bad burritos

Someone asked me yet again last night that all-too-common question, "Why did you move to Chicago?" Because I was in the company of funny people, as I so often find myself, I gave a slightly different answer than usual, "I really wanted to experience 30 below." My boyfriend added, "She really likes earmuffs." (It wouldn't have been funny to say any of that a few weeks ago when there was still a threat that the temperature would fall 40 degrees at any time... but now that March is nearly upon us, I feel confident that the worst is most certainly over. If you don't count the waffling of temperatures that's now upon us or the melting that will soon ensue.)

What I should have said was, "I wanted to eat lots and lots of really bad Mexican food."

Maybe I'm seeing the grass as greener in Southern California, but it seems like any Mexican restaurant I went to in San Diego or Santa Barbara (or LA for that matter... and even one in San Fran), it was reliably good. Or awesome. Or at least edible. Now while there are a fair number of Mexicans in Chicago, I have yet to go to a hands-down really good Mexican restaurant here--take out or sit down. I've been to a couple that pass, but always the rice isn't quite right or the tortilla isn't quite warm enough or there's just something that doesn't click like the amazing and famous Freebirds or Nico's or Rico's or Rose's or Senor Pico's... so last night I went out on a limb, went to one in a new neighborhood I had heard of but never been to, and it was not awesome, not good, and not really even edible. The half of chicken burrito I ate with one piece of bone, a measly, greasy slice of cheese, some brownish avocado, and a not-very-warm tortilla didn't give me food poisoning, but it left me planning a quick escape to the bathroom for the rest of the night and this morning just in case.

The good news is I can do things to slightly quell my addiction to good, SoCal Mexican food. I can eat almost-good-enough burritos. I can try more places that have been rated the best by Chicagoans, though they can't really be trusted. I can go to Chipotle, which doesn't have the right feel, but the food is passable. I can make burritos at home, drowning the not-quite-right beans and tortillas in sour cream, guacamole, and black olives. It's unfortunate, really, because I was just beginning to like it here.

the case for grad school

My latest article should be arriving in the mail shortly if you are a lucky subscriber. Or you can view it on the website. You may notice that I'm not posting a "this should have looked like this" version of it. Progress? Maybe.

You also may have noticed that I've been MIA. The winter is long, I have nothing to talk about besides the crazy and cruel weather (which no one wants to hear about anymore) and once I get out of the habit of posting often I forget to look for things to say and compose them in my head.

I have also become increasingly political in my talking, reading, and thinking, and I do not want this to become a political blog. There are far too many good ones (here, here, and here, just to name a few) and I am not qualified to be a good political blogger or a good compiler of political stories. I did enjoy writing my endorsement, but that's as political as I get here.

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I have never been a proponent of grad school. In fact, I have long been convinced that I would never go and have wondered why everyone thought it was the obvious next step after college. Why spend thousands on another degree that might not even lead anywhere? Why head immediately into more and more years of school when one has just graduated from 17?

Now, eight months out of college I am still not a proponent of beginning grad school immediately after undergrad (except for those who are on a specific path... to become a doctor or a lawyer or a scientist or psychologist or whatever). But I can see the argument now for going a couple years after college, or even long after college, after one has entered the work force and decided she either doesn't have enough training to do what she wants to do, or decided she doesn't really like the work force and wants to retreat back into her academia hole. I fit into both categories, hence the "she" pronoun and this post. I have many career and future aspirations that change weekly depending on my mood and the weather, but this particular aspiration to maybe someday go to grad school has not changed weekly, so I'm planning accordingly. Campus visits, reading online, talking to people, buying GRE prep books and taking practice tests, making friends again with people who could write recommendations for me... It might happen. I might apply if I still feel this way next winter, but for now I'm excited at the prospect of learning how to do math again for the GREs, preparing myself without spending much money, someday returning to my academia hole, perhaps going abroad again, and being, after it all, thousands of dollars in debt. But there's something admirable and serious about putting oneself through school. So maybe I'll learn to save a bit while I'm still working. Probably I'll still have to be a very hard-working student if I decide to do this. Maybe I'll finally cash in my bonds for the occasion.

The bottom line is, with the face of journalism changing so rapidly, I no longer think that journalism grad school is a waste of time. In fact, for people like me who made it through the first round of school and learning journalism just before and while the web was becoming so prevalent, it might be necessary to get that web edge. I'm still a proponent of paper newspapers... but I don't get any myself (this Slate article seems like a good excuse) and I'm beginning appreciate online that much more now that I spend basically all day reading the news.

more about the cold

There is nothing positive to be said about -1ºF. Or, for that matter, -1º with a windchill of -15ºF. There is nothing positive to be said about the coldest day of the year, unless you count being inside, drinking hot chocolate and eating sweet tea biscuits.

