The Taste of Chicago was GREAT! I ate so much! I met Sharon and Sarah at the Buckingham (Bundy) Fountain and we somehow managed to move through the crowd, tasting everything and anything that looked good. We had fried dough (nothing like our grandmother made, sadly), Italian water ice, cheeseburger (like the skit on SNL), chocolate chip cookie dough egg roll, toasted raviolli, Eli’s cheese cake, and more stuff I can’t remember. Little Sarah kept saying, “Cousin Donna, guess what? I can cluck my tongue!” and “Cousin Donna, guess what? I can whistle!”

Maybe you remember how I wrote a few months back about a colleague that I deeply disliked until seeing him in a suit and learning that he spoke a second language? The other day he was supposed to be in a meeting with me. When I found out, I immediately started to smooth my hair and checked to see that my mascara hadn’t run down my face. As it turned out, he wasn’t at the meeting. I felt silly having preened myself for him. In today’s meeting, he unexpectedly walked in and sat down. Upon seeing him, my stomach did a flip flop. I read about a technique in Get Anyone to Do Anything: Never Feel Powerless Again–With Psychological Secrets to Control and Influence Every Situation that I figured I’d put to use. Apparently you can get anyone to fall in love with you by simply gazing directly into their eyes. So I gazed into his eyes and you know what I realized? His eyes are really bulgy. His forehead is huge and when he speaks, he contorts his face as if he is smelling something rancid. I am not sure if the technique worked. What kind of threw me off guard is that he met my gaze and held it. I thought for sure he would quickly look away and maybe even blush or giggle. Of course, it would never work. He lives in Chicago which means he is most likely gay. Besides, it is never a smart idea to dip your nib in the company ink. So basically what I am saying is, “Number One: Disengage!”