I was felled by bad Swedish meatballs last night. They tasted so good when I ate them smothered in lingonberries, to the consternation of the waitress. Maybe she was on to something.

I've just sent out a glut of emails to my friends, hoping to generate some readership for this site. I haven't been faithfully updating it, as I once did, so I understand how your interest may have waned. Mine did.

According to my rehearsal schedule, I have tonight off, which means that I have the whole day to whatever I please. I haven't the slightest idea what to do. This would have been a perfect day for my New Yorker to arrive, but I think last week was a double issue. Oh well. I used to devote an entire afternoon to reading the New Yorker, from cover to cover, on the day that it arrived. I would devour all of the photography and theatre reviews, wishing that I could see them myself. Then I moved to New York, and only did something that I'd read about in the magazine two or three times. My dreams of the city had been shaped by the people at Conde Nast and Annie Hall. I imagined a sparkling life for myself, involving readings, opening nights, and long walks through the park. Instead, I was pounding the piss stained pavement of eighth avenue every day (especially fragrant in the summer months). Disillusionment is hard. But I still read the New Yorker, imagining a New York that still holds the energy of Dorothy Parker, George Gershwin, and Truman Capote. But I don't read the listings anymore.

It's too bad that Chicago doesn't have a magazine on par with the New Yorker. Oh sure, we have Chicago Magazine, but it's really the midwest equivalent of New York Magazine. Hell, I'd even settle for a Time Out Chicago. It's difficult imagining Chicago as deprived of anything cultural, but there are still a lot of things that I miss from New York. Where is our Times Square? Why don't we have a theatre district or a TKTS booth? Why is our transit system so sparse in comparison to the MTA? Chicago has its many charms, but I do not include circling for half an hour to find a parking place one of them.