There is, however, a certain cleanliness, a certain crispness about the -15º air. With not a cloud or snowflake in the sky skewing visibility, the lines of the buildings are perfectly straight and clear and everything is, in other words, brilliantly in focus. I looked down one of the few diagonal streets from the train this morning and could see the outline of downtown against the gray-yellow morning sky. And dotted above the three- and four-story red brick buildings into the distance were perfect clouds of white smoke coming from all the metal flews and chimneys. They seemed to be frozen in perfect formations by the air all at the same moment.

As I sat on the train this morning in just slightly warmer than -15º, bundled in my long johns, scarf, hood up, headphones on, I could also smell, quite strongly, chocolate along with every blast of frigid air from the frequently opening door.

Another Democratic Endorsement: A Slightly Different Take

This guest endorsement is courtesy of Prince Philip Ramon, aka Philip, my boyfriend. OK, so both being liberal, young, white kids, our endorsements perhaps aren't much of a surprise (as Philip says). But I can truthfully say I don't know anyone who's pro-Hilary, so you're stuck with two opinions, though very different, about Senator Barack Obama. If you like his writing, Philip will be starting his own blog soon; you can find it here.

Maybe it's symptomatic of the dull workday of an office drone, but the 2008 Presidential Primary is the first time I've truly engaged myself in the political process. Since the summer, I've drowned my career sorrows in the race for a job that I'm woefully underqualified to hold, whilst performing a job for which I'm clock-slowingly overqualified. My week is punctuated with Slate political gab, Daily Kos diatribes and Ken Rudin (NPR's Political Junkie) delivering puns that Mike Huckabee wouldn't touch. With such a historic, conventional-wisdom-defying primary season, there has been no shortage of destinations for my internet wanderings. In brief, I picked a hell of year to become politically aware.

Still, I've ultimately been a spectator in this affair. That is, until today. Living in one of the twenty-two states holding its primary on Feb. 5th, I went to large stone church down the street from my apartment and cast my ballot for Barack Obama. As a white-male, age 23, I don't suppose this is much of a shock. But I haven't always been an Obama supporter. Back when the debates were a seven (sometimes eight) candidate affair, I was mostly interested in Richardson or Biden. Richardson impressed me with his resume. In the debates, Biden routinely came off as the adult in the room when talking about foreign policy, making the other candidates' look like undergrads reaching for an adequate exam answer. Alas, he never made it past round one. Richardson folded soon after, not even holding on until a western contest.

It wasn't long until Democrats were left with the Big Three. Three senators, three passionate speakers, three candidates who made up for their lack of political experience with the promise of change in the lives of ordinary Americans. Let's face it. Policy-wise Clinton, Edwards and Obama are all pretty much identical. Sure the health care plans have different strategies, Iraq troop withdrawal timetables vary slightly, and the figures change depending on the stimulus package. But the goals are uniform; get out of Iraq safely, make universal health care a reality, turn back the economic tide of the last eight years that did not lift all boats. In this policy stale mate, we've seen some interesting arguments emerge for why we should vote for one candidate over another. Edwards has been a fighter "all his life," except in 2004 when he took a break to run as the nice guy (or Obama lite). Clinton acquired 35 years of experience that she didn't seem to have when Biden and Richardson were still in the fray (perhaps because it would've been a laughable comparison). What's interesting is that Obama's message didn't change. Some say it's his weakness, he doesn't veer from his inspirational rhetoric enough to show he's got the specifics worked out. I see it as his strength. It's a sign that he makes those speeches because he believes them, not because they will have the maximum impact on that day's newscycle.

Clinton said in her infamous diner tear-up that for her, this election is personal. I believe it. The tone of her campaign makes me think that this is as much about righting the country as it is about restoring the Clinton dynasty. On her husband's presidency, it annoys me that Clinton wants to have her cake and eat it to. She says she's running on her own record, but then comes out with a line like "it took a Clinton to clean up after the first Bush" when confronted with the question of her serving Bill's third term. For me, it's a lose-lose proposition. If she wants to claim the Clinton presidency as part of her experience, then I'd rather not repeat the bitter partisanship of the late 90s. If she truly wants to be judged on her record and hers alone, then she and Obama are essentially evenly matched.

Something very interesting surfaced in one the debates last month. It's a difference that I think is a legitimate issue when deciding between the two remaining contenders. When asked what his greatest weakness is, Obama gave an honest reply. He can't keep his paperwork organized. Clinton gave a nonresponse to the question, but jumped on Obama's self-effacing answer. She proclaimed herself a bureaucratic superstar. A distinction was drawn that I think goes to the heart of these two candidacies. Clinton's MLK comment and Teddy's endorsement made the point even clearer. Obama is like JFK. Clinton is like LBJ. I'm a little dubious that Clinton is the master executive she claims to be, considering she has no personal executive experience to speak of. But I'm willing to give her the benefit of the doubt. At this moment, I think we need the former. For the past eight years, we've been united in our collective embarrassment of having Homer Simpson run our country (with Mr. Burns as VP!). It's time to be united under a positive, trans formative figure. We've had enough of the politics of "us vs. them." Obama wants to engage the Republicans, engage the insurance companies, engage the Iranians. I think this is the only way to get meaningful progress. Rather than letting the pendulum swing from one extreme to the other every ten years, I'd like to see a United States in which individuals feel represented and encouraged to help in finding solutions.

