Ocelopotamus

Earlier this week we had one of those days when the temperature suddenly rocketed into the 70s and it felt like spring was a-busting out all over. Of course it’s cooled back down a scooch since then, but it reminded me of this photo I took with my phone early last winter on a similarly warm day. It’s one of the venerable stone lions outside Reza’s Persian restaurant in Andersonville, wearing a mitten bestowed on its noble head by some restlessly warm-handed passerby.

I like to imagine the owner of the mitten actually kneeling before the lion and saying something like, “Good sir lion, an thou canst see that that the day be surpassingly bold and warm, notwithstanding the wintriness of the calendar, I doth pray thee to safekeep yon cottony gauntlet on thy mighty gentle head till such time as I return for it, and tender thee all my thanks.”

So, what’s to do in Chicago this weekend?

• The Strangerer: Theater Oobleck is getting raves for Mickle Maher’s new Bush vs. Kerry vs. Camus opus, not that that’s any surprise. I’m hoping to catch it this weekend, if it’s not too sold out.
• Rogue 8: It’s closing weekend for the third episode of Dan Telfer’s latenight superhero serial Rogue 8, so strap on your jet-pack if you’re planning to see it. I managed to catch it a couple weekends ago and was glad I did. Having missed the first two episodes (pardon me, “issues”) it took me a little while to warm up to the story, but by the middle of the show I was noticing quite a bit of laughter coming from my own general direction, and by the end I was sucked right in. I was actually pissed when the audience voted for the silly ending instead of the plot-based one. Oh, and if you’ve never seen a man attempting to make out with an invisible woman, you’ll be able to check that one off your list.
• Mary Fons in Too Much Light: I’m so far out of the Neo-Futurist loop these days I didn’t even know she’d been cast till I read about it on the Too Much Light blog last week. But I’ve had the privilege of performing with Ms. Fons in LIP (both the Poetry Center Series she co-hosted with Joel Chmara, and Lisa Buscani’s earlier iteration of it at the Neo-Futurarium). I’m looking forward to seeing Mary’s work in TML when I can make it over there.