Just a quick update, since there's homework that demands procrastination.

Well it looks like I'll be moving in with my buddy Hugh down in Lincoln Park at the beginning of the month. After utilities, the rent should about break even to what I pay up here in the Den of LIES! (moo-ha-ha!) And if anyone out there's familiar with the area, Lincoln Park's a pretty cool place to be.

The space is a little tight, but if I've learned an important lesson up here, you can have all the space in the world - 'doesn't matter. If you live with an asshole (see: Trey Parker/Matt Stone worldview) square footage is totally irrelevant.

I walked in to Hugh's place this afternoon and he was sitting on the couch rabidly playing X-box.

(I think we're gonna get along just fine.)

So anyhow, everyone please knock on wood that things work out OK.

I'd also like to give a mad shoutout to my peeps Emily and her fiance Sean who helped me scope apartments yesterday.

[electroshock!]

We broke bread with our own shnazzy little dinner party, complete with the fresh batch of file gumbo Dickie, Sr. sent along with me on the plane last week.

It's been a crazy coupla weeks - and I'm not out of the woods yet - but it's nice to know a lot of people have your back...people you didn't even know existed two months ago. I can see why my folks still speak so highly of this city over 30 years later...

That said, I need to give a shoutout to Cronkette, who's probably wondering if I'm lying dead in a gutter somewhere since we've barely had a chance to talk in the last week.

Pearl Harbor sucked...and I miss you.