Some say that they'd vote for Obama, but not now. He should wait eight or twelve years. I disagree. Look what long careers in the Senate did for Biden and Dodd. They couldn't generate anywhere near the same amount of excitement for their candidacies. Obama could only run this kind of campaign now. After a decade in the Senate he would grow stale. Like McCain, he would go from maverick to establishment. Whereas if Obama is sworn in next year, I'll watch enthusiastically as the torch is passed to the new generation, rather than sing in my head those classic Who lyrics, "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss." If Obama becomes President, I don't think I'll be the only one looking back on this campaign as the first time I was genuinely excited and inspired by an election cycle.

2008 Democratic Primary Endorsement

This is not a political blog. However, on the eve of many of the primaries for this most historic of elections, I feel it is necessary and important for me to join the hundreds of other bloggers, newspapers, and famous people and issue an endorsement. So, my editorial board of one unanimously endorses Barack Obama as the Democratic nominee for the next president of the United States.


I first became enthralled with Obama four years ago, along with much of the rest of the nation, when he gave the keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention. Barely old enough to vote, I hazily remember vowing to vote for him if he ever ran for president. When he announced he was, indeed, running for president I, too, wondered along with the political analysts and the media whether the "wonder child" of only four years ago now had enough experience to become the president.

But now I wonder, maybe experience isn't the only thing the president needs: After all, we have seen this last seven years a president that did have experience but did not, overall, have a successful presidency or make good choices for our country. If serving as the governor of Texas is not enough, if attending Yale isn't enough, maybe in this day and age we need more. Obama has more. He is a fresh face in Washington and is better able and better suited to see past the traditional methods of politics, be creative and endevour to actually do what needs doing and not get stuck in overly complicated processes and old ways of governing. This is the age of the Internet, of everyone has an opinion, of taking the power out of the hands of the traditional news organizations and putting it in the hands of the people. This is the age of Apple and Google, of innovation, and in this age, we just can't elect the wife of the president eight years ago: What's new there? Abraham Lincoln came to the 1860 presidential elections with only four terms in the Illinois House of Representatives and one in the U.S. House of Representatives under his belt. And won. And went on to do one of the most drastic and important things a president has ever done: abolish slavery.

I'm going to echo The New York Times and say that Hilary and Barack both have pretty much the same views on a lot of the issues. They are, after all, both Democrats. Looking past the subtle, probably insignificant differences in their health plans, looking past their voting records, looking past Hilary's dirty way of running her campaign, her acting, her unfair accusations, and what she stands for (nothing new), I would probably vote for her if she was the nominee. Going purely on looks, having a woman president would be just as amazing and refreshing as having a black one.

But she's not the nominee. Given the same facts, I'm going to draw a different conclusion than The Times--who endorsed Hilary on her "experience" alone--and endorse Barack Obama. He has the mindset, he has the intelligence, he has the capacity to step out of the box and really bring some change to the White House. Chances are, Hilary is going to do things like the Clinton before her; lacking a precedent, Obama is going to do what he thinks is best for the country and for the world. And I trust him to make those important decisions.

So, if you're a resident of one of the 22 states that is hosting their primary today, and you're registered to vote, I encourage you to do just that. Whether or not you vote for my pick doesn't matter, what does matter is that you listen and then voice your own opinion.

Oh, and if you're republican, vote for Mitt Romney. We don't want John McCain going and stealing the votes of the moderates.

*Tune in tomorrow for a guest endorsement*

snow day

This morning there were four little girls with brightly colored backpacks standing in a line at the corner, trying to look mature. They were up to their knees in snow, the falling flakes were sticking to their eyelashes, and for all they knew they weren't standing at the corner, like they were told, but in the street. When you're four feet tall and up to your knees in snow, it's hard to be mature, so they were fidgeting, giggling, and letting their feet sink in further, all the while yelling assurances to their guardian down the street. They weren't playing, per se, but they'd certainly rather be standing here than in school.

I felt a similar jubilation upon stepping outside of my apartment this morning before a path on the sidewalk had been cleared, so I didn't mind walking up to my calves in snow next to them; they were standing in the path the footprints before them had already made.

It's the biggest snowstorm of the year and my two roommates and I all have snow days. We're cooped up inside with the heat, the snow drifted around all the windows, and there's a tiny knot of excitement in all our stomachs. We're trying to be mature, too.