Tomorrow!

OK, I promise that tomorrow night I will sit down, master iPhoto, and do my London Blogging. I will also start a picture album. Tonight I attended a co-worker's birthday party in the West Loop. She turned 23, so I'm asking you to imagine an apartment full of very young people. The camera pans past the couples..many couples...the people who have been Best Friends since second grade caught up in their own conversations, the single guys who all have a crush on the Birthday Girl. Pan past the drinks, the candles...to the couch, where I sit, shut out, next to two couples engrossed in Couple Conversation.

On my lap is the hostesses' dog.

This may seem sad and pathetic, unless you understand the dog was better company than most of the people there. They were all very nice, but you know how when you go to some parties people actually enjoy meeting new people, and some parties they just stand in a corner and talk to people they already know? Add ot this that they were all young enough to be my kids. In the words of the emu, "EEK!"

Fortunately another coworker whom I get along with was there, and she taught the Birthday Girl and I how to line dance.

So I'm home early and exhausted -- I'd decided to bike in this morning, as I craved a ride. As I got dressed in my layers the news reported that it was 30 degrees out with 30-mph winds.

"A 30-30 day!" I thought, relishing the bracing weather.

It was fine riding in, with the sun up and all, but coming home in the dark is kind of a drag; I saw maybe three other cyclists and a few walkers and joggers. It was peaceful but bleak. And my toes were cold. So it might be the El and I for the next few months.