Stuff Chicagoans Say

I found these videos on Youtube after reading an article about them, and I just had to share them with all of you. I love both of them, especially the part where the girl says, "Just take LSD to get there" (LSD = Lakeshore Drive), and the parts where the people are singing jingles from those annoying commercials for Empire Carpet and Luna. Those commercials bug me almost as much as that Binder & Binder commercial with that guy who always creeps me out, the one where he puts on a cowboy hat and says, "We'll deal with the government. You have enough to worry about." (Why the cowboy hat? Is that supposed to be reassuring? Or is he about to gallop away on a horse and fight the bad guys in a 1950s western movie?)

And I have to say that the people in the video are really not exaggerating the way Chicagoans speak or act. As they say, forty degrees is NOT cold; that's barbecue weather in Chicago! And as far as where the best pizza is made? Giordanos, of course!

But I've never made snow angels in the city. For one thing, the snow's usually too dirty from the mud splashed on it by passing cars as well as hundreds of footprints from people walking over it. I'm also too afraid that I'll either drown in the enormous piles of snow or get trampled by impatient commuters on their way to the train or tourists on their way to Michigan Avenue.

Both videos reminded me of how much Chicago has become home to me since I moved here several years ago, and how I've said several of the things that are said in both videos on more than one occasion. (Except for the stuff about sports, since I like football about as much as Hugh Hefner likes monogamy.)

I do try to remember how much I love Chicago on the days when I am stuck waiting for the El that's twenty minutes late in arriving, only for it to break down after I've only been on it for five minutes. And then I have to take a bus that also happens to be at least twenty minutes late and I end up crammed into a bus with a bunch of angry commuters who look like they're ready to whap someone in the face with their copies of the Red Eye just so they can sit down, while other commuters at the next bus stop see how crowded the bus is and believe that the only rational thing to do is to make the bus even more crowded by squeezing themselves in.

I also try to remember that Chicago really is a great city to live in, despite the days when I see rats scampering along the tracks when I'm waiting for the subway. I have this slightly irrational fear that they'll somehow find their way onto the platform and attack all the commuters before they take over the city and threaten to bite anyone who says, "Da Bears." I remind myself that I am lucky to live here, even when I'm walking down the street and see trash scattered all over the place by people too lazy to just walk less than half a dozen steps to the trash cans that are on practically every corner. It's also important to remind myself of why I haven't yet left the city for a place that doesn't annoy the hell out of me on a regular basis (but really, seeing as how I am completely neurotic, I don't think that place actually exists) on days when it's so windy that it looks like everyone's moving in slow motion, because they actually are. But I digress.

But on the other hand, I chose to move to this beautiful city, and I choose to stay here (at least for now), even though it drives me crazy to be a Chicagoan half the time. I would like to live somewhere else someday, maybe another city like New York or Boston, or maybe a quiet college town halfway across the country. I've also always had this fantasy of living in Europe someday, like one of the American expatriate writers. But for now, I live here because this city really is home to me, and it's hard to imagine what the past several years would have been like or who I would be if I had lived somewhere else.

(Side note: I don't usually swear on this blog, so I should warn you that there are some curse words in one of the videos, though you might have guessed that from the titles of the videos.)





Here's the Facebook page I found on the Youtube page of the first video: www.facebook.com/obramusic.

For more info about the people in the second video, check out their links below; I got the links from their Youtube page.

Robert Bacon - https://twitter.com/#!/tastethebacon
Marie Maloney - https://twitter.com/#!/marie_maloney
Tess Borgerding - http://ioimprov.com/chicago/performers/tess-borgerding

I've noticed that there's been a bit of a stir online over the fact that the second video focuses more on the North Side; I don't see what the big deal is, because the North Side is part of Chicago after all, and it's not like they're saying that the North Side is all there is in the city, which it obviously isn't. But then again, a lot of Chicagoans can be very territorial when it comes to their neighborhoods, no matter which side of the city they live on. 

What kinds of stuff do people say where you live? What kinds of beliefs do outsiders have about your hometown that aren't actually accurate? Why do you choose to stay there? Have you ever thought about living anywhere else?

Happy Groundhog Day, everyone! Only six more weeks of winter! (Except in Chicago, winter's going to feel like it lasts a lot longer, like it does every year! But hey, what are you gonna do? It's not like this is L.A.)