. Bush did not reduce the size of government when he created Homeland Security–the largest, costliest government agency in U.S. history. George W. Bush did not exercise fiscal conservatism when he raised the national debt to the largest level in U.S. history. George W. Bush may have lined a few pockets, in his close inner circle, but contrary to Republican ideology, his lack of economic oversight revealed once and for all that the myth of “trickle-down economics” and deregulation only destroys free markets, while redistributing wealth from the working poor and middle classes, to the absurdly rich.

Bridges failed, New Orleans was abandoned and left out to dry (literally), oil companies laughed all the way to the bank, while at the same time, Americans saw their wages erode, their enslavement to credit grow, their houses get auctioned off and their health insurance companies gouge them and deny more and more of their claims.

Sadly, millions of us knew this would be the outcome of George W. Bush’s time as president, well before his first “election.” Tragically, even though we knew better, we were forced to endure the worst eight years of government this country has ever known. For the past eight years, the ignorance of a large population of Americans and their lack of appreciation for our hard-fought, Constitutional rights, won their president on the irresolvable platforms of gay-hating, abortion, terrorism, war lust and a frightening contempt for intellectualism, which cost Kerry and Gore their elections.

While widespread ignorance of the sort who believed Obama was a Muslim flourished, the rest of us stood in horror, as a wave of unenlightenment swept the land. America took on the hue of the Dark Ages, as the threat of religious superstition strengthened the movement to remove scientific teachings from schools–replacing it with biblical conjecture, to criminalize stem cell research, to demand that God be mentioned in every thought, to laughingly assert that marriage has sanctity in a land of divorce and to ignorantly dismiss the fact that we have a separation of church and state clause in America BECAUSE, throughout the colonial period, European church authority created the oppressive conditions of intolerance, which caused America to fight for independence and religious freedom in the first place.

Other absurd notions were borne out of America’s foray into authoritarianism:

• That trading your right to privacy for increased security was patriotic
• That not wearing a flag pin was unpatriotic
• That America has a free market
• That redistributing wealth by correcting tax policies which have fleeced the middle class for 20 years is socialism

Today represents for me the possibility that progress of a 21st century grade, might be within our reach. Today represents the elevation of intellect, of ideas, of thought. Today represents the restoration of America’s image and stature around the world. Today represents the reaffirmation of the ideals of our founding fathers and a new ratification of the U.S. Constitution. Today represents hope that our country’s vast resources will again be directed towards futuristic infrastructure projects, education initiatives, health care for everyone and a shift towards a dependence on renewable energy. Today represents an America that will become a wise role model of peace and fair prosperity around the world.

Yes we did!

Walk to Rally

Waiting at Rally

Waiting for Obama

Triumph! After the Announcement of Barack Obama as President Elect