Breaking my movie theater hiatus?

So I'm sitting here, getting ready for my 20 miler (and I'll fully report on that from TX tomorrow) and watching my morning standby, the Today Show. They just had a preview for a movie that I potentially would be interested in seeing in the theater. In case you missed my previous post about the theater, I've gone about 14 months without a movie at the "movies". The preview caught my eye, or really caught my ear in this case, because the background music was one of my favorite songs, by M.I.A. It's the one that goes, "All I wanna do is... (POW POW POW POW... you know the song with all the gunshots?) called Paper Airplanes (download it, you won't regret it). I could probably do an entire blogpost on that song alone because it's so mainstream and yet so weird but that's really neither here nor there. So I hear that song pumping out of our gawdy speakers and I look up and it's Michael Moore yelling with a megaphone at the A.I.G. building in NYC. It's called Capitalism: A Love Story, or something like that, maybe don't quote me on this one.

I know this won't win me any fans of my more conservative audience (or frankly anyone from TX) but I actually enjoy watching his movies. He's seriously one of the craziest fat men in America and by no means to I agree with all of what he's saying. I do, however, believe in listening to things from all viewpoints and I don't believe that the mainstream media (especially my hated Fox News) give people an accurate picture of what's really going on in our country. It seems like I'll be waiting forever to watch it on Netflix so maybe, just maybe, I'll venture out one of these days and shell out my $12-15 to see it. Maybe I'll get a job first to afford it. I think the preview reached out and grabbed me, not only because of M.I.A's music but because I've seen so many of my friends, and even myself to a certain degree, become casualties of this economic crisis, I'm interested in what Mr. Moore has to say about it. And I hope the movie is laced with anti-W. Bush stuff, because I really can't get enough of that.

Sorry blogland, I promise I'll get back to running posting tomorrow and much lighter things :)

*Edited to add: Just caught Ann Curry's (FAV!) news report. I missed about half of the story but apparently that dumb broad Sarah Palin was running her mouth about China. Can she see that from Alaska too? Didn't she retire? Can she just shut up and go away? *

the Metra and other city musings

So we're pretty sure that we don't want to have kids for at least five more years. I have always wanted to enjoy just being married and Adam and I have way too much fun just being "the two of us" to want to give that up right now (yikes, I just used the words "give that up" in reference to having children... see, I'm totally not ready yet).

While it has been an absolute dream come true for me to truly live an urban life in the city (completely carless for more than a year!), when I imagine having a family, I keep thinking back to what I grew up with. Which is a big house, a big yard, lots of swimming pools (that aren't above ground), having a car to tote the childrens in, etc... or in other words, the dreaded suburbia. AHHHHHHH!!! I realize that so much in our lives is going to change in the next five years, friends will get married, have babies and start their own migration to the suburbs. I'm hoping that the idea won't be so completely upsetting by then.

All this has especially been on my mind because last night we rode a Metra train to Naperville to have a farewell dinner with a close friend of ours that's leaving Chicago. We left right around five, also known as the scariest time ever at Union Station. It really hit home for me just how many people ride the train in from the "far away" suburbs to work in the city everyday. It was insane and kind of traumatizing to me. When I think of commuting, I think of sitting in your car in traffic, not fighting your way to a board a train that will leave you if you aren't right on time. To put it another way: I feel that if you're going to work in the city and fight the other 86 billion people also doing so, that you should be living in the city and enjoying all that it has to offer, not worrying about catching the last train home for the night at exactly 8:13 p.m. I can't imagine living here and not being in the city. What would be the point then to putting up with the mega-crappy winters? I like to tell Adam that the suburbs here are Anywhereville, America. If we're going to live in Anywhereville, we might as well be closer to our families or in a place with a semi-decent climate (although if TX has another summer like this one next year, I may be changing my tune a little bit about wanting to go back).

There are days that I feel like I could handle having "city kids" but then I remember the tragedy that is Chicago Public Schools (sidenote: I will never send my kids to private school, I went when I was little and I absolutely do not believe in them). Then I remember the 20 muggings in and around our neighborhood in the past month. Then I look outside and realize there'd be no yard for the golden retreiver that Adam wants someday. Then I think about the pool I have always wanted to have in my backyard and I think about wanting my kids to have easily accessible grandparents someday. We're kind of alone in our own little world here in Chicago and while it's good for us for now, it's going to be very interesting to see where we end up in another five years.

P.S. If Chicago wins the Olympic bid, I might be having a city baby for a couple of years because there's no way I'm leaving before the Olympics!